together with a vanquished army of mistresses, housemaids,
laundresses, and butlers. She belonged to the order of Cooks Militant,
and she had long since won her spurs.

Among the things which Myrtella in her sweeping condemnation of life
in general disapproved, none loomed larger than her brother and his
family. But the bond of blood, stronger than likes or dislikes, favor
or prejudice, brought her back to him again and again, to share with
him her substance, and to criticize his conduct.

On this particular afternoon she had started out for Billy-goat Hill
to hear about the shooting, and to break the news to the family, that
she had gotten a new place. This happened with such regularity, that
it would not have deserved attention, had not the astounding fact to
be added that Myrtella was pleased. In her fifteen years of rebellious
services she had never before approximated a place that gave
satisfaction. To be sure there were dark and not-to-be-remembered
instances where she had failed to give satisfaction herself, but
usually it was the place, "the new place," with its varying code of
musts and must-nots, that caused Myrtella to spend many of her days in
the Intelligence Office, or on street-cars, or tramping through the
streets in quest of that ever elusive "good home."

She had started out on her pilgrimage in a fairly equable frame of
mind, but before she got well under way, the wind had made her
furious. It was a frisky March breeze that had gotten left behind and
now wandered into May, bent on mischief.

Myrtella tacked into it, like a sailing sloop, full rigged and all
sails set, an angular, heavy-set person with a belligerent expression