MR. PUFFER'S FIRST WIFE

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXV, Issue 3, 17 January 1907, Page 7

MR. PUFFER'S FIRST WIFE

'Say, do you know what I think'?' -I. was so acpustomed to the abrupt and the unexpected in Mrs. Puffer's method of conversation 1 that 1 was aot vi the, least surprised to have her address Uie&e words to mq the moment I entered my laundry one . Monday morning. 'Not gifted with psychic powers, and utterly incapable of following the various ramifications of a" fertile mind like l\lrs. Puffer's, -I said : ' I have not the least idea, Mrs. jfuffer.' ' Likely not. 1 reckon »it would take the seventh son of a seventh son, born with a caul over r.is face, as the fortune tellers put *t, to keep track o' my thoughts. Ever go to. a fortune-tellur or set in a seeyance with the lights all .turned out and spooks cavortin' in the air ? ' ' I never did.' ' Well, I have more,' than once— ivid say ! ' Sre leaned forward, shook one finger toward me, and ha voice took on a confidential tone, when she siilni • 'There, ain't nothin' .-in it, not a blessed thing, spesh'ly when it comes to materi'lizations ! That part • of it is a plumb fake. 'Why bless you ! I.'ye done washin' for the. speerits — washed their flowin' robes for' 'em and made pies for 'em. I dunno as I'm any-" thing extry of a cook, but folks have told me that I kin make as good pie "as anyone need want/ You see I was born in oH - Vermont, and that's a part o' -ibe great pie-belt o' the country, and any 'mother us* to make sixteen pics of a Sat-day "to last her family ■ over -Sunday. . 'My father— he weighed two hundred and forty in his shirt sleeves — he would eat a whole pie just be-_ foire he went to bed and call it' a little snack. "He was a right hearty pie eater. I made pies when I was only twelve years old, and I've been makin' 'em ever since. Next time I mix up a mess o' minchmeafo for pies I^l "bake you one, and* see if you don't lind that the proof o' my gabble is in the eatin'. 1 made pies and 1 sold 'em to my neighbors one winter — pies and doughnuts-^but you—know how doughnuts do

smell up a house cookin 1 ; anil X got sick o' fryjiv' fat and mess-in' with grease both in ifo? pies and the doughnuts, so -I give up both. ■ 1 It was in the winter, 1 made pies and doughnuts to sell that 1 got so iivtermut with the- speerits. Me and Madam Antoma- Leverctti got real friendly. She was the seventh "daughter of a seventh daughter, . and she could read .the past,- present, and future ; she was born under a certain star and could tell by look-in' at a hair of your head who your future hus- ' band was to ,be. She could . bring stray lovers back, and tell you how to make your folks make -wills in -your favor. She could produce any speerits you wanted produced if you paid two - dollars, and do slate- , "' ritin' and make chairs and tables go waitzin' round the room, and if you'd agree not to touch ''em she d" iniu'-vc speerits come out o' her cabinet arid wave their , arms. You see, she want no common meejuin.' ' 1 should thfhk not," i said, with a laugh. 'Mind you, i don't want to be taken v as sayin' •that she reely could do all this. She*"said she could - on hCii ___bu Aness cards and the notice she put in the papeis" and there was plenty o' people o' light weight when it comes to brains who believed that, she could do it, and- them was the kind that paid her twentyfive ccuts. apiece to set in her seeyances. They toad to pay fifty cents, if she give -'em a private" settin', and went into a trance just - f ot them alone. ' The whole thing just kind o'- tickled- me : - and Madam Antonia wks real good "comp'ny. -She's travelled all. over creation. You know her kind never finds 'it convenient to stay vjcry long in one place. Somebody gits to turnin' on the lights at the wrong time — for her, at least — or they go to squirtin' ani-line-dye stuff into the cabinet, which makes -it emtoarras_sin' for the speerit, or they have the bad ■ manners to . upset the whole' cabinet, speerit 1 and all,, or there's a mix-up- o' some sort that makes her busi-^ ness drop off and "she moves on. I should think from Madam' Antonia Leverett's talk that_;she had moved on about three hundred times. She was" a "little scrawny good-natured thing with a silly yallow wig, and the roses on her cheeks came out of a box.- 1 -got to makin' pirs and doughnuts for her and .-'also doin'.her washin' .in my own rooms. That's -what I • meant when 1 said. I'd washed for the speeritsr She knowed that- 1^ knowed- that she "was a humbuggim'" folks, but ' as folks like to be humbugged I didn't feel no ~"«all to make any trouble for her to pick- any quarrel with her. - ' - "' - ' But one day< when I was ironin' out one o the thin, flimsy white robes the speerits wore in the cabiijtt, and Madarrn Antonia was eatin' a piece o' applepie I'd set out -for her, 1. (Ad ■ say : "I'd no idea they had sewin'-machiues in the speerit-land."' V " What do you mean?" says she, colorin' up alittlc. . ' .•-■'-.'•- ' " WhyT" says I, " thv.s robe is machine-made and ou needn't tell me this 4s_just your' nightgown," ' You see she'd ben sayin' that the^ long flowm' robes I'd been' doin' up for her was just her nightgowns. Bosh ! Only a-jcrazytic^wouid ever > try to sleep in such thing's as they were. You'd git" so " tangled up before morning you'd need hefp in gettin' out o' bed, or you'd get cast like a horse, for it trailed the flour four feet. Now and then she'd kind-o' ' joke a' little herself about it. 1 know that one day when she was in my rooms I'd just made some extry minch-pics and they were hot from the oven, so I cut one an' give her a whole quarter of 4t, an' just as she'd finished it her sister that lived" with -her come to the door- and said there was a lady wantin' ' iiaclam Aatonia to go -into a trance for her, and the - adam says to" me, says she : "my ! but that pie was rich !- I reckon I'll see things in this trance if I never did before." ' And the little mischief ''went away^ gigglin'' and with her _hand clapped over mouthy mcanin', I reckon, that, she suddenly realised that she. was 1 kind o' givlu' herself away. Another . time when I. was ironin' "one 0 1 ' her robes and she was in my room she told me that there was ~to be the speerit of a big Injun chief in the cabinet that night, and, before I thought how it would^ .sound 1 says: " He'd .better not git on the war-path if he weais this robe I'm ironin' for its too ragged to stand" much strain. Why don't you '•c him' appear in one of his dirty old blankets ? " You know she didn't ' git a bit mad. She just slmk one finger at "me playful-li'<f\ jmd she' says :• "Now, -.ain't you terrible?" and - let it go at that. Showed her good sense, don')t you think ? -• ' (To .be concluded next week.)

The Rev. Father Manly, of Footscray, is . leaving Melbourne on February 5 on a trip ;to Europe.