Page:Burgess--Aint Angie awful.djvu/40

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34
AIN’T ANGIE AWFUL!

had he set a trap for her in this lonely place? As both her hands were in her muff she could not shut her eyes and thus conceal her blushes.

“Now here is my best seller,” he went on as if nothing had happened, which, in fact, it had. He displayed a small silver contraption looking like the skull of a rheostat. “This is devised for the use of ladies who are afraid of mice. Just attach it to the garter, and it catches them on the way up, thus rendering it unnecessary to mount a chair or other quadruped. You, my dear, are to peddle them; you will have all rights north of Fifth Avenue. You have brains and temperament and freckles, and should do well. I have picked you out of the whole of New York, but I shall return you. Now here is another, a trap with a chain to be fastened to the wall, grand piano or anything heavy, like a mortgage, or afternoon caller. You see, little one? The mouse, when caught, can neither pull the trap into his hole, nor the hole into his trap. You will work on a commission, say a captain’s, or, if you do well, a major’s.”

But Angela Bish had a soul above mouse-