outside envelope was addressed to Mr. James Perkins, the second to Miss Rebecca Jerome, with "Private" in one corner, and the third to Mrs. Nathaniel Cawthorne. What with the bank-envelope to open in addition, when Reba finally drew forth the thin double sheet of note-paper on the inside with Nathan's writing on it, it reminded her of the tiny kernel of solid wood at the center of a certain Chinese wooden egg, which she was allowed to play with Sunday afternoons when she was a child—a marvelous toy containing a diminishing series of brightly-striped wooden shells, fitting nicely, one inside the other.
"My dear Rebecca," Nathan began. "This is the second letter I ever wrote to a young lady, and the first one was to you, too, that night after that time at the movies." Reba glanced inside the folded notepaper. It was quite a long letter. What would it all be about?
"I hope," it went on, "you will excuse all mistakes and blots and bad writing."
There wasn't a single blot, and the writing was neat and uniform. Reba could see that, in order to keep his lines straight, he had first ruled the note-paper in pencil and afterward erased the marks.
"I am well," it informed her, "and I hope you are well too. I hope this finds your mother better. I hope my postcards reached you. New York is certainly a fine city."
Beneath this sentence there appeared two unerased pencil lines and beneath them, in purple ink (he had started out in black), began a new paragraph, well indented.
"I began this," he explained, "a week ago, but
