Part 8
I go to the kitchen door—broiled chickens and waffles, strawberries and cream. “Can I help you, mammy?”
“Mammy don’t need no help. This come while you was gallivantin’ up the lane.” The big, bold, square envelope sets my heart to leaping:
DEAREST:
I looked into my thought reservoir last night after I left you and discovered that if I hadn’t ever met you before I would have loved you just the same. Is that disloyalty to Carrie with the gold braids and the capricious moods? No, by my halidome, no! I have two in my heart—two girls—one the ideal of romantic youth, the other, the completer, sweeter, better beloved Caroline, but no less an ideal. Am I not the richest man in the world? If this be bigamy, give me bigamy or give me death.
P.S. I didn’t answer that question last night. Why did the cabby swear at you? Cabbies always swear unless you tip them. But never mind, hereafter I’ll be on hand to do the tipping for you.
P.P.S. I want you, my honey.
P.P.P.S. I need you.
THE END
[Illustration]
THE COUNTRY LIFE PRESS GARDEN CITY, N. Y.
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE
Obvious typographical errors and punctuation errors have been corrected after careful comparison with other occurrences within the text and consultation of external sources.
Some hyphens in words have been silently removed, some added, when a predominant preference was found in the original book.
Except for those changes noted below, all misspellings in the text, and inconsistent or archaic usage, have been retained.
p16 -> ‘who is just begining’ amended to ‘beginning’ p36 -> ‘Bobbie answers’ amended to ‘Bobby answers’ p50 -> ‘when that oldtime’ amended to ‘old-time’ p63 -> ‘Hs is trying’ amended to ‘he’ p80 -> ‘Mr. Eliott’s eyes’ amended to ‘Elliott’ p86 -> ‘he knows the housefurnishings’ amended to ‘house furnishings’ p98 -> ‘the mounta ns against’ amended to ‘mountains’ p99 -> ‘her shoulders n ghts’ amended to ‘nights’ p100 -> ‘The goss p’ amended to ‘gossip’ p105 -> ‘who is already distinguè’ amended to ‘distingué’ p108 -> ‘the back seat w th’ amended to ‘with’