Dear Sis:
Consider yourself patted on the back, and congratulated for being the nicest girl. Enclosed find two dollars which will buy six or eight pints of vanilla girl-exterminator, and don't, after taking the dose, leave a letter telling how you met your fate.
Yours, The mean old Grouch, Bud.
P. S. Tell Peggy Farraday's sister anything you please.
It was not long after this exchange of letters that Elizabeth asked her grandmother for the key of the locked closet.
"I thought you had forgot all about it," her grandmother said.
"No, but I was rash enough to promise Peggy that she could be with me when I opened it, and we've been doing so many things out of doors together that we haven't had any other time."
"Well, here it is. You can play with anything you find, as long as you want to, but hang the clothes up again, come night."
"I will, Grandmother. I'm so excited, and I've got to go upstairs and twirl my thumbs until Peggy comes. Send her right up, won't you?"
Waiting upstairs in her little blue room, Elizabeth began reading over her brother's letters, and pondering on his sudden change of mood.
"When he heard that Ruth Farraday was coming down here he was afraid I would say something to her. Before he knew that, he was willing to be just as mushy as I was. I suppose being in love is a pretty terrible feeling."
"Oh, Elizabeth-Elspeth," sang Peggy from the bottom of the stairs, "can I bring my sister Ruth up with me?"
"Cert-certainly." Elizabeth flew to straighten the pillows on the cradle settee, and to pick up some stray threads from the braided rug in front of it. "I shall be very glad to see her."