"I have it, I have it!" Faith actually jumped up and down.
"It's a letter! It's a letter from Debby! Now, isn't it? Your 'contents' gave it away. Say I'm right, father—come, now!"
"Well, you are. You've guessed it, that's certain."
"Humph!" sneered Hope, distinctly miffed, "who couldn't, after you'd fairly told it? I knew all the time it was a book, or a letter, or something."
"You should have said so sooner, Miss Hindsight," laughed her father. "But I confess you came pretty close to it, my dear. And here it is. From Debby, surely, because from Portsmouth, but this elegant modern writing is never hers in the world. She has evidently engaged some friend to write that address, and it's a neat one."
"Father, you said there was earth about it; how can that be?" broke in
Hope, scarcely mollified, as yet.
He held it up, and pointed to its worn condition, and two or three black thumb-marks.
"Isn't there earth for you?" he laughed. "What is earth but soil?"
"Oh—h!" cried Hope, "is that fair—to play upon words so?"
"Let's call it square anyhow, sweetheart, and you read it aloud to sister and me, won't you?"