“Dear ‘Floy’:
“Old Guardy has sent me up to this academy. I hate academies. I hate Guardy’s. I hate everything but snipe shooting and boating. Just now I am in a horrid fix. Every fellow in this academy has to write a composition once a week, I cannot do it. I never could. My talents don’t lie in that way. I don’t know where they do lie. What I want of you is to write those compositions for me. You can do it just as easy as water runs down hill. You could scratch one off while I am nibbing my pen. Old Phillips will think they are uncommon smart for me; but never mind, I shall keep dark, and you are such a good soul I know you can’t refuse. My cigars have been out two whole days; so you may know that I have no funds, else I would send you a present.
“Yours truly, Hal. Hunnewell.”
After glancing over this letter Ruth broke into a merry laugh, and saying, “This is too good to keep,” read it aloud for the amusement of the company, who unanimously voted Hal. Hunnewell a composition every week, for his precocious impudence.
“Come, now,” said Mr. Walter, as Ruth took up No. 3, “if you have another of the same sort, let us hear it, unless it be of a confidential nature.”
Ruth looked over the letter a moment, and then read:
“Dear ‘Floy’:
“Mamma has read me some of your stories. I like them very much. You say you love little children. Don’t you think we’ve got a bran new baby! It came last night when I was asleep in my trundle-bed. It is a little pink baby. Mamma says it will grow white by-and-bye. It has got such funny little fingers; they look all wrinkled, just like our maid’s when she has been at the wash-tub. Mother has to stay in bed with him to keep him warm, he’s such a little cold, shaky thing. He hasn’t a bit of hair, and he scowls like everything, but I guess he’ll be pretty by-and-bye. Anyhow I love him. I asked mother if I might not write and tell you about him, and she laughed and said, I don’t know who ‘Floy’ is, nor where she lives; but Uncle Jack (he gives me lots of candy and dolls) said that I must send it to ‘Floy’s’ publishers! I don’t know what a publisher is, and so I told Uncle Jack; and he laughed and said he would lose his guess if I didn’t have something to do with them one of these days. I don’t know what that meant either, and when I asked him, he said ‘go away, Puss.’ I think it is very nice to have an Uncle Jack at Christmas and New Year’s, but other times they only plague little children. I wish I could see you. How do you look? I guess you look like mamma; mamma has got blue eyes, and soft brown hair, and her mouth looks very pleasant when she smiles. Mamma’s voice is as sweet as a robin’s, so papa says. Papa is a great big man, so big that nobody could ever hurt me, or mamma. Papa wants to see you too. Won’t you write me a letter, a little letter all to myself? I’ve got a box made of rosewood, with a lock and key on it, where I’d hide it from Uncle Jack, (that would tease him!) Uncle Jack wants to see you too, but I hope you never will let him, for he’s such a terrible tease, he’d plague you dreadfully. I guess our baby would send his love to you if he only knew you. Please write me soon, and send it to Kitty Mills, care of Uncle Jack Mills, and please seal it up all tight, so he cannot peep into it.
“P.S.—I want you to write a book of stories for little girls, and don’t make them end bad, because it makes me cry; nor put any ghosts in them, because it scares me; or have any ‘moral’ down at the bottom, because Uncle Jack always asks me if I skipped it. Write something funny, won’t you? I like funny things, and fairy stories. Oh, I like fairy stories so much! Wasn’t it nice about the mice and the pumpkin, in Cinderella? Make them all end well, won’t you?
“Your affectionate little Kitty.”