DEAREST DAVID:
THIS is a love letter. I love you. I have always loved you, ever since I can remember, only I did not realize how much until you wouldn't let me have my own way about the money. Then I tried to hate you. The best thing I can say for the experiment was that it kept me thinking about you all the time. You were never out of my thoughts, David dear. Oh, how many nights have I laid awake inventing reasons for hating you, and how many, many times have I ended up by hating myself. I am a very mean, despicable creature. I am a loathsome, poisonous reptile, and you ought to put your foot on my neck and keep it there forever and ever. Now I know why I have been so mean to you. It is because I love you so much. You cannot grasp that, can you? You could if you were a woman.
The boy is waiting for this. How wonderful of you to send him out here in a taxi!!! I shall tell him to go back to town as fast as the car can travel. I hope it is a fast one, because I want you to get in it and come to me at once. I shall wait up for you, David. Please come tonight. You don't know how badly I need you. You must stay here with your mother and me, and I don't want you ever to go away again,—unless you take me with you.
Your humble sweetheart,
ALIX.
P.S.—I wouldn't quarrel with you for five hundred million dollars.
P.S.S.—Oh, how I wish some kind genie could transport you to me INSTANTLY! A.
Sealing the envelope, she sprang to her feet and started for the door. She stopped halfway, dashed back and fished in a drawer of her desk, found her purse and extracted a crumbling bank-note. Without so much as a glance to ascertain its denomination, she turned and sped downstairs.
Her eyes were aglow with excitement, her lips were parted in a divine smile. She was a little out of breath. The boy gazed upon her spellbound. In that brief, transcendent moment he fell deeply, hopelessly in love,—and that is why, a moment later, he manfully endeavoured to refuse the prodigious tip she was offering him. Only when she stuffed it, with her own fingers, into the depths of his breast pocket, directly over his heart, was he able to persuade himself that he ought to accept it if for no other reason than it would hurt her feelings if he didn't.
"You must go straight back just as fast as you can," she was saying,—and what a sweet, wonderful voice she had, just like some kind of a song he thought,—"and see that Mr. Strong has this letter at once. He is waiting for it, you know. You WILL hurry, won't you,—that's a good boy."