Then she pointed at Sally:
“Leather bag, please give to me
A letter from someone over the sea.”
The other girls looked their puzzled surprise at this request, as they had never heard that Sally had relations on the other side of the ocean.
“Suffering cats, Sally! You don’t mean you wish you could have a letter from Donald Dearing, do you? He has gone to France to be with his dad, and whose photograph you used to have.”
The pretty girl’s denial was vehement. “Not at all,” she declared. “I had to have something to rhyme with me and so I said sea.”
Eleanor was saying with an eagerness that could not be hidden:
“Leather bag, more than any other,
Give me a letter from my mother.”
“Betsy, for cricket’s sake, don’t begin that Round Robin Rhyme game again when we are in such a terrific hurry, because, according to its rule, we can’t do anything else until it’s been around.”
Virginia, having emptied the pouch, lifted a packet of letters. “Most of these seem to be for Mrs. Martin. I’ll put them in on her desk,” she said, suiting the action to the word.
Another pack was taken from the pouch. “Gimme one. Please, gimme one!” Betsy and Babs clamored with hands outstretched.