"Not a word! You have never written, you know, since we left school, and she would not be likely to."
"You didn't love each other quite to distraction, did you?" said Viola. "Poor V. V.! she really was the limit sometimes, wasn't she? I never minded her, of course, because I never listened to what she said. Besides, she was like pickles, you know; you just took her with the rest of your dinner, and she didn't make much difference. I used to tell her so. Well, poor V. V.! You never could guess: married, my dear!"
"Married!" echoed Peggy and Gertrude.
"Married! to a missionary; widower, with four children. Gone to China! You need not believe it unless you like; I don't believe it myself, though I saw them married."
"It is hard to believe, Vi!" said Gertrude. "How did it happen?"
"My dear, the limit! positively, the boundary line, arctic circle, and that sort of thing. Love at first sight, on both sides. Spectacles, bald,—not the spectacles, but he,—snuffy to a degree! You really never did! I was the first person she told. I simply screamed. 'My dear!' I said, 'you cannot mean it. You could not live with that waistcoat!'
"She told me I was frivolous—which I never attempted to deny—and said I did not understand, which was the truth. She looked really quite sweet in her wedding-dress, and when she went away she was quite softened, she truly was, and wept a little weep, and so did I. You see, Snowy, the very first thing I can remember in my life is V. V.'s breaking my doll over my head. I miss her dreadfully, I do indeed; nobody has been—well, acidulated, to me since she went, and I need the tonic. And speaking of tonics, where is Beef? where is the Fluffy? You know"—turning to Margaret—"I used to call the Snowy and the Fluffy and the Horny my triple tonic, Beef, Wine, and Iron; and the Fluffy was Beef. Steady and square, you know, and red and brown; exactly like beef; simply no difference except the clothes. How is she, Snowy?"
"The Fluffy—Bertha Haughton, you know, Margaret—is teaching in Blankton High School; very busy, very happy, indeed, perfectly absorbed in her work. I have a letter from her in my pocket this minute, that came last night. Would you like to hear it?"
And amid a clamor of eager assent, she drew out the letter and read as follows.
"'Dear Snowy: It is good to hear about all the jolly times at Camp. I wish I could come, but see no way to it just now. Yes, I know school is over, but there are the rank lists to make out, and all kinds of odd end-of-the-year chores to be done; besides, two of my boys have conditions to work out,—going to college in the fall,—and I am tutoring them. They are two of the dearest boys that ever were, only not very bright, and I have promised to stand by them.' This is the way she behaves, after teaching all the year; she is incorrigible! 'All the others passed without conditions, and three of them got honors, so I am very proud and happy. This has been the best year of all; but then, I say that every year, don't I? I do feel more and more that I am doing the thing in the whole world that I like best to do.'