"Janie wasn't lost," interrupted that small maiden in drowsy tones. "Me went to get a letter."
"To get a letter!" chorused her sisters. "Where?"
"To the store where Mercy goes. A man dave me one, too," she finished triumphantly, squirming down from her high chair to search about the room for the missing epistle, while the rest of the family forgot both pie and gingerbread in joining in the hunt. Rosslyn found it at last under the stove where it had fallen when Janie began her investigation of the oven; and the girls exclaimed in genuine surprise, "Why, it is a real letter!"'
"Addressed to mamma," said Mercedes, "Do you suppose Janie really went to the post-office all alone?"
But Janie was fast asleep in her chair where she had retired when convinced that Rosslyn had actually found her precious letter; so the sisters once more bent curious eyes upon the soiled envelope.
"Better re-address it to your mother," suggested Tabitha, remembering that in her written instructions, Mrs. McKittrick had failed to mention the matter of mail which might come to Silver Bow for her.
"Mamma told me to open all her letters, and not even to send papa's to Los Angeles, unless 'twas something very important."
"Then why don't you open it?" cried Susanne impatiently.
"And see who wrote it," added Inez.
"I—I—guess I will." Deliberately she tore open the envelope, spread out the brief letter it contained, and with a comically important air, read the few short lines. Then beginning with the heading, she read it the second time, her face growing graver at each word, until impatient Inez could stand the strain no longer, and burst out, "Well, what's it all about? Does it take you all night to read that teenty letter?"