Junior smiled. “I didn’t want to make you jealous. He never writes to you.”
“But didn’t you know how I would want to hear all his news?”
“You are so terribly engrossed in Uncle Robert’s career, I thought maybe you weren’t interested in Father.”
At school the binoculars made a hit with the boys because they showed the scars of war, but no one thought much of typewriters as Christmas presents except Junior. He knew what he was doing.
A few days later, when Blackie entered the room he found his roommate engrossed in reading a letter and so said nothing until Junior emitted an absent-minded chuckle.
“What’s the joke?”
“Oh, nothing; just a letter from my father.”
“From your father? I thought he never wrote to you.”
“What do you know about it?”
“Well, I never see any envelopes with foreign stamps.”