Mrs. Keniston paused, with rolling-pin upraised in astonishment.
"No. Yes. Of course. What ever put it into your head to ask such questions, child? There, take that, and go and get your little pie board, and roll it out smoothly, and I'll let you bake some dolly's pies. Don't worry your silly head about love-letters yet awhile, my dear."
"But did you?" persisted Patty. "Because I want to write one—at least Sir Leon does—and we don't know how to begin. How did yours begin?"
"I think my first began, 'My dear Miss Holliwell,'" said Mrs. Keniston, laughing. "Ask papa. He'll know."
"Did it?" inquired Patty, rather doubtfully. "Why, when Mr. Cope wrote to you to borrow that book, he began, 'My dear Mrs. Keniston,' and his couldn't be a love-letter, you know, because you're married to papa, and he's engaged to Miss Dover. I don't think that sounds lovery enough."
However, she took out her pencil, and began to write, spelling over each word noiselessly to herself as she put it down.
"Who is your letter to, Patty?" asked her mother at last, as she folded it up with a sigh of relief, and wrote an address on the back.
"Why," said Patty, rather falteringly, "it's from Sir Leon to Rosinella. That isn't the same as if I wrote to Matty, is it? Because, you know, Sir Leon's a man, and I'm not, and Matty—well, Matty isn't Rosinella. Matty never was Queen of Beauty at a tournament the way Rosinella was when we had one in the orchard the day after Cousin Evelyn told us Ivanhoe. And it isn't Matty's trousseau we're making; it's Rosinella's. And Rosinella has golden hair, and Matty has auburn. And—I may send it, mayn't I?"
"Yes, indeed, you may," said Mrs. Keniston, laughing much more than was necessary, Patty thought. "May I see it?"
Patty handed it across the table, with a glance of mingled pride and apprehension, and this is what Mrs. Keniston read: