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Page 29
"My dear sweet darling," it began, "I haven't written you very often
from here, but then I don't believe you know the difference, for you
never scold at all, even if I'm ever so long in writing. And as for you,
you rascal, you write less and less, and shorter and shorter. If I
didn't know for certain--but then, of course, you love me? Don't you,
you dearest boy? Of course you do, and who wouldn't? Now don't think I'm
really so conceited as that, for I only mean it in joke, but in earnest,
I might think it if I let myself, for they make such a fuss over me
here--you never saw anything like it! The Prince von H---- told Mamma
yesterday I was the prettiest girl who had been here in ten years--what
do you think of that, sir? The officers are as thick as bees wherever I
go, and I ride with them and dance with them and am having just the
loveliest time! You don't mind that, do you, darling, even if we are
engaged? Oh, about telling your mother--no, sir, you just cannot! You've
begged me all along to do that, but you might as well stop, for I
won't. You write more about that than anything else, it seems to me, and
I'll believe soon you are more in love with your mother than with me. So
take care! Remember, you promised that night at the hop at West
Point--what centuries ago it seems, and it was a year and a half!--that
you would not tell a living soul, not even your mother, until I said so.
You see, it might get out and--oh, what's the use of fussing? It might
spoil all my good time, and though I'm just as devoted as ever, and as
much in love, you big, handsome thing--yes, just exactly!--still, I want
to have a good time. Why shouldn't I? As the Prince would say, I'm
pretty enough--but that's nonsense, of course."
The letter was signed like all the others "Good Queen Bess," a foolish
enough name for a girl to call herself, the boy's mother thought, a
touch contemptuously. She sat several minutes with that letter in her
hand.
"I'll believe soon that you are more in love with your mother than you
are with me"--that soothed the sore spot in her heart wonderfully.
Wasn't it so, perhaps. It seemed to her that the boy had fallen into
this affair suddenly, impulsively, without realizing its meaning, and
that his loyalty had held him fast, after the glamour was gone. And
perhaps the girl, too. For the boy had much besides himself, and there
were girls who might think of that.
The next letter went far to confirm this theory.
"Of course I don't want to break our engagement," the girl wrote. "What
makes you ask such a question? I fully expect to marry you some day, of
course, when I have had my little 'fling,' and I should just go crazy if
I thought you didn't love me as much as always. You would if you saw me,
for they all say I'm prettier than ever. You don't want to break the
engagement, do you? Please, please, don't say so, for I couldn't bear
it."
And in the next few lines she mentioned herself by name. It was a
well-known name to the boy's mother, that of the daughter of a cousin
with whom she had never been over-intimate. She had had notes from the
girl a few times, once or twice from abroad, which accounted for the
familiarity of the writing. So she gathered the letters together, the
last one dated only a month before, and put them one side to send back.
"She will soon get over it," she said, and sighed as she turned to the
papers still left in the bottom of the box. There were only a few, a
thin packet of six or eight, and one lying separate. She slipped the
rubber band from the packet and looked hard at the irregular, strong
writing, woman's or man's, it was hard to say which. Then she spread out
the envelopes and took them in order by the postmarks. The first was a
little note, thanking him for a book, a few lines of clever nothing
signed by a woman's name which she had never heard.
* * * * *
"My dear Mr. ----," it ran. "Indeed you did get ahead of 'all the others'
in sending me 'The Gentleman from Indiana,' So far ahead that the next
man in the procession is not even in sight yet. I hate to tell you that,
but honesty demands it. I have taken just one sidewise peep at 'The
Gentleman'--and like his looks immensely--but to-morrow night I am
going to pretend I have a headache and stay home from the concert where
the family are going, and turn cannibal and devour him. I hope nothing
will interrupt me. Unless--I wonder if you are conceited enough to
imagine what is one of the very few things I would like to have
interrupt me? After that bit of boldness I think I must stop writing to
you. I mean it just the same. And thanking you a thousand times again, I
am,
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