E. H. Mayde

“ Now, Lucie, before you read another line you must promise not to breathe a word of this to Arthur. Well, this afternoon Nannie and I walked down to the West Manchester rocks. We sat with our backs against a nice ledge and looked off over the quiet sea and talked for hours. When we got up to go I had an experience before which Robinson Crusoe's footprint on the sand sinks into nothingness. Right on the other side of the ledge against which we had been leaning I saw, not a footprint, but a foot. Two feet, in fact, and attached to them two legs. All, evidently, the property of a man. ”

“ I really think it's better now that she and Billy and the babies should be by themselves. They have a very good servant, and a nice motherly woman for a nurse. But this is a digression. Jack's family dote on Nannie, and they all want her to go and live with them, but she says she couldn't bear it just yet, and so she has asked me to be her companion for a year, until she feels able to decide on her future.
Dr. Ellis, an awfully nice young surgeon, and a college class mate of Jack's, has been just as kind as he could be to Nannie. ”

“ What I wanted to learn was how to get a dinner for a hungry man. Billy was a perfect saint. You can't imagine what blunders I made, with no one to give any help. But I'd wade through it all again to know what I know now, and Billy says I'm a better cook than mother.
One day we had a narrow escape from a tragedy. An accident on the railroad had delayed our supplies a week. Meantime we had to live off the country, and such things as we could get at 'the store.' Well, I was going to have fishballs for dinner—Billy loves them. ”

“ And then the whole day was spoiled by this awful discovery. I'm sure I know now exactly how a woman feels when she finds the long-looked-for man under the bed. This, my dear, is the end of the tale of woe. And quite time, too. It will make a hole in my salary to pay the postage.
I'll send you a postal when we are settled in some secluded spot where shoes and trousers are unknown—and the wearers of those articles. ”

“ But no gentleman could have done so rude a thing as to listen to a long conversation like ours. I dare say you will think this is funny, but I'm sure you won't laugh when you hear the rest of the story. ”