Dear Enemy

And I forgot to tell you about Punch. When the fire occurred, those two

nice women who kept him all summer were on the point of catching a train

for California--and they simply tucked him under their arms, along

with their luggage, and carried him off. So Punch spends the winter in

Pasadena and I rather fancy he is theirs for good. Do you wonder that I

am in an exalted mood over all these happenings?

LATER.

Poor bereaved Percy has just been spending the evening with me, because

I am supposed to understand his troubles. Why must I be supposed to

understand everybody's troubles? It's awfully wearing to be pouring out

sympathy from an empty heart. The poor boy at present is pretty low,

but I rather suspect--with Betsy's aid--that he will pull through. He is

just on the edge of falling in love with Betsy, but he doesn't know it.

He's in the stage now where he's sort of enjoying his troubles. He feels

himself a tragic hero, a man who has suffered deeply. But I notice that

when Betsy is about, he offers cheerful assistance in whatever work is

toward.

Gordon telegraphed today that he is coming tomorrow. I am dreading the

interview, for I know we are going to have an altercation. He wrote the

day after the fire and begged me to "chuck the asylum" and get married

immediately, and now he's coming to argue it out. I can't make him

understand that a job involving the happiness of one hundred or so

children can't be chucked with such charming insouciance. I tried my

best to keep him away, but, like the rest of his sex, he's stubborn. Oh

dear, I don't know what's ahead of us! I wish I could glance into next

year for a moment.

The doctor is still in his plaster cast, but I hear is doing well,

after a grumbly fashion. He is able to sit up a little every day and to

receive a carefully selected list of visitors. Mrs. McGurk sorts them

out at the door, and repudiates the ones she doesn't like.

Good-by. I'd write some more, but I'm so sleepy that my eyes are

shutting on me. (The idiom is Sadie Kate's.) I must go to bed and get

some sleep against the one hundred and seven troubles of tomorrow.

With love to the Pendletons,

S. McB.

January 22.

Dear Judy:

This letter has nothing to do with the John Grier Home. It's merely from

Sallie McBride.

Do you remember when we read Huxley's letters our senior year? That book

contained a phrase which has stuck in my memory ever since: "There is

always a Cape Horn in one's life that one either weathers or wrecks

oneself on." It's terribly true; and the trouble is that you can't

always recognize your Cape Horn when you see it. The sailing is

sometimes pretty foggy, and you're wrecked before you know it.