Oh, ain’t Jo dismal! I won’t sadden you further on your trip, Amy, not while you are so far away from all of us, but will tell you something comical instead, for there is always something comical in our family, it seems. Demi has discovered the delights of apple tarts. He has also decided that he likes the “apple” portion a great deal better than he likes the “tart”; and, being a boy of admirably practical bent, he addresses this by the simple expedient of sucking all the fruit out from the shell and discarding the remains in whichever spot he happens to have finished eating it, with the result that we have all of necessity acquired the habit of checking any chair most carefully before we sit upon it for fear we will find ourselves on rising adorned about our person with a damp circle of sticky pastry. Daisy, meanwhile, who most pleasingly combines feminine knack with a good Yankee detestation of waste, has discovered in those pastry shells the perfect source of new bonnets for her dolls. It is “quite a landscape,” as Teddy would say, to see her rows of dollies all with their crumbling pastry headwear, this one decorated with a little daisy, that one with a tiny bow, for she has inherited all the good taste in dress of both her Mama and her aunt Amy. Can you think how Bethie would have delighted in them, dear? Do you remember those poor invalid dolls she cared for so tenderly when we were all children? We laughed at her then, but I can only weep now to remember what a big and generous heart beat in the breast of that little girl while we had her with us.
I long for you to be home, Amy, for it is so quiet here without you, and I do get cross and lonely at times. Well, I’ll comfort myself with the thought that you are the sister I will see again, when at last you have returned from your travels, and, oh, the stories you will have to tell then, and the jolly times we’ll start to have once more.
Kiss my boy Teddy for me, and tell him to behave himself or he’ll have me to answer to as well as you.
Ever your loving,
Jo.
On the morning after Sophie had arrived home from Coventry, Emma telephoned her at Fulla Beanz.
“How was Coventry?” she said. “I heard about the floods.”
“It was amazing,” said Sophie. She swiped a towel over a coffee machine and perched herself against the shop’s counter. “The most awesomely creative experience of my life. We took the parts to places you would not believe. We were even able to use the rain because we found ourselves sincerely worrying about warping, it was really evolutionary.”
“Evolutionary,” repeated Emma. Then, “Did you get any interesting phone calls while you were away?”
“Well, Mom was always on the phone to check I’d remembered to close all the windows—she’ll never let me forget that time, although it was years ago and the bed did dry out eventually. Lulu claims I took her brown sweater, but Lulu’s mad, she just won’t get it through her head how pathetic her clothes really are. I haven’t heard from Rupert, so I suppose we’re not going out anymore, but that’s okay, we were starting to get on each other’s nerves, actually. Oh, and Esme’s found someone new, I hope he’s more sensible than Jack, who I always thought was a bit sort of suspicious. He goes salsa dancing, which you really shouldn’t if you look like Prince Harry.”