March 6.
Dear Judy:
I don't know yet whether the children are going to love me or not, but
they DO love my dog. No creature so popular as Singapore ever entered
these gates. Every afternoon three boys who have been perfect in
deportment are allowed to brush and comb him, while three other good
boys may serve him with food and drink. But every Saturday morning the
climax of the week is reached, when three superlatively good boys give
him a nice lathery bath with hot water and flea soap. The privilege of
serving as Singapore's valet is going to be the only incentive I shall
need for maintaining discipline.
But isn't it pathetically unnatural for these youngsters to be living
in the country and never owning a pet? Especially when they, of all
children, do so need something to love. I am going to manage pets for
them somehow, if I have to spend our new endowment for a menagerie.
Couldn't you bring back some baby alligators and a pelican? Anything
alive will be gratefully received.
This should by rights be my first "Trustees' Day." I am deeply grateful
to Jervis for arranging a simple business meeting in New York, as we
are not yet on dress parade up here; but we are hoping by the first
Wednesday in April to have something visible to show. If all of the
doctor's ideas, and a few of my own, get themselves materialized, our
trustees will open their eyes a bit when we show them about.
I have just made out a chart for next week's meals, and posted it in the
kitchen in the sight of an aggrieved cook. Variety is a word hitherto
not found in the lexicon of the J.G.H. You would never dream all of
the delightful surprises we are going to have: brown bread, corn pone,
graham muffins, samp, rice pudding with LOTS of raisins, thick vegetable
soup, macaroni Italian fashion, polenta cakes with molasses, apple
dumplings, gingerbread--oh, an endless list! After our biggest girls
have assisted in the manufacture of such appetizing dainties, they will
almost be capable of keeping future husbands in love with them.
Oh, dear me! Here I am babbling these silly nothings when I have some
real news up my sleeve. We have a new worker, a gem of a worker.
Do you remember Betsy Kindred, 1910? She led the glee club and was
president of dramatics. I remember her perfectly; she always had lovely
clothes. Well, if you please, she lives only twelve miles from here. I
ran across her by chance yesterday morning as she was motoring through
the village; or, rather, she just escaped running across me.
I never spoke to her in my life, but we greeted each other like the
oldest friends. It pays to have conspicuous hair; she recognized me
instantly. I hopped upon the running board of her car and said:
"Betsy Kindred, 1910, you've got to come back to my orphan asylum and
help me catalogue my orphans."
And it astonished her so that she came. She's to be here four or five
days a week as temporary secretary, and somehow I must manage to keep
her permanently. She's the most useful person I ever saw. I am hoping
that orphans will become such a habit with her that she won't be able to
give them up. I think she might stay if we pay her a big enough salary.
She likes to be independent of her family, as do all of us in these
degenerate times.
In my growing zeal for cataloguing people, I should like to get our
doctor tabulated. If Jervis knows any gossip about him, write it to me,
please; the worse, the better. He called yesterday to lance a felon on
Sammy Speir's thumb, then ascended to my electric-blue parlor to
give instructions as to the dressing of thumbs. The duties of a
superintendent are manifold.
It was just teatime, so I casually asked him to stay, and he did! Not
for the pleasure of my society,--no, indeed,--but because Jane appeared
at the moment with a plate of toasted muffins. He hadn't had any
luncheon, it seems, and dinner was a long way ahead. Between muffins
(he ate the whole plateful) he saw fit to interrogate me as to my
preparedness for this position. Had I studied biology in college? How
far had I gone in chemistry? What did I know of sociology? Had I visited
that model institution at Hastings?
To all of which I responded affably and openly. Then I permitted myself
a question or two: just what sort of youthful training had been required
to produce such a model of logic, accuracy, dignity, and common sense
as I saw sitting before me? Through persistent prodding I elicited a
few forlorn facts, but all quite respectable. You'd think, from his
reticence, there'd been a hanging in the family. The MacRae PERE was
born in Scotland, and came to the States to occupy a chair at Johns
Hopkins; son Robin was shipped back to Auld Reekie for his education.
His grandmother was a M'Lachlan of Strathlachan (I am sure she sounds
respectable), and his vacations were spent in the Hielands a-chasing the
deer.
So much could I gather; so much, and no more. Tell me, I beg, some
gossip about my enemy--something scandalous by preference.
Why, if he is such an awfully efficient person does he bury himself in
this remote locality? You would think an up-and-coming scientific man
would want a hospital at one elbow and a morgue at the other. Are you
sure that he didn't commit a crime and isn't hiding from the law?
I seem to have covered a lot of paper without telling you much. VIVE LA
BAGATELLE! Yours as usual,