Out of the stiff envelope fluttered instead the tiny circular to which Cornelia had referred so scathingly.
It was a dainty bit of gray Japanese tissue with the crimson-inked text glowing gaily across it. Something in the whole color scheme and the riotously quirky typography suggested at once the audaciously original work of some young art student who was fairly splashing her way along the road to financial independence, if not to fame. And this is what the little circular said, flushing redder and redder and redder with each ingenuous statement:
THE SERIAL-LETTER COMPANY.
Comfort and entertainment Furnished for Invalids, Travelers,
and all Lonely People.
Real Letters
from
Imaginary Persons.
Reliable as your Daily Paper. Fanciful as your Favorite
Story Magazine. Personal as a Message from your Best Friend.
Offering all the Satisfaction of receiving Letters with no
Possible Obligation or even Opportunity of Answering Them.
SAMPLE LIST.
Letters from a Japanese Fairy. (Especially acceptable
Bi-weekly. to a Sick Child. Fragrant
with Incense and
Sandal Wood. Vivid
with purple and orange
and scarlet. Lavishly
interspersed with the
most adorable Japanese
toys that you ever saw
in your life.)
Letters from a little Son. (Very sturdy. Very
Weekly. spunky. Slightly profane.)
Letters from a Little Daughter. (Quaint. Old-Fashioned.
Weekly. Daintily Dreamy.
Mostly about Dolls.)
Letters from a Banda-Sea Pirate. (Luxuriantly tropical.
Monthly. Salter than the Sea.
Sharper than Coral.
Unmitigatedly murderous.
Altogether blood-curdling.)
Letters from a Gray-Plush Squirrel. (Sure to please Nature
Irregular. Lovers of Either
Sex. Pungent with
wood-lore. Prowly.
Scampery. Deliciously
wild. Apt to be just a
little bit messy perhaps
with roots and leaves
and nuts.)
Letters from Your Favorite (Biographically consistent.
Historical Character. Historically reasonable.
Fortnightly. Most vivaciously
human. Really unique.)
Love Letters. (Three grades: Shy.
Daily. Medium. Very Intense.)
In ordering letters kindly state approximate age, prevalent
tastes,-and in case of invalidism, the presumable severity
of illness. For price list, etc., refer to opposite page.
Address all communications to Serial Letter Co. Box, etc.,
etc.
As Stanton finished reading the last solemn business detail he crumpled up the circular into a little gray wad, and pressed his blond head back into the pillows and grinned and grinned.
"Good enough!" he chuckled. "If Cornelia won't write to me there seem to be lots of other congenial souls who will-cannibals and rodents and kiddies. All the same-" he ruminated suddenly: "All the same I'll wager that there's an awfully decent little brain working away behind all that red ink and nonsense."
Still grinning he conjured up the vision of some grim-faced spinster-subscriber in a desolate country town starting out at last for the first time in her life, with real, cheery self-importance, rain or shine, to join the laughing, jostling, deliriously human Saturday night crowd at the village post-office-herself the only person whose expected letter never failed to come! From Squirrel or Pirate or Hopping Hottentot-what did it matter to her? Just the envelope alone was worth the price of the subscription. How the pink-cheeked high school girls elbowed each other to get a peep at the post-mark! How the-. Better still, perhaps some hopelessly unpopular man in a dingy city office would go running up the last steps just a little, wee bit faster-say the second and fourth Mondays in the month-because of even a bought, made-up letter from Mary Queen of Scots that he knew absolutely without slip or blunder would be waiting there for him on his dusty, ink-stained desk among all the litter of bills and invoices concerning-shoe leather. Whether 'Mary Queen of Scots' prattled pertly of ancient English politics, or whimpered piteously about dull-colored modern fashions-what did it matter so long as the letter came, and smelled of faded fleur-de-lis-or of Darnley's tobacco smoke? Altogether pleased by the vividness of both these pictures Stanton turned quite amiably to his breakfast and gulped down a lukewarm bowl of milk without half his usual complaint.
[Illustration: "Good enough!" he chuckled]
It was almost noon before his troubles commenced again. Then like a raging hot tide, the pain began in the soft, fleshy soles of his feet and mounted up inch by inch through the calves of his legs, through his aching thighs, through his tortured back, through his cringing neck, till the whole reeking misery seemed to foam and froth in his brain in an utter frenzy of furious resentment. Again the day dragged by with maddening monotony and loneliness. Again the clock mocked him, and the postman shirked him, and the janitor forgot him. Again the big, black night came crowding down and stung him and smothered him into a countless number of new torments.
Again the treacherous Morning Nap wiped out all traces of the pain and left the doctor still mercilessly obdurate on the subject of an opiate.
And Cornelia did not write.
Not till the fifth day did a brief little Southern note arrive informing him of the ordinary vital truths concerning a comfortable journey, and expressing a chaste hope that he would not forget her. Not even surprise, not even curiosity, tempted Stanton to wade twice through the fashionable, angular handwriting. Dully impersonal, bleak as the shadow of a brown leaf across a block of gray granite, plainly-unforgivably-written with ink and ink only, the stupid, loveless page slipped through his fingers to the floor.
After the long waiting and the fretful impatience of the past few days there were only two plausible ways in which to treat such a letter. One way was with anger. One way was with amusement. With conscientious effort Stanton finally summoned a real smile to his lips.
Stretching out perilously from his snug bed he gathered the waste-basket into his arms and commenced to dig in it like a sportive terrier. After a messy minute or two he successfully excavated the crumpled little gray tissue circular and smoothed it out carefully on his humped-up knees. The expression in his eyes all the time was quite a curious mixture of mischief and malice and rheumatism.
"After all" he reasoned, out of one corner of his mouth, "After all, perhaps I have misjudged Cornelia. Maybe it's only that she really doesn't know just what a love-letter OUGHT to be like."
Then with a slobbering fountain-pen and a few exclamations he proceeded to write out a rather large check and a very small note.
"TO THE SERIAL-LETTER CO." he addressed himself brazenly.
"For the enclosed check-which you will notice doubles the
amount of your advertised price-kindly enter my name for a
six weeks' special 'edition de luxe' subscription to one of
your love-letter serials. (Any old ardor that comes most
convenient) Approximate age of victim: 32. Business status:
rubber broker. Prevalent tastes: To be able to sit up and
eat and drink and smoke and go to the office the way other
fellows do. Nature of illness: The meanest kind of
rheumatism. Kindly deliver said letters as early and often
as possible!
"Very truly yours, etc."
Sorrowfully then for a moment he studied the depleted balance in his check-book. "Of course" he argued, not unguiltily, "Of course that check was just the amount that I was planning to spend on a turquoise-studded belt for Cornelia's birthday; but if Cornelia's brains really need more adorning than does her body-if this special investment, in fact, will mean more to both of us in the long run than a dozen turquoise belts-."