Chapter XIV

GUAYABAL, CUBA--
and Heaven knows what date.

Father, dearest--

We have enjoyed your letters so much, and I am glad that you have
Uncle John to bear you out in your statements that you are almost
well and strong again, otherwise it would seem too good to be
true. What a fright you gave us all, you dear Daddy.

It is perfect here: if only you were with us I would be the
happiest girl in the world. Peter is all better again. I hope I
shall never live through another night like the one when we
nearly lost him. Bill is wonderful with children--I never saw
such patience and tenderness and sanity.

We see quite a lot of Mercedes. I am sure she would enchant you,
she is so pretty. But I should be jealous, you know, if she ever
adopted you as a second father, as she threatened to do when I
showed her your picture. Your picture, by the way, is the next
thing to the flesh and blood you! I talk to it by the hour.

Bill has confessed the Richard Warren hoax! Quite involuntarily.
I must admit surprise, but of course I am terrifically proud of
him. And you knew all along, you wretch, and never told me!

It was amusing of you to scold me for not going to the races. But
crowds--the bare idea of them confused me so. However, Bill
insisted upon reading that part of your letter and carried me
off, on your authority, if you please, to sit for hours in a
funny little box and watch the people and the horses and smell
the track and disgrace myself by rising suddenly and shouting as
my horse came in!

I won twelve dollars and am very haughty about it!

I think if I had ever seen a horse-race while I was ill, could
such a thing have happened, I would have died. Such sheer,
wonderful poetry of motion! Bill laughed at me and promises me
more thrills when the racing season is on in New York. He says
the Cuban race horses are a "lot of junk"--but he doesn't realize
what it meant to me. No one can realize what it means to me, to
be unfettered, to walk, to feel well, to be hostess in my own
(borrowed) home, _to be like other girls_! It is no longer a
miracle, of course. Nothing is, for very long, except
perhaps--life. And I look back on all my invalid years with
amazement: it seems a dream, a fantasy, remote and impossible. It
is as though I had always lived--as now,--really _lived_, Daddy
dearest!

My letters are terribly long! And I write you much oftener than
you me. We all send our love. Peter and I go further--we send
kisses.

Stay safe. Stay well, and write to your happy

MAVIS.

SUNSET LAKE,
SOMEWHERE IN CANADA

We have no calendar here, my small, enchanting daughter, and so
there are no such things as dates, only nights and days and
splendid undivided hours.

I was happy to have your letter. And you must not worry about
me--I feel twenty years younger and, so John says, look it. You
will not know your old Dad when you see him.

I miss you, my dear. This is our first separation. I could not
stand another. I hope that you have persuaded Bill that my home
must still be your home, when we are all together again. At first
it seemed unwise, two young things starting out in life, saddled
with the presence of a third person. For I am a third person
now--it is right that I should be. But I am very selfish. I want
to enjoy my girl, this new, wonderful manifestation of her. And
there is room in the old house for us all: you may tinker with
it as you please, add where you will, and I will keep from under
your feet. I am certain that Bill will have all the practice he
needs to keep him from getting rusty--even in Green Hill. And
good old Mac is quite ready to abdicate in his favor. How
splendidly it has all worked out! Never a day passes that I do
not thank God for your health, for your happiness, and for my own
reprieve.

Give my love to my son-in-law. I will answer his letter shortly.
Tell Peter I've a present for him--we've a guide up here who is a
genius with a pen-knife and a scrap of wood.

And inform Sarah that the last snap-shot of her you sent me is a
marvel! She's entirely too rejuvenated for Green Hill.

To you, my child, the tenderest affection of your devoted

FATHER.

I think, perhaps, that the hardest task I had, during the lazy days in Cuba, was writing to Father. There were times when the irony of the situation moved me to something very like laughter. A bitter form of mirth, and one I never thought to know. As carefully as any novelist, I built up my little fictionary happiness, evolved my plot, drew my characters, retaining enough of truth, and committing seven times seven sins of omission. It seemed to me, at times, that it was not I who wrote, but another Mavis, a happy Mavis, living in a tropical dream, companioned and at peace,--the Mavis I might have been--if--

What tears my guardian angel must have shed! What blotted pages must have soiled the ledger!

I wondered very often, if lies we tell to spare others are counted lies in the heavenly books. After all, surely we are not judged by earthly standards, there must be a larger vision and a more tolerant viewpoint. And sometimes, where the truth ended and where falsehood began, seemed hidden from me: times when the dream seemed real and reality a dream--