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-- CHAPTER XV