Dear Elizabeth: This letter will no doubt surprise you, but I couldn't wait any longer. I might begin by saying that I was homesick for Jack--which is true--but I'm going to confess that I'm homesick for you too. Is there still hope? I would have written you long ago, but I went into things too heavy and lost the money I got for the cattle--and then I couldn't. It would have looked like asking to come back to the land. As you know, I mortgaged the home eighty--it hurt some to do that, knowing you'd have to sign it--and began slower. I got along very well, but it was terribly tedious, and at last, after three years of steady work, and no debts, I couldn't wait any longer, and put half of what I had on the Board of Trade proceedings. _I won!_ Last Saturday I sold all I had, and now while I can come to you right, I want to ask if you will take me? Take me quick, if you are going to, before I do some reckless thing and lose it again. I hear you have prospered; that was why I had to wait so long. I often think of dear old Hugh, and his interest in some of the things about the neighbourhood, and I have been given to see while living in this rotten hole of a city how much I underestimated the people about us in Kansas. I would be glad to come back and live among them. Will you let me? A telegram will bring me to you on the next train. With love to both you and Jack, who will be seven years old this week, Affectionately, John. The tension was broken. Elizabeth laid the letter back with a smile. How like John to suggest a telegram! John never could wait. How well she knew his little weaknesses; the written characters of the missive had the flowing curves of haste in their running letters. He had written on the impulse of the moment, no matter how long the desire had been in his heart. The very spontaneity of the confession was unpremeditated and worked in John Hunter's favour. He had remembered Jack's birthday too! That day seven years ago rose up in Elizabeth's memory to plead for Jack's father. She earnestly desired John's presence, and yet--could it be done?