I wonder if Miss Priscilla would let me express my admiration for her by buying her one of those lovely boxes of paper with gold letters on each piece.  I don’t know anybody else in Byrdsville that they seem to match, and they cost five dollars, which the postmaster needs badly from the looks of his fringed cuffs and collars.  Accepting a present is bestowing affectionate regard on the person that offers it, and I believe Miss Prissy feels that way about me.  She must feel in her heart that I do not blame her course of conduct to the Colonel like the rest of Byrdsville does.  I am more charitable to faults than others.  I have to be.  I believe I will risk the box of paper.

But on the other hand, I am very fond of the Colonel and I feel that I would like him to know that I think he is very noble not to desert Miss Priscilla, even if she doesn’t want to marry him.  He is a faithful friend.  I wonder if he would like that lovely long-stemmed pipe that is in the drug store?  And I feel like I ought to do it, not to be partial.  I won’t buy him tobacco, for I feel sure that is a thing that women ought to fear to do for a man.

This is a very lonely night, and I can’t write any more because it reminds me to be uneasy about the express package in which I sent the article to Gilmore’s Weekly.

I am going down to sit in my mother’s room in a dark corner to be comforted.  That is my right and hers, too.  I wonder if girls that have mothers that can be real mothers, tell them all their troubles and perplexities and anxieties, or do girls that have mothers not have the other things to tell them?

But one thing before I close the ink-well I must record to my own satisfaction, though it seems mean to write it down.  The Idol has no idea of paying any kind of attentions to Helena Kirby and it is all settled that he doesn’t like her; or, rather, doesn’t know she is living on the earth, which is still better.  His lovely new gray suit didn’t affect him at all in regard to her.  Roxanne told me all about it several days ago.

Of course, everybody in Byrdsville has been very much interested and sorry over Lovelace Peyton’s explosion and his eyes, and they have all come and said so, and they hardly ever come empty-handed.  Roxanne has got nice and plump eating the things, and so has Uncle Pompey, after their long cornmeal fast during the time of invention number one.

But Belle’s mother, Mrs. Kirby, and Helena hadn’t come or done a single thing, until this occurred day before yesterday.  Helena happened of her own accord to meet the Idol right at the cottage gate when he came home from the furnace, and she was most untastefully beautifully dressed.  She had a large pink rose in her hand like a girl in a story-book.  She stopped to smile on him with extreme favor and give him the rose, also out of a book.  Roxanne saw and heard it all, because she couldn’t help it, from the window.

“Thank you, Miss Helena,” he said with a grand bow.  “I know Lovey will feel complimented at your thinking about him, and the rose will be lovely for him to smell and feel.  He is better to-day, we hope—­at least not so nervous.”