all that this means, but I guess I can weather it.  It probably has to do with what Rex called the ‘cosmic makings,’ geology and all sorts of prehistoric stuff.  I know the Dean mentioned one thing that began with a ‘paleo’ but I have forgotten the rest of it.  I’ll let you know later.

“I have a perfectly darling room.  It looks right out over Lake Michigan.  There’s a big square bay window to it, that overhangs the edge of the bluff like the balcony of a Spanish beauty.  Our back garden just topples right over into a ravine that ends up short on the shore.  I never saw such abrupt little chasms in my life.  Uncle Cassius was showing me the layers of strata there that a little recent landslide had shown up, and he says that the formation is just exactly like it is out west in Wyoming and Colorado.

“Aunt Daphne is just a dear.  It’s more fun to hear her tell of how she worried over a boy coming into the family.  The whole house is filled from one end to the other with Uncle Cassius’ treasures that he’s been collecting for years.  You’re liable to stumble over a stuffed armadillo or a petrified slice of some prehistoric monster anywhere at all.  I found a mummy case in the library closet, but there wasn’t anything in it at all, and I was awfully disappointed.  I don’t know but what I like it after all, although I miss you fearfully, dear nestful of robins.  I don’t even dare to think there are about a thousand miles between us.

“This is all I can write to you to-night because I’m so sleepy I can hardly keep my eyes open.  Aunt Daphne just came in and kissed me good-night.  She told me again how glad she is that I’m not a boy.  Uncle Cassius hasn’t committed himself yet, but I think he’s curious about me anyway.  Good-night all, and write oodles of news to me.

“Devotedly yours,
Kit.

“Sign of the Mummy,
Delphi, Wis.”

At the same moment that Kit was writing home, the Dean and Miss Daphne stepped out on the broad veranda.  Every evening about nine-thirty passers-by might have seen the flickering glow of the Dean’s good-night cigar.  He was not an habitual smoker, but the evening cigar was a sort of nocturnal ceremonial.  It gave him an excuse to step out into the fragrant darkness of the garden walk for a quiet little stroll before bedtime, and usually Miss Daphne would try to join him.

So to-night they paced together, discussing the girl with the red curls who had come to them from far-off New England, in lieu of the boy they had sent for.

“There’s no reason,” remarked the Dean, reflectively, “why the child should not have a pleasant visit, since she is here.  I have had a long conversation with her, and while I would not say that she was exceptionally—­er——­”

“Bright,” suggested Daphne.

“I should like to call it intellectual,” the Dean said kindly, “she is keenly impressionable and self-reliant.  I think I may be able to interest her, at least in a simplified course of study.  I have always believed that boys were more amenable to routine discipline in education than girls, but we shall see.”