As they were finishing their dessert, Mr. Sherman suddenly remembered that he had a letter in his pocket for Lloyd, which he had forgotten to give her.

“It is from Joyce,” she said, looking at the post-mark.  “Oh, if she were only heah, what a lovely time we could have!  It would be like havin’ anothah house pahty.  May I read it now at the table, mothah?  It is to all of us.”

Fidelia almost held her breath.  She was so afraid that Mrs. Sherman would suggest waiting until they went to the parlour.  There she could no longer be one of them, no matter how hard she might pretend.  She wanted the interesting play to go on as long as possible.  She did not know that she ought not to listen.  There were many things she had never been taught.  Lloyd began to read aloud.

“DEAR GIRLS:—­You will be in Tours by the time this letter reaches you, and I am simply wild to be there with you.  Oh, if I could be there only one day to take you to all the old places!  Do please go to the home of the ‘Little Sisters of the Poor,’ and ask for Sister Denisa.  Give her my love, and tell her that I often think of her.  And do go to that funny pie shop on the Rue Nationale, where everybody is allowed to walk around and help themselves and keep their own count.  And eat one of those tiny delicious tarts for me.  They’re the best in the world.

“I can’t think of anything else to-day, but that walk which you will be taking soon without me.  I can shut my eyes and see every inch of the way, as it used to look when we went home just after sunset.  There is the river Loire all rosy red in the after-glow, and the bridge with the soldiers marching across it; and on the other side of the river is the little old village of St. Symphorian with its narrow, crooked streets.  How I love every old cobblestone!  You will see the fat old women rattling home in their market carts, and hear the clang and click of wooden shoes down the streets.  Then there’ll be the high gate of customs in the old stone wall that fences in the village, and the country road beyond.  You’ll climb the hill with the new moon coming up behind the tall Lombardy poplars, and go on between the fields, turning brown in the twilight, till the Gate of the Giant Scissors looms up beside the road like a picture out of some fairy tale.  A little farther on you’ll come to Madame’s dear old villa with the high wall around it, and the laurel hedges and lime-trees inside.

“I wonder which of you will have my room with the blue parrots on the wall-paper.  Oh, I’m homesick to go back.  Yet, isn’t it strange, when I was there I used to long so for America, that many a time I climbed up in the pear-tree at the end of the garden for a good cry.  Don’t forget to swing up into that pear-tree.  There’s a fine view from the top.

“When you see Jules, ask him to show you the goats that chewed up the cushions