Excerpt:
“Oh! Jack, Ellen, come here this instant!” cried Jane Pellew in so excited a manner that the mail rider almost fell out of his jumper in his effort to see what it was that made Miss Jane “take on so.” She was dancing around the broad old veranda waving one of the letters he had just handed her.
“Too hot, Sis, and we are too comfortable,” came Jack’s lazy voice from under the big ash tree that shaded one side of the porch.
“You have enough energy for all of us, so s’pose you come to us,” Ellen called.
“You won’t be hot for long, but you are going to be very uncomfortable in a minute.” With the warning, Jane jumped off the porch and landed in Ellen’s lap, then pulled herself up quickly by means of one hand entwined in Jack’s thick chestnut hair.
“Shut up and listen!” commanded Jane.
“Nobody has a chance to do anything else with you around,” Jack reminded his sister.
“Who could do anything else but listen after having a hundred and thirty pounds of buoyant young Kentucky girl hurled on top of you from a distance of some ten feet? I don’t believe I shall ever get my breath again,” groaned Ellen.
“I’ll say you manage pretty well without it,” Jane laughed. “But, as I was saying, listen and you will hear the most wonderful piece of news that has happened in the history of mankind,” and she started reading from the letter she had still managed to keep in her hand:
“Dearest Jane:”
“Bet it is from one of the Camp Fire Girls,” interrupted her brother.
“Keep quiet, I have a good mind not to tell you after all. But I am such a nice girl I suppose I’ll have to. It’s from Mabel Wing. Now, let me finish,” pleaded Jane.
“Dearest Jane:
“As long as Ellen Birch is staying with you, read this to her, as I am so busy I’ll never have time to write two letters saying exactly the same thing. I am sending one to Ruth Garnier with the request that she read hers to Frances Bliss, who is staying at her home.
