ur arrives.

By the way, we have a Russian count and his wife, an Austrian count and
his, already all old, here. Mrs. Shuster is thrilled, and says their
titles are a "draw." The trouble is the counts quarrel on politics and
make snorty sounds at each other, so they have to be kept from
colliding. It is I who must do this the most often, and it tears my
nerves.

My pigeon, I will write again one of these days soon, when I have
settled. Now I am still on my head!

Your upside down friend,
PATRICE.

P. S. Larry has read this letter and says it is very bad
English--shocking! But I cannot write it all over again. You will see, I
shall do better next time.

V

PETER STORM TO JAMES STRICKLAND, A NEW YORK LAWYER CELEBRATED FOR HIS
BRILLIANT DEFENCE OF CERTAIN FAMOUS CRIMINALS

_Huntersford, Long Island_,
_April Something or Other._
(Why be a slave to dates?)

DEAR STRICKLAND:

Yours full of reproaches for changing my plans and upsetting yours is
"duly to hand," as you'd probably phrase it yourself. What are you
_for_, my dear man, except to take trouble off the shoulders of others
on to your own? I ask you that! You like it. You thrive on it. With your
uncanny talent for character reading, you should never have expected
anything of me but the unexpected. And the whole embroglio is your
fault, if you come to look at it between the eyes. I ought never to have
come back from Siberia four years ago. You hauled me back. What did I do
in the West and in the South? You know only too well. Yet here I am
again, at your call.

You'll say you didn't call me to do what I'm doing now, but something
widely different. I meant to answer the call in your way, it's true (if
at all), but for reasons which have cropped up I prefer to do it in my
own. You ought to be pleased at this, because I've now _definitely
determined to answer the call_. I hadn't at first. I'd made up my mind
no farther than to come and look into the matter you spoke of. I'm
looking into it all right where I am, I assure you, though from a
different angle than that proposed by you.

I don't know why you "deduce" that there's a woman in the case, for
there never has been one before. There were sometimes several, I admit.
But never One. Trust you to see the distinction!