go."

"Why, don't you write to him every little while?"

"No, I haven't been doing it, but I am going to now," she said,
then, as a sudden thought struck her, she exclaimed: "Oh, dear,
I am afraid I can't."

"Why not?" asked Patty.

"Because I used Miss Dorothy's typewriter at home. I don't write
very well with a pen and ink, you know, though I can do better than
I did."

"Oh, I expect you do well enough," said Patty consolingly, "and if
you don't, dad has a typewriter, and maybe he will let you use that,
and if he won't I know Roy will let you write with his. It is only a
little one, but it will do."

"I think you are very kind," said Marian. "Is Roy your brother?"

"My second brother; his name is Royal. Frank is the oldest one
and Bert the youngest of the three. There are six of us, you
know; three girls and three boys. First Dolly and Emily, then
the boys and then me."

"I should think it would be lovely to have so many brothers and
sisters."

"It is, only sometimes the boys tease, and my sisters think I must
always do as they say because they are so much older, and sometimes
I want to do as I please."

"But oughtn't you to mind them?"

"Oh, I suppose so. At least when I don't and they tell daddy, he
always sides with them, so that means they are right, I suppose."

There was some advantage in not having too many persons to obey,
Marian concluded, and when the three boys came storming in, one
making grabs at Patty's hair, another clamoring to have her find his
books, and the third berating the other two, it did seem to Marian
that there were worse things than being the only child in the house.

However, the boys soon subsided, so the two little girls were left
in peace and Patty displayed all the wonders in her possession; the
delightful little doll house which the boys had made for her the
Christmas before, the dolls who inhabited it, five in number, Mr.
and Mrs. Reginald Montgomery, their two children and the black cook.
"The coachman and nurse have to live in another house, there isn't
room for them here," Patty informed Marian. "Which do you like best,
hard dolls or paper ones?"

"Sometimes one and sometimes another," returned Marian. "I don't
know much about paper dolls, though. Mrs. Hunt gave me some out of
an old fashion book, but they got wet, and I haven't any nice ones
now."

"Emily makes lovely ones," Patty told her, "and I'll get her to do
some for us; I know she will."

"How perfe