Her Second Letter to Kate

Her First Letter to Kate

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Dear Kate,

 

I will lay our tardy postal service to waste for making me think you were too mad to write. I’m sorry for saying sorry so much, and I’m glad that Everett took all that about the Irish well. Your account of that winter ball is so romantic that it has opened my eyes – our stately public library, whose bookish smell I inhaled so happily, is just a drafty, ill-maintained nook, not to compare with fresh-cut evergreen boughs and spun snow. I’m truly, truly jealous and happy for you.

It is funny that I am back in Kent, armed with a university degree of questionable usefulness, only to be sequestered in another library. But there is some reading I should do for the dreaded little office job, and mother wanted some books too. I thought I would write to you while I am here, sitting at a wobbly desk in the corner, since it lends a desperate ambiance to the letter-writing, and since the steam coach will be another hour to take me home any way.