THE RE-CREATION OF BRIAN KENT


By Harold Bell Wright



DEAR AUNTIE SUE:

I have wondered many times, while writing this simple story of life and
love, if you would ever forgive me for putting you in a book. I hope you
will, because if you do not, I shall be heartbroken, and you wouldn't
want me that way, would you, Auntie Sue?

I fancy I can hear you say: "But, Harold, how COULD you! You know I
never did the things you have made me do in your story. You know I never
lived in a little log house by the river in the Ozark Mountains! What in
the world will people think!"

Well, to tell the truth, dear, I don't care so very much what people
think if only they will love you; and that they are sure to do,
because,--well, just because--You must remember, too, that you will
be eighty-seven years old the eighteenth of next November, and it is
therefore quite time that someone put you in a book.

And, after all, Auntie Sue, are you very sure that you have never lived
in a little log house by the river,--are you very sure, Auntie Sue?

Forgive my impertinence, as you have always forgiven me everything;
and love me just the same, because I have written only in love of the