Turning nervously back to the box's wrapping-paper Stanton read once
more the perfectly plain, perfectly unmistakable name and
address,--his own, repeated in absolute duplicate on the envelope.
Quicker than his mental comprehension mere physical embarrassment
began to flush across his cheek-bones. Then suddenly the whole truth
dawned on him: The first installment of his Serial-Love-Letter had
arrived.

"But I thought--thought it would be type-written," he stammered
miserably to himself. "I thought it would be a--be a--hectographed
kind of a thing. Why, hang it all, it's a real letter! And when I
doubled my check and called for a special edition de luxe--I wasn't
sitting up on my hind legs begging for real presents!"

But "Dear Lad" persisted the pleasant, round, almost childish
handwriting:

"DEAR LAD,

"I could have _cried_ yesterday when I got your letter
telling me how sick you were. Yes!--But crying wouldn't
'comfy' you any, would it? So just to send you
right-off-quick something to prove that I'm thinking of you,
here's a great, rollicking woolly wrapper to keep you snug
and warm this very night. I wonder if it would interest you
any at all to know that it is made out of a most larksome
Outlaw up on my grandfather's sweet-meadowed farm,--a
really, truly Black Sheep that I've raised all my own
sweaters and mittens on for the past five years. Only it
takes two whole seasons to raise a blanket-wrapper, so