or not, but I have, and it's a thing that helps when the black
shadow comes, when you reach the land of "benefits forgot and
friends remembered not."

And this reminds me that I should not write to my very dearest
friend who has her own problems and make her heart sad with mine;
so to the joyful news of my two friends add a third, Linda, for I
am going to tell you a secret because it will make you happy.
Since I have been in San Francisco some man, who for a reason of
his own does not tell me his name, has been writing me extremely
attractive letters. I have had several of them and I can't tell
you, Linda, what they mean to me or how they help me. There is a
touch of whimsy about them. I can't as yet connect them with
anybody I ever met, but to me they are taking the place of a
little lunch on the bread of life. They are such real, such
vivid, such alive letters from such a real person that I have
been doing the very foolish and romantic thing of answering them
as my heart dictates and signing my own name to them, which on
the surface looks unwise when the man in the case keeps his
identity in the background; but since he knows me and knows my
name it seems useless to do anything else: and answer these
letters I shall and must; because every one of them is to me a
strong light thrown on John Gilman. Every time one of these
letters comes to me I have the feeling that I would like to reach
out through space and pick up the man who is writing them and
dangle him before Eileen and say to her: "Take HIM. I dare you
to take HIM." And my confidence, Linda, is positively supreme
that she could not do it.

You know, between us, Linda, we regarded Eileen as a rare