We didn’t go to Bar Harbor; we came back to Boston, for Pa had to see about one of his inventions—Pa’s a wonderful man, he has invented lots of things—I don’t dare record the name of his motor car, for he has arranged by phonography and electricity a whole band, and when he goes out by himself always turns on the power and a band plays wonderfully clear—sounds as if it were just coming up the street. People rush to the doors and throw up the windows, and look up and down the street, but no band appears, and as Pa rides up the street the sound gets fainter and fainter, till it vanishes into silence; then he will put on the echo, and they hear it all over again as distinct as before. They never connect Pa with the band, and I have been with him several times early in the morning and Levey Cohen has gone in the evening, and people are wondering what it all means. They wrote it up in the papers, but no one has yet found out what it is, or where it comes from. When they do I don’t know what will happen. I am very sure I don’t want to be around. The other night we were coming home real late from a trip to Wonderland (say, that’s a good name for that place; I have wondered a whole lot since I saw it). We had had a wonderful day, Pa and I (Pa is a dear. He will shoot the shoots, ride the roller coaster or stand on his head if I say so to have fun). Well, we were riding real slow in Pa’s automobile, the nameless wonder, when all of a sudden I heard something that scared me. I heard a man’s rough voice shout, “Hi, there! stop or I’ll shoot!” Pa stopped so quick that it shook the machine good and the band struck up “Where Is My Wandering Boy To-night?” The burglar listened for a moment, spellbound, took off his hat and bowed his head and said, “That’s my sainted mother’s favorite song, I have always been bad and my poor mother has died of a broken heart.” Then as he proceeded with his story, Pa pulled out a second stop and the cornet played the second verse and a fine sweet tenor voice sang with such feeling that I nearly cried myself. The burglar was entirely broken up, and when the song ended and one of Sousa’s marches began, the man pulled himself together and said, “Well, that song saved your garl darned neck, for I intended murder to get money. Good-bye, that band will be in sight in a minute and I don’t care to be seen.” So off he went; then we moved on. Pa put on the echo and it all came back, the moon came out and it was the most dreamy thing you ever heard. The burglar waited some moments by the roadside in the bushes for the band to appear, but none came. He pondered a moment, then said, “Strung, by gosh.” When I got home I told Ma she had missed the best fun of her life, for I had had dreamland all day and all the way home besides. We didn’t tell Ma about the burglar, she would have had a real fit. Pa says Ma is too timid for a real modern 1906 woman—said she should have been born in ye olden days, but I don’t think so, my Ma is a darling and no one knows it better than Pa, either. Sometimes I sing, “Where Is My Wandering Boy To-night,” and Pa always laughs, and Ma don’t see the point at all. She says it’s sad, but Pa gets a fit of the giggles just like a girl and Levey Cohen and I have our hands full to keep Ma pleasant, for she thinks Pa is making fun of that poor wandering boy, when in reality Pa’s only giving thanks in a vocal way of his scalp and pocketbook being saved by his wonderful invention of a band. We have a fine burglar-alarm, Pa made it. It’s a cracker jack, I tell you what. When it is set, woe be to the one who tries to rob our house, he won’t try only once. A stranger is sure to bump into a wire, but they are very small, yet they work wonders; they run about the walls and floors so close that no one sees them, but we put down the plates under the rugs at each door. When one steps on one of them plates it turns on the lights, opens the telephone to the police station and in three seconds any burglar would wish himself electrocuted for the things that happen before he can say Jack Robinson. If he isn’t out of the house before three minutes the police get him, and there you are. Our gate has a red mark on it, small, but distinct. Pa says it is a warning for tramps and burglars to go by and not take the trouble to call. No one of that profession has ever called on us but once, and the police got them. They got 20 years and it is not time for them to call again for 19 years, they won’t be out till then. All of that profession know that, and they think that the Shaw Mansion is a very nice place to let alone, so we surely are blessed. We don’t put the silver away at night, for we feel sure it will be right where it was left the night before, even if that were out on the piazza.—or under the trees. Pa is a big man so he can do anything he likes.

We all went fishing out in a catboat and I love that sport. I caught 10 fish all myself, except Levey Cohen baited my hook and took off the fish. I don’t like to do that part. Pa got more than I did, and bigger ones, too, one weighed 20 pounds—it was a cod. I got small fish, mostly, for I didn’t think I could handle a big one, so I told the little fishes to bite my hook and for all the big ones to go to Pa’s side, and they did. Ma don’t fish, she says she never went but once and that’s when she caught Pa. She said it was easy to land him and I said, “What bait did you use, Ma?” and she said, “I just baited the hook with five million dollars.” Pa says that’s the biggest fish story he ever heard, so does Levey Cohen, and Pa says he has been on exhibition ever since, as a good catch. Ma says Pa is the only man she ever could love, so I am glad she married him. We are all very happy and have such jolly times, all the time. It’s a picnic for four all the time. When Uncle Smith and Levey Cohen is here I have heaps of friends that we see once in awhile, but I am too much taken up with my dear Pa to be much away from him. I go along with him everywhere I can because he likes to have me so much.

He is calling me now for a drive in my Franklin car, so

Bye-bye,

ELSIE.