Update: More Snow, Etc.

Merry wails from her room, where I sent her because Elspeth will not play her game. Her game consists mainly of telling Elspeth what to do. It is called "School" and when Merry started it today, fresh in from the blowing snow, Elspeth was a bad, bad student. According to Merry she stuck out her tongue, made other assorted faces, and then tore around the house like a banshee instead of staying politely in her seat in rapt attention and completing worksheets.

I believe Beatrix is knocking things off the piano.

Elspeth came to the supper table yesterday and drank huge quantities of water. We thought she was surreptitiously pouring water somewhere but she was drinking it down, demanding more, guzzling and quaffing. Today Merry brought me a big bowl of salt from a hidden shadow of the library table. She informed me Elspeth has been eating her way through it, like a buffalo in the African Wild.

There is a great deal of noise on the stairs, as if someone is dragging a huge, heavy object. It almost drowns out Merry's whimpering. It is Beatrix who is carrying the partial contents of my purse up the stairs. And. . .here. . .she. . .is. She has seized the mouse. Anything can happen.

Merry is panting, silent on my bed. Waiting for me to turn around, crush my face into sympathy and say, "Oh, dahlin. . ." I am waiting too.

Now Bea's abandoned the mouse. She grabs a permanent marker, a small post-it. She sits on the ground, uncaps the Sharpie, and says "Draw!"

Better go.