Script quote across upper back

The rain came in off the harbour at nine and hasn't let up, so I have hung your yellow oilcloth over the front of the stall and wedged it down with two bricks and a cabbage crate. Mrs Okafor from the bakery says it looks like a lifeboat tent. I told her it was your idea, and she laughed so hard she dropped a bag of hot rolls into a puddle, which I have decided to count as trade.

The buttons are doing well. The bone ones sold first, as you said they would, and a man in a tweed cap bought the whole jar of jet for his mother's coat, which I hope was a good coat. Nobody has asked for the brass ones, so they sit in their tin under the counter with the tissue paper. I opened it this morning looking for change and found the little folded square you tucked in there last spring, with my name on the outside in pencil and nothing inside but a single green thread.

I did not understand it until the rain eased around eleven and I read the back of the square, where you had written, very small, I carry your heart. I thought at first it was a line you had copied out of a book. Then I understood you were telling me where you keep the things you cannot sell.

I shall close at four, as promised, and bring the takings home in the tin. Leave the porch light on.

All my love, Walter