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Gr 4 Up—There are many ways to regard Siff's short story, originally published in 1964, and illustrated by Gian Berto Vanni. An unattractive little girl lives in an orphanage, desperately lonely and so ill-behaved that the orphanage director wishes to send her elsewhere. He thinks he's found his justification when the child is seen placing a note in a tree—orphanage children are forbidden to communicate with the outside world. The note, however, only says "Whoever finds this, I love you."The story is an artifact of a certain kind of mid-century European pathos, for sure. It's a small, sad, musical tale, like Albert Lamorisse's The Red Balloon or Antoine de Sain...Log In or Sign Up to Read More