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Updated: June 25, 2025
I assure you I felt proud of him, Rilla, when he told me what he'd done. Oh, there's an end of Rick MacAllister's reading. I must fly. I promised I'd play for the next chorus Alice Clow has such a headache." She was gone oh, thank God, she was gone! Rilla was alone again, staring out at the unchanged, dream-like beauty of moonlit Four Winds.
He's Charles Stuart MacAllister's dog, and I can give him to Charles Stuart when he comes." "Oh, he ain't going' to hurt anybody; are you, little doggie?" whispered Martha Ellen good-naturedly. "He'll be all right so long as your grandpa don't see him; eh, Eppie?" Eppie smiled shyly, and then Noah Clegg's squeaky boots sounded up the aisle and Sunday school had commenced.
Down at the bottom of the hollow, where the little stream widened into a lazy brown pond, lay Mr. MacAllister's saw-mill. It ran for only a few months in the spring and early summer and was now closed. Only, away down the valley where the road wound into the lumber yard, the banging of boards told that someone was preparing to haul away a load.
Coming up from MacAllister's one lovely summer gloaming Archie met Semple with Katie Morrison, the little girl whom he had loved and courted since ever he carried her dinner and slate to school for her. How they had come to know each other he could not tell; he had exercised all his tact and prudence to prevent it, evidently without avail.
The Martins were a trifle late to-day and, to Elizabeth's joy, they reached the corner where four great elms stretched out their sweeping arms to each other just as MacAllister's ample three-seated buggy came lumbering along. Charles Stuart was there on the front seat beside his father, to be sure; but Mother MacAllister was in the back seat alone.
And once Archie got an inkling of the meaning of "double entry" he was never weary of applying it to his own particular business; so that in a few weeks Alexander Semple was perfectly familiar with MacAllister's affairs. Still, Archie cordially disliked his teacher, and about the middle of summer it became evident that a very serious cause of quarrel was complicating the offence.
There were two roads leading thither. The one used by the school children on week-days was called the Short Cut. It ran down The Dale lane, crossed the pond beside MacAllister's mill, went up the opposite bank, over a wild half-cleared stretch of land called The Slash, through old Sandy McLachlan's wood, and by way of his rickety gate out on to the public highway a few yards from the school.
He was MacAllister's steward, appointed by virtue of his sterling character and known worth; but struggling constantly with ignorance of the methods by which even the most honest business can alone satisfactorily prove its honest condition. When Mr. Semple awoke next morning, Archie had disappeared, and David was standing in the door, smoking.
Charles Stuart, who was Mother MacAllister's really, truly child, had interrupted to inquire what "ower the border an' awa'" meant, and Elizabeth had felt impatient enough to slap him had she dared. Charles Stuart was very stupid about some things, though he could spell and always got the right answer to a sum in school. Elizabeth knew exactly what it meant, though she could not have explained.
MacAllister had dropped in, too, as he very often did of an evening, and suspended his work to discuss the question of the moment. Mr. MacAllister's double business of farmer and mill-owner, while not at all taxing his physique, was too much for his mental powers, and he was frequently compelled to have recourse to Mr. Gordon for help. Mr.
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