One day some boys threw
stones at Monday and old Johnny Mead, who never was known to take notice
of anything before, snatched up a meat axe in the butcher's shop and
chased them through the village. Nobody has molested Monday since.
"Kenneth Ford has gone back to Toronto. He came up two evenings ago to
say good-bye. I wasn't home--some clothes had to be made for the baby
and Mrs. Meredith offered to help me, so I was over at the manse, and I
didn't see Kenneth. Not that it matters; he told Nan to say good-bye to
Spider for him and tell me not to forget him wholly in my absorbing
maternal duties. If he could leave such a frivolous, insulting message
as that for me it shows plainly that our beautiful hour on the sandshore
meant nothing to him and I am not going to think about him or it again.
"Fred Arnold was at the manse and walked home with me. He is the new
Methodist minister's son and very nice and clever, and would be quite
handsome if it were not for his nose. It is a really dreadful nose. When
he talks of commonplace things it does not matter so much, but when he
talks of poetry and ideals the contrast between his nose and his
conversation is too much for me and I want to shriek with laughter. It
is really not fair, because everything he said was perfectly charming
and if somebody like Kenneth had said it I would have been enraptured.
When I listened to him with my eyes cast down I was quite fascinated;
but as soon as I looked up and saw his nose the spell was broken.
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