McAllister and His Double

by Arthur Cheney Train

"She's a dear little girl," said McAllister. "I hope she'll have a chance to get a good education."

"Education behind a counter in Bangor is all she'll get," answered her aunt.

They sat in silence for a moment, and then McAllister, feeling the craving induced by habit, drew an Obsequio from his pocket, and asked:

"Do you object to smoking?"

Miss Abby bristled.

"I don't want none o' them se-gars in this house, so long's I'm in it!" she exclaimed. "Ain't out-doors good enough for you, without stinkin' up the kitchen?"

"I didn't mean any offence," apologized McAllister. "I'll wait till I go out, of course."

"One of the devil's tricks!" sniffed Miss Abby.

McAllister, terribly embarrassed, got up and stepped to the window. The coffee had been execrable, but a benign influence animated him. Down the slope toward the gently flowing Penobscot little Abby was leading Wilkins by the hand. The boy-horse kicked his heels in a daisy-flecked pasture beyond the barn.

"What did you say the farm was worth?" asked the clubman.