“Oh no. It is time for it.”
“Let me see. It is not so early for it after all. It’s the fifteenth of October. The fifteenth! Why, that is the day Uncle Boardman said his mill would be done, and on my way back, I guess I’ll stop there and see how it looks.”
“That the mill where his trees are to be sawed up?”
“Yes, and I expect a lot more will come there. You see uncle built the mill, and Baggs buys up the timber where he can, and he and uncle run the mill together, and divide the profits somehow. But it has cost something to put that mill up. I know uncle had to borrow money to do it. I don’t like that Baggs at all, mother. He took me in at first, he was so soft–spoken, but I think I know him now.”
“He has been up in this neighborhood trying to buy woodland, and wanted your father to trade with him, but he wouldn’t. We don’t like his looks up this way.”
There was a lull in the conversation. The cricket without still kept up his sharp, piercing song, and Farmer Grant patiently beat out an accompaniment to the cricket’s tune.
“How long is it now, Walter, since you were confirmed?”
“Three months, mother.”
“Well, mother, I can’t say that I am making much progress, but I am trying to hold on.”