ress was ruined, not to speak of the
petticoat. Let me see--would not Tod be some relation of yours? Your
great grandmother West was a MacAllister. Her brother Amos was a
MacDonaldite in religion. I am told he used to take the jerks something
fearful. But you look more like your great grandfather West than the
MacAllisters. He died of a paralytic stroke quite early in life."

"Did you see anybody at the store?" asked Rilla desperately, in the
faint hope of directing Susan's conversation into more agreeable
channels.

"Nobody except Mary Vance," said Susan, "and she was stepping round as
brisk as the Irishman's flea."

What terrible similes Susan used! Would Kenneth think she acquired them
from the family!

"To hear Mary talk about Miller Douglas you would think he was the only
Glen boy who had enlisted," Susan went on. "But of course she always
did brag and she has some good qualities I am willing to admit, though
I did not think so that time she chased Rilla here through the village
with a dried codfish till the poor child fell, heels over head, into
the puddle before Carter Flagg's store."

Rilla went cold all over with wrath and shame. Were there any more
disgraceful scenes in her past that Susan could rake up? As for Ken, he
could have howled over Susan's speeches, but he would not so insult the
duenna of his lady, so he sat with a preternaturally solemn face which
seemed to poor Rilla a haughty and offended one.

"I paid eleven cents for a bottle of ink tonight," complained Susan.
"Ink is twice as high as it was last year. Perhaps it is because
Woodrow Wilson has been writing so many notes. It must cost him
considerable. My cousin Sophia says Woodrow Wilson is not the man she
expected him to be--but then no man ever was. Being an old maid, I do
not know much about men and have never pretended to, but my cousin
Sophia is very hard on them, although she married two of them, which
you might think was a fair share. Albert Crawford's chimney blew down
in that big gale we had last week, and when Sophia heard the bricks
clattering on the roof she thought it was a Zeppelin raid and went into
hysterics. And Mrs. Albert Crawford says that of the two things she
would have preferred the Zeppelin raid."

Rilla sat limply in her chair like one hypnotized. She knew Susan would
stop talking when she was ready to stop and that no earthly power could
make her stop any sooner. As a rule, she was very fond of Susan but
just n