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290 about having her for his wife ever since she was a little young girl. He'd go ahead in spite of Grandfather if Betsy would just have him. He says he is farmer enough to make a living for her, even if Grandfather won't let them live at Mill House. But Betsy won't have him, although she had already about got engaged to him.

"It was the very afternoon that Grandfather went over to see Mr. Bolling, that day in March. I had a cold and didn't go to school, but Uncle Spot made out he had forgotten about it and walked over to the mill to meet me, just as he had been doing—except he always drove. Of course this walking over was right foxy in Uncle Spot, 'cause it would be right hard to make love to a girl when you were in one buggy and she was in the other. As it was, he got in Betsy's old buggy. She was alone. Jo was sick with a cold, too. At least he pretended to be. And, Oh [sic], Aunt Pearly Gates, I wish I could have been there! I am mighty excited about being mixed up in a real romance.

"Betsy told me a little about it, but she was too shy to tell me everything. She didn't know how far Mr. Bolling had gone about that old hub factory land and she told Spot she liked him a little—at least that is what she said she