Page:Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm (1903).djvu/120

102 mad at your goin' home, you know, and you can't hardly blame 'em."

This was quite a new thought,—that the brick house might be closed to Hannah, since she, Rebecca, had turned her back upon its cold hospitality.

"How is this school down here in Riverboro—pretty good?" inquired uncle Jerry, whose brain was working with an altogether unaccustomed rapidity,—so much so that it almost terrified him.

"Oh, it 's a splendid school! And Miss Dearborn is a splendid teacher!"

"You like her, do you? Well, you 'd better believe she returns the compliment. Mother was down to the store this afternoon buyin' liniment for Seth Strout, an' she met Miss Dearborn on the bridge. They got to talkin' 'bout school, for mother has summer-boarded a lot o' the schoolmarms, an' likes 'em. 'How does the little Temperance girl git along?' asks mother. 'Oh, she 's the best scholar I have!' says Miss Dearborn. 'I could teach school from sun-up to sun-down if scholars was all like Rebecca Randall,' says she."

"Oh, Mr. Cobb, did she say that?" glowed Rebecca, her face sparkling and dimpling in an instant. "I 've tried hard all the time, but I 'll study the covers right off of the books now."

"You mean you would if you 'd ben goin' to stay here," interposed uncle Jerry. "Now ain't it too bad you 've jest got to give it all up on account