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It was alo to the Academy, and they had no shoes And still the cobbler didn’t come
Mother’s shears went snickety-snick through the web of beautiful sheep’s-gray cloth she had woven She cut and fitted and basted and sewed, and she reatcoat to hten caps
For Eliza Jane she made a new dress of wine-colored cloth, and shetheir old dresses and bonnets, sponging and pressing theain the other side out, to look like new
In the evenings Mother’s knitting-needles flashed and clicked, s for theot hot froether But they could not have new shoes unless the cobbler came in time
He didn’t coo to the Academy in his fine suit, with last year’s boots that were slit all around and showed his white socks through It couldn’t be helped
The lastcame Father and Almanzo did the chores Everyin the house blazed with candle-light, and Almanzo missed Royal in the barn
Royal and the girls were all dressed up at breakfast No one ate ed the carpet-bags downstairs He wished Alice wasn’t going away
The sleigh-bells cahed and wiped her eyes with her apron They all went out to the sleigh The horses pawed and shook jingles fro skirts, and Father let the horses go The sleigh slid by and turned into the road Alice’s black-veiled face looked back and she called:
“Good-by! Good-by!”
Ale and still and empty He ate dinner all alone with Father and Mother Chore-tio into the house and not see Alice He even missed Eliza Jane
After he went to bed he lay awake and wondered what they were doing, five long miles away
Nextthe cobbler came! Mother went to the door and said to him:
“Well, this is a pretty ti, I ood as barefoot!”
But the cobbler was so good-natured that she couldn’t be angry long It wasn’t his fault; he had been kept three weeks at one house,
The cobbler was a fat, jolly man His cheeks and his stomach shook when he chuckled He set up his cobbler’s bench in the dining-room by the , and opened his box of tools Already he had Mother laughing at his jokes Father brought last year’s tanned hides, and he and the cobbler discussed the