The Rise of Roscoe Paine

“Um-hm” is, I believe, good Scotch for “Yes.” I have read that it is, somewhere--in one of Barrie's yarns, I think. I had never been in Scotland, or much of anywhere else, excep...

The post-office was at Eldredge's store, and Eldredge's store, situated at the corners, where the Main Road and the Depot Road--which is also the direct road to South Denboro--j...

It is a dreadful thing to hate one's own father; to hate him and be unable to forgive him even though he is dead, although he paid for his sin with his life. Death is said to pa...

“No, I got it. Won't you--er--won't you sit down?” He pulled the armchair toward him and sat down. I noticed that he had a habit of doing things quickly. His sentences were shor...

So she was his daughter. I might have guessed it; would have guessed it if I had possessed the commonest of common-sense. I might have known that the auto was Colton's. No other...

The rain, which I expected would follow the squall, did not come until late that night, and it was still falling heavily the next morning. It was a warm rain, however, and, afte...

And that, in the end, was the answer I sent to Carver with his five dollars. I spent an hour in my room trying to compose and write a sarcastic reply to his note, but I finally...

The Methodist church stood on the slope of a little hill, back from the Main Road, and the parsonage was next door. Between the church and the parsonage was a stretch of lawn, d...

The strawberry festival and the “tempest” were, of course, the subjects most discussed at the breakfast table next morning. Lute monopolized the conversation, a fact for which I...

Mother was the only one to whom I told the whole story of my experience in the “tempest” and of Colton's call. She and I had a long talk. She was as surprised to hear of the fiv...

I met Mabel Colton several times during the following week. Once, at the place where I had met her before, in the grove by the edge of the bluff, and again walking up the Lane i...

“And now,” continued Miss Colton, after an interval during which, I presume, she had been waiting for some reply to her frank declaration concerning mind and appetite, “what mus...

I think Taylor was almost as surprised as Eldredge had been, when, at half-past eight the following morning, I appeared at the bank. He was already at his desk and, when he look...

When I left the boat house I did not go directly home, but wandered along the beach. I had puzzled my brain with Mr. Keene and his errand until I determined not to puzzle it any...

So I resolved, more resolutely than ever, to keep out of her way, to see as little of her as possible! and, as had happened before to similar resolutions of mine with which she...

He tried to pull his arm free. Finding that I would not let him do this he gave up the attempt and, with a poor attempt at a laugh, answered, “Matter? Why, nothing is the matter...

I am not going to attempt a description of my thoughts that night. It would take too long and the description would be wearisome. Other people's miseries are not interesting and...

The fog had come almost without warning. When, after leaving the bank, at four o'clock or thereabouts, I walked down to the shore and pulled my skiff out to where the Comfort la...

If I had been giving undivided attention to my combined duties as steersman and pilot, instead of neglecting them for other and more engrossing matters, I should, doubtless, hav...

My unexpected entrance caused a sensation. Lute, sitting on the edge of one of the kitchen chairs, an agonized expression on his face, started so violently that he almost lost h...

It was early in the evening, but the big house was lighted as if for a reception; lights in the rooms above, lights in the library and hall and drawing-room. Doctor Quimby's hor...

And yet sleep I did, for a little while, just before morning broke. I had spent the night pacing the floor and talking to Phineas, who was wide awake and full of stories and jok...

The next thing I remember with any distinctness is Dorinda's knocking at my bedroom door. I remember reaching that bedroom, of course, and of meeting Lute in the kitchen and tel...

They left me soon after this. I tried to make them tell who the mysterious friend might be, but they refused. The kind things they said and the gratitude they both expressed I s...