Alma picked up Gilbert Murray 's letter and went to her room . She wanted to cry , since she could not shake Anna . Even if she could have shook her , it would only have made her more perverse . Anna was in earnest ; Alma knew that , even while she hoped and believed that it was but the earnestness of a freak that would pass in time . Anna had had one like it a year ago , when she had cast Gilbert off for three months , driving him distracted by flirting with Charlie Moore . Then she had suddenly repented and taken him back . Alma thought that this whim would run its course likewise and leave a repentant Anna . But meanwhile everything might be spoiled . Gilbert might not prove forgiving a second time . Alma would have given much if she could only have induced Anna to answer Gilbert 's letter , but coaxing Anna to do anything was a very sure and effective way of preventing her from doing it . * * * * * Alma and Anna had lived alone at the old Williams homestead ever since their mother 's death four years before . Exeter matrons thought this hardly proper , since Alma , in spite of her grave ways , was only twenty-four . The farm was rented , so that Alma 's only responsibilities were the post office which she kept , and that harum-scarum beauty of an Anna . The Murray homestead adjoined theirs . Gilbert Murray had grown up with Alma ; they had been friends ever since she could remember . Alma loved Gilbert with a love which she herself believed to be purely sisterly , and which nobody else doubted could be , since she had been at pains to make a match -- Exeter matrons ' phrasing -- between Gil and Anna , and was manifestly delighted when Gilbert obligingly fell in love with the latter . There was a small mortgage on the Murray place which Mr. Murray senior had not been able to pay off . Gilbert determined to get rid of it , and his thoughts turned to the west . His father was an active , hale old man , quite capable of managing the farm in Gilbert 's absence . Alexander MacNair had gone to the west two years previously and got work on a new railroad .
He wrote to XXXXX to come too , promising him plenty of work and good pay .
Alma Anna Gilbert MacNair Moore Murray Williams months second years