asked Margaret excitedly . `` Ridgetown . '' `` Then my mother must have been your mother 's sister , and , oh , Freda , Freda , you are my cousin . '' Eventually this was proved to be the fact . Margaret investigated the matter and discovered beyond a doubt that she and Freda were cousins . It would be hard to say which of the two girls was the more delighted . `` Anyhow , we 'll never be parted again , '' said Margaret happily . `` Fir Cottage is your home henceforth , Freda . Oh , how rich I am . I have got somebody who really belongs to me . And I owe it all to Dr. Forbes . If he had n't suggested you coming here , I should never have found out that we were cousins . '' `` And I do n't think I should ever have got better at all , '' whispered Freda , slipping her hand into Margaret 's . `` I think we are going to be the two happiest girls in the world , '' said Margaret . `` And Freda , do you know what we are going to do when your summer vacation comes ? We are going to have a trip through the Rockies , yes , indeedy . It would have been nice going with Mrs. Boyd , but it will be ten times nicer to go with you . '' Matthew Insists on Puffed Sleeves Matthew was having a bad ten minutes of it . He had come into the kitchen , in the twilight of a cold , grey December evening , and had sat down in the wood-box corner to take off his heavy boots , unconscious of the fact that Anne and a bevy of her schoolmates were having a practice of `` The Fairy Queen '' in the sitting-room . Presently they came trooping through the hall and out into the kitchen , laughing and chattering gaily .
They did not see Matthew , who shrank bashfully back XXXXX the shadows beyond the wood-box with a boot in one hand and a bootjack in the other , and he watched them shyly for the aforesaid ten minutes as they put on caps and jackets and talked about the dialogue and the concert .
If at beyond in into of on that through to