`` You know it has n't really rained for three days , '' protested Kate . `` It 's been damp and horrid and threatening , but it has n't rained . I defy you to say that it has actually rained . '' `` When it 's so wet underfoot that you ca n't stir out without rubber boots it might as well be wet overhead too , '' I said , still grumpily . `` I believe you 're homesick , girl , '' said Kate anxiously . `` No , I 'm not , '' I answered , laughing , and feeling ashamed of my ungraciousness . `` Nobody could be homesick with such a jolly good fellow as you around , Kate . It 's only that this weather is getting on my nerves a bit . I 'm fit for treasons , stratagems , and spoils . If your chinook does n't come soon , Kitty , I 'll do something quite desperate . '' `` I feel that way myself , '' admitted Kate . `` Real reckless , Phil . Anyhow , let 's put on our despised rubber boots and sally out for a wade . '' `` Here 's Jim Nash coming on horseback down the trail , '' I said . `` Let 's wait and see if he 's got the mail . '' We hurried down , Kate humming , `` Somewhere the sun is shining , '' solely , I believe , because she knew it aggravated me . At any other time I should probably have thrown a pillow at her , but just now I was too eager to see if Jim Nash had brought any mail . I had come from Ontario , the first of September , to visit Uncle Kenneth Morrison 's family . I had been looking forward to the trip for several years . My cousin Kate and I had always corresponded since they had `` gone west '' ten years before ; and Kate , who revelled in the western life , had sung the praises of her adopted land rapturously and constantly .
It was quite a joke XXXXX her that , when I did finally come to visit her , I should have struck the wettest autumn ever recorded in the history of the west .
If as at before from in on since to with