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Alphy thought, “I guess he isn’t a perfect child after all.”

Mary Anne never again told the children, “Why can’t you be more like Wilfred?”

Alphy, who had been rather mellow in his younger years, had now become more ‘broody’. One day when Mary Anne told him to do something, Alphy responded that he didn’t have to listen to her, “Because you’re not my mother.”

His father, who had just come in the house, overheard Alphy, and scolded him for talking to Mary Anne in this manner. Alphy stomped upstairs - if Mary Anne was allowed to compare him to Wilfred, why couldn’t he compare her to his mother? His mother would have never acted like this, Alphy was sure.

One of Alphy’s favorite pastimes was to whittle wood. His father had taught him how to carve things out of wood. One afternoon he and Edmond had gone to the woods, and had brought home some tree limbs to whittle. Edmond was like Alphy’s shadow- wherever Alphy went, he usually followed close behind. One evening they decided they would make snowshoes. Both of them huddled around the stove working with the wood, until they had produced two pair of snowshoes. Mary Anne had told them several times to clean up the mess and go to bed. Finally they hung up the snowshoes and did as they were told.

The next day Alphy and Edmond went to the woods to check the rabbit snares for their father. First they started off with their snowshoes, but the shoes were lopsided and didn’t work like they were supposed to. The boys returned to the house and hung up their snowshoes. They would have to adjust them somehow. They decided to go and check the snares first, and work on the snowshoes later.

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