Join Host Bree Carlile as she reads the twelfth chapter of Rainbow Valley.

Come with us as we release one bite a day of one of your favorite classic novels, plays & short stories. Bree reads these classics like she reads to her daughter, one chapter a day. If you love books or audiobooks and want something to listen to as you're getting ready, driving to work, or as you're getting ready for bed, check out Bite at a Time Books!

Follow, rate, and review Bite at a Time Books where we read you your favorite classics, one bite at a time. Available wherever you listen to podcasts.

Check out our website, or join our Facebook Group!

Get exclusive Behind the Scenes content on our YouTube!

We are now part of the Bite at a Time Books Productions network!

If you ever wondered what inspired your favorite classic novelist to write their stories, what was happening in their lives or the world at the time, check out Bite at a Time Books Behind the Story wherever you listen to podcasts.

Follow us on all the socials: Instagram - Twitter - Facebook - TikTok

Follow Bree at: Instagram - Twitter - Facebook

Let's see what we can find.

Take it chapter by chapter.

One Bite at a Time My name is Brie Carlyle and I love to read and wanted to share my passion with listeners like you.

If you want to know what's coming next and vote on upcoming books, sign up for our newsletter@biteautimebooks.com.

You'll also find our new Tshirts in the shop.

More to come with quotes from your favorite classic novels.

Be sure to follow my show on your favorite podcast platform so you get all the new episodes.

You can find most of our links in the show notes, but also our website, Bite Atetimebooks.com includes all of the links for our show, including to our patreon to support the show, and YouTube, where we have special behind the narration of the episodes.

We're part of the bite at a Time books Productions network.

If you'd also like to hear what.

Inspired your favorite classic author to write.

Their novels and what was going on.

In the world at the time, check out Bite at a Time Books Behind the Story podcast.

Wherever you listen to podcasts.

Today we'll be continuing Rainbow Valley by Lucy Maud Montgomery.

Chapter Twelve an Explanation and the Dare.

The Reverend Dr.

Cooper preached England St.

Mary the next evening, and the Presbyterian church was crowded with people from near and far.

The Reverend Doctor was reputed to be a very eloquent speaker, and bearing in mind the old dictum that a minister should take his best clothes to the city and his best sermons to the country, he delivered a very scholarly and impressive discourse.

But when the folks went home that.

Night, it was not of Dr.

Cooper's sermon they talked.

They had completely forgotten all about it.

Dr.

Cooper had concluded with a fervent appeal, had wiped the perspiration from his massive brow, had said Let us pray, as he was famed for saying it, and had duly prayed.

There was a slight pause.

England St.

Mary Church the old fashioned of taking the collection after the sermon instead of before, still held, mainly because the Methodists had adopted the new fashion first, and Miss Cornelia and Elder Clau would not hear a following where Methodists had led Charles Baxter and Thomas Douglas, whose duty it was to pass.

The plates were on the point of rising to their feet.

The organist had got out the music of her anthem, and the choir had cleared its throat.

Suddenly Faith Meredith rose in the man's pew, walked up to the pulpit platform, and faced the amazed audience.

Ms.

Cornelia half rose in her seat and then sat down again.

Her pew was far back, and it occurred to her that whatever Faith meant to do or say would be half done or said before she could reach her.

There was no use making the exhibition worse than it had to be.

With an anguished glance at Mrs.

Doctor Blythe and another at Deacon Warren of the Methodist Church, Miss Cornelia resigned herself to another scandal if the child.

Was only dressed decently itself.

She groaned in spirit.

Faith, having spilled ink on her good dress, had serenely put on an old one of faded pink print.

A caddy cornered rent in the skirt had been darned with scarlet tracing cotton.

And the hem had been let down.

Showing a bright strip of unfaded pink around the skirt.

But Faith was not thinking of her clothes at all.

She was feeling suddenly nervous.

What had seemed easy in imagination was rather hard in reality.

Confronted by all those staring, questioning eyes, faith's courage almost failed her.

The lights were so bright, the silence so awesome, she thought she could not speak after all, but she must.

Her father must be cleared of suspicion.

Only the words would not come.

Una's little Pearl pure face gleamed up at her beseechingly from the man's pew.

The blithed children were lost in amazement.

Back under the gallery, Faith saw the sweet graciousness of Miss Rosemary West's smile and the amusement of Miss Ellen's, but none of these helped her.

It was Birdie Shakespeare drew who saved the situation.

Birdie Shakespeare sat in the front seat of the gallery, and he made a derisive face at Faith.

Faith promptly made a dreadful one back at him, and in her anger over being grimaced at by Bertie, Shakespeare forgot her sage fright.

She found her voice and spoke out clearly and bravely.

I want to explain something, she said.

And I want to do it now.

Because everybody will hear it that heard.

The other people are saying that Una and I stayed home last Sunday and cleaned house instead of going to Sunday school.

Well, we did, but we didn't mean to.

We got mixed up in the days of the week.

It was all Elder Baxter's fault sensation in Baxter's pew because he went and.

Changed the prayer meeting to Wednesday night.

And then we thought Thursday was Friday and so on, till we thought Saturday was Sunday.

Carl was laid up sick and so was Aunt Martha, so they couldn't put us right.

We went to Sunday school in all that rain on Saturday, and nobody came.

And then we thought we'd clean house on Monday and stop old cats from talking about how dirty the mance was.

General sensation all over the church, and we did.

I shook the rugs in the Methodist graveyard because it was such a convenient place and not because I meant to.

Be disrespectful of the dead.

It isn't the dead folks who have made the fuss over this.

It's the living folks.

And it isn't right for any of you to blame my father for this because he was away and didn't know anyhow.

We thought it was Monday.

He's just the best father that ever lived in the world, and we love him with all our hearts.

Faith's bravado ebbed out in a sob.

She ran down the steps and flashed out the side door.

Of the church.

There the friendly starlet summer night comforted her, and the ache went out of her eyes and throat.

She felt very happy.

The dreadful explanation was over, and everybody knew now that her father wasn't to blame and that she and Una were.

Not so wicked as to have cleaned.

House knowingly on Sunday.

Inside the church, people gazed blankly at each other, but Thomas Douglas rose and walked up the aisle with a set face.

His duty was clear a collection must be taken if disguise fell.

Taken it was.

The choir sang the anthem with a dismal conviction that it fell terribly flat, and Dr.

Cooper gave out the concluding.

Hymn and pronounced the benediction with considerably.

Less unction than usual.

The Reverend Doctor had a sense of humor, and Faith's performance tickled him.

Besides, John Meredith was well known in Presbyterian circles.

Mr.

Meredith returned home the next afternoon, but before his coming, faith contrived to scandalize Glenn St.

Mary again and the reaction from Sunday evening's intensity and strain.

She was especially full of what Miss Cornelia would have called devilment on Monday.

This led her to dare Walter Blithe to ride through Main Street on a pig while she rode another one.

The pigs in question were two tall, lank animals supposed to belong to Birdie shakespeare drew's father, which had been haunting the roadside by the mance for a couple of weeks.

Walter did not want to ride a pig through Glenn St.

Mary, but whatever Faith Meredith dared him to do must be done.

They tore down the hill and through the village.

Faith bent double with laughter over her terrified courser.

Walter crimson with shame.

They tore past the minister himself, just coming home from the station.

He being a little less dreamy and abstracted than usual, owing to have had a talk on the train with Miss Cornelia, who always wakened him up temporarily noticed them and thought he really must speak to Faith about it and tell her that such conduct was not seemly.

But he had forgotten the trifling incident by the time he reached home.

They passed Mrs.

Alec Davis, who shrieked in horror, and they passed Miss Rosemary West, who laughed inside.

Finally, just before the pigs swooped into Birdie, shakespeare drew his backyard, never to emerge therefrom again.

So great had been the shock to their nerves.

Faith and Walter jumped off as Doctor and Mrs.

Blythe drove swiftly by.

So that is how you bring up your boys, said Gilbert with mock severity.

Perhaps I do spoil them a little.

Said Anne Contritely, but oh, Gilbert, when.

I think of my own childhood before I came to Green Gables, I haven't.

The heart to be very strict.

How hungry for love and fun I was, an unloved little drudge with never.

A chance to play.

They do have such good times with the man's children.

What about the poor pigs?

Asked Gilbert, and tried to look sober and failed.

Do you really think it hurt them, she said.

I don't think anything could hurt those animals.

They've been the plague of the neighborhood this summer, and the Druze won't shut them up.

But I'll talk to Walter if I.

Can keep from laughing when I do it.

Miss Cornelia came up to Ingleside that evening to relieve her feelings over Sunday night.

To her surprise, she found that Anne did not view Faith's performance in quite the same light as she did.

I thought there was something brave and pathetic in her getting up there before that church full of people to confess, she said.

You could see she was frightened to death, yet she was bound to clear her father.

I loved her for it.

Oh, of course the poor child meant.

Well, sighed Miss Cornelia.

But just the same, it was a.

Terrible thing to do and is making more talk than the house cleaning on Sunday that had begun to die away, and this has started it all up again.

Rosemary west is like you.

She said last night as she left the church that it was a plucky thing for Faith to do, but it.

Made her feel sorry for the child, too.

Ms.

Allen thought it all a good joke and said she hadn't had as much fun in church for years.

Of course they don't care.

They are Episcopalians.

But.

We Presbyterians feel it.

And there were so many hotel people there that night and scores of Methodists.

Mrs.

Leander Crawford cried.

She felt so bad.

And Mrs.

Alec Davis said the little hussey ought to be spanked.

Mrs.

Leander Crawford is always crying in.

Church, said Susan contemptuously.

She cries over every affecting thing the minister says.

But you do not often see her name on a subscription list, Mrs.

Dr.

Dear.

Tears come cheaper.

She tried to talk to me one day about Aunt Martha being such a dirty housekeeper, and I wanted to say everyone knows that you have been seen mixing up cakes in the kitchen wash pan, Mrs.

Leander Crawford.

But I did not say it, Mrs.

Dr.

Dear, because I have too much respect for myself to condescend to argue with the likes of her.

But I could tell worse things than that of Mrs.

Leander Crawford if I was disposed to gossip.

And as for Mrs.

Alec Davis, if she had said that to me, Mrs.

Dr.

Dear, do you know what I would have said?

I would have said, I have no.

Doubt you would like to spank Faith.

Mrs.

Davis, but you will never have the chance to spank a minister's daughter, either in this world or in that which is to come.

If poor Faith had only been decently dressed, lamented Miss Cornelia again, it wouldn't have been quite that bad.

But that dress looked dreadful as she stood there upon that platform.

It was clean, though.

Mrs.

Dr.

Deere said susan, they are clean children.

They may be very heedless and reckless.

Mrs.

Doctor Deer and I'm not saying they're not, but they never forget to wash behind their ears.

The idea of faith forgetting what day was Sunday persisted.

Miss Cornelia.

She will grow up just as careless.

And impractical as her father, believe me.

I suppose Carl would have known better if he hadn't been sick.

I don't know what was wrong with him, but I think it very likely he had been eating those blueberries that grew in the graveyard.

No wonder they made him sick.

If I was a Methodist, I'd try to keep my graveyard cleaned up at least.

I am of the opinion that Carl only ate the sours that grow on.

The d***, said Susan hopefully.

I do not think any minister's son would eat blueberries that grew on the graves of dead people.

You know, it would not be so bad, Mrs.

Dr.

Deer, to eat things that grew on the d***.

The worst of last night's performance was the face Faith made at somebody in the congregation before she started in, said Miss Cornelia.

Elder Cloud declares she made it at him.

And did you hear that she was seen riding on a pig today?

I saw her.

Walter was with her.

I gave him a little a very little scolding about it.

He did not say much, but he gave me the impression that it had been his idea and that Faith was not to blame.

I do not believe that, Mrs.

Dr.

Deer, cried Susan up in arms.

That is just Walter's way to take the blame on himself.

But you know as well as I do, mrs.

Dr.

Deer, that that blessed child would never have thought of writing on a pig, even if he does write poetry.

Oh, there's no doubt the notion was hatched in Faith Meredith's brain, said Miss Cornelia.

And I don't say that I'm sorry that Amos Drew's old pigs did get their comeuppance for once.

But the minister's daughter and the doctor's son, said Anne, mimicking Miss Cornelia's tone.

Then she laughed.

Dear Miss Cornelia, they're only little children.

And you know they've never yet done anything bad.

They're just heedless and impulsive, as I was myself once they'll grow sedate and.

Sober as I've done.

Miss Cornelia laughed, too.

There are times, and deary, when I know by your eyes that your soberness.

Is put on like a garment and.

You'Re really aching to do something wild and young again.

Well, I feel encouraged somehow.

A talk with you always does have that effect on me.

Now, when I go to see Barbara Sampson, it's just the opposite.

She makes me feel that everything's wrong.

And always will be.

But of course, living all your life with a man like Joe Samson wouldn't be exactly cheering.

It is a very strange thing to think that she married Joe Sampson after all her chances, remarked Susan.

She was much sought after when she was a girl.

She used to boast to me that.

She had 21 bows and Mr.

pthink?

What was Mr.

pthink?

Well, he was a sort of hanger on, Mrs.

Dr, dear, but you could not exactly call him a bow.

He did not really have any intentions.

21 bows and me that never had one.

But Barbara went through the woods and picked up the Crooked Stick after all.

And yet they say her husband can make better baking powder biscuits than she can, and she always gets him to make them when company comes to tea.

Which reminds me that I have company coming to tea tomorrow and I must.

Go home and set my bread, said Miss Cornelia.

Mary said she could set it, and no doubt she could.

But while I live and move and have my being, I set my own bread, believe me.

How is Mary getting on?

Asked Anne.

I have no fault to find with.

Mary, said Miss Cornelia, rather gloomily.

She's getting some flesh on her bones and she's clean and respectful though there's more in her than I can fathom.

She's a sly puss.

If you dug for a thousand years, you couldn't get to the bottom of that child's mind, believe me.

As for Work, I never saw anything like her.

She eats it up.

Mrs.

Wiley may have been cruel to her, but folks needn't say she made Mary work.

Mary's a born worker.

Sometimes I wonder which will wear out first, her legs or her tongue.

I don't have enough to do to keep me out of mischief these days.

I'll be real glad when school opens, for then I'll have something to do again.

Mary doesn't want to go to school, but I put my foot down and said that, gosh she must.

I shall not have the Methodist saying that I kept her out of school while I lulled in idleness.

Thank you for joining Bite at a.

Time Books today while we read a bite of one of your favorite classics.

Again, my name is Brie Carlyle, and.

I hope you come back tomorrow for.

The next bite of Rainbow Valley.

Don't forget to sign up for our newsletter at bite atetimebooks.com and check out the shop.

You can check out the show notes or our website, byteimebooks.com for the rest of the links for our show.

Take a look and look, and let's see what we can find.