After her brother, Albert, died, Dorrie lost her sense of security and now needs to be married to the mystery person who has fallen in love with her, remarks Millicent. Millicent is married to Porter, a much older man who owns three farms. After they married, she gave birth to three children. When Albert was alive, Porter was renting the siblings back their house after they were evicted but they never came up with enough money. To make up for the lack of money, Dorrie and Albert helped out around Millicent and Porter’s house, and Dorrie exhibited a remarkable strength for doing hard labor. 

While they were helpful in cleaning the house, the siblings did not do much housework in their own, as they had sold all of their furniture at the auction. After Albert’s death, Dorrie lost a part of herself and relayed to Millicent all of the humorous stories Albert told her about his grocery delivering job. Millicent compares Dorrie to her best friend Muriel and says that Dorrie is more of a lady than her. Muriel was not her first choice of a best friend but because her husband is a farmer she is not associated with the class of women she wishes she was. Muriel is over thirty and unmarried, but not for lack of trying. A music teacher, Muriel frequently went on dates with the married parents of the children she was instructing, a lifestyle Millicent vehemently disapproves of.

About two years after Albert died, Millicent invited an Anglican minister and his visiting friend to dinner. Millicent and Muriel worked to plan the meal. The friend, Mr. Speirs, is tall and thin and not a great conversationalist, to Muriel’s disappointment. The meal is interrupted twice. First, when Porter finds a distressed calf that strangled itself in the wire fence, a visual that Muriel finds representative of the boring dinner conversation. Secondly, Dorrie shows up late, having been sidetracked by a feral cat she shot on her way over. Mr. Spiers pays special attention to Dorrie and they engage in a side conversation about hunting muskrats, rabbits and cats.

Later that May, Dorrie shows up to Millicent’s house with white fabric to make a wedding dress as Dorrie is engaged to Mr. Speirs. Muriel helps cut the dress and Millicent takes charge of the planning and invitations. The Sunday before the wedding, Millicent invites Dorrie over for a meal and she doesn’t show. Millicent goes over to Dorrie’s house and finds her cooking dinner. Dorrie tells her that she doesn’t want to leave her house to live with Mr. Speir. Millicent lies and tells Dorrie that she and Porter have already sold the house in anticipation of her marriage. 

On the day of her wedding, Dorrie walks to the chapel. Years later, Millicent receives a postcard from Dorrie, writing from Australia. She said that she was happy, although her husband had died. After the wedding, Muriel had left for Alberta and married a widower. Millicent and Porter never sold or rented Dorrie’s house and persevered through time. Millicent reflects on the odd custom Dorrie and her brother used to practice of gathering walnuts that had fallen off the trees, counting them and then dumping them on the edge of the field. From her house across the way, Millicent looks at the walnut tree and asks herself why she hasn’t torn down the house.