"You have very beautiful hair, my dear," said Miss Minerva admiringly. "I always liked red hair. My Aunt Lydia had it . . . she was the only red-haired Tomgallon. One night when she was brushing it in the north room it caught fire from her candle and she ran shrieking down the hall wrapped in flames. All part of the Curse, my dear . . . all part of the Curse."
"Was she . . ."
"No, she wasn't burned to death, but she lost all her beauty. She was very handsome and vain. She never went out of the house from that night to the day of her death and she left directions that her coffin was to be shut so that no one might see her scarred face. Won't you sit down to remove your rubbers, my dear? This is a very comfortable chair. My sister died in it from a stroke. She was a widow and came back home to live after her husband's death. Her little girl was scalded in our
kitchen with a pot of boiling water. Wasn't that a tragic way for a child to die?"
"Oh, how . . ."
"But at least we knew how it died. My half-aunt Eliza . . . at least, she would have been my half-aunt if she had lived . . . just disappeared when she was six years old. Nobody ever knew what became of her."
"But surely . . ."
"Every search was made but nothing was ever discovered. It was said that her mother . . . my step-grandmother . . . had been very cruel to an orphan niece of my grandfather's who was being brought up here. She locked it up in the closet at the head of the stairs, one hot summer day, for punishment and when she went to let it out she found it . . . dead. Some people thought it was a judgment on her when her own child vanished. But I think it was just Our Curse."
"Who put . . . ?"
"What a high instep you have, my dear! My instep used to be admired too. It was said a stream of water could run under it . . . the test of an aristocrat."
Miss Minerva modestly poked a slipper from under her velvet skirt and revealed what was undoubtedly a very handsome foot.
"It certainly . . ."
"Would you like to see over the house, my dear, before we have supper? It used to be the Pride of Summerside. I suppose everything is very old-fashioned now, but perhaps there are a few things of interest. That sword hanging by the head of the stairs belonged to my great-great-grandfather who was an officer in the British Army and received a grant of land in Prince Edward Island for his services. He never lived in this house, but my great-great-grandmother did for a few weeks. She did not long survive her son's tragic death."
Miss Minerva marched Anne ruthlessly over the whole huge house, full of great square rooms . . . ballroom, conservatory, billiard-room, three drawing-rooms, breakfast-room, no end of bedrooms and an enormous attic. They were all splendid and dismal.
"Those were my Uncle Ronald and my Uncle Reuben," said Miss Minerva, indicating two worthies who seemed to be scowling at each other from the opposite sides of a fireplace. "They were twins and they hated each other bitterly from birth. The house rang with their quarrels. It darkened their mother's whole life. And during their final quarrel in this very room, while a thunderstorm was going on, Reuben was killed by a flash of lightning. Ronald never got over it. He was a haunted man from that day. His wife," Miss Minerva added reminiscently, "swallowed her wedding-ring."
"What an ex . . ."
"Ronald thought it was very careless and wouldn't have anything done. A prompt emetic might have . . . but it was never heard of again. It spoiled her life. She always felt so unmarried without a wedding-ring."
"What a beautiful . . ."
"Oh, yes, that was my Aunt Emilia . . . not my aunt really, of course. Just the wife of Uncle Alexander. She was noted for her spiritual look, but she poisoned her husband with a stew of mushrooms . . . toadstools really. We always pretended it was an accident, because a murder is such a messy thing to have in a family, but we all knew the truth. Of course she married him against her will. She was a gay young thing and he was far too old for her. December and May, my dear. Still, that did not really justify toadstools. She went into a decline soon afterwards. They are buried together in Charlottetown . . . all the Tomgallons bury in Charlottetown. This was my Aunt Louise. She drank laudanum. The doctor pumped it out and saved her, but we all felt we could never trust her again. It was really rather a relief when she died respectably of pneumonia. Of course, some of us didn't blame her much. You see, my dear, her husband had spanked her."
"Spanked . . ."
"Exactly. There are really some things no gentleman should do, my dear, and one of them is spank his wife. Knock her down . . . possibly . . . but spank her, never! I would like," said Miss Minerva, very majestically, "to see the man who would dare to spank me."
Anne felt she would like to see him also. She realized that there are limits to the imagination after all. By no stretch of hers could she imagine a husband spanking Miss Minerva Tomgallon.
"This is the ballroom. Of course it is never used now. But there have been any number of balls here. The Tomgallon balls were famous. People came from all over the Island to them. That chandelier cost my father five hundred dollars. My Great-aunt Patience dropped dead while dancing here one night . . . right there in that corner. She had fretted a great deal over a man who had disappointed her. I cannot imagine any girl breaking her heart over a man. Men," said Miss Minerva, staring at a photograph of her father . . . a person with bristling side-whiskers and a hawk-like nose . . . "have always seemed to me such trivial creatures."
The dining-room was in keeping with the rest of the house. There was another ornate chandelier, an equally ornate, gilt-framed mirror over the mantelpiece, and a table beautifully set with silver and crystal and old Crown Derby. The supper, served by a rather grim and ancient maid, was bountiful and exceedingly good, and Anne's healthy young appetite did full justice to it. Miss Minerva kept silence for a time and Anne dared say nothing for fear of starting another avalanche of tragedies. Once a large, sleek black cat came into the room and sat down by Miss Minerva with a hoarse meow. Miss Minerva poured a saucer of cream and set it down before him. She seemed so much more human after this that Anne lost a good deal of her awe of the last of the Tomgallons.
"Do have some more of the peaches, my dear. You've eaten nothing . . . positively nothing."
"Oh, Miss Tomgallon, I've enjoyed . . ."
"The Tomgallons always set a good table," said Miss Minerva complacently. "My Aunt Sophia made the best sponge-cake I ever tasted. I think the only person my father ever really hated to see come to our house was his sister Mary, because she had such a poor appetite. She just minced and tasted. He took it as a personal insult. Father was a very unrelenting man. He never forgave my brother Richard for marrying against his will. He ordered him out of the house and he was never allowed to enter it again. Father always repeated the Lord's Prayer at family worship every morning, but after Richard flouted him he always left out the sentence, 'Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.' I can see him," said Miss Minerva dreamily, "kneeling there leaving it out."
After supper they went to the smallest of the three drawing-rooms . . . which was still rather big and grim . . . and spent the evening before the huge fire . . . a pleasant, friendly enough fire. Anne crocheted at a set of intricate doilies and Miss Minerva knitted away at an afghan and kept up what was practically a monologue composed in great part of colorful and gruesome Tomgallon history.
"This is a house of tragical memories, my dear."
"Miss Tomgallon, didn't any pleasant thing ever happen in this house?" asked Anne, achieving a complete sentence by a mere fluke. Miss Minerva had had to stop talking long enough to blow her nose.
"Oh, I suppose so," said Miss Minerva, as if she hated to admit it. "Yes, of course, we used to have gay times here when I was a girl. They tell me you're writing a book about every one in Summerside, my dear."
"I'm not . . . there isn't a word of truth . . ."
"Oh!" Miss Minerva was plainly a little disappointed. "Well, if ever you do you are at liberty to use any of our stories you like, perhaps with the names disguised. And now what do you say to a game of parchesi?"
"I'm afraid it is time I was going. . . ."
"Oh, my dear, you can't go home tonight. It's pouring cats and dogs . . . and listen to the wind. I don't keep a carriage now . . . I have so little use for one . . . and you can't walk half a mile in that deluge. You must be my guest for the night."
Anne was not sure she wanted to spend a night in Tomgallon House. But neither did she want to walk to Windy Poplars in a March tempest. So they had their game of parchesi . . . in which Miss Minerva was so interested that she forgot to talk about horrors . . . and then a "bedtime snack." They ate cinnamon toast and drank cocoa out of old Tomgallon cups of marvelous thinness and beauty.
Finally Miss Minerva took her up to a guest-room which Anne at first was glad to see was not the one where Miss Minerva's sister had died of a stroke.
"This is Aunt Annabella's room," said Miss Minerva, lighting the candles in the silver candlesticks on a rather pretty green dressing-table and turning out the gas. Matthew Tomgallon had blown out the gas one night . . . whereupon exit Matthew Tomgallon. "She was the handsomest of all the Tomgallons. That's her picture above the mirror. Do you notice what a proud mouth she had? She made that crazy quilt on the bed. I hope you'll be comfortable, my dear. Mary has aired the bed and put two hot bricks in it. And she has aired this night-dress for you . . ." pointing to an ample flannel garment hanging over a chair and smelling strongly of moth balls. "I hope it will fit you. It hasn't been worn since poor Mother died in it. Oh, I nearly forgot to tell you . . ." Miss Minerva turned back at the door . . . "this is the room Oscar Tomgallon came back to life in--after being thought dead for two days. They didn't want him to, you know--that was the tragedy. I hope you'll sleep well, my dear."
Anne did not know if she could sleep at all or not. Suddenly there seemed something strange and alien in the room . . . something a little hostile. But is there not something strange about any room that has been occupied through generations? Death has lurked in it . . . love has been rosy red in it . . . births have been here . . . all the passions . . . all the hopes. It is full of wraths.
But this was really rather a terrible old house, full of the ghosts of dead hatreds and heart-breaks, crowded with dark deeds that had never been dragged into light and were still festering in its corners and hidy-holes. Too many women must have wept here. The wind wailed very eerily in the spruces by the window. For a moment Anne felt like running out, storm or no storm.
Then she took herself resolutely in hand and commanded common sense. If tragic and dreadful things had happened here, many shadowy years agone, amusing and lovely things must have happened, too. Gay and pretty girls had danced here and talked over their charming secrets; dimpled babies had been born here; there had been weddings and balls and music and laughter. The sponge-cake lady must have been a comfortable creature and the unforgiven Richard a gallant lover.
"I'll think on these things and go to bed. What a quilt to sleep under! I wonder if I'll be as crazy as it by morning. And this is a spare room! I've never forgotten what a thrill it used to give me to sleep in any one's spare room."
Anne uncoiled and brushed her hair under the very nose of Annabella Tomgallon, who stared down at her with a face in which there were pride and vanity, and something of the insolence of great beauty. Anne felt a little creepy as she looked in the mirror. Who knew what faces might look out of it at her? All the tragic and haunted ladies who had ever looked into it, perhaps. She bravely opened the closet door, half expecting any number of skeletons to tumble out, and hung up her dress. She sat down calmly on a rigid chair, which looked as if it would be insulted if anybody sat on it, and took off her shoes. Then she put on the flannel nightgown, blew out the candles and got into the bed, pleasantly warm from Mary's bricks. For a little while the rain streaming on the panes and the shriek of the wind around the old eaves prevented her from sleeping. Then she forgot all the Tomgallon tragedies in dreamless slumber until she found herself looking at dark fir boughs against a red sunrise.
"I've enjoyed having you so much, my dear," said Miss Minerva when Anne left after breakfast. "We've had a real cheerful visit, haven't we? Though I've lived so long alone I've almost forgotten how to talk. And I need not say what a delight it is to meet a really charming and unspoiled young girl in this frivolous age. I didn't tell you yesterday but it was my birthday, and it was very pleasant to have a bit of youth in the house. There is nobody to remember my birthday now . . ." Miss Minerva gave a faint sigh . . . "and once there were so many."
"Well, I suppose you heard a pretty grim chronicle," said Aunt Chatty that night.
"Did all those things Miss Minerva told me really happen, Aunt Chatty?"
"Well, the queer thing is, they did," said Aunt Chatty. "It's a curious thing, Miss Shirley, but a lot of awful things did happen to the Tomgallons."
"I don't know that there were many more than happen in any large family in the course of six generations," said Aunt Kate.
"Oh, I think there were. They really did seem under a curse. So many of them died sudden or violent deaths. Of course there is a streak of insanity in them . . . every one knows that. That was curse enough . . . but I've heard an old story . . . I can't recall the details . . . of the carpenter who built the house cursing it. Something about the contract . . . old Paul Tomgallon held him to it and it ruined him, it cost so much more than he had figured."
"Miss Minerva seems rather proud of the curse," said Anne.
"Poor old thing, it's all she has," said Rebecca Dew.
Anne smiled to think of the stately Miss Minerva being referred to as a poor old thing. But she went to the tower room and wrote to Gilbert:
"I thought Tomgallon House was a sleepy old place where nothing ever happened. Well, perhaps things don't happen now but evidently they did. Little Elizabeth is always talking of Tomorrow. But the old Tomgallon house is Yesterday. I'm glad I don't live in Yesterday . . . that Tomorrow is still a friend.
"Of course I think Miss Minerva has all the Tomgallon liking for the spotlight and gets no end of satisfaction out of her tragedies. They are to her what husband and children are to other women. But, oh, Gilbert, no matter how old we get in years to come, don't let's ever see life as all tragedy and revel in it. I think I'd hate a house one hundred and twenty years old. I hope when we get our house of dreams it will either be new, ghostless and traditionless, or, if that can't be, at least have been occupied by reasonably happy people. I shall never forget my night at Tomgallon House. And for once in my life I've met a person who could talk me down."
Little Elizabeth Grayson had been born expecting things to happen. That they seldom happened under the watchful eyes of Grandmother and the Woman never brighted her expectations in the least. Things were just bound to happen some time . . . if not today, then tomorrow.
When Miss Shirley came to live at Windy Poplars Elizabeth felt that Tomorrow must be very close at hand and her visit to Green Gables was like a foretaste of it. But now in the June of Miss Shirley's third and last year in Summerside High, little Elizabeth's heart had descended into the nice buttoned boots Grandmother always got for her to wear. Many children at the school where she went envied little Elizabeth those beautiful buttoned kid boots. But little Elizabeth cared nothing about buttoned boots when she could not tread the way to freedom in them. And now her adored Miss Shirley was going away from her forever. At the end of June she would be leaving Summerside and going back to that beautiful Green Gables. Little Elizabeth simply could not bear the thought of it. It was of no use for Miss Shirley to promise that she would have her down to Green Gables in the summer before she was married. Little Elizabeth knew somehow that Grandmother would not let her go again. Little Elizabeth knew Grandmother had never really approved of her intimacy with Miss Shirley.
"It will be the end of everything, Miss Shirley," she sobbed.
"Let's hope, darling, that it is only a new beginning," said Anne cheerfully. But she felt downcast herself. No word had ever come from little Elizabeth's father. Either her letter had never reached
him or he did not care. And, if he did not care, what was to become of Elizabeth? It was bad enough now in her childhood, but what would it be later on?
"Those two old dames will boss her to death," Rebecca Dew had said. Anne felt that there was more truth than elegance in her remark.
Elizabeth knew that she was "bossed." And she especially resented being bossed by the Woman. She did not like it in Grandmother, of course, but one conceded reluctantly that perhaps a grandmother had a certain right to boss you. But what right had the Woman? Elizabeth always wanted to ask her that right out. She would do it some time . . . when Tomorrow came. And oh, how she would enjoy the look on the Woman's face!
Grandmother would never let little Elizabeth go out walking by herself . . . for fear, she said, that she might be kidnaped by gypsies. A child had been once, forty years before. It was very seldom gypsies came to the Island now, and little Elizabeth felt that it was only an excuse. But why should Grandmother care whether she were kidnaped or not? Elizabeth knew that Grandmother and the Woman didn't love her at all. Why, they never even spoke of her by her name if they could help it. It was always "the child." How Elizabeth hated to be called "the child" just as they might have spoken of "the dog" or "the cat" if there had been one. But when Elizabeth had ventured a protest, Grandmother's face had grown dark and angry and little Elizabeth had been punished for impertinence, while the Woman looked on, well content. Little Elizabeth often wondered just why the Woman hated her. Why should any one hate you when you were so small? Could you be worth hating? Little Elizabeth did not know that the mother whose life she had cost had been that bitter old woman's darling and, if she had known, could not have understood what perverted shapes thwarted love can take.
Little Elizabeth hated the gloomy, splendid Evergreens, where everything seemed unacquainted with her although she had lived in it all her life. But after Miss Shirley had come to Windy Poplars everything had changed magically. Little Elizabeth lived in a world of romance after Miss Shirley's coming. There was beauty wherever you looked. Fortunately Grandmother and the Woman couldn't prevent you from looking, though Elizabeth had no doubt they would if they could. The short walks along the red magic of the harbor road, which she was all too rarely permitted to share with Miss Shirley, were the high lights in her shadowy life. She loved everything she saw . . . the far-away lighthouse painted in odd red and white rings . . . the far, dim blue shores . . . the little silvery blue waves . . . the range lights that gleamed through the violet dusks . . . all gave her so much delight that it hurt. And the harbor with its smoky islands and glowing sunsets! Elizabeth always went up to a window in the mansard roof to watch them through the treetops . . . and the ships that sailed at the rising of the moon. Ships that came back . . . ships that never came back. Elizabeth longed to go in one of them . . . on a voyage to the Island of Happiness. The ships that never came back stayed there, where it was always Tomorrow.
That mysterious red road ran on and on and her feet itched to follow it. Where did it lead to? Sometimes Elizabeth thought she would burst if she didn't find out. When Tomorrow really came she would fare forth on it and perhaps find an island all her own where she and Miss Shirley could
live alone and Grandmother and the Woman could never come. They both hated water and would not put foot in a boat for anything. Little Elizabeth liked to picture herself standing on her island and mocking them, as they stood vainly glowering on the mainland shore.
"This is Tomorrow," she would taunt them. "You can't catch me any more. You're only in Today."
What fun it would be! How she would enjoy the look on the Woman's face!
Then one evening in late June an amazing thing happened. Miss Shirley had told Mrs. Campbell that she had an errand next day at Flying Cloud, to see a certain Mrs. Thompson, who was convener of the refreshment committee of the Ladies' Aid, and might she take Elizabeth with her. Grandmother had agreed with her usual dourness . . . Elizabeth could never understand why she agreed at all, being completely ignorant of the Pringle horror of a certain bit of information Miss Shirley possessed . . . but she had agreed.
"We'll go right down to the harbor mouth," whispered Anne, "after I've done my errand at Flying Cloud."
Little Elizabeth went to bed in such excitement that she didn't expect to sleep a wink. At last she was going to answer the lure of the road that had called so long. In spite of her excitement, she conscientiously went through her little ritual of retiring. She folded her clothes and cleaned her teeth and brushed her golden hair. She thought she had rather pretty hair, though of course it wasn't like Miss Shirley's lovely red-gold with the ripples in it and the little love-locks that curled around her ears. Little Elizabeth would have given anything to have had hair like Miss Shirley's.
Before she got into bed little Elizabeth opened one of the drawers in the high, black, polished old bureau and took a carefully hidden picture from under a pile of hankies . . . a picture of Miss Shirley which she had cut out of a special edition of the Weekly Courier that had reproduced a photograph of the High School staff.
"Good night, dearest Miss Shirley." She kissed the picture and returned it to its hiding-place. Then she climbed into bed and cuddled down under the blankets . . . for the June night was cool and the breeze of the harbor searching. Indeed, it was more than a breeze tonight. It whistled and banged and shook and thumped, and Elizabeth knew the harbor would be a tossing expanse of waves under the moonlight. What fun it would be to steal down close to it under the moon! But it was only in Tomorrow one could do that.
Where was Flying Cloud? What a name! Out of Tomorrow again. It was maddening to be so near Tomorrow and not be able to get into it. But suppose the wind blew up rain for tomorrow! Elizabeth knew she would never be allowed to go anywhere in rain.
She sat up in bed and clasped her hands.
"Dear God," she said, "I don't like to meddle, but could You see that it is fine tomorrow? Please,
dear God."
The next afternoon was glorious. Little Elizabeth felt as if she had slipped from some invisible shackles when she and Miss Shirley walked away from that house of gloom. She took a huge gulp of freedom, even if the Woman was scowling after them through the red glass of the big front door. How heavenly to be walking through the lovely world with Miss Shirley! It was always so wonderful to be alone with Miss Shirley. What would she do when Miss Shirley had gone? But little Elizabeth put the thought firmly away. She wouldn't spoil the day by thinking it. Perhaps . . . a great perhaps . . . she and Miss Shirley would get into Tomorrow this afternoon and then they would never be separated. Little Elizabeth just wanted to walk quietly on towards that blueness at the end of the world, drinking in the beauty around her. Every turn and kink of the road revealed new lovelinesses . . . and it turned and kinked interminably, following the windings of a tiny river that seemed to have appeared from nowhere.
On every side were fields of buttercups and clover where bees buzzed. Now and then they walked through a milky way of daisies. Far out the strait laughed at them in silver-tipped waves. The harbor was like watered silk. Little Elizabeth liked it better that way than when it was like pale blue satin. They drank the wind in. It was a very gentle wind. It purred about them and seemed to coax them on.
"Isn't it nice, walking with the wind like this?" said little Elizabeth.
"A nice, friendly, perfumed wind," said Anne, more to herself than Elizabeth. "Such a wind as I used to think a mistral was. Mistral sounds like that. What a disappointment when I found out it was a rough, disagreeable wind!"
Elizabeth didn't quite understand . . . she had never heard of the mistral . . . but the music of her beloved's voice was enough for her. The very sky was glad. A sailor with gold rings in his ears . . . the very kind of person one would meet in Tomorrow . . . smiled as he passed them. Elizabeth thought of a verse she had learned in Sunday-school . . . "The little hills rejoice on every side." Had the man who wrote that ever seen hills like those blue ones over the harbor?
"I think this road leads right to God," she said dreamily.
"Perhaps," said Anne. "Perhaps all roads do, little Elizabeth. We turn off here just now. We must go over to that island . . . that's Flying Cloud."
Flying Cloud was a long, slender islet, lying about a quarter of a mile from the shore. There were trees on it and a house. Little Elizabeth had always wished she might have an island of her own, with a little bay of silver sand in it.
"How do we get to it?"
"We'll row out in this flat," said Miss Shirley, picking up the oars in a small boat tied to a leaning
tree.
Miss Shirley could row. Was there anything Miss Shirley couldn't do? When they reached the island, it proved to be a fascinating place where anything might happen. Of course it was in Tomorrow. Islands like this didn't happen except in Tomorrow. They had no part or lot in humdrum Today.
A little maid who met them at the door of the house told Anne she would find Mrs. Thompson on the far end of the island, picking wild strawberries. Fancy an island where wild strawberries grew!
Anne went to hunt Mrs. Thompson up, but first she asked if little Elizabeth might wait in the living-room. Anne was thinking that little Elizabeth looked rather tired after her unaccustomedly long walk and needed a rest. Little Elizabeth didn't think she did, but Miss Shirley's lightest wish was law.
It was a beautiful room, with flowers everywhere and wild sea-breezes blowing in. Elizabeth liked the mirror over the mantel which reflected the room so beautifully and, through the open window, a glimpse of harbor and hill and strait.
All at once a man came through the door. Elizabeth felt a moment of dismay and terror. Was he a gypsy? He didn't look like her idea of a gypsy but of course she had never seen one. He might be one . . . and then in a swift flash of intuition Elizabeth decided she didn't care if he did kidnap her. She liked his crinkly hazel eyes and his crinkly brown hair and his square chin and his smile. For he was smiling.
"Now, who are you?" he asked.
"I'm . . . I'm me," faltered Elizabeth, still a little flustered.
"Oh, to be sure . . . you. Popped out of the sea, I suppose . . . come up from the dunes . . . no name known among mortals."
Elizabeth felt that she was being made fun of a little. But she didn't mind. In fact she rather liked it. But she answered a bit primly.
"My name is Elizabeth Grayson."
There was a silence . . . a very queer silence. The man looked at her for a moment without saying anything. Then he politely asked her to sit down.
"I'm waiting for Miss Shirley," she explained. "She's gone to see Mrs. Thompson about the Ladies' Aid Supper. When she comes back we are going down to the end of the world."
Now, if you have any notion of kidnaping me, Mr. Man!
"Of course. But meanwhile you might as well be comfortable. And I must do the honors. What would you like in the way of light refreshment? Mrs. Thompson's cat has probably brought something in."
Elizabeth sat down. She felt oddly happy and at home. "Can I have just what I like?" "Certainly." "Then," said Elizabeth triumphantly, "I'd like some ice-cream with strawberry jam on it." The man rang a bell and gave an order. Yes, this must be Tomorrow . . . no doubt about it.
Ice-cream and strawberry jam didn't appear in this magical manner in Today, cats or no cats. "We'll set a share aside for your Miss Shirley," said the man. They were good friends right away. The man didn't talk a great deal, but he looked at Elizabeth
very often. There was a tenderness in his face . . . a tenderness she had never seen before in anybody's face, not even Miss Shirley's. She felt that he liked her. And she knew that she liked him.
Finally he glanced out of the window and stood up.
"I think I must go now," he said. "I see your Miss Shirley coming up the walk, so you'll not be alone." "Won't you wait and see Miss Shirley?" asked Elizabeth, licking her spoon to get the last vestige
of the jam. Grandmother and the Woman would have died of horror had they seen her. "Not this time," said the man. Elizabeth knew he hadn't the slightest notion of kidnaping her, and she felt the strangest, most
unaccountable sensation of disappointment. "Good-by and thank you," she said politely. "It is very nice here in Tomorrow." "Tomorrow?" "This is Tomorrow," explained Elizabeth. "I've always wanted to get into Tomorrow and now I
have." "Oh, I see. Well, I'm sorry to say I don't care much about Tomorrow. I would like to get back into
Yesterday."
Little Elizabeth was sorry for him. But how could he be unhappy? How could any one living in Tomorrow be unhappy?
Elizabeth looked longingly back to Flying Cloud as they rowed away. Just as they pushed through the scrub spruces that fringed the shore to the road, she turned for another farewell look at it. A flying team of horses attached to a truck wagon whirled around the bend, evidently quite beyond their driver's control.
Elizabeth heard Miss Shirley shriek. . . .
The room went around oddly. The furniture nodded and jiggled. The bed . . . how came she to be in bed? Somebody with a white cap on was just going out of the door. What door? How funny one's head felt! There were voices somewhere . . . low voices. She could not see who was talking, but somehow she knew it was Miss Shirley and the man.
What were they saying? Elizabeth heard sentences here and there, bobbing out of a confusion of murmuring.
"Are you really . . . ?" Miss Shirley's voice sounded so excited..
"Yes . . . your letter . . . see for myself . . . before approaching Mrs. Campbell . . . Flying Cloud is the summer home of our General Manager. . . ."
If that room would only stay put! Really, things behaved rather queerly in Tomorrow. If she could only turn her head and see the talkers . . . Elizabeth gave a long sigh.
Then they came over to her bed . . . Miss Shirley and the man. Miss Shirley all tall and white, like a lily, looking as if she had been through some terrible experience but with some inner radiance shining behind it all . . . a radiance that seemed part of the golden sunset light which suddenly flooded the room. The man was smiling down at her. Elizabeth felt that he loved her very much and that there was some secret, tender and dear, between them which she would learn as soon as she had learned the language spoken in Tomorrow.
"Are you feeling better, darling?" said Miss Shirley.
"Have I been sick?" "You were knocked down by a team of runaway horses on the mainland road," said Miss Shirley.
"I . . . I wasn't quick enough. I thought you were killed. I brought you right back here in the flat and your . . . this gentleman telephoned for a doctor and nurse." "Will I die?" said little Elizabeth. "No, indeed, darling. You were only stunned and you will be all right soon. And, Elizabeth darling,
this is your father."
"Father is in France. Am I in France, too?" Elizabeth would not have been surprised at it. Wasn't this Tomorrow? Besides, things were still a bit wobbly. "Father is very much here, my sweet." He had such a delightful voice . . . you loved him for his
voice. He bent and kissed her. "I've come for you. We'll never be separated anymore."
The woman in the white cap was coming in again. Somehow, Elizabeth knew whatever she had to say must be said before she got quite in. "Will we live together?" "Always," said Father. "And will Grandmother and the Woman live with us?" "They will not," said Father. The sunset gold was fading and the nurse was looking her disapproval. But Elizabeth didn't care. "I've found Tomorrow," she said, as the nurse looked Father and Miss Shirley out. "I've found a treasure I didn't know I possessed," said Father, as the nurse shut the door on him.
"And I can never thank you enough for that letter, Miss Shirley." "And so," wrote Anne to Gilbert that night, "little Elizabeth's road of mystery has led on to happiness and the end of her old world."
"Windy Poplars, "Spook's Lane, "(For the last time), "June 27th.
"DEAREST:
"I've come to another bend in the road. I've written you a good many letters in this old tower room these past three years. I suppose this is the last one I will write you for a long, long time. Because after this there won't be any need of letters. In just a few weeks now we'll belong to each other forever . . . we'll be together. Just think of it . . . being together . . . talking, walking, eating. dreaming, planning together . . . sharing each other's wonderful moments . . . making a home out of our house of dreams. Our house! Doesn't that sound 'mystic and wonderful,' Gilbert? I've been building dream houses all my life and now one of them is going to come true. As to whom I really want to share my house of dreams with . . . well, I'll tell you that at four o'clock next year.
"Three years sounded endless at the beginning, Gilbert. And now they are gone like a watch in the night. They have been very happy years . . . except for those first few months with the Pringles. After that, life has seemed to flow by like a pleasant golden river. And my old feud with the Pringles seems like a dream. They like me now for myself . . . they have forgotten they ever hated me. Cora Pringle, one of the Widow Pringle's brood, brought me a bouquet of roses yesterday and twisted round the stems was a bit of paper bearing the legend, 'To the sweetest teacher in the whole world.' Fancy that for a Pringle!
"Jen is broken-hearted because I am leaving. I shall watch Jen's career with interest. She is brilliant and rather unpredictable. One thing is certain . . . she will have no commonplace existence. She can't look so much like Becky Sharp for nothing.
"Lewis Allen is going to McGill. Sophy Sinclair is going to Queen's. Then she means to teach until she has saved up enough money to go to the School of Dramatic Expression in Kingsport. Myra Pringle is going to 'enter society' in the fall. She is so pretty that it won't matter a bit that she wouldn't know a past perfect participle if she met it on the street.
"And there is no longer a small neighbor on the other side of the vine-hung gate. Little Elizabeth has gone forever from that sunshineless house . . . gone into her Tomorrow. If I were staying on in Summerside I should break my heart, missing her. But as it is, I'm glad. Pierce Grayson took her away with him. He is not going back to Paris but will be living in Boston. Elizabeth cried bitterly at our parting but she is so happy with her father that I feel sure her tears will soon be dried. Mrs. Campbell and the Woman were very dour over the whole affair and put all the blame on me . . . which I accept cheerfully and unrepentantly.
"'She has had a good home here,' said Mrs. Campbell majestically.
"'Where she never heard a single word of affection,' I thought but did not say.
"'I think I'll be Betty all the time now, darling Miss Shirley,' were Elizabeth's last words. 'Except,' she called back, 'when I'm lonesome for you, and then I'll be Lizzie.'
"'Don't you ever dare to be Lizzie, no matter what happens,' I said.
"We threw kisses to each other as long as we could see, and I came up to my tower room with tears in my eyes. She's been so sweet, the dear little golden thing. She always seemed to me like a little aeolian harp, so responsive to the tiniest breath of affection that blew her way. It's been an adventure to be her friend. I hope Pierce Grayson realizes what a daughter he has . . . and I think he does. He sounded very grateful and repentant.
"'I didn't realize she was no longer a baby,' he said, 'nor how unsympathetic her environment was. Thank you a thousand times for all you have done for her.'
"I had our map of fairyland framed and gave it to little Elizabeth for a farewell keepsake.
"I'm sorry to leave Windy Poplars. Of course, I'm really a bit tired of living in a trunk, but I've loved it here . . . loved my cool morning hours at my window . . . loved my bed into which I have veritably climbed every night . . . loved my blue doughnut cushion . . . loved all the winds that blew. I'm afraid I'll never be quite so chummy with the winds again as I've been here. And shall I ever have a room again from which I can see both the rising and the setting sun?
"I've finished with Windy Poplars and the years that have been linked with it. And I've kept the faith. I've never betrayed Aunt Chatty's hidy-hole to Aunt Kate or the buttermilk secret of each to either of the others.
"I think they are all sorry to see me go . . . and I'm glad of it. It would be terrible to think they were glad I am going . . . or that they would not miss me a little when I'm gone. Rebecca Dew has been making all my favorite dishes for a week now . . . she even devoted ten eggs to angel-cake twice . . . and using the 'company' china. And Aunt Chatty's soft brown eyes brim over whenever I mention my departure. Even Dusty Miller seems to gaze at me reproachfully as he sits about on his little haunches.
"I had a long letter from Katherine last week. She has a gift for writing letters. She has got a position as private secretary to a globe-trotting M. P. What a fascinating phrase 'globe-trotting' is! A person who would say, 'Let's go to Egypt,' as one might say, 'Let's go to Charlottetown' . . . and go! That life will just suit Katherine.
"She persists in ascribing all her changed outlook and prospects to me. 'I wish I could tell you what you've brought into my life,' she wrote. I suppose I did help. And it wasn't easy at first. She seldom said anything without a sting in it, and listened to any suggestion I made in regard to the school work with an air of disdainfully humoring a lunatic. But somehow, I've forgotten it all. It
was just born of her secret bitterness against life.
"Everybody has been inviting me to supper . . . even Pauline Gibson. Old Mrs. Gibson died a few months ago, so Pauline dared do it. And I've been to Tomgallon House for another supper with Miss Minerva of that ilk and another one-sided conversation. But I had a very good time, eating the delicious meal Miss Minerva provided, and she had a good time airing a few more tragedies. She couldn't quite hide the fact that she was sorry for any one who was not a Tomgallon, but she paid me several nice compliments and gave me a lovely ring set with an aquamarine . . . a moonlight blend of blue and green . . . that her father had given her on her eighteenth birthday . . . 'when I was young and handsome, dear . . . quite handsome. I may say that now, I suppose.' I was glad it belonged to Miss Minerva and not to the wife of Uncle Alexander. I'm sure I could never have worn it if it had. It is very beautiful. There is a mysterious charm about the jewels of the sea.
"Tomgallon House is certainly very splendid, especially now when its grounds are all a-leaf and a-flower. But I wouldn't give my as yet unfounded house of dreams for Tomgallon House and grounds with the ghosts thrown in.
"Not but what a ghost might be a nice, aristocratic sort of thing to have around. My only quarrel with Spook's Lane is that there are no spooks.
"I went to my old graveyard yesterday evening for a last prowl . . . walked all round it and wondered if Herbert Pringle occasionally chuckled to himself in his grave. And I'm saying good-by tonight to the old Storm King, with the sunset on its brow, and my little winding valley full of dusk.
"I'm a wee bit tired after a month of exams and farewells and 'last things.' For a week after I get back to Green Gables I'm going to be lazy . . . do absolutely nothing but run free in a green world of summer loveliness. I'll dream by the Dryad's Bubble in the twilight. I'll drift on the Lake of Shining Waters in a shallop shaped from a moonbeam . . . or in Mr. Barry's flat, if moonbeam shallops are not in season. I'll gather starflowers and June bells in the Haunted Wood. I'll find plots of wild strawberries in Mr. Harrison's hill pasture. I'll join the dance of fireflies in Lover's Lane and visit Hester Gray's old, forgotten garden . . . and sit out on the back door-step under the stars and listen to the sea calling in its sleep.
"And when the week is ended you will be home . . . and I won't want anything else."
When the time came the next day for Anne to say good-by to the folks at Windy Poplars, Rebecca Dew was not on hand. Instead, Aunt Kate gravely handed Anne a letter.
"Dear Miss Shirley," wrote Rebecca Dew, "I am writing this to bid my farewell because I cannot
trust myself to say it. For three years you have sojourned under our roof. The fortunate possessor of a cheerful spirit and a natural taste for the gaieties of youth, you have never surrendered yourself to the vain pleasures of the giddy and fickle crowd. You have conducted yourself on all occasions and to every one, especially the one who pens these lines, with the most refined delicacy. You have always been most considerate of my feelings and I find a heavy gloom on my spirits at the thought of your departure. But we must not repine at what Providence has ordained. (First Samuel, 29th and 18th.)
"You will be lamented by all in Summerside who had the privilege of knowing you, and the homage of one faithful though humble heart will ever be yours, and my prayer will ever be for your happiness and welfare in this world and your eternal felicity in that which is to come.
"Something whispers to me that you will not be long 'Miss Shirley' but that you will erelong be linked together in a union of souls with the choice of your heart, who, I understand from what I have heard, is a very exceptional young man. The writer, possessed of but few personal charms and beginning to feel her age (not but what I'm good for a good few years yet), has never permitted herself to cherish any matrimonial aspirations. But she does not deny herself the pleasure of an interest in the nuptials of her friends and may I express a fervent wish that your married life will be one of continued and uninterrupted Bliss? (Only do not expect too much of a man.)
"My esteem and, may I say, my affection for you will never lessen, and once in a while when you have nothing better to do will you kindly remember that there is such a person as
"Your obedient servant,
"REBECCA DEW.
"P.S. God bless you."
Anne's eyes were misty as she folded the letter up. Though she strongly suspected Rebecca Dew had got most of her phrases out of her favorite "Book of Deportment and Etiquette," that did not make them any the less sincere, and the P. S. certainly came straight from Rebecca Dew's affectionate heart.
"Tell dear Rebecca Dew I'll never forget her and that I'm coming back to see you all every summer."
"We have memories of you that nothing can take away," sobbed Aunt Chatty.
"Nothing," said Aunt Kate, emphatically.
But as Anne drove away from Windy Poplars the last message from it was a large white bath-towel fluttering frantically from the tower window. Rebecca Dew was waving it.
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