Anne of the Island - L. M. Montgomery [13]
“Bolingbroke!” exclaimed Anne. “Why, that is where I was born.”
“Do you really mean it? Why, that makes you a Bluenose after all.”
“No, it doesn’t,” retorted Anne. “Wasn’t it Dan O’Connell who said that if a man was born in a stable it didn’t make him a horse? I’m Island to the core.”
“Well, I’m glad you were born in Bolingbroke anyway. It makes us kind of neighbors, doesn’t it? And I like that, because when I tell you secrets it won’t be as if I were telling them to a stranger. I have to tell them. I can’t keep secrets—it’s no use to try. That’s my worst failing—that, and indecision, as aforesaid. Would you believe it?—it took me half an hour to decide which hat to wear when I was coming here—here, to a graveyard! At first I inclined to my brown one with the feather; but as soon as I put it on I thought this pink one with the floppy brim would be more becoming. When I got it pinned in place I liked the brown one better. At last I put them close together on the bed, shut my eyes, and jabbed with a hat pin. The pin speared the pink one, so I put it on. It is becoming, isn’t it? Tell me, what do you think of my looks?”
At this naive demand, made in a perfectly serious tone, Priscilla laughed again. But Anne said, impulsively squeezing Philippa’s hand, “We thought this morning that you were the prettiest girl we saw at Redmond.”
Philippa’s crooked mouth flashed into a bewitching, crooked smile over very white little teeth.
“I thought that myself,” was her next astounding statement, “but I wanted someone else’s opinion to bolster mine up. I can’t decide even on my own appearance. Just as soon as I’ve decided that I’m pretty I begin to feel miserably that I’m not. Besides, have a horrible old great-aunt who is always saying to me, with a mournful sigh, ‘You were such a pretty baby. It’s strange how children change when they grow up.’ I adore aunts, but I detest great-aunts. Please tell me quite often that I am pretty, if you don’t mind. I feel so much more comfortable when I can believe I’m pretty. And I’ll be just as obliging to you if you want me to—I can be, with a clear conscience.”
“Thanks,” laughed Anne, “but Priscilla and I are so firmly convinced of our own good looks that we don’t need any assurance about them, so you needn’t trouble.”
“Oh, you’re laughing at me. I know you think I’m abominably vain, but I’m not. There really isn’t one spark of vanity in me. And I’m never a bit grudging about paying compliments to other girls when they deserve them. I’m so glad I know you folks. I came up on Saturday and I’ve nearly died of homesickness ever since. It’s a horrible feeling, isn’t it? In Bolingbroke I’m an important personage, and in Kingsport I’m just nobody! There were times when I could feel my soul turning a delicate blue. Where do you hang out?”
“Thirty-eight St. John’s Street.”
“Better and better. Why, I’m just around the corner on Wallace Street. I don’t like my boardinghouse, though. It’s bleak and lonesome, and my room looks out on such an unholy back yard. It’s the ugliest place in the world. As for cats—well, surely all the Kingsport cats can’t congregate there at night, but half of them must. I adore cats on hearth rugs, snoozing before nice, friendly fires, but cats in back yards at midnight are totally different animals. The first night I was here I cried all night, and so did the cats. You should have seen my nose in the morning. How I wished I had never left home!”
“I don’t know how you managed to make up your mind to come to Redmond at all, if you are really such an undecided person,” said amused Priscilla.
“Bless your heart, honey, I didn’t. It was father who wanted me to come here. His heart was set on it—why, I don’t know. It seems perfectly ridiculous to think of me studying for a B.A. degree, doesn’t it? Not but what I can do it, all right. I have heaps of brains.”
“Oh!” said Priscilla vaguely.
“Yes. But it’s such hard work to use them. And B.A.’s are such learned, dignified, wise, solemn creatures—they must be. No, I didn’t want to come to Redmond. I did