Anne of Windy Poplars - L. M. Montgomery [28]
Last night I bearded the lion in his den; in other words, I went boldly up the front steps of the Evergreens to the square porch with the four whitewashed iron urns in its corner and rang the bell. When Miss Monkman came to the door I asked her if she would lend little Elizabeth to me for a walk. I expected a refusal, but after the Woman had gone in and conferred with Mrs Campbell she came back and said dourly that Elizabeth could go, but, please, I wasn’t to keep her out late. I wonder if even Mrs Campbell has got her orders from Miss Sarah.
Elizabeth came dancing down the dark stairway, looking like a pixie in a red coat and little green cap, and almost speechless for joy.
‘I feel all squirmy and excited, Miss Shirley,’ she whispered as soon as we got away. ‘I’m Betty. I’m always Betty when I feel like that.’
We went as far down the Road that Leads to the End of the World as we dared, and then back. Tonight the harbour, lying dark under a crimson sunset, seemed full of implications of ‘fairylands forlorn’ and mysterious isles in uncharted seas. I thrilled to it, and so did the mite I held by the hand.
‘If we ran hard, Miss Shirley, could we get into the sunset?’ she wanted to know. I remembered Paul and his fancies about the ‘sunset land’.
‘We must wait for Tomorrow before we can do that,’ I said. ‘Look, Elizabeth, at that golden island of cloud just over the harbour-mouth. Let’s pretend that’s your Island of Happiness.’
‘There is an island down there somewhere,’ said Elizabeth dreamily. ‘It’s name is Flying Cloud. Isn’t that a lovely name – a name just out of Tomorrow? I can see it from the garret windows. It belongs to a gentleman from Boston, and he has a summer home there. But I pretend it’s mine.’
At the door I stooped and kissed Elizabeth’s cheek before she went in. I shall never forget her eyes. Gilbert, that child is just starved for love.
Tonight, when she came over for her milk, I saw that she had been crying.
‘They – they made me wash your kiss off, Miss Shirley,’ she sobbed. ‘I didn’t want ever to wash my face again. I vowed I wouldn’t. Because, you see, I didn’t want to wash your kiss off. I got away to school this morning without doing it, but tonight the Woman just took me and scrubbed it off.’
I kept a straight face. ‘You couldn’t go through life without washing your face occasionally, darling. But never mind about the kiss. I’ll kiss you every night when you come for the milk, and then it won’t matter if it is washed off the next morning.’
‘You are the only person who loves me in the world,’ said Elizabeth. ‘When you talk to me I smell violets.’
Was anybody ever paid a prettier compliment? But I couldn’t quite let the first sentence pass.
‘Your grandmother loves you, Elizabeth.’
‘She doesn’t. She hates me.’
‘You’re just a wee bit foolish, darling. Your grandmother and Miss Monkman are both old people, and old people are easily disturbed and worried. Of course, you annoy them sometimes. And – of course – when they were young children were brought up much more strictly than they are now. They cling to the old way.’
But I felt I was not convincing Elizabeth. After all, they don’t love her, and she knows it. She looked carefully back at the house to see if the door was shut. Then she said deliberately, ‘Grandmother and the Woman are just two old tyrants, and when Tomorrow comes I’m going to escape them for ever.’
I think she expected I’d die of horror. I really suspect Elizabeth said it just to make a sensation. I merely laughed, and kissed her. I hope Martha Monkman saw it from the kitchen window.
I can see over Summerside from the left window in the tower. Just now it is a huddle of friendly white roofs – friendly at last, since the Pringles are my friends. Here and there a light is gleaming