Chapter IV
April’s Lady
Kingsport is a quaint old town, hearking back to early Colonial days,
and wrapped in its ancient atmosphere, as some fine old dame in
garments fashioned like those of her youth. Here and there it sprouts
out into modernity, but at heart it is still unspoiled; it is full of
curious relics, and haloed by the romance of many legends of the past.
Once it was a mere frontier station on the fringe of the wilderness,
and those were the days when Indians kept life from being monotonous to
the settlers. Then it grew to be a bone of contention between the
British and the French, being occupied now by the one and now by the
other, emerging from each occupation with some fresh scar of battling
nations branded on it.
It has in its park a martello tower, autographed all over by tourists,
a dismantled old French fort on the hills beyond the town, and several
antiquated cannon in its public squares. It has other historic spots
also, which may be hunted out by the curious, and none is more quaint
and delightful than Old St. John’s Cemetery at the very core of the
town, with streets of quiet, old-time houses on two sides, and busy,
bustling, modern thoroughfares on the others. Every citizen of
Kingsport feels a thrill of possessive pride in Old St. John’s, for, if
he be of any pretensions at all, he has an ancestor buried there, with
a queer, crooked slab at his head, or else sprawling protectively over
the grave, on which all the main facts of his history are recorded. For
the most part no great art or skill was lavished on those old
tombstones. The larger number are of roughly chiselled brown or gray
native stone, and only in a few cases is there any attempt at
ornamentation. Some are adorned with skull and cross-bones, and this
grizzly decoration is frequently coupled with a cherub’s head. Many are
prostrate and in ruins. Into almost all Time’s tooth has been gnawing,
until some inscriptions have been completely effaced, and others can
only be deciphered with difficulty. The graveyard is very full and very
bowery, for it is surrounded and intersected by rows of elms and
willows, beneath whose shade the sleepers must lie very dreamlessly,
forever crooned to by the winds and leaves over them, and quite
undisturbed by the clamor of traffic just beyond.
Anne took the first of many rambles in Old St. John’s the next
afternoon. She and Priscilla had gone to Redmond in the forenoon and
registered as students, after which there was nothing more to do that
day. The girls gladly made their escape, for it was not exhilarating to
be surrounded by crowds of strangers, most of whom had a rather alien
appearance, as if not quite sure where they belonged.
The “freshettes” stood about in detached groups of two or three,
looking askance at each other; the “freshies,” wiser in their day and
generation, had banded themselves together on the big staircase of the
entrance hall, where they were shouting out glees with all the vigor of
youthful lungs, as a species of defiance to their traditional enemies,
the Sophomores, a few of whom were prowling loftily about, looking
properly disdainful of the “unlicked cubs” on the stairs. Gilbert and
Charlie were nowhere to be seen.
“Little did I think the day would ever come when I’d be glad of the
sight of a Sloane,” said Priscilla, as they crossed the campus, “but
I’d welcome Charlie’s goggle eyes almost ecstatically. At least, they’d
be familiar eyes.”
“Oh,” sighed Anne. “I can’t describe how I felt when I was standing
there, waiting my turn to be registered—as insignificant as the
teeniest drop in a most enormous bucket. It’s bad enough to feel
insignificant, but it’s unbearable to have it grained into your soul
that you will never, can never, be anything but insignificant, and that
is how I did feel—as if I were invisible to the naked eye and some of
those Sophs might step on me. I knew I would go down to my grave
unwept, unhonored and unsung.”
“Wait till next year,” comforted Priscilla. “Then we’ll be able to look
as bored and sophisticated as any Sophomore of them all. No doubt it is
rather dreadful to feel insignificant; but I think it’s better than to
feel as big and awkward as I did—as if I were sprawled all over
Redmond. That’s how I felt—I suppose because I was a good two inches
taller than any one else in the crowd. I wasn’t afraid a Soph might
walk over me; I was afraid they’d take me for an elephant, or an
overgrown sample of a potato-fed Islander.”
“I suppose the trouble is we can’t forgive big Redmond for not being
little Queen’s,” said Anne, gathering about her the shreds of her old
cheerful philosophy to cover her nakedness of spirit. “When we left
Queen’s we knew everybody and had a place of our own. I suppose we have
been unconsciously expecting to take life up at Redmond just where we
left off at Queen’s, and now we feel as if the ground had slipped from
under our feet. I’m thankful that neither Mrs. Lynde nor Mrs. Elisha
Wright know, or ever will know, my state of mind at present. They would
exult in saying ‘I told you so,’ and be convinced it was the beginning
of the end. Whereas it is just the end of the beginning.”
“Exactly. That sounds more Anneish. In a little while we’ll be
acclimated and acquainted, and all will be well. Anne, did you notice
the girl who stood alone just outside the door of the coeds’ dressing
room all the morning—the pretty one with the brown eyes and crooked
mouth?”
“Yes, I did. I noticed her particularly because she seemed the only
creature there who _looked_ as lonely and friendless as I _felt_. I had
_you_, but she had no one.”
“I think she felt pretty all-by-herselfish, too. Several times I saw
her make a motion as if to cross over to us, but she never did it—too
shy, I suppose. I wished she would come. If I hadn’t felt so much like
the aforesaid elephant I’d have gone to her. But I couldn’t lumber
across that big hall with all those boys howling on the stairs. She was
the prettiest freshette I saw today, but probably favor is deceitful
and even beauty is vain on your first day at Redmond,” concluded
Priscilla with a laugh.
“I’m going across to Old St. John’s after lunch,” said Anne. “I don’t
know that a graveyard is a very good place to go to get cheered up, but
it seems the only get-at-able place where there are trees, and trees I
must have. I’ll sit on one of those old slabs and shut my eyes and
imagine I’m in the Avonlea woods.”
Anne did not do that, however, for she found enough of interest in Old
St. John’s to keep her eyes wide open. They went in by the entrance
gates, past the simple, massive, stone arch surmounted by the great
lion of England.
“‘And on Inkerman yet the wild bramble is gory,
And those bleak heights henceforth shall be famous in story,’”
quoted Anne, looking at it with a thrill. They found themselves in a
dim, cool, green place where winds were fond of purring. Up and down
the long grassy aisles they wandered, reading the quaint, voluminous
epitaphs, carved in an age that had more leisure than our own.
“‘Here lieth the body of Albert Crawford, Esq.,’” read Anne from a
worn, gray slab, “‘for many years Keeper of His Majesty’s Ordnance at
Kingsport. He served in the army till the peace of 1763, when he
retired from bad health. He was a brave officer, the best of husbands,
the best of fathers, the best of friends. He died October 29th, 1792,
aged 84 years.’ There’s an epitaph for you, Prissy. There is certainly
some ‘scope for imagination’ in it. How full such a life must have been
of adventure! And as for his personal qualities, I’m sure human eulogy
couldn’t go further. I wonder if they told him he was all those best
things while he was alive.”
“Here’s another,” said Priscilla. “Listen—
‘To the memory of Alexander Ross, who died on the 22nd of September,
1840, aged 43 years. This is raised as a tribute of affection by one
whom he served so faithfully for 27 years that he was regarded as a
friend, deserving the fullest confidence and attachment.’”
“A very good epitaph,” commented Anne thoughtfully. “I wouldn’t wish a
better. We are all servants of some sort, and if the fact that we are
faithful can be truthfully inscribed on our tombstones nothing more
need be added. Here’s a sorrowful little gray stone, Prissy—‘to the
memory of a favorite child.’ And here is another ‘erected to the memory
of one who is buried elsewhere.’ I wonder where that unknown grave is.
Really, Pris, the graveyards of today will never be as interesting as
this. You were right—I shall come here often. I love it already. I see
we’re not alone here—there’s a girl down at the end of this avenue.”
“Yes, and I believe it’s the very girl we saw at Redmond this morning.
I’ve been watching her for five minutes. She has started to come up the
avenue exactly half a dozen times, and half a dozen times has she
turned and gone back. Either she’s dreadfully shy or she has got
something on her conscience. Let’s go and meet her. It’s easier to get
acquainted in a graveyard than at Redmond, I believe.”
They walked down the long grassy arcade towards the stranger, who was
sitting on a gray slab under an enormous willow. She was certainly very
pretty, with a vivid, irregular, bewitching type of prettiness. There
was a gloss as of brown nuts on her satin-smooth hair and a soft, ripe
glow on her round cheeks. Her eyes were big and brown and velvety,
under oddly-pointed black brows, and her crooked mouth was rose-red.
She wore a smart brown suit, with two very modish little shoes peeping
from beneath it; and her hat of dull pink straw, wreathed with
golden-brown poppies, had the indefinable, unmistakable air which
pertains to the “creation” of an artist in millinery. Priscilla had a
sudden stinging consciousness that her own hat had been trimmed by her
village store milliner, and Anne wondered uncomfortably if the blouse
she had made herself, and which Mrs. Lynde had fitted, looked _very_
countrified and home-made besides the stranger’s smart attire. For a
moment both girls felt like turning back.
But they had already stopped and turned towards the gray slab. It was
too late to retreat, for the brown-eyed girl had evidently concluded
that they were coming to speak to her. Instantly she sprang up and came
forward with outstretched hand and a gay, friendly smile in which there
seemed not a shadow of either shyness or burdened conscience.
“Oh, I want to know who you two girls are,” she exclaimed eagerly.
“I’ve been _dying_ to know. I saw you at Redmond this morning. Say,
wasn’t it _awful_ there? For the time I wished I had stayed home and
got married.”
Anne and Priscilla both broke into unconstrained laughter at this
unexpected conclusion. The brown-eyed girl laughed, too.
“I really did. I _could_ have, you know. Come, let’s all sit down on
this gravestone and get acquainted. It won’t be hard. I know we’re
going to adore each other—I knew it as soon as I saw you at Redmond
this morning. I wanted so much to go right over and hug you both.”
“Why didn’t you?” asked Priscilla.
“Because I simply couldn’t make up my mind to do it. I never can make
up my mind about anything myself—I’m always afflicted with indecision.
Just as soon as I decide to do something I feel in my bones that
another course would be the correct one. It’s a dreadful misfortune,
but I was born that way, and there is no use in blaming me for it, as
some people do. So I couldn’t make up my mind to go and speak to you,
much as I wanted to.”
“We thought you were too shy,” said Anne.
“No, no, dear. Shyness isn’t among the many failings—or virtues—of
Philippa Gordon—Phil for short. Do call me Phil right off. Now, what
are your handles?”
“She’s Priscilla Grant,” said Anne, pointing.
“And _she’s_ Anne Shirley,” said Priscilla, pointing in turn.
“And we’re from the Island,” said both together.
“I hail from Bolingbroke, Nova Scotia,” said Philippa.
“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 some one 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 it just to oblige father. He _is_ such a duck.
Besides, I knew if I stayed home I’d have to get married. Mother wanted
that—wanted it decidedly. Mother has plenty of decision. But I really
hated the thought of being married for a few years yet. I want to have
heaps of fun before I settle down. And, ridiculous as the idea of my
being a B.A. is, the idea of my being an old married woman is still
more absurd, isn’t it? I’m only eighteen. No, I concluded I would
rather come to Redmond than be married. Besides, how could I ever have
made up my mind which man to marry?”
“Were there so many?” laughed Anne.
“Heaps. The boys like me awfully—they really do. But there were only
two that mattered. The rest were all too young and too poor. I must
marry a rich man, you know.”
“Why must you?”
“Honey, you couldn’t imagine _me_ being a poor man’s wife, could you? I
can’t do a single useful thing, and I am _very_ extravagant. Oh, no, my
husband must have heaps of money. So that narrowed them down to two.
But I couldn’t decide between two any easier than between two hundred.
I knew perfectly well that whichever one I chose I’d regret all my life
that I hadn’t married the other.”
“Didn’t you—love—either of them?” asked Anne, a little hesitatingly. It
was not easy for her to speak to a stranger of the great mystery and
transformation of life.
“Goodness, no. _I_ couldn’t love anybody. It isn’t in me. Besides I
wouldn’t want to. Being in love makes you a perfect slave, _I_ think.
And it would give a man such power to hurt you. I’d be afraid. No, no,
Alec and Alonzo are two dear boys, and I like them both so much that I
really don’t know which I like the better. That is the trouble. Alec is
the best looking, of course, and I simply couldn’t marry a man who
wasn’t handsome. He is good-tempered too, and has lovely, curly, black
hair. He’s rather too perfect—I don’t believe I’d like a perfect
husband—somebody I could never find fault with.”
“Then why not marry Alonzo?” asked Priscilla gravely.
“Think of marrying a name like Alonzo!” said Phil dolefully. “I don’t
believe I could endure it. But he has a classic nose, and it _would_ be
a comfort to have a nose in the family that could be depended on. I
can’t depend on mine. So far, it takes after the Gordon pattern, but
I’m so afraid it will develop Byrne tendencies as I grow older. I
examine it every day anxiously to make sure it’s still Gordon. Mother
was a Byrne and has the Byrne nose in the Byrnest degree. Wait till you
see it. I adore nice noses. Your nose is awfully nice, Anne Shirley.
Alonzo’s nose nearly turned the balance in his favor. But _Alonzo!_ No,
I couldn’t decide. If I could have done as I did with the hats—stood
them both up together, shut my eyes, and jabbed with a hatpin—it would
have been quite easy.”
“What did Alec and Alonzo feel like when you came away?” queried
Priscilla.
“Oh, they still have hope. I told them they’d have to wait till I could
make up my mind. They’re quite willing to wait. They both worship me,
you know. Meanwhile, I intend to have a good time. I expect I shall
have heaps of beaux at Redmond. I can’t be happy unless I have, you
know. But don’t you think the freshmen are fearfully homely? I saw only
one really handsome fellow among them. He went away before you came. I
heard his chum call him Gilbert. His chum had eyes that stuck out _that
far_. But you’re not going yet, girls? Don’t go yet.”
“I think we must,” said Anne, rather coldly. “It’s getting late, and
I’ve some work to do.”
“But you’ll both come to see me, won’t you?” asked Philippa, getting up
and putting an arm around each. “And let me come to see you. I want to
be chummy with you. I’ve taken such a fancy to you both. And I haven’t
quite disgusted you with my frivolity, have I?”
“Not quite,” laughed Anne, responding to Phil’s squeeze, with a return
of cordiality.
“Because I’m not half so silly as I seem on the surface, you know. You
just accept Philippa Gordon, as the Lord made her, with all her faults,
and I believe you’ll come to like her. Isn’t this graveyard a sweet
place? I’d love to be buried here. Here’s a grave I didn’t see
before—this one in the iron railing—oh, girls, look, see—the stone says
it’s the grave of a middy who was killed in the fight between the
Shannon and the Chesapeake. Just fancy!”
Anne paused by the railing and looked at the worn stone, her pulses
thrilling with sudden excitement. The old graveyard, with its
over-arching trees and long aisles of shadows, faded from her sight.
Instead, she saw the Kingsport Harbor of nearly a century agone. Out of
the mist came slowly a great frigate, brilliant with “the meteor flag
of England.” Behind her was another, with a still, heroic form, wrapped
in his own starry flag, lying on the quarter deck—the gallant Lawrence.
Time’s finger had turned back his pages, and that was the Shannon
sailing triumphant up the bay with the Chesapeake as her prize.
“Come back, Anne Shirley—come back,” laughed Philippa, pulling her arm.
“You’re a hundred years away from us. Come back.”
Anne came back with a sigh; her eyes were shining softly.
“I’ve always loved that old story,” she said, “and although the English
won that victory, I think it was because of the brave, defeated
commander I love it. This grave seems to bring it so near and make it
so real. This poor little middy was only eighteen. He ‘died of
desperate wounds received in gallant action’—so reads his epitaph. It
is such as a soldier might wish for.”
Before she turned away, Anne unpinned the little cluster of purple
pansies she wore and dropped it softly on the grave of the boy who had
perished in the great sea-duel.
“Well, what do you think of our new friend?” asked Priscilla, when Phil
had left them.
“I like her. There is something very lovable about her, in spite of all
her nonsense. I believe, as she says herself, that she isn’t half as
silly as she sounds. She’s a dear, kissable baby—and I don’t know that
she’ll ever really grow up.”
“I like her, too,” said Priscilla, decidedly. “She talks as much about
boys as Ruby Gillis does. But it always enrages or sickens me to hear
Ruby, whereas I just wanted to laugh good-naturedly at Phil. Now, what
is the why of that?”
“There is a difference,” said Anne meditatively. “I think it’s because
Ruby is really so _conscious_ of boys. She plays at love and
love-making. Besides, you feel, when she is boasting of her beaux that
she is doing it to rub it well into you that you haven’t half so many.
Now, when Phil talks of her beaux it sounds as if she was just speaking
of chums. She really looks upon boys as good comrades, and she is
pleased when she has dozens of them tagging round, simply because she
likes to be popular and to be thought popular. Even Alex and
Alonzo—I’ll never be able to think of those two names separately after
this—are to her just two playfellows who want her to play with them all
their lives. I’m glad we met her, and I’m glad we went to Old St.
John’s. I believe I’ve put forth a tiny soul-root into Kingsport soil
this afternoon. I hope so. I hate to feel transplanted.”