Rilla of Ingleside (Unabridged). Lucy Maud Montgomery
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Black spots were scattered at random over his yellow carcass, one of them, apparently, blotting out an eye. His ears were in tatters, for Monday was never successful in affairs of honour. But he possessed one talisman. He knew that not all dogs could be handsome or eloquent or victorious, but that every dog could love. Inside his homely hide beat the most affectionate, loyal, faithful heart of any dog since dogs were; and something looked out of his brown eyes that was nearer akin to a soul than any theologian would allow. Everybody at Ingleside was fond of him, even Susan, although his one unfortunate propensity of sneaking into the spare room and going to sleep on the bed tried her affection sorely.
On this particular afternoon Rilla had no quarrel on hand with existing conditions.
“Hasn’t June been a delightful month?” she asked, looking dreamily afar at the little quiet silvery clouds hanging so peacefully over Rainbow Valley. “We’ve had such lovely times — and such lovely weather. It has just been perfect every way.”
“I don’t half like that,” said Miss Oliver, with a sigh. “It’s ominous — somehow. A perfect thing is a gift of the gods — a sort of compensation for what is coming afterwards. I’ve seen that so often that I don’t care to hear people say they’ve had a perfect time. June has been delightful, though.”
“Of course, it hasn’t been very exciting,” said Rilla. “The only exciting thing that has happened in the Glen for a year was old Miss Mead fainting in Church. Sometimes I wish something dramatic would happen once in a while.”
“Don’t wish it. Dramatic things always have a bitterness for some one. What a nice summer all you gay creatures will have! And me moping at Lowbridge!”
“You’ll be over often, won’t you? I think there’s going to be lots of fun this summer, though I’ll just be on the fringe of things as usual, I suppose. Isn’t it horrid when people think you’re a little girl when you’re not?”
“There’s plenty of time for you to be grown up, Rilla. Don’t wish your youth away. It goes too quickly. You’ll begin to taste life soon enough.”
“Taste life! I want to eat it,” cried Rilla, laughing. “I want everything — everything a girl can have. I’ll be fifteen in another month, and then nobody can say I’m a child any longer. I heard someone say once that the years from fifteen to nineteen are the best years in a girl’s life. I’m going to make them perfectly splendid — just fill them with fun.”
“There’s no use thinking about what you’re going to do — you are tolerably sure not to do it.”
“Oh, but you do get a lot of fun out of the thinking,” cried Rilla.
“You think of nothing but fun, you monkey,” said Miss Oliver indulgently, reflecting that Rilla’s chin was really the last word in chins. “Well, what else is fifteen for? But have you any notion of going to college this fall?”
“No — nor any other fall. I don’t want to. I never cared for all those ologies and isms Nan and Di are so crazy about. And there’s five of us going to college already. Surely that’s enough. There’s bound to be one dunce in every family. I’m quite willing to be a dunce if I can be a pretty, popular, delightful one. I can’t be clever. I have no talent at all, and you can’t imagine how comfortable it is. Nobody expects me to do anything so I’m never pestered to do it. And I can’t be a housewifely, cookly creature, either. I hate sewing and dusting, and when Susan couldn’t teach me to make biscuits nobody could. Father says I toil not neither do I spin. Therefore, I must be a lily of the field,” concluded Rilla, with another laugh.
“You are too young to give up your studies altogether, Rilla.”
“Oh, mother will put me through a course of reading next winter. It will polish up her B.A. degree. Luckily I like reading. Don’t look at me so sorrowfully and so disapprovingly, dearest. I can’t be sober and serious — everything looks so rosy and rainbowy to me. Next month I’ll be fifteen — and next year sixteen — and the year after that seventeen. Could anything be more enchanting?”
“Rap wood,” said Gertrude Oliver, half laughingly, half seriously. “Rap wood, Rilla-my-Rilla.”
III. Moonlit Mirth
Rilla, who still buttoned up her eyes when she went to sleep so that she always looked as if she were laughing in her slumber, yawned, stretched, and smiled at Gertrude Oliver. The latter had come over from Lowbridge the previous evening and had been prevailed upon to remain for the dance at the Four Winds lighthouse the next night.
“The new day is knocking at the window. What will it bring us, I wonder.”
Miss Oliver shivered a little. She never greeted the days with Rilla’s enthusiasm. She had lived long enough to know that a day may bring a terrible thing.
“I think the nicest thing about days is their unexpectedness,” went on Rilla. “It’s jolly to wake up like this on a golden-fine morning and wonder what surprise packet the day will hand you. I always daydream for ten minutes before I get up, imagining the heaps of splendid things that may happen before night.”
“I hope something very unexpected will happen today,” said Gertrude. “I hope the mail will bring us news that war has been averted between Germany and France.”
“Oh — yes,” said Rilla vaguely. “It will be dreadful if it isn’t, I suppose. But it won’t really matter much to us, will it? I think a war would be so exciting. The Boer war was, they say, but I don’t remember anything about it, of course. Miss Oliver, shall I wear my white dress tonight or my new green one? The green one is by far the prettier, of course, but I’m almost afraid to wear it to a shore dance for fear something will happen to it. And will you do my hair the new way? None of the other girls in the Glen wear it yet and it will make such a sensation.”
“How did you induce your mother to let you go to the dance?”
“Oh, Walter coaxed her over. He knew I would be heartbroken if I didn’t go. It’s my first really-truly grownup party, Miss Oliver, and I’ve just lain awake at nights for a week thinking it over. When I saw the sun shining this morning I wanted to whoop for joy. It would be simply terrible if it rained tonight. I think I’ll wear the green dress and risk it. I want to look my nicest at my first party. Besides, it’s an inch longer than my white one. And I’ll wear my silver slippers too. Mrs. Ford sent them to me last Christmas and I’ve never had a chance to wear them yet. They’re the dearest things. Oh, Miss Oliver, I do hope some of the boys will ask me to dance. I shall die of mortification — truly I will, if nobody does and I have to sit stuck up against the wall all the evening. Of course Carl and Jerry can’t dance because they’re the minister’s sons, or else I could depend on them to save me from utter disgrace.”
“You’ll have plenty of partners — all the over-harbour boys are coming — there’ll be far more boys than girls.”
“I’m glad I’m not a minister’s daughter,” laughed Rilla. “Poor Faith is so furious because she won’t dare to dance tonight. Una doesn’t care, of course. She has never hankered after dancing. Somebody told Faith there would be a taffy-pull in the kitchen for those who didn’t dance and you should have seen the face she made. She and Jem will sit out on the rocks most of the evening, I suppose. Did you know that we are all to walk down as far as that little creek below the old House of Dreams and then sail to the lighthouse? Won’t it just be absolutely divine?”
“When I was fifteen I talked in italics and superlatives too,” said Miss Oliver sarcastically. “I think the party promises to be pleasant for young fry. I expect to be bored. None of those boys will bother dancing with an old maid like me. Jem and Walter will take me out once out of charity. So you can’t expect me to look forward to it with your touching young rapture.”
“Didn’t you have a good time at your