Anne of the Island
Page 37
Chapter XXXVII
Full-fledged B.A.'s
"I wish I were dead, or that it were tomorrow night," groaned Phil.
"If you live long enough both wishes will come true," said Anne calmly.
"It's easy for you to be serene. You're at home in Philosophy. I'mnot--and when I think of that horrible paper tomorrow I quail. If Ishould fail in it what would Jo say?"
"You won't fail. How did you get on in Greek today?"
"I don't know. Perhaps it was a good paper and perhaps it was bad enoughto make Homer turn over in his grave. I've studied and mulled overnotebooks until I'm incapable of forming an opinion of anything. Howthankful little Phil will be when all this examinating is over."
"Examinating? I never heard such a word."
"Well, haven't I as good a right to make a word as any one else?"demanded Phil.
"Words aren't made--they grow," said Anne.
"Never mind--I begin faintly to discern clear water ahead where noexamination breakers loom. Girls, do you--can you realize that ourRedmond Life is almost over?"
"I can't," said Anne, sorrowfully. "It seems just yesterday that Prisand I were alone in that crowd of Freshmen at Redmond. And now we areSeniors in our final examinations."
"'Potent, wise, and reverend Seniors,'" quoted Phil. "Do you suppose wereally are any wiser than when we came to Redmond?"
"You don't act as if you were by times," said Aunt Jamesina severely.
"Oh, Aunt Jimsie, haven't we been pretty good girls, take us by andlarge, these three winters you've mothered us?" pleaded Phil.
"You've been four of the dearest, sweetest, goodest girls that ever wenttogether through college," averred Aunt Jamesina, who never spoiled acompliment by misplaced economy.
"But I mistrust you haven't any too much sense yet. It's not to beexpected, of course. Experience teaches sense. You can't learn it in acollege course. You've been to college four years and I never was, but Iknow heaps more than you do, young ladies."
"'There are lots of things that never go by rule, There's a powerful pile o' knowledge That you never get at college, There are heaps of things you never learn at school,'"
quoted Stella.
"Have you learned anything at Redmond except dead languages and geometryand such trash?" queried Aunt Jamesina.
"Oh, yes. I think we have, Aunty," protested Anne.
"We've learned the truth of what Professor Woodleigh told us lastPhilomathic," said Phil. "He said, 'Humor is the spiciest condiment inthe feast of existence. Laugh at your mistakes but learn from them, jokeover your troubles but gather strength from them, make a jest ofyour difficulties but overcome them.' Isn't that worth learning, AuntJimsie?"
"Yes, it is, dearie. When you've learned to laugh at the things thatshould be laughed at, and not to laugh at those that shouldn't, you'vegot wisdom and understanding."
"What have you got out of your Redmond course, Anne?" murmured Priscillaaside.
"I think," said Anne slowly, "that I really have learned to look uponeach little hindrance as a jest and each great one as the foreshadowingof victory. Summing up, I think that is what Redmond has given me."
"I shall have to fall back on another Professor Woodleigh quotation toexpress what it has done for me," said Priscilla. "You remember thathe said in his address, 'There is so much in the world for us all if weonly have the eyes to see it, and the heart to love it, and the handto gather it to ourselves--so much in men and women, so much in art andliterature, so much everywhere in which to delight, and for which to bethankful.' I think Redmond has taught me that in some measure, Anne."
"Judging from what you all, say" remarked Aunt Jamesina, "the sumand substance is that you can learn--if you've got natural gumptionenough--in four years at college what it would take about twenty yearsof living to teach you. Well, that justifies higher education in myopinion. It's a matter I was always dubious about before."
"But what about people who haven't natural gumption, Aunt Jimsie?"
"People who haven't natural gumption never learn," retorted AuntJamesina, "neither in college nor life. If they live to be a hundredthey really don't know anything more than when they were born. It'stheir misfortune not their fault, poor souls. But those of us who havesome gumption should duly thank the Lord for it."
"Will you please define what gumption is, Aunt Jimsie?" asked Phil.
"No, I won't, young woman. Any one who has gumption knows what it is,and any one who hasn't can never know what it is. So there is no need ofdefining it."
The busy days flew by and examinations were over. Anne took High Honorsin English. Priscilla took Honors in Classics, and Phil in Mathematics.Stella obtained a good all-round showing. Then came Convocation.
"This is what I would once have called an epoch in my life," saidAnne, as she took Roy's violets out of their box and gazed at themthoughtfully. She meant to carry them, of course, but her eyes wanderedto another box on her table. It was filled with lilies-of-the-valley, asfresh and fragrant as those which bloomed in the Green Gables yard whenJune came to Avonlea. Gilbert Blythe's card lay beside it.
Anne wondered why Gilbert should have sent her flowers for Convocation.She had seen very little of him during the past winter. He had come toPatty's Place only one Friday evening since the Christmas holidays, andthey rarely met elsewhere. She knew he was studying very hard, aiming atHigh Honors and the Cooper Prize, and he took little part in the socialdoings of Redmond. Anne's own winter had been quite gay socially.She had seen a good deal of the Gardners; she and Dorothy were veryintimate; college circles expected the announcement of her engagement toRoy any day. Anne expected it herself. Yet just before she left Patty'sPlace for Convocation she flung Roy's violets aside and put Gilbert'slilies-of-the-valley in their place. She could not have told why shedid it. Somehow, old Avonlea days and dreams and friendships seemed veryclose to her in this attainment of her long-cherished ambitions. Sheand Gilbert had once picturedout merrily the day on which they shouldbe capped and gowned graduates in Arts. The wonderful day had come andRoy's violets had no place in it. Only her old friend's flowers seemedto belong to this fruition of old-blossoming hopes which he had onceshared.
For years this day had beckoned and allured to her; but when it came theone single, keen, abiding memory it left with her was not that of thebreathless moment when the stately president of Redmond gave her cap anddiploma and hailed her B.A.; it was not of the flash in Gilbert's eyeswhen he saw her lilies, nor the puzzled pained glance Roy gave her as hepassed her on the platform. It was not of Aline Gardner's condescendingcongratulations, or Dorothy's ardent, impulsive good wishes. It was ofone strange, unaccountable pang that spoiled this long-expected day forher and left in it a certain faint but enduring flavor of bitterness.
The Arts graduates gave a graduation dance that night. When Anne dressedfor it she tossed aside the pearl beads she usually wore and took fromher trunk the small box that had come to Green Gables on Christmas day.In it was a thread-like gold chain with a tiny pink enamel heart as apendant. On the accompanying card was written, "With all good wishesfrom your old chum, Gilbert." Anne, laughing over the memory the enamelheart conjured up the fatal day when Gilbert had called her "Carrots"and vainly tried to make his peace with a pink candy heart, had writtenhim a nice little note of thanks. But she had never worn the trinket.Tonight she fastened it about her white throat with a dreamy smile.
She and Phil walked to Redmond together. Anne walked in silence; Philchattered of many things. Suddenly she said,
"I heard today that Gilbert Blythe's engagement to Christine Stuart wasto be announced as soon as Convocation was over. Did you hear anythingof it?"
"No," said Anne.
"I think it's true," said Phil lightly.
Anne did not speak. In the darkness she felt her face burning. Sheslipped her hand inside her collar and caught at the gold chain. Oneenergetic twist and it gave way. Anne thrust the broken trinket into herpocket. Her hands were trembling and h
er eyes were smarting.
But she was the gayest of all the gay revellers that night, and toldGilbert unregretfully that her card was full when he came to ask her fora dance. Afterwards, when she sat with the girls before the dying embersat Patty's Place, removing the spring chilliness from their satin skins,none chatted more blithely than she of the day's events.
"Moody Spurgeon MacPherson called here tonight after you left," saidAunt Jamesina, who had sat up to keep the fire on. "He didn't know aboutthe graduation dance. That boy ought to sleep with a rubber band aroundhis head to train his ears not to stick out. I had a beau once who didthat and it improved him immensely. It was I who suggested it to him andhe took my advice, but he never forgave me for it."
"Moody Spurgeon is a very serious young man," yawned Priscilla. "Heis concerned with graver matters than his ears. He is going to be aminister, you know."
"Well, I suppose the Lord doesn't regard the ears of a man," said AuntJamesina gravely, dropping all further criticism of Moody Spurgeon.Aunt Jamesina had a proper respect for the cloth even in the case of anunfledged parson.