Lucy Montgomery - Emily's Quest

Emily shook her head. Of what use was dancing now that Teddy was gone?

"Do you know," said Ilse pensively, "I think this summer has been rather a failure, in spite of our fun. We thought we could be children again, but we haven't been. We've only been pretending."

Pretending? Oh, if this heartache were only a pretence! And this burning shame and deep, mute hurt. Teddy had not even cared enough to write her a line of farewell. She knew... she had known ever since the Chidlaw dance... he did not love her; but surely friendship demanded something. Even her friendship meant nothing to him. This summer had been only an interlude to him. Now he had gone back to his real life and the things that mattered. And he had written Ilse. Pretend? Oh, well, she would pretend with a vengeance. There were times when the Murray pride was certainly an asset.

"I think it's as well the summer is over," she said carelessly. "I simply MUST get down to work again. I have neglected my writing shamefully the past two months."

"After all, that's all you really care about, isn't it?" said Ilse curiously. "I love my work but it doesn't possess me as yours possesses you. I'd give it up in a twinkling for... well, we're all as we're made. But is it really comfortable, Emily, to care for only one thing in life?"

"Much more comfortable than caring for too many things."

"I suppose so. Well, you ought to succeed when you lay everything on the altar of your goddess. That's the difference between us. I'm of weaker clay. There are some things I couldn't give up... some things I WON'T. And as Old Kelly advises, if I can't get what I want... well, I'll want what I can get. Isn't that common sense?"

Emily, wishing she could fool herself as easily as she could other people, went over to the window and kissed Ilse's forehead.

"We aren't children any longer... and we can't go back to childhood, Ilse. We're women... and must make the best of it. I think you'll be happy yet. I WANT you to be."

Ilse squeezed Emily's hand. "Darn common-sense!" she said drearily.

If she had not been in New Moon she would probably have used the unexpurgated edition.

"NOV. 17, 19...

"There are two adjectives that are never separated in regard to a November day... 'dull' and 'gloomy.' They were wedded together in the dawn of language and it is not for me to divorce them now. Accordingly, then, this day has been dull and gloomy, inside and outside, materially and spiritually.

"Yesterday wasn't so bad. There was a warm autumnal sun and Cousin Jimmy's big heap of pumpkins made a lovely pool of colour against the old grey barns, and the valley down by the brook was mellow with the late, leafless gold of juniper-trees. I walked in the afternoon through the uncanny enchantment of November woods, still haunted by loveliness, and again in the evening in the afterglow of an autumnal sunset. The evening was mild and wrapped in a great, grey, brooding stillness of windless fields and waiting hill... a stillness which was yet threaded through with many little eerie, beautiful sounds which I could hear if I listened as much with my soul as my ears. Later on there was a procession of stars and I got a message from them.

"But to-day WAS dreary. And to-night virtue has gone out of me. I wrote all day but I could not write this evening. I shut myself into my room and paced it like a caged creature. ''Tis the middle of the night by the castle clock,' but there is no use in thinking of sleep. I can't sleep. The rain against the window is very dismal and the winds are marching by like armies of the dead. All the little ghostly joys of the past are haunting me... all the ghostly fears of the future.

"I keep thinking... foolishly... of the Disappointed House to-night... up there on the hill with the roar of the rainy wind about it. Somehow this is what hurts me worst to-night. Other nights it is the fact that I don't even know where Dean is this winter... or that Teddy never writes a line to me... or just that there are hours when sheer loneliness wrings the stamina out of me. In such moments I come to this old journal for comforting. It's like talking it out to a faithful friend."

"NOV. 30, 19...

"I have two chrysanthemums and a rose out. The rose is a song and a dream and an enchantment all in one. The 'mums are very pretty, too, but it does not do to have them and the rose too near together. Seen by themselves they are handsome, bright blossoms, pink and yellow, and cheery, looking very well satisfied with themselves. But set the rose behind them and the change is actually amusing. They then seem like vulgar, frowsy kitchen maids beside a stately, white queen. It's not the fault of the poor 'mums that they weren't born roses, so to be fair to them I keep them by themselves and enjoy them that way.

"I wrote a GOOD story to-day. I think even Mr. Carpenter would have been satisfied with it. I was happy while I was writing it. But when I finished it and came back to reality...

"Well, I'm not going to growl. Life has at least grown LIVABLE again. It was NOT livable through the autumn. I know Aunt Laura thought I was going into consumption. Not I. That would be too Victorian. I fought things out and conquered them and I'm a sane, FREE woman once more. Though the taste of my folly is still in my mouth at times and very bitter it is.

"Oh, I'm really getting on very well. I'm beginning to make a livable income for myself and Aunt Elizabeth reads my stories aloud o' evenings to Aunt Laura and Cousin Jimmy. I can always get through TODAY very nicely. It's to-morrow I can't live through."

"JANUARY 15, 19...

"I've been out for a moonlit snowshoe tramp. There was a nice bite of frost in the air and the night was exquisite... a frosty, starry lyric of light. Some nights are like honey... and some like wine... and some like wormwood. To-night is like wine... white wine... some clear, sparkling, fairy brew that rather goes to one's head. I am tingling all over with hope and expectation and victory over certain principalities and powers that got a grip on me last night about three o'clock.

"I have just drawn aside the curtain of my window and looked out. The garden is white and still under the moon, all ebony of shadow and silver of frosted snow. Over it all the delicate traceries where trees stand up leafless in seeming death and sorrow. But only seeming. The life-blood is at their hearts and by and by it will stir and they will clothe themselves in bridal garments of young green leaves and pink blossoms. And over there where the biggest drift of all lies deep the Golden Ones will uplift their trumpets of the morning.

"And far beyond our garden field after field lies white and lonely in the moonlight. Lonely? I hadn't meant to write that word. It slipped in. I'm NOT lonely... I have my work and my books and the hope of spring... and I know that this calm, simple existence is a much better and happier one than the hectic life I led last summer.

"I believed that before I wrote it down. And now I don't believe it. It isn't true. This is stagnation!!

"Oh, I am... I AM lonely... with the loneliness of unshared thought. What is the use of denying it? When I came in I WAS the victor... but now my banner is in the dust again."

"FEB. 20, 19...

"Something has happened to sour February's temper. Such a peevish month. The weather for the past few weeks has certainly been living up to the Murray traditions.

"A dreary snowstorm is raging and the wind is pursuing tormented wraiths over the hills. I know that out beyond the trees Blair Water is a sad, black thing in a desert of whiteness. But the great, dark, wintry night outside makes my cosy little room with its crackling fire seem cosier, and I feel much more contented with the world than I did that beautiful night in January. To-night isn't so... so INSULTING.