Lucy Montgomery - Emily Climbs

"There are so many dear, green corners in the Land of Uprightness, full of the aroma of sun-steeped ferns, and grassy, open spaces where pale asters feather the grass, swaying gently towards each other when the Wind Woman runs among them. And just to the left of my window there is a group of tall old firs that look, in moonlight or twilight, like a group of witches weaving spells of sorcery. When I first saw them, one windy night against the red sunset, with the reflection of my candle, like a weird, signal flame, suspended in the air among their boughs, the FLASH came... for the first time in Shrewsbury... and I felt so happy that nothing else mattered. I have written a poem about them.

"But oh, I burn to write stories. I knew it would be hard to keep my promise to Aunt Elizabeth but I didn't know it would be SO hard. Every day it seems harder... such splendid ideas for plots pop into my mind. Then I have to fall back on character studies of the people I know. I have written several of them. I always feel so strongly tempted to TOUCH THEM UP A BIT... deepen the shadows... bring out the highlights a little more vividly. But I remember that I promised Aunt Elizabeth never to write anything that wasn't true so I stay my hand and try to paint them exactly as they are.

"I have written one of Aunt Ruth. Interesting but dangerous. I never leave my Jimmy-book or my diary in my room. I know Aunt Ruth rummages through it when I'm out. So I always carry them in my book-bag.

"Ilse was up this evening and we did our lessons together. Aunt Ruth frowns on this... and, to be strictly just, I don't know that she is wrong. Ilse is so jolly and comical that we laugh more than we study, I'm afraid. We don't do as well in class next day... and besides, this house disapproves of laughter.

"Perry and Teddy like the High School. Perry earns his lodging by looking after the furnace and grounds and his board by waiting on the table. Besides, he gets twenty-five cents an hour for doing odd jobs. I don't see much of him or Teddy, except in the week- ends home, for it is against the school rules for boys and girls to walk together to and from school. Lots DO it, though. I had several chances to but I concluded that it would not be in keeping with New Moon traditions to break the rule. Besides, Aunt Ruth asks me every blessed night when I come home from school if I've walked with anybody. I think she's sometimes a little disappointed when I say 'No.'

"Besides, I didn't much fancy any of the boys who wanted to walk with me.

"October 20, 19...

"My room is full of boiled cabbage smells to-night but I dare not open my window. Too much night air outside. I would risk it for a little while if Aunt Ruth hadn't been in a very bad humour all day. Yesterday was my Sunday in Shrewsbury and when we went to church I sat in the corner of the pew. I did not know that Aunt Ruth must always sit there but she thought I did it on purpose. She read her Bible all the afternoon. I FELT she was reading it AT me, though I couldn't imagine why. This morning she asked me why I did it.

"'Did what?' I said in bewilderment.

"'Em'ly, you know what you did. I will not tolerate this slyness. What was your motive?'

"'Aunt Ruth, I haven't the slightest idea what you mean,' I said... quite haughtily, for I felt I was not being treated fairly.

"'Em'ly, you sat in the corner of the pew yesterday just to keep me out of it. WHY did you do it?"

"I looked down at Aunt Ruth... I am taller than she is now and I can do it. She doesn't like it, either. I was angry and I THINK I had a little of the Murray look on my face. The whole thing seemed so contemptible to be making a fuss over.

"'If I did it to keep you out of it, isn't that WHY?' I said as contemptuously as I felt. I picked up my book-bag and stalked to the door. There I stopped. It occurred to me that, whatever the Murrays might or might not do, I was not behaving as a Starr should. Father wouldn't have approved of my behaviour. So I turned and said, very politely,

"'I should not have spoken like that, Aunt Ruth, and I beg your pardon. I didn't mean anything by sitting in the corner. It was just because I happened to go into the pew first. I didn't know you preferred the corner.'

"Perhaps I overdid the politeness. At any rate, my apology only seemed to irritate Aunt Ruth the more. She sniffed and said,

"'I will forgive you this time, but don't let it happen again. Of course I didn't expect you would tell me your reason. You are too sly for that.'

"Aunt Ruth, Aunt Ruth! If you keep on calling me sly you'll drive me into being sly in reality and THEN watch out. If I choose to be sly I can twist you round my finger! It's only because I'm straightforward that you can manage me at all.

"I have to go to bed every night at nine o'clock... 'people who are threatened with consumption require a great deal of sleep.' When I come from school there are chores to be done and I must study in the evenings. So I haven't a moment of time for writing anything. I know Aunt Elizabeth and Aunt Ruth have had a conference on the subject. But I HAVE to write. So I get up in the morning as soon as it is daylight, dress, and put on a coat... for the mornings are cold now... sit down and scribble for a priceless hour. I didn't choose that Aunt Ruth should discover it and call me sly so I told her I was doing it. She gave me to understand that I was mentally unsound and would make a bad end in some asylum, but she didn't actually forbid me... probably because she thought it would be of no use. It wouldn't. I've GOT to write, that is all there is to it. That hour in the grey morning is the most delightful one in the day for me.

"Lately, being forbidden to write stories, I've been THINKING them out. But one day it struck me that I was breaking my compact with Aunt Elizabeth in spirit if not in letter. So I have stopped it.

"I wrote a character study of Ilse to-day. Very fascinating. It is difficult to analyse her. She is so different and unexpectable. (I coined that word myself.) She doesn't even get mad like anybody else. I enjoy her tantrums. She doesn't say so many awful things in them as she used to but she is PIQUANT. (Piquant is a new word for me. I like using a new word. I never think I really own a word until I've spoken or written it.)

"I am writing by my window. I love to watch the Shrewsbury lights twinkle out in the dusk over that long hill.

"I had a letter from Dean to-day. He is in Egypt... among ruined shrines of old gods and the tombs of old kings. I saw that strange land through his eyes... I seemed to go back with him through the old centuries... I knew the magic of its skies. I was Emily of Karnak or Thebes... not Emily of Shrewsbury at all. That is a trick Dean has.

"Aunt Ruth insisted on seeing his letter and when she read it she said it was impious!

"I should never have thought of that adjective.

"October 21, 19...

"I climbed the steep little wooded hill in the Land of Uprightness to-night and had an exultation on its crest. There's always something satisfying in climbing to the top of a hill. There was a fine tang of frost in the air, the view over Shrewsbury Harbour was very wonderful, and the woods all about me were expecting something to happen soon... at least that is the only way I can describe the effect they had on me. I forgot EVERYTHING... Aunt Ruth's stings and Evelyn Blake's patronage and Queen Alexandra's dog collar... everything in life that isn't just right. Lovely thoughts came flying to meet me like birds. They weren't MY thoughts. I couldn't think anything half so exquisite. They CAME from somewhere.

"Coming back, on that dark little path, where the air was full of nice, whispering sounds, I heard a chuckle of laughter in a fir copse just behind me. I was startled... and a little bit alarmed. I knew at once it wasn't human laughter... it was more like the Puckish mirth of fairy folk, with just a faint hint of malice in it. I can no longer believe in wood elves... alas, one loses so much when one becomes incredulous... so this laughter puzzled me... and, yes, a horrid, crawly feeling began in my spine. Then, suddenly, I thought of owls and knew it for what it was... a truly delightful sound, as if some survival of the Golden Age were chuckling to himself there in the dark. There were two of them, I think, and they were certainly having a good time over some owlish joke. I must write a poem about it... though I'll never be able to put into words half the charm and devilry of it.