There were not lacking those who would gladly have stepped into Gilbert’s vacant place. But Anne snubbed them without fear and without reproach. If the real Prince Charming was never to come she would have none of a substitute. So she sternly told herself that gray day in the windy park.
Suddenly the rain of Aunt Jamesina’s prophecy came with a swish and rush. Anne put up her umbrella and hurried down the slope. As she turned out on the harbor road a savage gust of wind tore along it. Instantly her umbrella turned wrong side out. Anne clutched at it in despair. And then — there came a voice close to her.
“Pardon me — may I offer you the shelter of my umbrella?”
Anne looked up. Tall and handsome and distinguished-looking — dark, melancholy, inscrutable eyes — melting, musical, sympathetic voice — yes, the very hero of her dreams stood before her in the flesh. He could not have more closely resembled her ideal if he had been made to order.
“Thank you,” she said confusedly.
“We’d better hurry over to that little pavillion on the point,” suggested the unknown. “We can wait there until this shower is over. It is not likely to rain so heavily very long.”
The words were very commonplace, but oh, the tone! And the smile which accompanied them! Anne felt her heart beating strangely.
Together they scurried to the pavilion and sat breathlessly down under its friendly roof. Anne laughingly held up her false umbrella.
“It is when my umbrella turns inside out that I am convinced of the total depravity of inanimate things,” she said gaily.
The raindrops sparkled on her shining hair; its loosened rings curled around her neck and forehead. Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes big and starry. Her companion looked down at her admiringly. She felt herself blushing under his gaze. Who could he be? Why, there was a bit of the Redmond white and scarlet pinned to his coat lapel. Yet she had thought she knew, by sight at least, all the Redmond students except the Freshmen. And this courtly youth surely was no Freshman.
“We are schoolmates, I see,” he said, smiling at Anne’s colors. “That ought to be sufficient introduction. My name is Royal Gardner. And you are the Miss Shirley who read the Tennyson paper at the Philomathic the other evening, aren’t you?”
“Yes; but I cannot place you at all,” said Anne, frankly. “Please, where DO you belong?”
“I feel as if I didn’t belong anywhere yet. I put in my Freshman and Sophomore years at Redmond two years ago. I’ve been in Europe ever since. Now I’ve come back to finish my Arts course.”
“This is my Junior year, too,” said Anne.
“So we are classmates as well as collegemates. I am reconciled to the loss of the years that the locust has eaten,” said her companion, with a world of meaning in those wonderful eyes of his.
The rain came steadily down for the best part of an hour. But the time seemed really very short. When the clouds parted and a burst of pale November sunshine fell athwart the harbor and the pines Anne and her companion walked home together. By the time they had reached the gate of Patty’s Place he had asked permission to call, and had received it. Anne went in with cheeks of flame and her heart beating to her fingertips. Rusty, who climbed into her lap and tried to kiss her, found a very absent welcome. Anne, with her soul full of romantic thrills, had no attention to spare just then for a crop-eared pussy cat.
That evening a parcel was left at Patty’s Place for Miss Shirley. It was a box containing a dozen magnificent roses. Phil pounced impertinently on the card that fell from it, read the name and the poetical quotation written on the back.
“Royal Gardner!” she exclaimed. “Why, Anne, I didn’t know you were acquainted with Roy Gardner!”
“I met him in the park this afternoon in the rain,” explained Anne hurriedly. “My umbrella turned inside out and he came to my rescue with his.”
“Oh!” Phil peered curiously at Anne. “And is that exceedingly commonplace incident any reason why he should send us longstemmed roses by the dozen, with a very sentimental rhyme? Or why we should blush divinest rosy-red when we look at his card? Anne, thy face betrayeth thee.”
“Don’t talk nonsense, Phil. Do you know Mr. Gardner?”
“I’ve met his two sisters, and I know of him. So does everybody worthwhile in Kingsport. The Gardners are among the richest, bluest, of Bluenoses. Roy is adorably handsome and clever. Two years ago his mother’s health failed and he had to leave college and go abroad with her — his father is dead. He must have been greatly disappointed to have to give up his class, but they say he was perfectly sweet about it. Fee — fi — fo — fum, Anne. I smell romance. Almost do I envy you, but not quite. After all, Roy Gardner isn’t Jonas.”
“You goose!” said Anne loftily. But she lay long awake that night, nor did she wish for sleep. Her waking fancies were more alluring than any vision of dreamland. Had the real Prince come at last? Recalling those glorious dark eyes which had gazed so deeply into her own, Anne was very strongly inclined to think he had.
Chapter XXVI.
Enter Christine
The girls at Patty’s Place were dressing for the reception which the Juniors were giving for the Seniors in February. Anne surveyed herself in the mirror of the blue room with girlish satisfaction. She had a particularly pretty gown on. Originally it had been only a simple little slip of cream silk with a chiffon overdress. But Phil had insisted on taking it home with her in the Christmas holidays and embroidering tiny rosebuds all over the chiffon. Phil’s fingers were deft, and the result was a dress which was the envy of every Redmond girl. Even Allie Boone, whose frocks came from Paris, was wont to look with longing eyes on that rosebud concoction as Anne trailed up the main staircase at Redmond in it.
Anne was trying the effect of a white orchid in her hair. Roy Gardner had sent her white orchids for the reception, and she knew no other Redmond girl would have them that night — when Phil came in with admiring gaze.
“Anne, this is certainly your night for looking handsome. Nine nights out of ten I can easily outshine you. The tenth you blossom out suddenly into something that eclipses me altogether. How do you manage it?”
“It’s the dress, dear. Fine feathers.”
“‘Tisn’t. The last evening you flamed out into beauty you wore your old blue flannel shirtwaist that Mrs. Lynde made you. If Roy hadn’t already lost head and heart about you he certainly would tonight. But I don’t like orchids on you, Anne. No; it isn’t jealousy. Orchids don’t seem to BELONG to you. They’re too exotic — too tropical — too insolent. Don’t put them in your hair, anyway.”
“Well, I won’t. I admit I’m not fond of orchids myself. I don’t think they’re related to me. Roy doesn’t often send them — he knows I like flowers I can live with. Orchids are only things you can visit with.”
“Jonas sent me some dear pink rosebuds for the evening — but — he isn’t coming himself. He said he had to lead a prayer-meeting in the slums! I don’t believe he wanted to come. Anne, I’m horribly afraid Jonas doesn’t really care anything about me. And I’m trying to decide whether I’ll pine away and die, or go on and get my B.A. and be sensible and useful.”
“You couldn’t possibly be sensible and useful, Phil, so you’d better pine away and die,” said Anne cruelly.