ds, and your little family jokes--and your love for
each other showing in every look and word, even when you didn't know
it--and I would go home to--you know what I went home to! Oh, Anne, I
don't believe I'm jealous and envious by nature. When I was a girl I
lacked many things my schoolmates had, but I never cared--I never
disliked them for it. But I seem to have grown so hateful--"

"Leslie, dearest, stop blaming yourself. You are NOT hateful or
jealous or envious. The life you have to live has warped you a little,
perhaps-but it would have ruined a nature less fine and noble than
yours. I'm letting you tell me all this because I believe it's better
for you to talk it out and rid your soul of it. But don't blame
yourself any more."

"Well, I won't. I just wanted you to know me as I am. That time you
told me of your darling hope for the spring was the worst of all, Anne.
I shall never forgive myself for the way I behaved then. I repented it
with tears. And I DID put many a tender and loving thought of you into
the little dress I made. But I might have known that anything I made
could only be a shroud in the end."

"Now, Leslie, that IS bitter and morbid--put such thoughts away.

"I was so glad when you brought the little dress; and since I had to
lose little Joyce I like to think that the dress she wore was the one
you made for her when you let yourself love me."

"Anne, do you know, I believe I shall always love you after this. I
don't think I'll ever feel that dreadful way about you again. Talking
it all out seems to have done away with it, somehow. It's very
strange--and I thought it so real and bitter. It's like opening the
door of a dark room to show some hideous creature you've believed to be
there--and when the light streams in your monster turns out to have
been just a shadow, vanishing when the light comes. It will never come
between us again."

"No, we are real friends now, Leslie, and I am very glad."

"I hope you won't misunderstand me if I say something else. Anne, I
was grieved to the core of my heart when you lost your baby; and if I
could have saved her for you by cutting off one of my hands I would
have done it. But your sorrow has brought us closer together. Your
perfect happiness isn't a barrier any longer. Oh, don't misunderstand,
dearest--I'm NOT glad that your happiness isn't perfect any longer--I
can say that sincerely; but since it isn't, there isn't such a gulf
betw