Celebration

Good afternoon, Nora May. I'm real glad to see you. I've been watching
you coming down the hill and I hoping you'd turn in at our gate. Going
to visit with me this afternoon? That's good. I'm feeling so happy and
delighted and I've been hankering for someone to tell it all to.

Tell you about it? Well, I guess I might as well. It ain't any breach
of confidence.

You didn't know Anne Douglas? She taught school here three years ago,
afore your folks moved over from Talcott. She belonged up Montrose way
and she was only eighteen when she came here to teach. She boarded
with us and her and me were the greatest chums. She was just a sweet
girl.

She was the prettiest teacher we ever had, and that's saying a good
deal, for Springdale has always been noted for getting good-looking
schoolmarms, just as Miller's Road is noted for its humly ones.

Anne had _yards_ of brown wavy hair and big, dark blue eyes. Her face
was kind o' pale, but when she smiled you would have to smile too, if
you'd been chief mourner at your own funeral. She was a well-spring of
joy in the house, and we all loved her.

Gilbert Martin began to drive her the very first week she was here.
Gilbert is my sister Julia's son, and a fine young fellow he is. It
ain't good manners to brag of your own relations, but I'm always
forgetting and doing it. Gil was a great pet of mine. He was so bright
and nice-mannered everybody liked him. Him and Anne were a
fine-looking couple, Nora May. Not but what they had their
shortcomings. Anne's nose was a mite too long and Gil had a crooked
mouth. Besides, they was both pretty proud and sperrited and
high-strung.

But they thought an awful lot of each other. It made me feel young
again to see 'em. Anne wasn't a mossel vain, but nights she expected
Gil she'd prink for hours afore her glass, fixing her hair this way
and that, and trying on all her good clothes to see which become her
most. I used to love her for it. And I used to love to see the way
Gil's face would light up when she came into a room or place where he
was. Amanda Perkins, she says to me once, "Anne Douglas and Gil Martin
are most terrible struck on each other." And she said it in a tone
that indicated that it was a dreadful disgraceful and unbecoming state
of affairs. Amanda had a disappointment once and it soured her. I
immediately responded, "Yes, they are most terrible struck on each
other," and I said it in a tone that indicated I tho