It was all so exciting
that only at the last minute just before the trunk was shut, did she
remember to tuck in "The Romance of King Arthur."
At the depot in Pleasanton, Aunt Isabel alone met her; Uncle Charlie
was "indisposed." Missy was sorry to hear that. For she had liked
Uncle Charlie even before he had become Romantic. He was big and
silent like father and grandpa and you had a feeling that, like
them, he understood you more than did most grown-ups.
She liked Aunt Isabel, too; she couldn't have helped that, because
Aunt Isabel was so radiantly beautiful. Missy loved all beautiful
things. She loved the heavenly colour of sunlight through the
stained-glass windows at church; the unquenchable blaze of her
nasturtium bed under a blanket of grey mist; the corner street-lamp
reflecting on the wet sidewalk; the smell of clean, sweet linen
sheets; the sound of the brass band practicing at night, blaring but
unspeakably sad through the distance; the divine mystery of faint-
tinted rainbows; trees in moonlight turned into great drifts of
fairy-white blossoms.
And she loved shining ripples of golden hair; and great blue eyes
that laughed in a sidewise glance and then turned softly pensive in
a second; and a sweet high voice now vivacious and now falling into
hushed cadences; and delicate white hands always restlessly
fluttering; and, a drifting, elusive fragrance, as of wind-swept
petals.
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