An Old-fashioned Girl by Louisa M. Alcott

entirely lost his heart. The girls laughed at me when I said so, and

they declared that it would be a very improper thing to do, but I ‘ve

observed that they don’t hesitate to snub ‘ineligible parties,’ as they

call poor, very young, or unpopular men. It ‘s all right then, but

when a nice person comes it ‘s part of the fun to let him go on to

the very end, whether the girls care for him or not. The more

proposals, the more credit. Fan says Trix always asks when she

comes home after the summer excursions, ‘How many birds have

you bagged?’ as if men were partridges. What wicked creatures we

are! some of us at least. I wonder why such a love of conquest was

put into us? Mother says a great deal of it is owing to bad

education nowadays, but some girls seem born for the express

purpose of making trouble and would manage to do it if they lived

in a howling wilderness. I ‘m afraid I ‘ve got a spice of it, and if I

had the chance, should be as bad as any of them. I ‘ve tried it and

liked it, and maybe this is the consequence of that night’s fun.”

Here Polly leaned back and looked up at the little mirror over the

chimney-piece, which was hung so that it reflected the faces of

those about the fire. In it Polly saw a pair of telltale eyes looking

out from a tangle of bright brown hair, cheeks that flushed and

dimpled suddenly as the fresh mouth smiled with an expression of

conscious power, half proud, half ashamed, and as pretty to see as

the coquettish gesture with which she smoothed back her curls and

flourished a white hand. For a minute she regarded the pleasant

picture while visions of girlish romances and triumphs danced

through her head, then she shook her hair all over her face and

pushed her chair out of range of the mirror, saying, with a droll

mixture of self-reproach and self-approval in her tone; “Oh,

Puttel, Puttel, what a fool I am!”

Puss appeared to endorse the sentiment by a loud purr and a

graceful wave of her tail, and Polly returned to the subject from

which these little vanities had beguiled her.

“Just suppose it is true, that he does ask me, and I say yes! What a

stir it would make, and what fun it would be to see the faces of the

girls when it came out! They all think a great deal of him because

he is so hard to please, and almost any of them would feel

immensely flattered if he liked them, whether they chose to marry

him or not. Trix has tried for years to fascinate him, and he can’t

bear her, and I ‘m so glad! What a spiteful thing I am. Well, I can’t

help it, she does aggravate me so!” And Polly gave the cat such a

tweak of the ear that Puttel bounced out of her lap in high

dudgeon.

“It don’t do to think of her, and I won’t!” said Polly to herself,

setting her lips with a grim look that was not at all becoming.

“What an easy life I should have plenty of money, quantities of

friends, all sorts of pleasures, and no work, no poverty, no cold

shoulders or patched boots. I could do so much for all at home

how I should enjoy that!” And Polly let her thoughts revel in the

luxurious future her fancy painted. It was a very bright picture, but

something seemed amiss with it, for presently she sighed and

shook her head, thinking sorrowfully, “Ah, but I don’t love him,

and I ‘m afraid I never can as I ought! He ‘s very good, and

generous, and wise, and would be kind, I know, but somehow I

can’t imagine spending my life with him; I ‘m so afraid I should get

tired of him, and then what should I do? Polly Sydney don’t sound

well, and Mrs. Arthur Sydney don’t seem to fit me a bit. Wonder

how it would seem to call him ‘Arthur’?” And Polly said it under

Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147

Leave a Reply 0

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *