Then, as he realized what must have happened to bring her there, he turned to his aunt.
“Aunt Anne! Well, Aunt Anne! You’re the greatest Anne of the three!” he cried.
Anne swiftly ran past Kit and dropped on her knees before the oldest Anne’s chair, her head on Miss Carrington’s lap.
“Oh, I will be good! I will repay you! Please love me!” she cried.
“Nonsense. I do!” declared the oldest Anne.
CHAPTER XXIII
The Fall of the Curtain
THERE are many tests of youthfulness, the mirror the least accurate.
“A man is as young as he feels,” we are told, but this is misleading. A bad cold, a bill, an ill-cooked dinner, a few hours over-work, and the youthful man of the morning may feel decrepit by night. Thoreau hits it more nearly when he makes the thrill with which spring is hailed the test of age; we are not old, he tells us, if the blood in our veins runs swifter with the mounting sap; if we echo the joyousness of the bluebird’s annunciatory warble.
Akin to this under urban conditions is the expectant thrill with which we await the curtain’s rise upon the drama. Both are anticipatory; both mean youth’s impatience for the play. Each summer is heralded by vague anticipation of delight; each play which we wait to see for the first time hints of unknown pleasures. No one is jaded, no one really old, who is eager for a new joy.