Join Host Bree Carlile as she reads the third chapter of Anne of the Island by Lucy Maud Montgomery.

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Welcome to Bite at a Time Books, where we read you your favorite classics one byte at a time.

My name is Brie Carlyle and I love to read and wanted to share my passion with listeners like you.

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Today we'll be continuing Anne of the island by Lucy Maud Montgomery.

Chapter Three greeting and farewell.

Charlie Sloan, Gilbert Blive and Anne Shirley left Avonlea the following Monday morning.

Anne had hoped for a fine day.

Diana was to drive her to the station, and they wanted this, their last drive together for some time, to be a pleasant one.

But when Anne went to bed Sunday night, the east wind was moaning around Green Gables with an ominous prophecy which was fulfilled in the morning.

Anna awoke to find raindrops pattering against her window and shadowing the pond's gray surface with widening rings.

Hills and sea were hidden and mist, and the whole world seemed dim and dreary.

Anne, dressed in the cheerless gray dawn for an early start was necessary to catch the boat train.

She struggled against the tears that would well up in her eyes.

In spite of herself, she was leaving the home that was so dear to her, and something told her that she was leaving it forever.

Save as a holiday refuge, things would never be the same again.

Coming back for vacations would not be living there.

And oh, how dear and beloved everything was.

That little white porch room, sacred to the dreams of girlhood.

The old snow queen at the window, the brook and the hollow, the dryad's bubble, the haunted woods and lover's lane.

All the thousand in one dear spots were memories of the old years.

Bited.

Could she ever be really happy anywhere else?

Breakfast at Green Gables that morning was a rather doleful meal.

Davy, for the first time in his life, probably could not eat, but blubbered shamelessly over his porridge.

Nobody else seemed to have much appetite saved Dora, who tucked away her rations comfortably.

Dora, like the immortal and most prudent Charlotte, who went on cutting bread and butter when her frenzy lover's body had been carried past on a shutter, was one of those fortunate creatures who are seldom disturbed by anything.

Even at eight, it took a great deal to ruffle Dora's placidity.

She was sorry.

Anne was going away, of course, but was that.

Any reason why she should fail to appreciate a poached egg on toast?

Not at all.

And seeing that Davy could not eat his, dora ate it for him promptly on time.

Diana appeared with hoarse and buggy, her rosy face glowing above her raincoat.

The goodbyes had to be said.

Then somehow Mrs.

Lynde came in from her quarters to give Anne a hardy embrace and warned her to be careful of her health, whatever she did.

Marilla brusque and tearless packed Anne's cheek and said she supposed they'd hear from her when she got settled.

A casual observer might have concluded that Anne's going mattered very little to her, unless that observer had happened to get a good look in her eyes.

Dora kissed Anne primly and squeezed out two decorous little tears.

But Davy, who had been crying on the back porch step ever since they rose from the table, refused to say goodbye at all when he saw Anne coming towards him.

He sprang to his feet, bolted up the back stairs, and hid in a closed closet out of which he would not come.

His muffled howls were the last sounds and heard as she left Green Gables.

It rained heavily all the way to Bright River, to which station they had to go, since the branch line trained from Carmody did not connect with the boat train.

Charlie and Gilbert were on the station platform when they reached it, and the train was whistling.

Anne had just time to get her ticket and trunk check.

Say it.

Hurried farewell to Diana and hasten on board.

She wished she were going back with Diana to Avonlea.

She knew she was going to die of homesickness, and, oh, if only that dismal rain would stop pouring down, as if the whole world were weeping over summer vanished and joys departed.

Even Gilbert's presence brought her no comfort, for Charlie sloan was there too, and Sloanishness could be tolerated only in fine weather.

It was absolutely inseparable in rain.

But when the boat steamed out of Charlottetown Harbor, things took a turn for the better.

The rain ceased, and the sun began to burst out goldenly now and again between the rents and the clouds, furnishing the gray seas with copperhued radiance, and lighting up the mists that curtained the island's red shores with gleams of gold foretokening.

A fine day after all.

Besides, Charlie Sloan promptly became so seasick that he had to go below, and Anne and Gilbert were left alone on deck.

I'm very glad that all the Sloans get seasick as soon as they go on water, thought Anne mercilessly.

I'm sure I couldn't take my farewell look at the old sod, with Charlie standing there pretending to look sentimentally at it, too.

Well, we're off, remarked Gilbert unsentimentally.

Yes.

I feel like Byron's child.

Harold.

Only it isn't really my native sure that I'm watching, said Anne, winking her gray eyes vigorously.

Nova Scotia is that, I suppose.

But once native, shores the land one loves the best and that's good old Pei for me.

I can't believe I didn't always live here.

Those eleven years before I came seemed like a bad dream.

It's seven years since I crossed on this boat.

The evening Mrs.

Spencer brought me over from Hope Town I can see myself in that dreadful old wincy dress and faded sailor hat exploring decks and cabins with enraptured curiosity.

It was a fine evening.

And how those Red Island shores did gleam in the sunshine.

Now I'm crossing the strait again.

Oh, Gilbert, I do hope I'll like redmond and kingsport, but I'm sure I won't.

Where's all your philosophy gone, Anne?

It's all submerged under a great swamping wave of loneliness and homesickness.

I've longed for three years to go to Redmond and now I'm going and I wish I weren't.

Never mind.

I shall be cheerful and philosophical again after I've just won good cry.

I must have that as I went.

And I'll have to wait until I get to my boarding house bed tonight, wherever it may be, before I can have it.

Then Anne will be herself again.

I wonder if Davy has come out of the closet yet.

It was nine that night when their train reached Kingsport and they found themselves in the bluewhite glare of the crowded station.

Anne felt horribly bewildered.

But a moment later she was seized by Priscilla Grant who had come to Kingsport on Saturday.

Here you are, beloved.

And I suppose you're as tired as I was when I got here Saturday night.

Tired, Priscilla?

Don't talk of it.

I'm tired and green and provincial and only about ten years old.

For pity's sake, take your poor broken down chum to some place where she can hear herself think.

I'll take you right up to our boarding house.

I have a cab ready outside.

It's such a blessing you're here, Prissy.

If you weren't, I think I should just sit down on my suitcase here and now and weep bitter tears.

What a comfort.

One familiar faces and a howling wilderness of strangers.

Is that Gilbert Blithe over there?

Anne how he has grown up this past year.

He was only a schoolboy when I taught in Carmody.

And, of course, that's Charlie Sloan.

He hasn't changed.

Couldn't he looked just like that when he was born and he'll look like that when he's 80.

This way, dear.

We'll be home in 20 minutes.

Home?

Groaned Anne.

You mean we'll be in some horrible boarding house in a still more horrible hall bedroom looking out on a dingy backyard?

It isn't a horrible boarding house, Anne girl.

Here's our cab.

Hop in.

The driver will get your trunk.

Oh, yes, the boarding house.

It's really a very nice place of its kind, as you'll admit tomorrow morning when a good night's sleep has turned your blues rosy pink.

It's a big oldfashioned graystone house on St.

John street.

Just a nice little constitutional from Redmond.

It used to be the residence of great folk, but fashion has deserted St john street and its houses only dream now of better days.

They're so big that people living in them have to take borders just to fill up.

At least that is the reason our landladys are very anxious to impress on us.

They're delicious, Anne.

Our landladys, I mean.

How many are there?

Two.

Ms.

Hannah Harvey and Miss Ada Harvey.

They were born twins about 50 years ago.

I can't get away from twins, it seems, smiled Anne.

Wherever I go they confront me.

Oh, they're not twins now, dear.

After they reached the age of 30, they never were twins again.

Miss Hannah has grown old not too gracefully, and Miss Ada has stayed 30 less gracefully.

Still, I don't know whether Miss Hannah can smile or not.

I've never caught her at it so far.

But Miss Ada smiles all the time and that's worse.

However, they're nice, kind souls and they take two borders every year because Ms Hannah's economical soul can't bear to waste room space.

Not because they need to or have to, as Ms Ada has told me seven times since Saturday night.

As for our rooms, I admit they are all bedrooms and mine does look out on the backyard.

Your room is a front one and looks out on old St John's graveyard, which is just across the street.

That sounds gruesome shivered.

Anne I think I'd rather have the backyard view.

Oh no, you wouldn't.

Wait and see.

Old St.

John's is a darling place.

It's been a graveyard so long, but it ceased to be one and has become one of the sites of kingsport.

I was all through it yesterday for a pleasure exertion.

There's a big stone wall and a row of enormous trees all around it, and rows of trees all through it.

And the queerest old tombstones with the queerest and quaintest inscriptions.

You'll go there to study, Anne.

See if you don't.

Of course, nobody has ever buried there now, but a few years ago they put up a beautiful monument to the memory of Nova Scotian soldiers who fell in the Crimean War.

It is just opposite the entrance gates and their scope for imagination in it, as you used to say.

Here's your trunk at last.

And the boys coming to say goodnight.

Must I really shake hands with Charlie sloan anne his hands are always so cold and fishy feeling.

We must ask them to call occasionally.

Ms Hannah gravely told me we could have young gentlemen callers two evenings in the week if they went away at a reasonable hour.

And Miss Ada asked me, smiling, please, to be sure they didn't sit on her beautiful cushions.

I promised to see to it, but goodness knows where else they can sit unless they sit on the floor, for there are cushions on everything.

Ms Ada even has an elaborate battenberg one on top of the piano and was laughing.

By this time, Priscilla's Gay Chatter had the intended effect of cheering her up.

Homesickness vanished for the time being and did not even return in full force.

When she finally found herself alone in her little bedroom, she went to her window and looked out.

The street below was dim and quiet.

Across at, the moon was shining above the trees in old St.

John's, just behind the great dark head of the lion on the monument, and wondered if it could have been only that morning that she had left Green Gables.

She had the sense of a long passage of time which one day of change in travel gives.

I suppose that very moon is looking down on Green Gables now, she mused.

But I won't think about it that way.

Homesickness lies.

I'm not even going to have my good cry.

I'll put that off to a more convenient season, and just now I'll go calmly and sensibly to bed and to sleep.

Thank you for joining Bite at the Time Books today while we read a bite of one of your favorite classics.

If you enjoy our show, be sure to follow us so you get all the new episodes.

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We would also love for you to drop us a rating on your favorite podcast platform and share our show with your friends.

You can catch us on all the social medias at Bite at a Timebooks or on our website, Bite atotimebooks.com.

Again, my name is Brie Carlyle, and I hope you come back tomorrow for the next bite of Anne of the island.