*Disclaimer: characters are, as always, property of L.M. Montgomery. The poetry that Paul and "Mother Lavendar" recite is from "Paul Revere's Ride," by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

Chapter Three

The carriage picked us up right at the docks and carried us through the crowds at the port. The driver was Father's regular Boston driver, and he drove through the busy streets with ease. There was so much to see on the way! I sat on the very edge of the bench so I could look out the window.

I have never seen buildings so close together in all my life! Some roads were lined with shops, some with houses. I wondered if the people who lived in them could look out their dining-room windows and see what their neighbors were having for supper. I wondered if such proximity would be enjoyable or irritating. Surely it wouldn't be entirely agreeable for someone to be able to look into your bedroom window if the lights were on at night.

Lost in thought about the lives of the Bostonians, I almost failed to notice Mother Lavendar gently shaking my arm. But I was taken back to reality by her voice -

"Paul, look!" I looked over at her, and she was pointing out the other window. I climbed over her and she slid sideways to let me in beside her, next to the window that she was pointing to.

It was a red brick church with a white steeple. "It's beautiful," I said.

"It's the Old North Church," Mother Lavendar smiled. "Do you know the poem about Paul Revere's ride?"

"Yes!" I cried, jumping up to recite. I spoke in a clear, strong voice, just like my beautiful teacher showed me how.

"Listen, my children, and you shall hear

Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere.

On the eighteenth of April in seventy-five

Hardly a man is now alive

Who remembers that famous day and year."

Mother Lavendar smiled. "Do you remember the part when he watches for the lanterns? 'But mostly he watched with eager search.'"

I grinned, and recited the verse she spoke of, complete with dramatic gestures and hushed tones at the important parts.

"But mostly he watched with eager search

The belfry tower of the Old North Church,

As it rose above the graves on the hill,

Lonely and spectral and sombre and still.

And lo! as he looks, on the belfry's height

A glimmer, and then a gleam of light!"

"That's the Old North Church," Mother Lavendar said. "The church with the white steeple."

"Really?" I leaned towards the window to look at it again, but we had already passed.

Father smiled. "Don't worry, Paul, I'll take you back. I'll take you to all the places where the Revolution happened."

I sat back in my seat, next to Mother Lavendar, imagining Paul Revere in his three-corner hat riding like the wind on his horse on these very streets. I felt as though I had leapt into the poem. I was all at once excited to be here and terribly homesick for my beautiful teacher.

"Wouldn't Anne Shirley love to have seen that?" Mother Lavendar sighed. I looked at her and managed a smile. No matter how many times our thoughts coincide, it always makes me feel wonderful when she says what I have been thinking. I leaned over and rest my head on her shoulder, realizing how tired I am from the trip.

Mother Lavendar smiled and patted my hand. Father said, "We're nearly there, son."

I didn't care if we ever got there - I loved the feeling of the wheels turning under me and the carriage rumbling along and the succession of buildings I could see out the window. Most were brick, several stories high but thin.

We pulled up in front of a house that, to my surprise, was not touching other houses on both sides. It was set in a yard that was small but enough so that we wouldn't feel crowded. The house was made of large white bricks, three stories tall and square. Lining the steps that lead up to the black-painted double doors stood Father's servants. He had told me he had a cook, a butler and two maids. I wondered which of the men was the cook and which was the butler - all were standing stock-still like soldiers and unsmiling.

"Do they always look so solemn?" I asked Father as we climbed out of the carriage.

Either he didn't hear me, or he pretended not to notice. He acknowledged each one with a polite nod as we followed him up the stairs and into the house.

The entryway was not massive, but big enough. Next to the doorway was a wooden table with flowers in a pot and a mirror that reflected the image of the three of us standing in our traveling clothes. A hallway extended back through the house, and on either side were wooden doors. Father promised he would take us on a tour later - "After we've all been settled."

He led us up the carpeted stairway to the upstairs. The upstairs seemed to be arranged in a horseshoe around the entryway, just like the bottom floor. I guessed that it was so guests would feel like they were in a big space, with the ceiling so far above them when they came in.

Father led me first into my bedroom. It had been prepared for me already, with a big four-poster bed complete with canopy and damask curtains. I had a fireplace and a washstand and a desk by the window. I went over to the window to see what my view was. Oh, good! I had a wonderful view of the back gardens - small, but I could tell that we had nice flowers.

"Supper will be in a half hour, son," Father said as he led Mother Lavendar out the door. "You have plenty of time to wash up."

As they left, I looked around for a moment in excitement. Then like a brick had been dropped into my stomach, the strangeness of my surroundings hit me. I knew I would be able to appreciate the view in time, but I felt very odd at that particular moment. The room felt very big, and the view very unfamiliar, and the dark wood of the bed very imposing. I suppose a new home never feels like home right away, but this being my first new home I had never felt this strange displaced sensation.

I ran out of the room and turned left into the hallway. I opened one door, then another, then another, before I found Mother Lavendar and Father conversing with a servant in their own new bedroom. I stood in the door watching them - somehow the strange empty feeling went away when I wasn't alone.

Mother Lavendar saw me standing there and started. "Paul!" she cried. "Is something wrong?"

"No," I said. And as though she could read my mind - and sometimes I think she can - she came over to me and laid a gentle hand on my shoulder.

"Would you like me to come help you settle in?" she asked. I only nodded.

She followed me back to my room, where my trunk had been delivered. We went through my things, putting them away.

"I wonder what our neighbors are like," I said.

"I bet some of them are diplomats," she suggested, a twinkle in her eye.

"From Europe?" I suggested.

She smiled. "France, I think."

And we went on unpacking and making up stories about our neighbors, and by the time we had unpacked we had invented a Polish count, an English duchess with an Irish orphan maid, a manufacturing giant, and an eccentric old dowager with seventeen gray cats.

We had supper in the dining room, which had mirrors on both sides to make it look larger. A large mahogany table took up most of the room, and below the window was the sideboard from which the maids served us our supper of roast chicken and potatoes prepared in a way I'd never seen.

By the end of the meal, I was exhausted. Travel is wearying, and all the new sights and experiences had worn me out. As soon as I was done eating, I excused myself upstairs, changed into my pajamas, and climbed into bed. I didn't know how late it was, but as it was dark, it must have been after nine o'clock.

The bed was vast and softer than any bed I'd ever slept in - I sunk deep into the feather tick as soon as I laid down.

Is there anything more strange than a strange bed? Knowing deep inside me that this wasn't the room I had gone to sleep in, that this wasn't the room in which my little mother had read to me and sung me songs, the empty, lost feeling returned. And finally being relaxed in body, my eyes released tears that felt like they had been waiting to spill for hours. I wept into my pillow, not knowing quite why except that it must have something to do with the empty feeling that was slowly creeping from my heart into my middle.

I was vaguely aware of it when the edge of my mattress dipped, and then I felt Mother Lavendar's hand smoothing my hair away from my forehead.

"What is it, pet?" she asked. "Are you homesick?"

Although "homesick" wasn't quite the word for what I felt - it was more like being lost in a dark wood - her gentle voice made the tears flow stronger. Mother Lavendar lifted me from the mattress and held me to her.

"Hush," she whispered. "Hush now."

She held me silently for a while, and eventually I quieted.

"I do like Boston," I murmured into her white cotton nightdress.

"I know," she said. "First nights make you feel so alone. Like you're hanging in the air, and you can't see the ground?" I nodded. "I know. I always cry when I sleep in a new place. I promise you, it will be exciting again tomorrow. Boston won't hold it against you."

I giggled wearily and nestled closer to her. I intended to thank her for coming in to me, but my eyes drooped shut and my voice, it seemed, had already gone to sleep. Mother Lavendar began to sing.

"My life goes on, in endless song, above earth's lamentations. . ."

A song I knew. Mother Lavendar here. Father down the hall. The empty feeling began to go away, and my weary body slipped into a deep sleep. I was even eager for the morning.