Even yet , Anne , when I think that I made her last year happy I 'm not sorry for what I did . As for Dick -- I did n't hate him when I married him -- I just felt for him the indifferent , friendly feeling I had for most of my schoolmates . I knew he drank some -- but I had never heard the story of the girl down at the fishing cove . If I had , I COULD N'T have married him , even for mother 's sake . Afterwards -- I DID hate him -- but mother never knew . She died -- and then I was alone . I was only seventeen and I was alone . Dick had gone off in the Four Sisters . I hoped he would n't be home very much more . The sea had always been in his blood . I had no other hope . Well , Captain Jim brought him home , as you know -- and that 's all there is to say . You know me now , Anne -- the worst of me -- the barriers are all down . And you still want to be my friend ? '' Anne looked up through the birches , at the white paper-lantern of a half moon drifting downwards to the gulf of sunset . Her face was very sweet . `` I am your friend and you are mine , for always , '' she said . `` Such a friend as I never had before . I have had many dear and beloved friends -- but there is a something in you , Leslie , that I never found in anyone else . You have more to offer me in that rich nature of yours , and I have more to give you than I had in my careless girlhood .
We are both women -- and XXXXX forever . ''
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