The Doctor's Sweetheart

"The Doctor's Sweetheart" by Lucy Maud Montgomery is a poignant short story that explores themes of love, sacrifice, and the complexities of relationships. Set in a small, picturesque community, the narrative centers around a young woman named Christina who is deeply in love with a local doctor. As she grapples with her feelings and the demands of her affections, the story delves into the challenges of unrequited love and the bittersweet nature of romantic longing. Through Montgomery's characteristic lyrical prose, readers are invited to reflect on the intricacies of the human heart and the choices we make for love.

• Short story

								
Just because I am an old woman outwardly it doesn't follow that I am
one inwardly. Hearts don't grow old--or shouldn't. Mine hasn't, I am
thankful to say. It bounded like a girl's with delight when I saw
Doctor John and Marcella Barry drive past this afternoon. If the
doctor had been my own son I couldn't have felt more real pleasure in
his happiness. I'm only an old lady who can do little but sit by her
window and knit, but eyes were made for seeing, and I use mine for
that purpose. When I see the good and beautiful things--and a body
need never look for the other kind, you know--the things God planned
from the beginning and brought about in spite of the counter plans and
schemes of men, I feel such a deep joy that I'm glad, even at
seventy-five, to be alive in a world where such things come to pass.
And if ever God meant and made two people for each other, those people
were Doctor John and Marcella Barry; and that is what I always tell
folk who come here commenting on the difference in their ages. "Old
enough to be her father," sniffed Mrs. Riddell to me the other day. I
didn't say anything to Mrs. Riddell. I just looked at her. I presume
my face expressed what I felt pretty clearly. How any woman can live
for sixty years in the world, as Mrs. Riddell has, a wife and mother
at that, and not get some realization of the beauty and general
satisfactoriness of a real and abiding love, is something I cannot
understand and never shall be able to.

Nobody in Bridgeport believed that Marcella would ever come back,
except Doctor John and me--not even her Aunt Sara. I've heard people
laugh at me when I said I knew she would; but nobody minds being
laughed at when she is sure of a thing and I was sure that Marcella
Barry would come back as that the sun rose and set. I hadn't lived
beside her for eight years to know so little about her as to doubt
her. Neither had Doctor John.

Marcella was only eight years old when she came to live in Bridgeport.
Her father, Chester Barry, had just died. Her mother, who was a sister
of Miss Sara Bryant, my next door neighbor, had been dead for four
years. Marcella's father left her to the guardianship of his brother,
Richard Barry; but Miss Sara pleaded so hard to have the little girl
that the Barrys consented to let Marcella live with her aunt until she
was sixteen. Then, they said, she would have to go back to them, to be
properly educated and take the place of her father's daughter in his
world. For, of course, it is a fact that Miss Sara Bryant's world was
and is a very different one from Chester Barry's world. As to which
side the difference favors, that isn't for me to say. It all depends
on your standard of what is really worth while, you know.

So Marcella came to live with us in Bridgeport. I say "us" advisedly.
She slept and ate in her aunt's house, but every house in the village
was a home to her; for, with all our little disagreements and diverse
opinions, we are really all one big family, and everybody feels an
interest in and a good working affection for everybody else. Besides,
Marcella was one of those children whom everybody loves at sight, and
keeps on loving. One long, steady gaze from those big grayish-blue
black-lashed eyes of hers went right into your heart and stayed there.

She was a pretty child and as good as she was pretty. It was the right
sort of goodness, too, with just enough spice of original sin in it to
keep it from spoiling by reason of over-sweetness. She was a frank,
loyal, brave little thing, even at eight, and wouldn't have said or
done a mean or false thing to save her life.

She and I were right good friends from the beginning. She loved me and
she loved her Aunt Sara; but from the very first her best and deepest
affection went out to Doctor John Haven, who lived in the big brick
house on the other side of Miss Sara's.

Doctor John was a Bridgeport boy, and when he got through college he
came right home and settled down here, with his widowed mother. The
Bridgeport girls were fluttered, for eligible young men were scarce in
our village; there was considerable setting of caps, I must say that,
although I despise ill-natured gossip; but neither the caps nor the
wearers thereof seemed to make any impression on Doctor John. Mrs.
Riddell said that he was a born old bachelor; I suppose she based her
opinion on the fact that Doctor John was always a quiet, bookish
fellow, who didn't care a button for society, and had never been
guilty of a flirtation in his life. I knew Doctor John's heart far
better than Martha Riddell could know anybody's; and I knew there was
nothing of the old bachelor in his nature. He just had to wait for the
right woman, that was all, not being able to content himself with less
as some men can and do. If she never came Doctor John would never
marry; but he wouldn't be an old bachelor for all that.

He was thirty when Marcella came to Bridgeport--a tall,
broad-shouldered man with a mane of thick brown curls and level, dark
hazel eyes. He walked with a little stoop, his hands clasped behind
him; and he had the sweetest, deepest voice. Spoken music, if ever a
voice was. He was kind and brave and gentle, but a little distant and
reserved with most people. Everybody in Bridgeport liked him, but only
a very few ever passed the inner gates of his confidence or were
admitted to any share in his real life. I am proud to say I was one; I
think it is something for an old woman to boast of.

Doctor John was always fond of children, and they of him. It was
natural that he and little Marcella should take to each other. He had
the most to do with bringing her up, for Miss Sara consulted him in
everything. Marcella was not hard to manage for the most part; but she
had a will of her own, and when she did set it up in opposition to
the powers that were, nobody but the doctor could influence her at
all; she never resisted him or disobeyed his wishes.

Marcella was one of those girls who develop early. I suppose her
constant association with us elderly folks had something to do with
it, too. But, at fifteen, she was a woman, loving, beautiful, and
spirited.

And Doctor John loved her--loved the woman, not the child. I knew it
before he did--but not, as I think, before Marcella did, for those
young, straight-gazing eyes of hers were wonderfully quick to read
into other people's hearts. I watched them together and saw the love
growing between them, like a strong, fair, perfect flower, whose
fragrance was to endure for eternity. Miss Sara saw it, too, and was
half-pleased and half-worried; even Miss Sara thought the Doctor too
old for Marcella; and besides, there were the Barrys to be reckoned
with. Those Barrys were the nightmare dread of poor Miss Sara's life.

The time came when Doctor John's eyes were opened. He looked into his
own heart and read there what life had written for him. As he told me
long afterwards, it came to him with a shock that left him
white-lipped. But he was a brave, sensible fellow and he looked the

								Rate this book:0.0 / 0 votes