第8章

星期五

叔叔，您觉得如何？英文指导教授说，我上一篇文章显出一种不寻常的原创力。她真的这么说！她的原话就是这么讲的。想想我这18年来受的训练，这似乎不太可能，不是吗？约翰·格利尔之家的目的，就是要把97个小孤儿变成97个相貌、言行举止都一样的人。

我不寻常的艺术天分倒是在很小时就通过在门板上画李皮太太展现出来了。我希望当我说我幼年的家的坏话时，您不要不高兴。不过您有权利在我变得太恶劣时，随时停止您的支持。这样说是不太好听，不过您不能期望我太有礼貌，孤儿院毕竟不是淑女训练学校。

叔叔，您知道，大学里难的不是功课，而是娱乐。大半的时候，我都不懂女孩们在谈些什么，她们的笑话似乎都与她们相同的过去有关。我在她们的世界里就像是一个外国人，听不懂她们的语言。这是一种很惆怅的感觉。我一生都有这样的感觉。高中时，女孩们会站在一起冷眼看着我。我很奇怪，可能自己很与众不同，而每个人都知道。我可以感觉“约翰·格利尔之家”就写在我脸上。然后会有一些好人走来安慰我。我恨他们每一个人——尤其是那些好人。

这里没有人知道我是在孤儿院里长大的。我告诉莎丽·麦克白我的父母双亡，是一位好心的老先生送我上大学的——到目前为止，这都是事实。我不希望您觉得我很蠢，不过我真的希望跟其他女孩子一样，但那可怕的“家”的阴影笼罩着我的童年，使我和大家完全不同。如果我能不去理这点，把它逐出脑海，我想我可以变得跟其他女孩一样可爱。我不认为我们有任何区别，您觉得呢？

无论如何，莎丽·麦克白喜欢我！

您永远的，茱蒂·亚伯特

（原名乔若莎）

星期六上午

我刚才又把信读了一遍，这封信的基调好像很阴郁。但是您可能猜不到，我星期一早上要交一篇特殊的报告，复习几何学，感冒还很严重。

Friday

What do you think, Daddy?The English instructor said that my last paper shows an unusual amount of originality. She did, truly.Those were her words.It doesn't seem possible, does it, considering the eighteen years of training that I've had?The aim of the John Grier Home(as you doubtless know and heartily approve of)is to turn the ninety-seven orphans into ninety-seven twins.

The unusual artistic ability which I exhibit was developed at an early age through drawing chalk pictures of Mrs. Lippett on the woodshed door.I hope that I don't hurt your feelings when I criticize the home of my youth?But you have the upper hand, you know, for if I become too impertinent, you can always stop payment of your cheques.That isn't a very polite thing to say-but you can't expect me to have any manners;a foundling asylum isn't a young ladies'finishing school.

You know, Daddy, it isn't the work that is going to be hard in college. It's the play.Half the time I don't know what the girls are talking about;their jokes seem to relate to a past that every one but me has shared.I'm a foreigner in the world and I don't understand the language.It's a miserable feeling.I've had it all my life.At the high school the girls would stand in groups and just look at me.I was queer and different and everybody knew it.I could FEEL'John Grier Home'written on my face.And then a few charitable ones would make a point of coming up and saying something polite.I HATED EVERY ONE OF THEM-the charitable ones most of all.

Nobody here knows that I was brought up in an asylum. I told Sallie McBride that my mother and father were dead, and that a kind old gentleman was sending me to college which is entirely true so far as it goes.I don't want you to think I am a coward, but I do want to be like the other girls, and that Dreadful Home looming over my childhood is the one great big difference.If I can turn my back on that and shut out the remembrance, I think, I might be just as desirable as any other girl.I don't believe there's any real, underneath difference, do you?

Anyway, Sallie McBride likes me!

Yours ever, Judy Abbott(Nee Jerusha.)

Saturday morning

I've just been reading this letter over and it sounds pretty un-cheerful. But can't you guess that I have a special topic due Monday morning and a review in geometry and a very sneezy cold?