THE DIARY OF A YOUNG GIRL : THE DEFINITIVE EDITION ... - Fidele

fountain pen was given a new case in honor of the occasion. Not only did it have
room for a pencil, it also had a zipper, which was much more impressive. When I
was thirteen, the fountain pen went with me to the Annex, and together we've raced
through countless diaries and compositions. I'd turned fourteen and my fountain
pen was enjoying the last year of its life with me when . . .
It was just after five on Friday afternoon. I came out of my room and was about to
sit down at the table to write when I was roughly pushed to one side to make room
for Margot and Father, who wanted to practice their Latin. The fountain pen
remained unused on the table, while its owner, sighing, was forced to make do with
a very tiny corner of the table, where she began rubbing beans. That's how we
remove mold from the beans and restore them to their original state. At a quarter
to six I swept the floor, dumped the dirt into a news paper, along with the rotten
beans, and tossed it into the stove. A giant flame shot up, and I thought it was
wonderful that the stove, which had been gasping its last breath, had made such a
miraculous recovery.
All was quiet again. The Latin students had left, and I sat down at the table to
pick up where I'd left off. But no matter where I looked, my fountain pen was
nowhere in sight. I took another look. Margot looked, Mother looked, Father
looked, Dussel looked. But it had vanished.
"Maybe it fell in the stove, along with the beans!" Margot suggested.
"No, it couldn't have!" I replied.
But that evening, when my fountain pen still hadn't turned up, we all assumed it
had been burned, especially because celluloid is highly inflammable. Our darkest
fears were confirmed the next day when Father went to empty the stove and
discovered the clip, used to fasten it to a pocket, among the ashes. Not a trace
of the gold nib was left. "It must have melted into stone," Father conjectured.
I'm left with one consolation, small though it may be: my fountain pen was
cremated, just as I would like to be someday!
Yours, Anne
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 17, 1943
Dearest Kitty,
Recent events have the house rocking on its foundations. Owing to an outbreak of
diphtheria at Bep's, she won't be allowed to come in contact with us for six
weeks. Without her, the cooking and shopping will be very difficult, not to
mention how much we'll miss her company. Mr. Kleiman is still in bed and has eaten
nothing but gruel for three weeks. Mr. Kugler is up to his neck in work.
Margot sends her Latin lessons to a teacher, who corrects and then returns them.
She's registered under Bep's name. The teacher's very nice, and witty too. I bet
he's glad to have such a smart student.
Dussel is in a turmoil and we don't know why. It all began with Dussel's saying
nothing when he was upstairs; he didn't exchange so much as a word with either Mr.
or Mrs. van Daan. We all noticed it. This went on for a few days, and then Mother
took the opportunity to warn him about Mrs. van D., who could make life miserable
for him. Dussel said Mr. van Daan had started the silent treatment and he had no
intention of breaking it. I should explain that yesterday was November 16, the
first anniversary of his living in the Annex. Mother received a plant in honor of