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Anne of the Island - A Dramatic Reading · Anne of the Island - A Dramatic Reading

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  Chapter one, The shadow of change. Harvest is ended and summer is gone,
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  quoted Anne Shirley, gazing across the shorn fields dreamily. She and Diana
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  Barry had been picking apples in the Green Gables orchard, but were now resting
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  from their labors in a sunny corner, where airy fleets of thistledown drifted by
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  on the wings of a wind that was still summer, sweet with the incense
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  of ferns in the haunted wood. But everything the landscape around them spoke of
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  autumn. The sea was roaring hollowly in the distance. The fields were bare
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  and sere, scarfed with golden rod. The brook valley below green Gables overflowed
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  with asters of ethereal purple, and the lake of Shining Waters was blue,
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  blue, blue, not the changeful blue of spring, nor the pale azure
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  of summer, but a clear, steadfast, serene blue, as if the
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  water were past all moods and tenses of emotion and had settled down to a
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  tranquility unbroken by fickle dreams. It has been a nice summer, said Diana,
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  twisting the new ring on her left hand with a smile, and Miss
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  Lavender's wedding seemed to come as a sort of crown to it. I suppose
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  mister and missus Irving are on the Pacific coast now. It seems to me
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  they have been gone long enough to go around to the world, sighed Anne.
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  I can't believe it is only a week since they were married. Everything
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  has changed, miss Lavender, and mister and missus Allan gone. How lonely
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  the manse looks with the shutters all closed. I went past it last night
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  and it made me feel as if everybody in it had died. We'll never
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  get another minister as nice as mister Allen, said Diana with gloomy conviction.
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  I suppose we'll have all kinds of supplies this winter, and half the Sunday's
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  no preaching at all, and you and Gilbert gone. It will be awfully
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  dull. Fred will be here, insinuated Anne. Slyly. When is missus
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  Lynde going to move up? Asked Diana, as if she had not heard
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  Anne's remark tomorrow. I'm glad she's coming, but it will be another change.
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  Marilla and I cleared everything out of the spare room yesterday. Do you
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  know I hated to do it? Of course it was silly, but it
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  did seem as if we were committing sacrilege. That old spare room has always
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  seemed like a shrine to me. When I was a child, I thought
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  it the most wonderful apartment in the world. You remember what a consuming desire
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  I had to sleep in a spare room bed. But not the Green Gables
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  spare room. Oh no, never there. It would have been too terrible.
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  I couldn't have slept a wink from awe. I never walked through that
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  room when Marilla sent me in on an errand no, indeed, I tiptoed
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  through it and held my breath as if I were in church, and felt
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  relieved when I got out of it. The pictures of George Whitefield and the
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  Duke of Wellington hung there, one on each side of the mirror, and
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  frowned so sternly at me all the time I was in, especially if I
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  dared peep in the mirror, which was the only one in the house that
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  didn't twist my face a little. I always wondered how Marilla dared house cleaned
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  that room, and now it's not only cleaned, but stripped bare. George
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  Whitefield and the Duke have been relegated to the upstairs hall. So passes the
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  glory of this world, concluded Anne, with a laugh in which there was
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  a little note of regret. It is never pleasant to have our old shrines
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  desecrated, even when we have outgrown them. I'll be so lonesome when you
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  go, moaned Diana for the hundredth time. Time to think you go next
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  week. But we are together still, said Anne cheerily. We mustn't let
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  next week rob us of this week's joy. I hate the thought of going
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  myself home, and I are such good friends. Talk of being lonesome,
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  it's I who should groan. You'll be here with any number of your old
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  friends and Fred, while I shall be alone among strangers, not knowing a
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  soul except Gilbert Anne. Charlie Sloane, said Diana, imitating Anne's italics and
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  slyness. Charlie Sloane will be a great comfort, of course, agreed Anne
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  sarcastically, whereupon both those irresponsible damsels laughed. Diana knew exactly what Anne thought
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  of Charlie Sloane, but despite sundry confidential talks, she did not know just
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  what Anne thought of Gilbert. Blythe to be sure, Anne herself did not
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  know that the boys may be boarding at the other end of Kingsport for all
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  I know, Anne went on, I am glad I'm going to Redmond,
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  and I am sure I shall like it after a while. But for the
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  first few weeks I know I won't. I shan't even have the comfort of
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  looking forward to the weekend visit home as I had when I went to Queen's.
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  Christmas will seem like a thousand years away. Everything is changing, We're
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  going to change, said Diana sadly. I have a feeling that things will
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  never be the same again. Anne. We have come to a parting of
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  the ways, I suppose, said Anne thoughtfully. We had to come to
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  it. Do you think, Diana, that being grown up is really as
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  nice as we used to imagine it would be when we were children. I
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  don't know. There are some nice things about it, answered Diana, again,
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  caressing her ring with that little smile, which always had the effect of
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  making Anne feel suddenly left out and inexperienced. But there are so many puzzling
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  things too. Sometimes I feel as if being grown up just frightened me,
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  and then I would give anything to be a little girl again. I suppose
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  we'll get used to being grown up in time, said Anne cheerfully. There
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  won't be so many unexpected things about it, by and by, though,
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  after all, I fancy it's the unexpected things that give spice to life.
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  We're eighteen, Diana. In two more years we'll be twenty. When I
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  was ten, I thought twenty was a green old age. In no time,
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  you'll be a staid, middle aged matron, and I shall be nice
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  old maid aunt Anne coming to visit you on vacations. You'll always keep a
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  corner for me, won't you, die, Doc Darling. Not the spare
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  room, of course, old maids can't aspire to spare rooms. And I
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  shall be as humble as you Riah heap, and quite content with a little
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  over the porch or off the parlor cubby hole. What nonsense you do,
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  talk, Anne laughed. Diana, you'll marry somebody splendid and handsome and rich,
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  and no spare room in Avonlea will be half gorgeous enough for you,
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  and you'll turn up your nose at all the friends of your youth. That
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  would be a pity. My nose is quite nice, but I fear turning
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  it up, would spoil it, said Anne, patting that shapely organ.
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  I haven't so many good features that I could afford to spoil those I have.
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  So even if I should marry the king of the Cannibal Islands, I
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  promise you I won't turn up my nose at you, Diana with another gay
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  laugh. The girls separated, Diana to return to Orchard Slope, Anne to
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  walk to the post office. She found a letter awaiting her there, and
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  when Gilbert blythe overtook her on the bridge over the Lake of Shining Waters,
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  she was sparkling with the excitement of it. Priscilla Grant is going to Redmond,
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  too, she exclaimed, isn't that splendid. I hoped she would,
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  but she didn't think her father would consent. He has, however, and
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  we're to board together. I feel that I can face an army with banners,
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  or all the professors of Redmond in one fell phalanx, with a chum
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  like Priscilla by my side. I think we'll like Kingsport, said Gilbert.
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  It's a nice old burg, they tell me, and has the finest natural
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  park in the world. I've heard that the scenery in it is magnificent.
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  I wonder if it will be, can be any more beautiful than this,
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  murmured Anne, looking around her with the loving, enraptured eyes of those to
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  whom home must always be the loveliest spot in the world, no matter what
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  fairer lands may lie under alien stars. They were leaning on the bridge of
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  the old Pond, drinking deep of the enchantment of the dusk, just at
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  the spot where Anne had climbed from her sinking dory on the day Elaine floated
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  down to Camelot. The fine, impurpling dye of sunset still stained the western
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  skies, but the moon was rising, and the water lay like a great
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  silver dream. In her light remembrance wove a sweet and subtle spell over the
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  two young creatures. You're very quiet, eh, said Gilbert at last.
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  I'm afraid to speak or move, for fear all this wonderful beauty will vanish,
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  just like a broken silence, breathed Anne. Gilbert suddenly laid his hand
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  over the slender white one lying on the rail of the bridge. His hazel
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  eyes deepened into darkness, his still boyish lips opened to say something of the
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  dream and hope that thrilled his soul. But Anne snatched her hand away and
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  turned quickly. The spell of the dusk was broken for her. I must
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  go home, she exclaimed, with a rather overdone carelessness. Marilla had a
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  headache this afternoon, and I'm sure the twins will be in some dreadful mischief
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  by this time. I really shouldn't have stayed away so long. She chattered
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  ceaselessly and inconsequently until they reached the Green Gables Lane. Poor Gilbert hardly had
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  a chance to get a word in edgewise. Anne felt rather relieved when they
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  parted. There had been a new secret self consciousness in her heart with regard
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  to Gilbert. Ever since that fleeting moment of revelation in the garden of Echo
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  Lodge. Something alien had intruded into the old perfect school day comradeship, something
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  that threatened to marrit. I never felt glad to see Gilbert go before,
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  she thought, half resentfully, half sorrowfully, as she walked alone up the
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  lane. Our friendship will be spoiled if he goes on with this nonsense.
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  It mustn't be spoiled. I won't let it. Oh, why can't boys
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  be just sensible? Anne had an uneasy doubt that it was not strictly sensible
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  that she should still feel on her hand the warm pressure of Gilbert's as distinctly
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  as she had felt it for the swift second his had rested there, and
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  still less sensible that the sensation was far from being an unpleasant one, very
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  different from that which had attended a similar demonstration on Charlie Sloane's part when she
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  had been sitting at a dance with him at a White Sands party three nights
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  before. Anne shivered over the disagreeable recollection, but all problems connected with infatuated
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  Swains vanished from her mind when she entered the homely, unsentimental atmosphere of the
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  Green Gables kitchen, where an eight year old boy was crying grievously on the
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  sofa. What is the matter, Davy asked Anne, taking him up in
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  her arms. Where are Marilla and Dora. Marilla's putting Dora to bed,
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  sobbed Davy. And I'm crying because Dora fell down the outside cellar steps heels
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  over her head and scraped all the skin off her nose. And oh,
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  well, don't cry about it, dear. Of course you are sorry for
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  her, but crying won't help her any She'll be all right tomorrow. Crying
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  never helps anyone, Davy, boy, And I ain't crying cause Dora fell
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  down, cellar, said Davy, cutting short Anne's well meant preachment with increasing
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  bitterness. I'm crying because I wasn't there to see her fall. I'm always
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  missing some fun or other, seems to me, Oh, Davy, Anne
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  choked back an unholy shriek of laughter. Would you call it fun to see
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  poor little Dora fall down the steps and get hurt? She wasn't much hurt,
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  said Davy defiantly. Course, if she'd been killed, I'd have been
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  real sorry, Anne. But the keys sain't so easy killed. They're like
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  the Bluets. I guess her. Bluett fell off the hailoft last Wednesday and
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  rolled right down through the turnip shoot into the box stall where they had a
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  fearful wild cross horse, and rolled right under his heels. And still he
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  got out alive, with only three bones broke. Missus Lynde says, there
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  are some folks you can't kill with a meat axe. Is Missus Lynde coming
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  here tomorrow? Anne? Yes, Davy, and I hope you'll be always
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  very nice and good to her. I'll be nice and good, But will
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  she ever put me to bed at nights? Anne? Perhaps? Why Cauz,
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  said Davy very decidedly. If she does, I won't say my prayers
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  before her like I do before you. Anne. Why not? Because I
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  don't think it would be nice to talk to God before strangers. Anne.
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  Dora can say hers to missus Lynde if she likes, but I won't.
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  I'll wait till she's gone and then say em. Won't that be all right?
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  Anne? Yes? If you are sure you won't forget to say them,
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  Davy, boy, Oh, I won't forget you bet. I think
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  saying my prayers is great fun, but it won't be as good fun saying
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  them alone as saying them to you. I wish you'd stay home, Anne.
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  I don't see what you want to go away and leave us for.
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  I don't exactly want to, Davy, but I feel I ought to go.
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  If you don't want to go, you needn't. You're grown up.
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  When I'm grown up, I'm not going to do one single thing I don't
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  want to do. Anne. All your life, Davy, you'll find yourself
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  doing things you don't want to do. I won't, said, Davy flatly
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  catch me. I have to do things I don't want to do now,
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  because you and Marilla'll send me to bed if I don't. But when I
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  grow up, you can't do that, and there'll be nobody to tell me
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  not to do things. Won't I have the time, say Anne? Milty
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  Bolter says. His mother says, you're going to college to see if you
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  can catch a man? Are you? Anne? I want to know?
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  For a second, Anne burned with resentment. Then she laughed, reminding herself
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  that missus Bolter's crude, vulgarity of thought and speech could not harm her.
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  No, Davy, I'm not. I'm going to study and grow and learn
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  about many things. What things shoes and chips and sealing wax and cabbages and
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  kings, quoted Anne. But if you did want to catch a man,
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  how would you go about it? I want to know, Davy, for
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  whom the subject evidently possessed a certain fascination. You'd better ask missus Bolter,
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  said Anne thoughtlessly. I think it's likely she knows more about the process than
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  I do. I will the next time I see her, said Davy gravely.
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  Davy, if you do, cried Anne, realizing her mistake. But
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  you just told me too, protested Davy, aggrieved, It's time you went
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  to bed, decreed Anne. By way of getting out of the scrape.
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  After Davy had gone to bed, Anne wandered down to Victoria Island and sat
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  there alone, curtained with fine spun moonlit gloom, while the water laughed around
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  her in a duet of brook and wind. Anne had always loved that brook.
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  Many a dream had she spun over its sparkling water in days gone by.
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  She forgot lovelorn youths, and the cayenne's speeches of malicious neighbors, and
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  all the problems of her girlish existence. In imagination, she sailed over ste
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  vorried seas that washed the distant shining shores of fairy lands forlorn, where lost
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  Atlantis and Elysium lie with the evening star for pilot, to the land of
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  heart's desire. And she was richer in those dreams than in realities. For
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  things seen pass away, but the things that are unseen are eternal. End
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  of chapter one, Chapter ten, Patty's Place. The next evening found them
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  treading resolutely the herringbone walk through the tiny garden the april wind was filling the
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  pine trees with its roundelay, and the grove was alive with robins, great
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  plump, saucy fellows strutting along the paths. The girls rang rather timidly and
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  were admitted by a grim and ancient handmaiden. The door opened directly into a
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  large living room, whereby a cheery little fire sat two other ladies, both
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  of whom were also grim and ancient, Except that one looked to be about
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  seventy and the other fifty, there seemed little difference between them. Each had
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  amazingly big, light blue eyes behind steel rimmed spectacles. Each wore a cap
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  and a gray shawl. Each was knitting without haste and without rest. Each
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  rocked placidly and looked at the girls without speaking, And just behind each sat
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  a large white China dog with round green spots all over it, a green
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  nose, and green ears. Those dogs captured Anne's fancy on the spot.
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  They seemed like the twin guardian deities of Patty's place. For a few minutes,
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  nobody spoke. The girls were too nervous to find words, and neither
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  the ancient ladies nor the China dogs seemed conversationally. Inclined, Anne glanced about
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  the room. What a dear place it was. Another door opened out of
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  it, directly into the pine grove, and the robins came boldly up on
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  the very step. The floor was spotted with round braided mats, such as
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  Marilla made it green gables, but which were considered out of date everywhere else,
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  even in Avonlea, and yet here they were. On Spofford Avenue,
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  a big, polished grandfather's clock ticked loudly and solemnly. In a corner there
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  were delightful little cupboards over the mantelpiece, behind whose glass doors gleamed quaint bits
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  of china. The walls were hung with old prince and silhouettes. In one
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  corner, the stairs went up, and at the first low turn was a
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  long window with an inviting seat. It was all just as Anne had known
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  it must be. By this time, the silence had grown too dreadful,
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  and Priscilla nudged Anne to intimate that she must speak. We we saw by
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  your sign that this house is to let, said Anne faintly, addressing the
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  older lady, who was evidently Miss Patty Spoffored. Oh yes, said miss
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  Patty, I intended to take that sign down today. Then then we are
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  too late, said Anne sorrowfully. You've led it to someone else. No,
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  but we have decided not to let it at all. Oh, I'm
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  so sorry, exclaimed Anne impulsively. I love this place, so I did
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  hope we could have got it. Then did miss Patty lay down her knitting,
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  take off her specs, rub them, put them on again, and
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  for the first time look at Anne as at a human being. The other
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  lady followed her example so perfectly that she might as well have been a reflection
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  in a mirror. You love it, said miss Patty, with emphasis.
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  Does that mean that you really love it? Or that you merely like the
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  looks of it? The girls nowadays indulge in such exaggerated statements that one never
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  can tell what they do mean. It wasn't so in my young days.
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  Then, a girl did not say she loved turnips in just the same tone
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  as she might have said that she loved her mother or her savior. Anne's
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  conscience bore her up. I really do love it, she said gently.
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  I did ever since I saw it last fall. My two college chums and
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  I want to keep house next year instead of boarding. So we are looking
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  for a little place to rent, and when I saw that this house was
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  to let, I was so happy. If you love it, you can
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  have it, said Miss Patty. Maria and I decided today that we would
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  not let it after all, because we did not like any of the people
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  who have wanted it. We don't have to let it. We can afford
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  to go to Europe. Even if we don't let it. It would help
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  us out, But not for gold. Will I let my home pass into
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  the possession of such people as have come here and looked at it. You
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  are different. I believe you do love it, and we'll be good to
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  it. You can have it if if we can afford to pay what you
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  ask for it, hesitated Anne. Miss Patty named the amount required. Anne
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  and Priscilla looked at each other. Priscilla shook her head. I'm afraid we
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  can't afford quite so much, said Anne, choking back her disappointment. You
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  see, we are only college girls, and we are poor. What were
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  you thinking you could afford? Demanded Miss Patty. Ceasing not to knit,
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  Anne named her amount. Miss Patty nodded gravely. That will do as I
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  told you. It is not strictly necessary that we should let it at all.
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  We are not rich, but we have enough to go to Europe on.
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  I have never been in Europe in my life, and never expected or
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  wanted to go, but my niece there, Maria Spofford, has taken a
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  fancy to go. Now. You know, a young person like Maria can't
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  go globe trotting alone. No, I I suppose not, murmured Anne,
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  seeing that Miss Patty was quite solemnly in earnest. Of course, not so
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  I have to go along to look after her. I expect to enjoy it
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  too. I'm seventy years old, but I'm not tired of living yet.
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  I dare say i'd have gone to Europe before if the idea had occurred to
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  me. We shall be away for two years, perhaps three. We stail
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  in June, and we shall send you the key and leave all in order
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  for you to take possession when you choose. We shall pack away a few
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  things we prize especially, but all the rest will be left. Will you
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  leave the China dogs? Asked Anne timidly, Would you like me too?
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  Oh? Indeed, yes, they are delightful. A pleased expression came into
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  Miss Patty's face. I think a great deal of those dogs, she said
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  proudly. They are over a hundred years old, and they have sat on
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  either side of this fireplace ever since my brother Aaron brought them from London fifty
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  years ago. Spofford Avenue was called after my brother erin fine man he was,
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  said Miss Maria, speaking for the first time. He was a good
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  uncle to you. Maria said Miss Patty, with evident emotion. You do
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  well to remember him. I shall always remember him, said Miss Maria,
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  solemnly. I can see him this minute, standing there before that fire was,
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  hands under his coat, tails beaming on us. Miss Maria took out
• 21:57
  her handkerchief and wiped her eyes. But Miss Patty came resolutely back from the
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  regions of sentiment to those of business. I shall leave the dogs where they
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  are, if you will promise to be very careful of them, she said.
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  Their names are Gog and Magog. Gog looks to the right, and
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  Maygog to the left. And there's just one more thing. You don't object
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  I hope to this house being called Patty's Place. No, indeed, we
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  think that is one of the nicest things about it. You have sense,
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  I see, said miss Patty, in a tone of great satisfaction. Would
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  you believe it? All the people who came here to rent the house wanted
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  to know if they couldn't take the name off the gate during their occupation of
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  it. I told them roundly that the name went with the house. This
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  has been Patty's place ever since my brother Erin left it to me in his
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  will, and Patty's Place it shall remain until I die and Maria dies.
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  After that happens, the next possessor can call it any fool name he likes,
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  concluded Miss Patty. Much she might have said, after that the deluge,
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  And now wouldn't you like to go over the house and see it all
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  before we consider this bargain made further explorations still further delighted the girls. Besides
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  the big living room, there was a kitchen and a small bedroom downstairs.
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  Upstairs were three rooms, one large and two small. Anne took an especial
• 23:22
  fancy to one of the small ones, looking out into the big pines,
• 23:25
  and hoped it would be hers. It was papered in pale blue and had
• 23:29
  a little old timey toilet table with sconces for candles. There was a diamond
• 23:33
  paned window with a seat under the blue muslin frills. That would be a
• 23:37
  satisfying spot for studying or dreaming. It's all so delicious that I know we
• 23:42
  are going to wake up and find it a fleeting vision of the night,
• 23:47
  said Priscilla as they went away. Miss Patty and Miss Maria are hardly such
• 23:52
  stuff as dreams are made of, laughed Anne. Can you fancy them globe
• 23:56
  trotting, especially in those shawls and caps. I suppose they'll take them off
• 24:00
  when they really begin to trot, said Priscilla. But I know they'll take
• 24:06
  their knitting with them everywhere. They simply couldn't be parted from it. They
• 24:10
  will walk about Westminster Abbey and knit. I feel sure. Meanwhile, Anne,
• 24:14
  we shall be living in Patty's place and on Spofford Avenue. I feel
• 24:18
  like a millionairess even now. I feel like one of the morning stars that
• 24:22
  sang for Joy, said Anne. Phil Gordon crept into thirty eight Saint John's
• 24:26
  that night and flung herself on Anne's bed. Girls, Dear, I'm tired
• 24:32
  to death. I feel like the man without a country, or was it
• 24:36
  without a shadow? I forget which. Anyway, I've been packing up,
• 24:40
  and I suppose you are worn out because you couldn't decide which things to pack
• 24:42
  first or where to put them, laughed Priscilla, exactly. And when I
• 24:48
  had got everything jammed in somehow, and my landlady and her maid had both
• 24:52
  sat on it while I locked it, I discovered I had packed a whole
• 24:55
  lot of things I wanted for convocation at the very bottom. I had to
• 24:59
  unlock the old thing and poke and dive into it for an hour before I
• 25:03
  fished out what I wanted. I would get hold of something that felt like
• 25:06
  what I was looking for, and I'd yank it up and it would be
• 25:08
  something else. No, Anne, I did not swear. I didn't say
• 25:12
  you did well. You looked it, but I admit my thoughts verged on
• 25:18
  the profane. And I have such a cold in the head I can do
• 25:21
  nothing but sniffle, sigh and sneeze. Isn't that alliterative agony for you,
• 25:26
  Queen, Anne, Do say something to cheer me up. Remember that next
• 25:30
  Thursday night you'll be back in the land of Alec And Alonzo suggested Anne.
• 25:36
  Phil shook her head dolefully more alliteration. No, I don't want Alec and
• 25:41
  Alonzo when I have a cold in the head. But what has happened you
• 25:45
  two? Now that I look at you closely, you seem all light it
• 25:48
  up with an internally iridescence. Why you're actually shining? What's up? We
• 25:55
  are going to live in Patty's place next winter, said Anne triumphantly. Live
• 25:59
  Markie not bored. We've rented it, and Stella Maynard is coming and her
• 26:03
  aunt is going to keep house for us. Phil bounced up, wiped her
• 26:07
  nose, and fell on her knees before Anne. Girls, girls, let
• 26:11
  me come too. Oh, I'll be so good. If there's no room
• 26:15
  for me, I'll sleep in the little doghouse in the orchard. I've seen
• 26:18
  it. Only let me come. Get up, you goose. I won't
• 26:22
  stir off my marrow bones till you tell me I can live with you next
• 26:26
  winter. Anne and Priscilla looked at each other. Then Anne said slowly,
• 26:32
  Phil, dear, we'd love to have you, but we may as well
• 26:34
  speak plainly. I'm poor, Chris is poor. Stella Maynard is poor.
• 26:40
  Our housekeeping will have to be very simple, and our table plain. You'd
• 26:44
  have to live as we would. Now you are rich and your boarding house.
• 26:48
  Fair attests the fact. Oh what do I care for that? Demanded
• 26:52
  Phil tragically. Better a dinner of herbs where you chums are than a stalled
• 26:56
  ox in a lonely boarding house. Don't think I'm stomach girls. I'll be
• 27:00
  willing to live on bread and water with just a little jam if you'll let
• 27:06
  me come. And then continued Anne, there will be a good deal of
• 27:10
  work to be done. Stella's aunt can't do it all. We all expect
• 27:12
  to have our chores to do. Now you toil, not neither do I
• 27:18
  spin, finished Philippa. But I'll learn to do things. You'll only have
• 27:22
  to show me once. I can make my own bed to begin with.
• 27:26
  And remember that though I can't cook, I can keep my temper. That's
• 27:30
  something. And I never growl about the weather, that's more. Oh,
• 27:36
  please, please, I never wanted anything so much in my life. And
• 27:40
  this floor is awfully hard. There's just one more thing, said Priscilla,
• 27:45
  resolutely you Phil, as all redmand knows and ten collars almost every evening now
• 27:51
  at Patty's place. We can't do that. We have decided that we shall
• 27:53
  be at home to our friends on Friday evenings only if you come with us,
• 27:59
  you'll have to rule. Well. You don't think I'll mind that,
• 28:03
  do you? Why I'm glad of it. I knew I should have had
• 28:06
  some such rule myself, but I hadn't enough decision to make it or stick
• 28:10
  to it. When I can shuffle off the responsibility on you, it will
• 28:14
  be a real relief. If you won't let me cast in my lot with
• 28:17
  you, I'll die of the disappointment, and then I'll come back and haunt
• 28:21
  you. I'll camp on the very doorstep of Patty's place, and you won't
• 28:25
  be able to go out or come in without falling over my spook again.
• 28:29
  Anne and Priscilla exchanged eloquent looks. Well, said Anne. Of course,
• 28:34
  we can't promise to take you until we've consulted with Stella, but I don't
• 28:37
  think she'll object. And as far as we are concerned, you may come
• 28:41
  and glad welcome. If you get tired of our simple life, you can
• 28:45
  leave us, and no questions asked, added Priscilla. Phil sprang up,
• 28:51
  hugged them both jubilantly and went on her way, rejoicing. I hope things
• 28:55
  will go right, said Priscilla soberly. We must make them go right,
• 29:00
  avowed Anne. I think phil will fit into our happy little home very well.
• 29:04
  All Phil's a dear to rattle around with and be chums. And of
• 29:07
  course the more there are of us, the easier it will be on our
• 29:10
  slim purses. But how will she be to live with? You have to
• 29:14
  summer and winter with anyone before you know if she's livable or not. Oh
• 29:18
  well, we'll all be put to the test as far as that goes,
• 29:21
  and we must quit us like sensible folk living and let live. Phil isn't
• 29:25
  selfish, though she's a little thoughtless, and I believe we will all get
• 29:29
  on beautifully in Patty's place. End of chapter ten, Chapter eleven, The
• 29:36
  Round of Life. Anne was back in Avonlea with the luster of the Thorburne
• 29:41
  scholarship on her brow. People told her she hadn't changed much, in a
• 29:47
  tone which hinted they were surprised and a little disappointed. She hadn't. Avonlea
• 29:52
  had not changed either, at least so it seemed at first. But as
• 29:56
  Anne sat in the green Gables pew on the first Sunday after her and looked
• 30:00
  over the congregation, she saw several little changes which all coming home to her
• 30:06
  at once made her realize that time did not quite stand still. Even in
• 30:10
  Avonlea, a new minister was in the pulpit. In the pews, more
• 30:15
  than one familiar face was missing forever Old Uncle Abe, his prophesying over and
• 30:19
  done, with Missus Peter Sloane, who had sighed it was to be hoped
• 30:25
  for the last time. Timothy Cotton, who, as Missus Rachel Lynde said,
• 30:30
  had actually managed to die at last after practicing at it for twenty years.
• 30:33
  And old Josiah Sloane, whom nobody knew in his coffin because he had
• 30:37
  his whiskers neatly trimmed, were all sleeping in the little graveyard behind the church.
• 30:42
  And Billy Andrews was married to Nettie Blewett. They appeared out that Sunday
• 30:48
  when Billy, beaming with pride and happiness, showed his beplumed and besilked bride
• 30:53
  into the harm In Andrew's pew, An dropped her lips to hide her dancing
• 30:57
  eyes. She recalled the stormy winter night of the Christmas holidays when Jane had
• 31:02
  proposed for Billy. He certainly had not broken his heart over his rejection.
• 31:07
  Anne wondered if Jane had also proposed to Nettie for him, or if he
• 31:11
  had mustered enough spunk to ask the fateful question himself. All the Andrews family
• 31:15
  seemed to share in his pride and pleasure. From Missus Harmon and the pew
• 31:19
  to Jane in the choir. Jane had resigned from the Avonlea School and intended
• 31:25
  to go west in the fall. Can't get a bow in Avonlea, that's
• 31:29
  what said Missus Rachel. Lynde scornfully says. She thinks she'll have better health
• 31:34
  out west. I never heard her health was poor before. Jane is a
• 31:40
  nice girl, Anne had said loyally. She never tried to attract attention as
• 31:45
  some did. Oh she never chased the boys, if that's what you mean,
• 31:49
  said Missus Rachel. But she'd like to be married just as much as
• 31:53
  anybody. That's what What else would take her out west to some forsaken place
• 31:59
  who's only recommendation is that men are plenty and women scarce, don't you tell
• 32:04
  me? But it was not at Jane, Anne gazed that day in dismay
• 32:07
  and surprise. It was at Ruby Gillis, who sat beside her in the
• 32:12
  choir. What had happened to Ruby? She was even handsomer than ever,
• 32:16
  but her blue eyes were too bright and lustrous, and the color of her
• 32:21
  cheeks was hectically brilliant. Besides, she was very thin. The hands that
• 32:24
  held her hymn book were almost transparent in their delicacy. Is Ruby Gillis ill,
• 32:30
  Anne asked of Missus Lynde as they went home from church. Ruby Gillis
• 32:35
  is dying of galloping consumption, said Missus Lynde bluntly. Everybody knows it,
• 32:40
  except herself and her family. They won't give in if you ask them.
• 32:45
  She's perfectly well. She hasn't been able to teach since she had that attack
• 32:51
  of congestion in the winter, but she says she's going to teach again in
• 32:53
  the fall, and she's after the White Sand School. She'll be in her
• 32:59
  grave, poor girl, when White Sands School opens. That's what Anne listened
• 33:05
  in shocked silence. Ruby Gillis, her old school chum dying. Could it
• 33:09
  be possible? Of late years they had grown apart, but the old tie
• 33:14
  of schoolgirl intimacy was there and made itself felt sharply in the tug The news
• 33:19
  gave at Anne's heartstrings. Ruby the brilliant, the Mary the coquettish. It
• 33:23
  was impossible to associate the thought of her with anything like death. She had
• 33:29
  greeted Anne with gay cordiality after church and urged her to come up the next
• 33:32
  evening. I'll be away Tuesday Wednesday evenings, she had whispered, triumphantly.
• 33:38
  There's a concert of Camedy in a party at what sounds herbs Pencer is going
• 33:44
  to take me. He's melaitis mischul to coach your moura, and I if
• 33:49
  I get talk with you, I want to hear all about your jewings at
• 33:52
  Redmond. Anne knew that Ruby meant she wanted to tell Anne about her own
• 33:57
  recent flirtations, but she promised to go, and Diana offered to go with
• 34:00
  her. I've been wanting to go to see Ruby for a long while,
• 34:05
  she told Anne when they left Green Gables the next evening. But I really
• 34:08
  couldn't go alone. It's so awful to hear Ruby rattling on as she does
• 34:12
  and pretending there's nothing the matter with her, even when she could hardly speak
• 34:15
  for coughing. She's fighting so hard for her life, and yet she hasn't
• 34:19
  any chance at all, they say. The girls walked silently down the red
• 34:22
  twilight road. The robins were singing vespers in the high treetops, filling the
• 34:28
  golden air with their jubilant voices. The silver fluting of the frogs came from
• 34:32
  marshes and ponds over fields, where seeds were beginning to stir with life and
• 34:37
  thrill to the sunshine and rain that had drifted over them. The air was
• 34:42
  fragrant with the wild, sweet, wholesome smell of young raspberry copses. White
• 34:46
  mists were hovering in the silent hollows, and violet stars were shining bluely on
• 34:52
  the brooklands. What a beautiful sunset, said Diana. Look, Anne,
• 34:57
  it's just like a land in itself, isn't it. That long low back
• 35:00
  of purple cloud of the shore, and the clear sky farther on is like
• 35:04
  a golden sea. If we could sail to it in the moonshine boat,
• 35:07
  Paul rote of in his old composition, You remember how nice it would be,
• 35:13
  said Anne, rousing from her reverie. Do you think we could find
• 35:16
  all our yesterdays there, Diana, all our old springs and blossoms, The
• 35:22
  beds of flowers that Paul saw. There are the roses that have bloomed for
• 35:24
  us in the past, don't, said Diana. You make me feel as
• 35:30
  if we were old women with everything in life behind us. I think I've
• 35:32
  almost felt as if we were since I heard about poor Ruby, said Anne.
• 35:37
  If it is true that she is dying, any other sad thing might
• 35:40
  be true too. You don't mind calling in at Elisha writes for a moment,
• 35:45
  do you, asked Diana, Mother asked me to leave this little dish
• 35:47
  of jelly for Aunt Tassa. Who is Aunt Atossa? Oh? Haven't you
• 35:52
  heard? She's Missus Samson Coats of Spencervale, Missus Elisha Wright's aunt. She's
• 35:58
  father's aunt too. Her husband died last winter and she was left very poor
• 36:00
  and lonely, so the Rights took her to live with them. Mother thought
• 36:04
  we ought to take her, but Father put his foot down. Live with
• 36:07
  Auntatasa. You would not, Is she so terrible? Asked Anne absently.
• 36:13
  You'll probably see what she'd like before we can get away, said Diana significantly.
• 36:17
  Father says she has a face like a hatchet cuts the air, but
• 36:21
  her tongue is sharper. Still late as it was, Aunt Atossa was cutting
• 36:24
  potato sets in the right kitchen. She wore a faded, old wrapper,
• 36:29
  and her gray hair was decidedly untidy. Aunt Atasa did not like being caught
• 36:34
  in a kilter, so she went out of her way to be disagreeable.
• 36:37
  Oh so youur Anne Shirley, she said. When Diana introduced Anne, I've
• 36:44
  heard of you. Her tone implied that she had heard nothing good. Missus
• 36:49
  Andrews was telling me you were home. She said you had improved a good
• 36:52
  deal. There was no doubt. Aunt Atossa thought there was plenty of room
• 36:57
  for further improvement, she ceased, not from cutting SATs with much energy.
• 37:01
  Is it any use to ask you to sit down, she inquired, sarcastically.
• 37:07
  Of course, there's nothing very entertaining here for you. The rest are
• 37:12
  all away. Mother sent you this little pot of rubarb jelly, said Diana,
• 37:15
  pleasantly. She made it today and thought you might like some. Oh
• 37:20
  thanks, said Aunt Tatarsa, sourly. I never fancy your mother's jelly.
• 37:25
  She always makes it too sweet. However, I'll try to worry some down.
• 37:30
  My appetite's been dreadful. Poor this spring. I'm far from well,
• 37:36
  continued aunt Atossa solemnly, but still I keep a doing. People who can't
• 37:40
  work aren't want it here. If it isn't too much trouble, will you
• 37:45
  be condescending enough to set the jelly in the pantry. I'm in a hurry
• 37:50
  to get these spuds done to night. I suppose you two ladies never do
• 37:53
  anything like this. You'd be afraid of spoiling your hands. I used to
• 38:00
  cut potato sets before we rented the farm, smiled Anne. I do it,
• 38:04
  yet, laughed Diana. I cut sets three days last week. Of
• 38:08
  course, she added teasingly. I did my hands up in lemon juice and
• 38:13
  kid gloves every night after it. Aunt t Tarsa sniffed, I suppose you
• 38:17
  got that notion out of some of those silly magazines you read so many off.
• 38:22
  I wonder your mother allows you, but she always spoiled you. We
• 38:27
  all thought when George married her she wouldn't be a suitable wife for him.
• 38:30
  Aunt Atasa sighed heavily, as if all forebodings upon the occasion of George Berry's
• 38:36
  marriage had been amply and darkly fulfilled. Going are you, she inquired,
• 38:42
  as the girls rose. Well, I suppose you can't find much amusement talking
• 38:46
  to an old woman like me. It's such a pitied boys ain't home.
• 38:52
  We want to run in and see Ruby Gillis a little while, explained Diana.
• 38:55
  Oh anything does for an excuse, of course, said aunt Tatasa amiably,
• 39:01
  just whip in and whip out before you have time to say, how
• 39:05
  do decently? It's college airs. I suppose you'd be wiser to keep away
• 39:10
  from Ruby Gillis. The doctors say consumption's catching. I always know Ruby'd gets
• 39:16
  something getting off to Boxton last fall for a visit. People who ain't content
• 39:22
  to stay home always catch something. People who don't go visiting catch things too.
• 39:27
  Sometimes they even die, said Diana solemnly. Then they don't have themselves
• 39:32
  to blame for it, retorted Auntatasa triumphantly. I hear you are to be
• 39:37
  married in June. Diana. There's no truth in that report, said Diana,
• 39:43
  blushing. Well, don't put it off too long, said aunt Tatasa
• 39:47
  significantly, you'll fade soon. You're all complexion and hair, and the rites
• 39:53
  are terrible fickle. You ought to wear a hat, Miss Shirley. Your
• 39:59
  nose is frickling scandalous. My, but you are red headed. Well,
• 40:05
  I suppose we're all as the Lord made us. Give Marilla Cuthbert my respects.
• 40:10
  She's never been to see me since I come to Evanlea. But I
• 40:14
  suppose I oughtn't to complain. The Cuthberts always did think themselves are cut higher
• 40:19
  than anyone else around here. Oh isn't she dreadful? Gasped Diana as they
• 40:24
  escaped down the lane. She's worse than miss Eliza Andrews, said Anne.
• 40:30
  But then think of living all your life with a name like a Tasa.
• 40:34
  Wouldn't it sour almost anyone? She should have tried to imagine her name was
• 40:38
  Cordelia. It might have helped her a great deal. It certainly helped me
• 40:43
  in the days when I didn't like Anne. Josie Pye will be just like
• 40:45
  her when she grows up, said Diana. Josie's mother and aunt Atossa are
• 40:51
  cousins, you know, Oh, dear, I'm glad that's over. She's
• 40:53
  so malicious. She seems to put a bad flavor in everything. Father tells
• 40:58
  such a funny story about her. One time they had a minister in spencer
• 41:00
  Vale, who was a very good spiritual man, but very deaf. He
• 41:05
  couldn't hear any ordinary conversation at all. Well, they used to have a
• 41:07
  prayer meeting on Sunday evenings, and all the church members present would get up
• 41:12
  and pray and turn or say a few words on some Bible verse. But
• 41:15
  one evening aunt Ataza bounced up. She didn't either pray or preach. Instead,
• 41:19
  she lit into everybody else in the church and gave them a fearful breaking
• 41:22
  down, calling them right out by name, and telling them how they all
• 41:24
  had behaved, and casting up all the quarrels and scandals of the past ten
• 41:29
  years. Finally, she wound up by saying that she was disgusted with Spencervale
• 41:31
  Church and she never meant to darken its door again, and she hoped a
• 41:35
  fearful judgment would come upon it. Then she sat down out of breath,
• 41:37
  and the minister, who hadn't heard a word she said, immediately remarked,
• 41:42
  in a very devout voice, Ah men, the Lord grant our dear sister's
• 41:45
  prayer. You ought to hear Father tell the story. Speaking of stories,
• 41:50
  Diana remarked Anne in a significant confidential tone. Do you know that? Lately?
• 41:55
  I have been wondering if I could write a short story, a story
• 41:59
  that would be good enough to be published. Why, of course you could,
• 42:02
  said Diana, after she had grasped the amazing suggestion. You used to
• 42:07
  write perfectly thrilling stories years ago in our old story club. Well, I
• 42:12
  hardly meant one of that kind of stories, smiled Anne. I've been thinking
• 42:15
  about it a little of late, but I'm almost afraid to try, for
• 42:20
  if I should fail, it would be too humiliating. I heard Priscilla say
• 42:23
  once that all missus Morgan's first stories were rejected, but I'm sure yours wouldn't
• 42:27
  be in first. Likely editors have more sense nowadays. Margaret Burton, one
• 42:31
  of the junior girls at Redmond, wrote a story last winter and it was
• 42:35
  published in The Canadian Woman. I really do think I could write one at
• 42:37
  least as good, and will you have it published in The Canadian Woman.
• 42:42
  I might try one of the bigger magazines first. It all depends on what
• 42:45
  kind of a story I write. What is it to be about. I
• 42:50
  don't know yet. I want to get hold of a good plot. I
• 42:52
  believe this is very necessary from an editor's point of view. The only thing
• 42:57
  I've settled on is the heroine's name. It is to be Averil Lester.
• 43:00
  Rather pretty, don't you think. Don't mention this to any one, Diana.
• 43:05
  I haven't told anybody but you and mister Harrison. He wasn't very encouraging.
• 43:08
  He said there was far too much trash written nowadays as it was,
• 43:13
  and he'd expected something better of me after a year at college. What does
• 43:16
  mister Harrison know about it? Demanded Diana scornfully. They found the Gillis home
• 43:22
  gay with lights and callers. Leonard Kimball of Spencervale and Morgan Bell of Carmody
• 43:29
  were glaring at each other. Across the parlor. Several merry girls had dropped
• 43:32
  in. Ruby was dressed in white, and her eyes and cheeks were very
• 43:37
  brilliant. She laughed and chattered incessantly, and after the other girls had gone,
• 43:42
  she took Anne upstairs to display her new summer dresses. I've a blue
• 43:45
  silves to make up yet, miss little heavy for Smola. I think I'll
• 43:50
  live until the fall. I'm going to teach you white sounds, you know.
• 43:53
  How'd you like my hats? That Amanda had an in church yesterday was
• 43:58
  real, Dinkie, but I like something right of for herself that she noticed
• 44:02
  this to usicless voice downstairs. They both come to to meant to set each
• 44:07
  other at haardn't care a single bit about either of them. You know,
• 44:10
  heaps Fencer still when I like sometimes, I really thinks mister Wright at Christmas,
• 44:16
  I thought a spencer vel school master was that. Then I found out
• 44:21
  something about him that Churnman gains him to Nello went insane and had to own
• 44:24
  him down. Perishless boys hadn't come to night. I wanted to have a
• 44:29
  nice good talk with you, Anne and tell her such heaps of things.
• 44:34
  Ye know, we're always good chums, won't we. Ruby slipped her arm
• 44:37
  about Anne's waist with a shallow little laugh. But just for a moment their
• 44:42
  eyes met, and behind all the luster of Ruby's Anne saw something that made
• 44:46
  her heart ache. Come upon him, won't you? Anne, whispered Ruby,
• 44:52
  Come alone? I won't you? Are you feeling quite well? Ruby?
• 44:58
  Me? Well, I'm perfectly well. Well. I never felt better
• 45:00
  in my life. The coals dis congestion just once. It poor me a
• 45:04
  little. Just see my collar. I don't look much like an invalid.
• 45:08
  I'm sure Ruby's voice was almost sharp. She pulled her arm away from Anne,
• 45:14
  as if in resentment, and ran downstairs, where she was gayer than
• 45:16
  ever, apparently so much absorbed in bantering her two swains that Diana and Anne
• 45:22
  felt rather out of it and soon went away. End of chapter eleven.
• 45:30
  Chapter twelve, Averil's atonement, what are you dreaming now? Anne? The
• 45:37
  two girls were loitering one evening in a fairy hollow of the brook. Ferns
• 45:42
  nodded in it, and little grasses were green, and wild pears hung finely
• 45:46
  scented white curtains around it. Anne roused herself from her reverie with a happy
• 45:52
  sigh. I was thinking out my story, Diana. Oh have you really
• 45:58
  begun? It? Cried Diana, all alight with eager interest in a moment.
• 46:02
  Yes, I have only a few pages written, but I have it
• 46:06
  all pretty well thought out. I've had such a time to get a suitable
• 46:09
  plot. None of the plots that suggested themselves suited a girl named Averil.
• 46:15
  Couldn't you have changed your name? No? The thing was impossible. I
• 46:20
  tried to, but I couldn't do it any more than I could change yours.
• 46:23
  Averil was so real to me that no matter what other name I tried
• 46:28
  to give her, I just thought of her as Averil behind it all.
• 46:30
  But finally I got a plot that matched her. Then came the excitement of
• 46:35
  choosing names for all my characters. You have no idea how fascinating that is.
• 46:39
  I've lain awake for hours thinking over those names. The hero's name is
• 46:44
  Perceval Dalrymple. Have you named all the characters, asked Diana wistfully. If
• 46:51
  you hadn't, I was going to ask you to let me name one,
• 46:53
  just some unimportant person. I feel as if I had a share in the
• 46:57
  story. Then you may name the little hired who lived with the Lesters,
• 47:00
  conceded Anne. He is not very important, but he is the only one
• 47:05
  left unnamed. Call him Raymond fitz Osborne, suggested Diana, who had a
• 47:12
  store of such names laid away in her memory, relics of the old story
• 47:15
  club which she and Anne and Jane Andrews and Ruby Gillis had had in their
• 47:20
  school days. Anne shook her head doubtfully. I'm afraid that is too aristocratic
• 47:25
  a name for a chore boy, Diana. I couldn't imagine if fitz Osborne
• 47:30
  feeding pigs and picking up chips? Could you? Diana didn't see why if
• 47:35
  you had an imagination at all, you couldn't stretch it to that extent.
• 47:38
  But probably Anne knew best, and the chore boy was finally christened Robert Ray,
• 47:45
  to be called Bobby. Should occasion require, how much do you suppose
• 47:47
  you get for it? Asked Diana. But Anne had not thought about this
• 47:52
  at all. She was in pursuit of fame, not filthy lucre, and
• 47:57
  her literary dreams were as yet untainted by mercenary considerations. You'll let me read
• 48:02
  it, won't you, pleaded Diana. When it is finished, i'll read
• 48:07
  it to you and mister Harrison, and I shall want you to criticize it
• 48:09
  severely. No one else shall see it until it is published. How are
• 48:15
  you going to end it happily or unhappily? I'm not sure. I'd like
• 48:20
  it to end unhappily, because that would be so much more romantic. But
• 48:23
  I understand editors have a prejudice against sad endings. I heard Professor Hamilton say
• 48:29
  once that nobody but a genius should try to write an unhappy ending, and
• 48:34
  concluded Anne modestly. I'm anything but a genius. Oh I like happy endings
• 48:39
  best. You'd better let him marry her, said Diana, who, especially
• 48:45
  since her engagement to Fred, thought this was how every story should end.
• 48:50
  But you like to cry over stories. Oh, yes, in the middle
• 48:52
  of them. But I like everything to come right at last. I must
• 48:57
  have one pathetic scene in it, said Anne. Thought I might let Robert
• 49:01
  Ray be injured in an accident and have a death scene. No, you
• 49:06
  mustn't kill Bobby off, declared Diana, laughing. He belongs to me and
• 49:10
  I want him to live and flourish. Kill somebody else if you have to.
• 49:15
  For the next fortnight, Anne writhed or reveled, according to mood in
• 49:19
  her literary pursuits, now she would be jubilant over a brilliant idea, now
• 49:23
  despairing because some contrary character would not behave properly. Diana could not understand this.
• 49:30
  Make them do as you want them to, she said, I can't,
• 49:36
  mourned Anne Averil is such an unmanageable heroine. She will do and say
• 49:40
  things I never meant her to. Then that spoils everything that went before,
• 49:45
  and I have to write it all over again. Finally, however, the
• 49:49
  story was finished, and Anne read it to Diana in the seclusion of the
• 49:52
  porch gable. She had achieved her pathetic scene without sacrificing Robert Ray, and
• 49:59
  she kept a watch on Diana as she read it. Diana rose to the
• 50:02
  occasion and cried properly, but when the end came she looked a little disappointed.
• 50:07
  Why did you kill Maurice Lennox, she asked, reproachfully. He was
• 50:13
  the villain, protested Anne. He had to be punished. I like him
• 50:17
  best of them all, said unreasonable Diana. Well he's dead, and he'll
• 50:22
  have to stay dead, said Anne, rather resentfully. If I had let
• 50:27
  him live, he'd have gone on persecuting Avril and Perceval. Yes, unless
• 50:31
  you had reformed him, that wouldn't have been romantic, and besides, it
• 50:37
  would have made the story too long. Well, anyway, it's a perfectly
• 50:39
  elegant story, Anne, and it will make you famous. Of that,
• 50:43
  I'm sure. Have you got a title for it? Oh? I decided
• 50:45
  on the title long ago. I call it Averil's Atonement. Doesn't that sound
• 50:51
  nice and alliterative? Now, Diana, tell me candidly, do you see
• 50:54
  any faults in my story, well, hesitated Diana. That part where Averil
• 51:00
  makes the cake doesn't seem to me quite romantic enough to match the rest.
• 51:05
  It's just what anybody might do. Heroine shouldn't do cooking. I think why.
• 51:09
  That is where the humor comes in, and it's one of the best
• 51:12
  parts of the whole story, said Anne. And it may be stated that
• 51:15
  in this she was quite right. Diana prudently refrained from any further criticism,
• 51:22
  but mister Harrison was much harder to please. First, he told her there
• 51:25
  was entirely too much description in the story. Cut out all those flowery passages,
• 51:31
  he said, unfeelingly. Anne had an uncomfortable conviction that mister Harrison was
• 51:37
  right, and she forced herself to expunge most of her beloved descriptions, though
• 51:40
  it took three rewritings before the story could be pruned down to please the fastidious
• 51:45
  mister Harrison. I've left out all the descriptions, but the sunset, she
• 51:51
  said, at last. I simply couldn't let it go. It was the
• 51:54
  best of them all. It hasn't anything to do with the story, said
• 51:59
  mister Harrison. And you shouldn't have laid the scene among rich city people.
• 52:05
  What do you know of them? Why didn't you lay it right here in
• 52:08
  Avonlea changing the name, of course, or else, missus Rachel Lynne would
• 52:13
  probably think she was the heroine. Oh, that would never have done,
• 52:17
  protested Anne. Avonlea is the dearest place in the world, but it isn't
• 52:22
  quite romantic enough for the scene of a story. I dare say there's been
• 52:25
  many a romance in Avonlea, and many a tragedy too, said mister Harrison
• 52:31
  dryly. But your folks ain't like real folks anywhere. They talk too much
• 52:37
  and used too high flown language. There's one place where that Daryl rymple Chap
• 52:42
  talks even on for two pages and never lets the girl get a word in
• 52:45
  edgewise. If he'd done that in real life, she'd have pitched him.
• 52:51
  I don't believe it, said Anne flatly. In her secret soul, she
• 52:55
  thought that the beautiful, poetical things said to Averil would win any girls heart
• 53:00
  completely. Besides, it was gruesome to hear of Averril, the stately queen
• 53:05
  like Averril pitching anyone. Avril declined her suitors, anyhow, resumed the merciless
• 53:12
  mister Harrison, I don't see why Maurice Lennox didn't get her. He was
• 53:16
  twice the man. The other is he did bad things, but he did
• 53:21
  them. Percival had in time for anything but mooning. Mooning. That was
• 53:27
  even worse than pitching. Maurice Lennox was the villain, said Anne indignantly.
• 53:32
  I don't see why everyone likes him better than Perceval. Perceval is too good.
• 53:38
  He's aggravating. Next time you write about a hero, put a little
• 53:43
  spice of human nature in him. Avril couldn't have married Maurice. He was
• 53:46
  bad. She'd have reformed him. You can't reform a man. You can't
• 53:52
  reform a jellyfish. Of course, your story isn't bad. It's kind of
• 53:57
  interesting, i'll admit. But you're too young to write a story that would
• 54:00
  be worthwhile. Wait ten years. Anne made up her mind that the next
• 54:06
  time she wrote a story, she wouldn't ask anybody to criticize it. It
• 54:08
  was too discouraging. She would not read the story to Gilbert, although she
• 54:14
  told him about it. If it is a success, you'll see it when
• 54:16
  it is published, Gilbert. But if it is a failure, nobody shall
• 54:20
  ever see it. Marilla knew nothing about the venture. In imagination, Anne
• 54:25
  saw herself reading a story out of a magazine to Marilla, entrapping her into
• 54:30
  praise of it, for in imagination, all things are possible, and then
• 54:34
  triumphantly announcing herself the author. One day, Anne took to the post office
• 54:39
  a long, bulky envelope addressed with the delightful confidence of youth and inexperience to
• 54:45
  the very biggest of the big magazines. Diana was as excited over it as
• 54:50
  Anne herself. How long do you suppose it will be before you hear from
• 54:52
  it, she asked. It shouldn't be longer than a fortnight. Oh,
• 54:58
  how happy and proud I shall be if it is accepted. Of course it
• 55:00
  will be accepted, and they will likely ask you to send them more.
• 55:04
  You may be as famous as missus Morgan someday, Anne, And then how
• 55:07
  proud I'll be of knowing you, said Diana, who possessed at least the
• 55:12
  striking merit of an unselfish admiration of the gifts and graces of her friends.
• 55:16
  A week of delightful dreaming followed, and then came a bitter awakening. One
• 55:22
  evening Diana found Anne in the porch gable with suspicious looking eyes. On the
• 55:27
  table lay a long envelope and a crumpled manuscript. Anne, your story hasn't
• 55:31
  come back, cried Diana incredulously. Yes it has, said Anne shortly.
• 55:38
  Well, that editor must be crazy. What reason did he give? No
• 55:43
  reason at all? There is just a printed slip saying that it wasn't found
• 55:45
  acceptable. I never thought much of that magazine anyway, said Diana hotly.
• 55:51
  The stories in it are not half as interesting as those in The Canadian Woman,
• 55:54
  although it costs so much more. I suppose the editor is prejudiced against
• 55:58
  anyone who isn't a Yankee. Don't be discouraged, Anne, Remember how missus
• 56:01
  Morgan's stories came back. Send yours to the Canadian Woman. I believe I
• 56:06
  will, said Anne, plucking up heart. And if it is published,
• 56:09
  I'll send that American editor a marked copy. But I'll cut the Sunset out.
• 56:14
  I believe mister Harrison was right. Out came the Sunset. But in
• 56:19
  spite of this heroic mutilation, the editor of The Canadian Woman sent Averil's atonement
• 56:23
  back so promptly that the indignant Diana declared that it couldn't have been read at
• 56:28
  all, and vowed she was going to stop her subscription immediately. Anne took
• 56:32
  this second rejection with the calmness of despair. She locked the story away in
• 56:37
  the garret trunk where the old story club tales reposed. But first she yielded
• 56:42
  to Diana's entreaties and gave her a copy. This is the end of my
• 56:46
  literary ambitions, she said, bitterly. She never mentioned the matter to mister
• 56:52
  Harrison, but one evening he asked her bluntly if her story had been accepted.
• 56:55
  No, the editor wouldn't take it, she answered. Mister Harrison looked
• 57:01
  sideways at the flushed, delicate profile. Well, I suppose you'll keep on
• 57:07
  writing them, he said encouragingly. No. I shall never try to write
• 57:10
  a story again, declared Anne, with the hopeless finality of nineteen when a
• 57:15
  door is shut in its face. I wouldn't give up altogether, said mister
• 57:21
  Harrison reflectively. I'd write a story once in a while, but I wouldn't
• 57:25
  pester editors with it. I'd write of people and places like I knew,
• 57:30
  and I'd make my characters talk every day English, and I'd let the sun
• 57:35
  rise and set in the usual quiet way, without much fuss over the fact.
• 57:40
  If I had to have villains at all, I'd give them a chance,
• 57:45
  Anne, I give them a chance. There are some terrible bad men
• 57:49
  in the world, I suppose, but you'd have to go a long piece
• 57:52
  to find them. Though Missus Lynde believes we're all bad. But most of
• 57:57
  us have got a little decency where in us keep on writing. Anne,
• 58:02
  No, it was very foolish of me to attempt it. When I'm through
• 58:06
  Redmond, I'll stick to teaching. I can't teach, I can't write stories.
• 58:10
  It'll be time for you to be getting a husband when you're through Redmond,
• 58:15
  said mister Harrison. I don't believe in putting marrying off too long like
• 58:20
  I did. Anne got up and marched home. There were times when mister
• 58:23
  Harrison was really intolerable pitching, mooning and getting a husband. Ow end of
• 58:32
  chapter twelve, Chapter thirteen, The Way of Transgressors, Davy and Dora were
• 58:40
  ready for Sunday school. They were going alone, which did not often happen
• 58:45
  for Missus Lynde always attended Sunday school. But Missus Lynde had twisted her ankle
• 58:51
  and was lame, so she was staying home this morning. The twins were
• 58:53
  also to represent the family at church, for Anne had gone away the evening
• 58:58
  before to spend Sunday with friends in Carmity, and Marilla had one of her
• 59:01
  headaches. Davy came downstairs slowly. Dora was waiting in the hall for him.
• 59:07
  Having been made ready by missus Lynde, Davy had attended to his own
• 59:12
  preparations. He had a cent in his pocket for the Sunday school collection and
• 59:16
  a five cent piece for the church collection. He carried his Bible in one
• 59:21
  hand and his Sunday School quarterly in the other. He knew his lesson and
• 59:24
  his Golden Text, and his Catechism questioned perfectly. Had he not studied them
• 59:30
  perforce in missus Lynde's kitchen all last Sunday afternoon, Davy therefore should have been
• 59:35
  in a placid frame of mind. As a matter of fact, despite text
• 59:39
  and catechism, he was inwardly as a ravening wolf. Missus Lynde limped out
• 59:45
  of her kitchen as he joined Dora. Are you clean? She demanded severely,
• 59:51
  Yes, all of me, that shows, Davy answered with a defiant
• 59:54
  scowl. Missus Rachel sighed. She had her suspicions about Davy's neck and ears,
• 1:00:00
  but she knew that if she attempted to make a personal examination, Davy
• 1:00:05
  would likely take to his heels, and she could not pursue him today.
• 1:00:08
  Well, be sure you behave yourselves, she warned them. Don't walk in
• 1:00:14
  the dust, don't stop in the porch to talk to the other children.
• 1:00:17
  Don't squirm or wiggle in your places, don't forget the golden text, don't
• 1:00:23
  lose your collection or forget to put it in. Don't whisper at prayer time,
• 1:00:29
  and don't forget to pay attention to the sermon. Davy deigned no response.
• 1:00:34
  He marched away down the lane, followed by the meek Dora, but
• 1:00:37
  his soul seethed within. Davy had suffered, or thought he had suffered,
• 1:00:43
  many things at the hands and tongue of Missus Rachel Lynde since she had come
• 1:00:46
  to Green Gables. For Missus Lynde could not live with anybody, whether they
• 1:00:51
  were nine or ninety, without trying to bring them up properly. And it
• 1:00:54
  was only the preceding afternoon that she had interfered to influence Marilla against a La,
• 1:01:00
  allowing Davy to go fishing with the Timothy Cottons. Davy was still boiling
• 1:01:04
  over this. As soon as he was out of the lane, Davy stopped
• 1:01:07
  and twisted his countenance into such an unearthly and terrific contortion that Dora, although
• 1:01:13
  she knew his gifts in that respect, was honestly alarmed. Lest he should
• 1:01:16
  never in the world be able to get it straightened out again. Darn her,
• 1:01:22
  exploded Davy. Oh, Davy, don't swear, gasped Dora in dismay.
• 1:01:28
  Darn ain't swearing, not real swearing, and I don't care if it
• 1:01:31
  is, retorted Davy recklessly. Well, if you must say dreadful words,
• 1:01:37
  don't say them on Sunday, pleaded Dora. Davy was as yet far from
• 1:01:42
  repentance, but in his secret soul he felt that perhaps he had gone a
• 1:01:45
  little too far. I'm going to invent a swear word of my own,
• 1:01:51
  he declared. God will punish you if you do, said Dora solemnly.
• 1:01:57
  Then I think God is a mean old scamp, retorted Davy. Doesn't he
• 1:02:01
  know A fellow must have some way of expressing his feelings, Davy, said
• 1:02:07
  Dora. She expected that Davy would be struck down dead on the spot,
• 1:02:10
  but nothing happened anyway. I ain't going to stand any more of missus Lynde's
• 1:02:15
  bossing, spluttered Davy. Ann and Marilla may have the right to boss me,
• 1:02:21
  but she hasn't. I'm going to do every single thing she told me
• 1:02:25
  not to do. You watch me in grim, deliberate silence, while Dora
• 1:02:30
  watched him with the fascination of horror. Davy stepped off the green grass of
• 1:02:35
  the roadside, ankle deep into the fine dust which four weeks of rainless weather
• 1:02:39
  had made on the road, and marched along in it, shuffling his feet
• 1:02:44
  viciously until he was enveloped in a hazy cloud. That's the beginning, he
• 1:02:49
  announced triumphantly. And I'm going to stop on the porch and talk as long
• 1:02:53
  as there's anybody there to talk to. I'm going to squirm and wriggle and
• 1:02:58
  whisper, and I'm going to say I don't know the golden text, and
• 1:03:01
  I'm going to throw away both of my collections right now. And Davy hurled
• 1:03:07
  sent Ann Nickel over mister Barry's fence with fierce delight. Satan made you do
• 1:03:12
  that? Said Dora, reproachfully. He didn't, cried Davy indignantly. I
• 1:03:19
  just thought it out for myself, and I've thought of something else. I'm
• 1:03:22
  not going to Sunday school or church at all. I'm going up to play
• 1:03:27
  with the Cottons. They told me yesterday they weren't going to Sunday school today
• 1:03:31
  because their mother was away and there was nobody to take them. Come along,
• 1:03:36
  Dora, we'll have a great time. I don't want to go,
• 1:03:39
  protested Dora. You've got to, said Davy. If you don't come,
• 1:03:45
  I'll tell Marilla that Frank Bell kissed you in school last Monday. I couldn't
• 1:03:51
  help it. I didn't know he was going to, cried Dora, blushing
• 1:03:55
  scarlet. Well you didn't slap him or seem a bit fross, retorted Davy.
• 1:04:01
  I'll tell her that too. If you don't come, we'll take the
• 1:04:05
  short cut up this field. I'm afraid of those cows, protested poor Dora,
• 1:04:12
  seeing a prospect of escape, the very idea of your being scared of
• 1:04:15
  those cows, scoffed Davy. Why they're both younger than you, they're bigger,
• 1:04:23
  said Dora. They won't hurt you. Come along, now this is
• 1:04:27
  great. When I grow up, I ain't going to bother going to church
• 1:04:30
  at all. I believe I can get to Heaven by myself. You'll go
• 1:04:34
  to the other place if you break the Sabbath day, said unhappy Dora,
• 1:04:40
  following him sorely against her will. But Davy was not scared yet. Hell
• 1:04:45
  was very far off, and the delights of a fishing expedition with the Cottons
• 1:04:48
  were very near. He wished Dora had more spunk. She kept looking back
• 1:04:54
  as if she were going to cry every minute, and that spoiled a fellow's
• 1:04:57
  fun hang girls. Anyway, Davy did not say darn this time, even
• 1:05:02
  in thought. He was not sorry yet that he had said at once,
• 1:05:06
  But it might be as well not to tempt the unknown powers too far.
• 1:05:11
  On one day, the small Cottons were playing in their back yard and hailed
• 1:05:15
  Davy's appearance with whoops of delight. Pete, Tommy, Adolphus, and Mirabel
• 1:05:20
  Cotton were all alone. Their mother and older sisters were away. Dora was
• 1:05:26
  thankful Mirabel was there. At least she had been afraid she would be alone
• 1:05:30
  in a crowd of boys. Mirabel was almost as bad as a boy.
• 1:05:33
  She was so noisy and sunburned and reckless. But at least she wore dresses.
• 1:05:39
  We've come to go fishing, announced Davy, whoop yelled the Cottons.
• 1:05:45
  They rushed away to dig worms at once, Mirabel leading the van with a
• 1:05:48
  tin can. Dora could have sat down and cried, Oh, if only
• 1:05:53
  that hateful frank Bell had never kissed her, then she could have defied Davy
• 1:05:57
  and gone to her beloved Sunday school. They dared, not, of course,
• 1:06:01
  go fishing on the pond where they would be seen by people going to
• 1:06:04
  church. They had to resort to the brook in the woods behind the cotton
• 1:06:08
  house, but it was full of trout, and they had a glorious time
• 1:06:12
  that morning. At least the Cottons certainly had, and Davy seemed to have
• 1:06:15
  it, not being entirely bereft of prudence. He had discarded boots and stockings
• 1:06:21
  and borrowed Tommy Cotton's overalls. Thus accoutered bog and marsh and undergrowth had no
• 1:06:28
  terrors for him. Dora was frankly and manifestly miserable. She followed the others
• 1:06:33
  in their peregrinations from pool to pool, clasping her Bible and quarterly tightly,
• 1:06:39
  and thinking with bitterness of soul of her beloved class, where she should be
• 1:06:43
  sitting that very moment before a teacher she adored. Instead, here she was
• 1:06:47
  roaming the woods with those half wild cottons, trying to keep her boots clean
• 1:06:51
  and her pretty white dress free from rents and stains. Mirabel had offered the
• 1:06:57
  loan of an apron, but Dora had scornfully refused the trout bit, as
• 1:07:00
  they always do on Sundays. In an hour, the transgressors had all the
• 1:07:04
  fish they wanted, so they returned to the house, much to Dora's relief.
• 1:07:10
  She sat primly on a hen coop in the yard while the others played
• 1:07:14
  an uproarious game of tag, And then they all climbed to the top of
• 1:07:16
  the pig house roof and cut their initials on the saddle board. The flat
• 1:07:20
  roofed hen house and a pile of straw beneath gave Davy another inspiration. They
• 1:07:26
  spent a splendid half hour climbing on the roof and diving off into the straw
• 1:07:30
  with whoops and yells. But even unlawful pleasures must come to an end.
• 1:07:35
  When the rumble of wheels over the pond bridge told that people were going home
• 1:07:39
  from church. Davy knew they must go. He discarded Tommy's overalls, resumed
• 1:07:44
  his own rightful attire, and turned away from his string of trout with a
• 1:07:47
  sigh. No use to think of taking them home. Well, hadn't we
• 1:07:51
  a splendid time, he demanded defiantly, as they went down the hill field.
• 1:07:58
  I hadn't, said Dora flatly, And I don't believe you had really
• 1:08:02
  either, she added, with a flash of insight that was not to be
• 1:08:06
  expected of her. I had so, cried Davy, but in the voice
• 1:08:12
  of one who doth protest too much. No wonder you hadn't, just sitting
• 1:08:15
  there like a like a mule. I ain't going to associate with the Cottons,
• 1:08:21
  said Dora loftily. The Cottons are all right, retorted Davy, and
• 1:08:27
  they have far better times than we have. They do just as they please,
• 1:08:31
  and say just what they like before everybody. I'm going to do that
• 1:08:35
  too after this. There are lots of things you wouldn't dare say before everybody,
• 1:08:42
  averred Dora. No there isn't. There is too, would you,
• 1:08:47
  demanded Dora gravely, Would you say, Tomcat before the minister. This was
• 1:08:54
  a Staggerer. Davy was not prepared for such a concrete example of the freedom
• 1:08:58
  of speech. But one did not have to be consistent with Dora, of
• 1:09:01
  course not, he admitted sulkily. Tomcat isn't a holy word. I wouldn't
• 1:09:08
  mention such an animal before a minister at all. But if you had to
• 1:09:14
  persisted, Dora, I'd call it a Thomas pussy, said Davy. I
• 1:09:18
  think gentleman cat would be more polite, reflected Dora. You thinking, retorted
• 1:09:26
  Davy with withering scorn. Davy was not feeling comfortable, though he would have
• 1:09:30
  died before he admitted it to Dora. Now that the exhilaration of truant delights
• 1:09:35
  had died away, his conscience was beginning to give him salutary twinges. After
• 1:09:41
  all, perhaps it would have been better to have gone to Sunday school and
• 1:09:44
  church. Missus Lynde might be bossy, but there was always a box of
• 1:09:47
  cookies in her kitchen cupboard, and she was not stingy. At this inconvenient
• 1:09:51
  moment, Davy remembered that when he had torn his new school pants the week
• 1:09:56
  before, missus Lynde had mended them beautifully. And never said a word to
• 1:10:00
  Marilla about them. But Davy's cup of iniquity was not yet full. He
• 1:10:04
  was to discover that one sin demands another to cover it. They had dinner
• 1:10:09
  with Missus Lynde that day, and the first thing she asked Davy was were
• 1:10:14
  all your class in Sunday school today? Yes'm, said Davy with a gulp.
• 1:10:18
  All were there sept one? Did you say your Golden Text and Catechism?
• 1:10:24
  Yes'm? Did you put your collection in? Yes'm? Was missus Malcolm
• 1:10:28
  Macpherson in church? I don't know this at least was the truth, thought
• 1:10:33
  wretched Davy. Was the lady's aid announced for next week? Yes, I'm
• 1:10:39
  quakingly was prayer meeting? I? I don't know. You should know,
• 1:10:45
  you should listen more attentively to the announcements. What was mister Harvey's text?
• 1:10:49
  Davey took a frantic gulp of water and swallowed it and the last protest of
• 1:10:54
  conscience Together, he glibally recited an old golden text learned several weeks ago.
• 1:11:00
  Fortunately, Missus Lynde now stopped questioning him, but Davy did not enjoy his
• 1:11:03
  dinner. He could only eat one helping of pudding. What's the matter with
• 1:11:09
  you, demanded justly astonished missus Lynde, Are you sick? No, muttered
• 1:11:15
  Davy. You look pale. You better keep out of the sun this afternoon,
• 1:11:19
  admonished missus Lynde. Do you know how many lies you told? Missus
• 1:11:25
  Lynde asked Dora reproachfully. As soon as they were alone after dinner, Davy
• 1:11:30
  goaded to desperation, turned fiercely. I don't know and I don't care,
• 1:11:36
  he said. You just shut up, Dora Keith. Then poor Davy betook
• 1:11:41
  himself to a secluded retreat behind the woodpile to think over the way of transgressors.
• 1:11:46
  Green Gables was wrapped in darkness and silence. When Anne reached home,
• 1:11:50
  she lost no time going to bed, for she was very tired and sleepy.
• 1:11:55
  There had been several Avonlea jollifications the preceding week, involving rather late hours.
• 1:12:00
  Anne's head was hardly on her pillow before she was half asleep, But
• 1:12:04
  just then her door was softly opened and a pleading voice said Anne. Anne
• 1:12:11
  sat up drowsily. Davy, is that you? What is the matter?
• 1:12:15
  A white clad figure flung itself across the floor and onto the bed. Anne
• 1:12:21
  sobbed Davy, getting his arms about her neck. I'm awful glad you're home.
• 1:12:26
  I couldn't go to sleep till I told somebody, told somebody what how
• 1:12:30
  miserable I am? Why are you miserable, dear? Cause I was so
• 1:12:35
  bad today? Anne? Oh, I was awful, bad, better than
• 1:12:39
  I've ever been yet. What did you do? Oh? I'm afraid to
• 1:12:44
  tell you you'll never like me again, Anne. I couldn't say my prayers
• 1:12:47
  tonight. I couldn't tell God what I'd done. I was shamed to have
• 1:12:51
  him know. But he knew anyway, Davy. That's what Dora said,
• 1:12:57
  But I thought perhaps he mightn't have noticed just at the time. Anyway,
• 1:13:00
  I'd rather tell you first, what is it you did? Out? It
• 1:13:05
  all came in a rush. I run away from Sunday school and went fishing
• 1:13:11
  with the Cottons. And I told ever so many whoppers to missus Lynde,
• 1:13:15
  oh, most half a dozen. And and I I said a swear word,
• 1:13:19
  Anne, a pretty near swear word, anyhow, And I called God
• 1:13:24
  names. There was silence. Davy didn't know what to make of it.
• 1:13:29
  Was Anne so shocked that she never would speak to him again. Anne,
• 1:13:31
  what are you going to do to me? He whispered, nothing, Dear,
• 1:13:36
  You've been punished already, I think, No, I haven't. Nothing's
• 1:13:41
  been done to me. You've been very unhappy ever since you did wrong,
• 1:13:45
  haven't you, you bet? Said Davy emphatically. That was your conscience punishing
• 1:13:50
  you, Davy? What's my conscience? I want to know. It's something
• 1:13:56
  in you, Davy that always tells you when you are doing wrong and makes
• 1:13:59
  you unhappy if you persist in doing it. Haven't you noticed that? Yes?
• 1:14:02
  But I didn't know what it was. I wish I didn't have it.
• 1:14:06
  I'd have lots more fun. Where is my conscience, Anne, I
• 1:14:11
  want to know? Is it in my stomach? No, it's in your
• 1:14:15
  soul, answered Anne, thankful for the darkness, since gravity must be preserved
• 1:14:19
  in serious matters. I suppose I can't get clear of it, then,
• 1:14:25
  said Davy with a sigh. Are you going to tell Marilla and missus Lynde
• 1:14:29
  on me? Anne? No, dear, I'm not going to tell anyone.
• 1:14:32
  You are sorry. You were naughty, aren't you, you bet?
• 1:14:36
  And you'll never be bad like that again? No, but added Davy cautiously,
• 1:14:43
  I might be bad some other way. You won't say naughty words,
• 1:14:46
  or run away on Sundays or tell falsehoods to cover up your sins. No,
• 1:14:51
  it doesn't pay, said Davy. Well, Davy, just tell God
• 1:14:57
  you are sorry and ask him to forgive you. Have you forgiven me?
• 1:15:00
  Anne, Yes, dear, then, said Davy joyously. I don't care
• 1:15:05
  much whether God does or not. Davy. Oh, I'll ask him.
• 1:15:11
  I'll ask him, said Davy, quickly, scrambling off the bed, convinced
• 1:15:15
  by Anne's tone that he must have said something dreadful. I don't mind asking
• 1:15:19
  him. Anne. Please God, I'm awful. Sorry, I behaved bad
• 1:15:24
  today, and I'll try to be good on Sundays always, and please forgive
• 1:15:28
  me there now, Anne, Well, now run off to bed like a
• 1:15:30
  good boy. All right, Say I don't feel miserable anymore. I feel
• 1:15:35
  fine. Good night, good night. Anne slipped down on her pillows with
• 1:15:41
  a sigh of relief. Oh how sleepy she was. In another second,
• 1:15:45
  Anne Davy was back again by her bed. Anne dragged her eyes open.
• 1:15:51
  What is it now, dear, she asked, trying to keep a note
• 1:15:56
  of impatience out of her voice. Anne, have you ever noticed how miss
• 1:16:00
  Harrison's spits. Do you suppose if I practice hard, I can learn to
• 1:16:03
  spit just like him. Anne sat up Davy Keith. She said, go
• 1:16:10
  straight to your bed, and don't let me catch you out of it again.
• 1:16:13
  Tonight. Go now. Davy went and stood not upon the order of
• 1:16:17
  his going. End of Chapter thirteen, Chapter fourteen, the Summons. Anne
• 1:16:27
  was sitting with Ruby Gillis in the Gillis's garden after the day had crept lingeringly
• 1:16:31
  through it and was gone. It had been a warm, smoky summer afternoon.
• 1:16:36
  The world was in a splendor of out flowering. The idle valleys were
• 1:16:41
  full of hazes, the woodways were pranked with shadows, and the fields with
• 1:16:45
  the purple of the asters. Anne had given up a moonlight drive to the
• 1:16:49
  White Sands Beach that she might spend the evening with Ruby. She had so
• 1:16:54
  spent many evenings that summer, although she often wondered what good it did anyone,
• 1:16:58
  and sometimes went home to deciding that she could not go again. Ruby
• 1:17:02
  grew paler as the summer waned. The White Sands school was given up.
• 1:17:06
  Her father thought it better that she shouldn't teach till New Year's and the fancy
• 1:17:11
  work she loved oftener, and Oftener fell from hands grown too weary for it.
• 1:17:15
  But she was always gay, always hopeful, always chattering and whispering of
• 1:17:19
  her bows and their rivalries and despairs. It was this that made Anne's visits
• 1:17:26
  hard for her. What had once been silly or amusing was gruesome. Now
• 1:17:30
  it was death peering through a wilful mask of life. Yet Ruby seemed to
• 1:17:34
  cling to her and never let her go until she had promised to come again
• 1:17:39
  soon. Missus Lynde grumbled about Anne's frequent visits and declared she would catch consumption.
• 1:17:45
  Even Marilla was dubious. Every time you go to see Ruby, you
• 1:17:48
  come home looking tired out, she said. It's so very sad and dreadful,
• 1:17:56
  said Anne in a low tone. Ruby doesn't seem to realize her can
• 1:18:00
  in the least, and yet I somehow feel she needs help, craves it,
• 1:18:03
  and I want to give it to her and can't. All the time
• 1:18:08
  I'm with her, I feel as if I were watching her struggle with an
• 1:18:10
  invisible foe, trying to push it back with such feeble resistance as she has.
• 1:18:15
  That is why I come home tired. But tonight. Anne did not
• 1:18:18
  feel this so keenly. Ruby was strangely quiet, she said, not a
• 1:18:24
  word about parties and drives and dresses and fellows. She lay in the hammock,
• 1:18:29
  with her untouched work beside her, and a white shawl wrapped about her
• 1:18:32
  thin shoulders. Her long yellow braids of hair, how Anne had envied those
• 1:18:38
  beautiful braids in old school days, lay on either side of her. She
• 1:18:42
  had taken the pins out. They made her headache, she said. The
• 1:18:45
  hectic flush was gone for the time, leaving her pale and childlike. The
• 1:18:50
  moon rose in the silvery sky, empearling the clouds around her. Below,
• 1:18:56
  the pond shimmered in its hazy radiance. Just beyond the Gillis homestead was the
• 1:19:00
  church with the old graveyard beside it. The moonlight shone on the white stones,
• 1:19:06
  bringing them out in clear cut relief against the dark trees behind. How
• 1:19:11
  strange a graveyard looks wermonlight, said Ruby suddenly, How ghostly she shuddered,
• 1:19:18
  Anne, it won't belong now. Before all be lying over there, he
• 1:19:21
  and Zana and all the rest it were going out fault life, and I'll
• 1:19:26
  be there in the old graveyard. Did the surprise of it bewildered Anne.
• 1:19:30
  For a few moments. She could not speak. You know it's so,
• 1:19:34
  don't ye, said Ruby insistently. Yes I know, answered Anne in a
• 1:19:41
  low tone. Dear Ruby, I know everybody knows it, said Ruby bitterly.
• 1:19:47
  I know it. I've known it all summer. Though I wouldn't give
• 1:19:51
  in, uno Ann. She reached out and caught Anne's hand pleadingly impulsively.
• 1:19:58
  I don't want to die. I'm afraid to die. Why should you be
• 1:20:01
  afraid, Ruby asked Anne quietly, Because because, uh, I'm not afraid.
• 1:20:09
  But I'm not afraid. But I'll go to heaven, Anne, I'm
• 1:20:12
  a church member. But it will be all so different, I think,
• 1:20:17
  I think, and I get so frightened and and homesick. Heaven not a
• 1:20:21
  very beautiful, of course, the Bible says so. But an there won't
• 1:20:28
  be lad have been used to through Anne's mind drifted an intrusive recollection of a
• 1:20:33
  funny story she had heard Philip A. Gordon tell the story of some old
• 1:20:36
  man who had said very much the same thing about the world to come.
• 1:20:41
  It had sounded funny. Then she remembered how she and Priscilla had laughed over
• 1:20:45
  it, but it did not seem in the least humorous now coming from Ruby's
• 1:20:49
  pale, trembling lips. It was sad, tragic, and true. Heaven
• 1:20:55
  could not be what Ruby had been used to. There had been nothing in
• 1:20:59
  her gay, frist life, her shallow ideals and aspirations to fit her for
• 1:21:03
  that great change, or make the life to come seem to her anything but
• 1:21:06
  alien and unreal and undesirable. Anne wondered helplessly what she could say that would
• 1:21:13
  help her. Could she say anything, I think, Ruby, she began
• 1:21:18
  hesitatingly, for it was difficult for Anne to speak to any one of the
• 1:21:21
  deepest thoughts of her heart or the new ideas that had vaguely begun to shape
• 1:21:26
  themselves in her mind concerning the great mysteries of life here and hereafter, superseding
• 1:21:31
  her old childish conceptions, And it was hardest of all to speak of them
• 1:21:35
  to such as Ruby Gillis. I think perhaps we have very mistaken ideas about
• 1:21:42
  heaven, what it is and what it holds for us. I don't think
• 1:21:45
  it can be so very different from life here as most people seem to think.
• 1:21:49
  I believe we'll just go on living a good deal. As we live
• 1:21:51
  here and be ourselves just the same, Only it will be easier to be
• 1:21:57
  good and to follow the highest. All the hindrances and perplexities will be taken
• 1:22:01
  away, and we shall see clearly. Don't be afraid, Ruby, I
• 1:22:06
  can't help it, said Ruby pitifully. Even it ought to say about heaven
• 1:22:12
  is true, and you can't be short. It may be I live the
• 1:22:15
  imagination of yours. It won't be just the same. It can't be.
• 1:22:19
  I want to go on living here. I'm so young, Anne, Heaven's
• 1:22:24
  had a love. It thought so hard to live, and it isn't in
• 1:22:28
  a use how to die. I live everything I care for. Anne sat
• 1:22:32
  in a pain that was almost intolerable. She could not tell comforting falsehoods,
• 1:22:38
  and all that Ruby said was so horribly true. She was leaving everything she
• 1:22:42
  cared for. She had laid up her treasures on earth. Only she had
• 1:22:45
  lived solely for the little things of life, the things that pass, forgetting
• 1:22:50
  the great things that go onward into eternity, bridging the gulf between the two
• 1:22:55
  lives, and making of death a mere passing from one dwelling to the other,
• 1:22:59
  from twilight to unclouded day, God would take care of her. There.
• 1:23:02
  Anne believed she would learn, but now it was no wonder. Her
• 1:23:06
  soul clung in blind helplessness to the only things she knew and loved. Ruby
• 1:23:13
  raised herself on her arm and lifted up her bright, beautiful blue eyes to
• 1:23:16
  the moonlit skies. I want to live, she said, in a trembling
• 1:23:20
  voice. I want to live like other girls. I I want to be
• 1:23:26
  married Anne, and and have little children. You know I always love babies.
• 1:23:30
  Anne. I couldn't say this to any one but you, I know
• 1:23:32
  you understand. And then poor herp he he loves me and I love him,
• 1:23:39
  Anne che o. This meant nothing to me, but he does.
• 1:23:43
  And if I could live ad be his wife and be so happy, Oh
• 1:23:45
  Anne. So Ruby sank back on her pillows and sobbed convulsively. Anne pressed
• 1:23:53
  her hand in an agony of sympathy, silent sympathy, which perhaps helped Ruby
• 1:23:58
  more than broken in perfect words could have done. For Presently, she grew
• 1:24:01
  calmer and her sobs ceased. I'm glad I've told you this, Anne,
• 1:24:05
  she whispered. It has helped me just to say it all out. I
• 1:24:10
  wanted all summer, every time I came. I wanted to talk it over
• 1:24:14
  with you, but I couldn't. It seemed as if it would make death
• 1:24:18
  so sure if I said it was going to die if anyone now said it,
• 1:24:23
  who hinted it? I didn't say it, but even think it.
• 1:24:27
  In the daytime and people were around me, and everything was cheerful, it
• 1:24:31
  wasn't so hard to keep thinking from it. But in to night, when
• 1:24:35
  I couldn't sleep, it was so dreadful, Anne, I couldn't get away
• 1:24:40
  from it. Then. Thus Jess came a stern me in the face until
• 1:24:44
  I got so frightened I couldn't have screamed. But you won't be frightened any
• 1:24:47
  more, Ruby, will you. You'll be brave and believe that all is
• 1:24:51
  going to be well with you. I'll try. I'll think over what you
• 1:24:55
  have said and try to believe it. I know I'll come up as often
• 1:24:59
  as he can, don't you, Anne, Yes, dear, it won't
• 1:25:02
  be very long now, Anne, I'm feel sure for that, rather hear
• 1:25:06
  you said anyone else. I always like you best off. All the girls
• 1:25:11
  I went to school with you were never jealous, I mean like so as
• 1:25:15
  I were. Paul, And what was up to see me yesterday. You
• 1:25:18
  remember, Emma and I were such chums for three years when you went to
• 1:25:20
  school and told me quarrel that time is to call concerts. We've never spoken
• 1:25:26
  to each other since. Wasn't it silly? And anything like that seems silly
• 1:25:30
  now? I don't my maid oft Kral yesterday She said she should have spoken
• 1:25:34
  years ago unless she thought I wouldn't. And I never spoke to her because
• 1:25:40
  I was sure she would speak to me. Is it a strangehip? People
• 1:25:43
  soon to say each other? Anne? Most of the trouble in life comes
• 1:25:45
  from misunderstanding, I think, said Anne. I must go now, Ruby,
• 1:25:50
  it's getting late and you shouldn't be out in the damp. You'll come
• 1:25:55
  up soon again, Yes, very soon. And if there's anything I can
• 1:25:59
  do to help you, you all be so glad. No, you have
• 1:26:01
  helped me already. Nothing seems quite so dreadful. Now, good night,
• 1:26:06
  Anne, Good night, Dear Anne walked home very slowly in the moonlight.
• 1:26:12
  The evening had changed something for her. Life held a different meaning, a
• 1:26:15
  deeper purpose. On the surface, it would go on just the same,
• 1:26:19
  but the deeps had been stirred. It must not be with her as with
• 1:26:24
  poor butterfly Ruby. When she came to the end of one life, it
• 1:26:28
  must not be to face the next with the shrinking terror of something wholly different,
• 1:26:31
  something for which accustomed thought and ideal and aspiration had unfitted her. The
• 1:26:36
  little things of life, sweet and excellent, in their place must not be
• 1:26:41
  the things lived. For the highest must be sought and followed. The life
• 1:26:45
  of heaven must be begun here on earth. That good night in the garden
• 1:26:50
  was for all time. Anne never saw Ruby in life again. The next
• 1:26:56
  night, the A. V. I. S gave a farewell party to
• 1:26:58
  Jane Andrews before her departure for the West. And while light feet danced and
• 1:27:02
  bright eyes laughed and merry tongues chattered, there came a summons to a soul
• 1:27:06
  in Avonlea that might not be disregarded or evaded. The next morning, the
• 1:27:12
  word went from house to house that Ruby Gillis was dead. She had died
• 1:27:15
  in her sleep, painlessly and calmly, and on her face was a smile,
• 1:27:20
  as if after all, death had come as a kindly friend to lead
• 1:27:25
  her over the threshold, instead of the grisly phantoms she had dreaded. Missus
• 1:27:30
  Rachel Lynde said emphatically after the funeral that Ruby Gillis was the handsomest corpse she
• 1:27:34
  ever laid eyes on. Her loveliness as she lay white clad among the delicate
• 1:27:40
  flowers that Anne had placed about her, was remembered and talked of for years
• 1:27:44
  in Avonlea. Ruby had always been beautiful, but her beauty had been of
• 1:27:48
  the earth, earthy. It had had a certain insolent quality in it,
• 1:27:53
  as if it flaunted itself in the beholder's eye. Spirit had never shone through
• 1:27:58
  it, Intellect had never refined it, but death had touched it and consecrated
• 1:28:02
  it, bringing out delicate modelings and purity of outline never seen before, doing
• 1:28:09
  what life and love and great sorrow and deep womanhood joys might have done for
• 1:28:13
  Ruby. Anne, looking down through a mist of tears at her old playfellow,
• 1:28:18
  thought she saw the face God had meant Ruby to have, and remembered
• 1:28:23
  it so always. Missus Gillis called Anne aside into a vacant room before the
• 1:28:28
  funeral procession left the house and gave her a small packet. I want you
• 1:28:31
  to have this, she sobbed. Ruby would have liked you to have it.
• 1:28:36
  It's the embroidered centerpiece she was working at. It isn't quite finished.
• 1:28:43
  The needle is sticky in it, just where her poor little fingers put it
• 1:28:46
  the last time she laid it down, the afternoon before she died. There's
• 1:28:50
  always a piece of unfinished work left, said missus Lynde, with tears in
• 1:28:55
  her eyes. But I suppose there's always someone to fit. How difficult it
• 1:29:00
  is to realize that one we have always known can really be dead, said
• 1:29:04
  Anne as she and Diana walked home. Ruby is the first of our schoolmates
• 1:29:11
  to go, one by one, sooner or later, all the rest of
• 1:29:14
  us must follow. Yes, I suppose so, said Diana uncomfortably. She
• 1:29:19
  did not want to talk of that. She would have preferred to have discussed
• 1:29:24
  the details of the funeral, the splendid white velvet casket mister Gillis had insisted
• 1:29:29
  on having for Ruby. The Gillises must always make us blurge, even at
• 1:29:32
  funerals, quoth Missus Rachel Lynde, herb Spencer's sad face, the uncontrolled hysteric
• 1:29:40
  grief of one of Ruby's sisters. But Anne would not talk of these things.
• 1:29:44
  She seemed wrapped in a reverie in which Diana felt lonesomely that she had
• 1:29:47
  neither lot nor part. Ruby Gillis was a great girl to laugh, said
• 1:29:53
  Davy suddenly. Will she laugh as much in heaven as she did in Avonlea?
• 1:29:57
  Anne, I want to know. Yes, I think she will,
• 1:30:01
  said Anne. Oh, Anne protested Diana with a rather shocked smile. Well
• 1:30:09
  why not, Diana asked Anne. Seriously. Do you think we'll never laugh
• 1:30:13
  in heaven? Oh? I I don't know, floundered Diana. It doesn't
• 1:30:19
  seem just right somehow. You know it's rather dreadful to laugh at church.
• 1:30:24
  But heaven won't be like church all the time, said Anne. I hope
• 1:30:29
  it ain't, said Davy emphatically. If it is, I don't want to
• 1:30:32
  go church is awful, dull anyway. I don't mean to go for ever
• 1:30:38
  so long. I mean to live to be a hundred years old, like
• 1:30:42
  mister Thomas Blewett of White Sands. He says he's lived so long cause he
• 1:30:45
  always smoked tobacco, and he killed all the germs. Can I smoke tobacco
• 1:30:50
  pretty soon? Anne? No, Davy, I hope you'll never use tobacco,
• 1:30:55
  said Anne absently. What'll you feel like if the germs kill me,
• 1:30:59
  then demanded Davy. End of chapter fourteen. Chapter fifteen A dream turned upside
• 1:31:08
  down. Just one more week and we go back to Redmond, said Anne.
• 1:31:14
  She was happy at the thought of returning to work, classes and Redmond
• 1:31:17
  friends. Pleasing visions were also being woven around Patty's place. There was a
• 1:31:23
  warm, pleasant sense of home in the thought of it, even though she
• 1:31:26
  had never lived there. But the summer had been a very happy one too,
• 1:31:30
  a time of glad living with summer suns and skies, a time of
• 1:31:33
  keen delight and wholesome things, a time of renewing and deepening of old friendships,
• 1:31:39
  A time in which she had learned to live more nobly, to work
• 1:31:42
  more patiently, to play more heartily. All life lessons are not learned at
• 1:31:46
  college, she thought, life teaches them everywhere. But alas, the final
• 1:31:53
  week of that pleasant vacation was spoiled for Anne by one of those impish happenings
• 1:31:58
  which are like a dream turned upside down. Been writing any more stories lately,
• 1:32:02
  inquired mister Harrison genially one evening when Anne was taking tea with him and
• 1:32:06
  missus. Harrison no, answered Anne rather crisply well no offense mant. Missus
• 1:32:13
  Hiram Sloane told me the other day that a big envelope addressed to the rollings
• 1:32:18
  Reliable Baking Powder Company of Montreal had been dropped into the post office box a
• 1:32:24
  month ago, and she suspicioned that somebody was trying for the prize they'd offered
• 1:32:30
  for the best story that introduced the name of their baking powder. She said,
• 1:32:34
  it wasn't addressed in your writing, but I thought maybe it was you.
• 1:32:40
  Indeed, no, I saw the prize offer, but I'd never dream
• 1:32:43
  of competing for it. I think it would be perfectly disgraceful to write a
• 1:32:46
  story to advertise a baking powder. It would be almost as bad as Judson
• 1:32:50
  Parker's patent medicine fence. So spake Anne, loftily, little dreaming of the
• 1:32:57
  Valley of humiliation awaiting her. That very evening, Diana popped into the porch
• 1:33:00
  gable, bright eyed and rosy cheeked, carrying a letter. Oh, Anne,
• 1:33:05
  here's a letter for you. I was at the office, so I
• 1:33:08
  thought i'd bring it along. Do open it quick. If it is what
• 1:33:11
  I believe it is, I shall be just wild with delight. Anne puzzled,
• 1:33:15
  opened the letter and glanced over the typewritten contents. Miss Anne Shirley green
• 1:33:20
  Gables, Avonlea, p E Island. Dear madam, we have much pleasure
• 1:33:26
  in informing you that your charming story Averil's Atonement, has won the prize of
• 1:33:30
  twenty five dollars offered in our recent competition. We enclosed the check here with
• 1:33:35
  We are arranging for the publication of the story in several prominent Canadian newspapers,
• 1:33:41
  and we also intend to have it printed in pamphlet form for distribution among our
• 1:33:45
  patrons. Thanking you for the interest you have shown in our enterprise, we
• 1:33:48
  remain yours very truly the Rollings Reliable Baking Powder Company. I don't understand,
• 1:33:57
  said Anne blankly. Diana clapped her hands. Oh, I knew it would
• 1:34:01
  win the prize. I was sure of it. I sent your story into
• 1:34:03
  the competition, Anne Diana Barry. Yes I did, said Diana, gleefully,
• 1:34:11
  perching herself on the bed. When I saw the offer, I thought
• 1:34:14
  of your story in a minute, and at first I thought I'd ask you
• 1:34:15
  to send it in, but then I was afraid you wouldn't. That's a
• 1:34:18
  little faith left in it, So I just decided I'd send the copy you
• 1:34:21
  gave me and say nothing about it. Then if it didn't win the prize,
• 1:34:26
  you'd never know, and you wouldn't feel badly over it, because the
• 1:34:28
  stories that failed were not to be returned, and if it did, you'd
• 1:34:30
  have such a delightful surprise. Diana was not the most discerning of mortals,
• 1:34:35
  but just at this moment, it struck her that Anne was not looking exactly
• 1:34:39
  overjoyed. The surprise was there, beyond doubt, but where was the delight?
• 1:34:44
  Why? Anne, you don't seem a bit pleased, she exclaimed.
• 1:34:47
  Anne instantly manufactured a smile and put it on. Of course, I couldn't
• 1:34:53
  be anything but pleased over your unselfish wish to give me pleasure, she said
• 1:34:57
  slowly. But you know, I'm so so amazed. I can't realize it,
• 1:35:01
  and I don't understand. There wasn't a word in my story about about
• 1:35:08
  Anne choked a little over the word baking powder. Oh I put that in,
• 1:35:14
  said Diana, reassured it was as easy as a wink. And of
• 1:35:16
  course my experience in our old story club helped me. You know the scene
• 1:35:19
  where Averil makes the cake, well, I just stated that she used the
• 1:35:24
  rollings Reliable in it, and that was why it turned out so well.
• 1:35:27
  And then in the last paragraph, where Perceval clasps Averil in his arms and
• 1:35:30
  says, sweetheart, the beautiful coming years will bring us the fulfillment of our
• 1:35:33
  home of dreams, I added, in which we will never use any baking
• 1:35:38
  powder except rollings reliable. Oh, gasped poor Anne, as if some one
• 1:35:43
  had dashed cold water on her. And you've won the twenty five dollars,
• 1:35:46
  continued Diana, jubilantly. Why I heard Priscilla say once that the Canadian woman
• 1:35:51
  only pays five dollars for a story. Anne held out the hateful pink slip
• 1:35:57
  and shaking fingers. I can't take it. It's yours, by right,
• 1:36:00
  Diana. You sent the story in and made the alterations I I would certainly
• 1:36:05
  never have sent it. So you must take the check. I'd like to
• 1:36:10
  see myself, said Diana scornfully. Why what I did wasn't any trouble.
• 1:36:15
  The honor of being a friend of the prize winner is enough for me.
• 1:36:17
  Well, I must go. I should have gone straight home from the post
• 1:36:20
  office, for we have company. But I simply had to come hear the
• 1:36:24
  noose. I'm so glad for your sake, Anne, Anne suddenly bent forward,
• 1:36:28
  put her arms about Diana and kissed her cheek. I think you are
• 1:36:31
  the sweetest and truest friend in the world, Diana, she said, with
• 1:36:35
  a little tremble in her voice. And I assure you I appreciate the motive
• 1:36:40
  of what you've done. Diana, pleased and embarrassed, got herself away,
• 1:36:45
  and poor Anne, after flinging the innocent check into her bureau drawer as if
• 1:36:49
  it were blood money, cast herself on her bed and wept tears of shame
• 1:36:54
  and outraged sensibility. Oh she could never live this down. Never. Gilbert
• 1:37:00
  arrived at dusk, brimming over with congratulations, for he had called at Orchard
• 1:37:03
  Slope and heard the news, But his congratulations died on his lips at sight
• 1:37:09
  of Anne's face. Why Anne, what's the matter? I expected to find
• 1:37:14
  you radiant over winning Rawling's reliable prize. Good for you, Oh, Gilbert,
• 1:37:19
  not you, implored Anne in an et to brute tone. I thought
• 1:37:25
  you would understand. Can't you see how awful it is? I must confess
• 1:37:29
  I had what is wrong everything, moaned Anne. I feel as if I
• 1:37:35
  were disgraced forever. What do you think a mother would feel like if she
• 1:37:39
  found her child tattooed over with a baking powder advertisement. I feel just the
• 1:37:44
  same. I loved my poor little story, and I wrote it out of
• 1:37:47
  the best that was in me, and it is sacrilege to have it degraded
• 1:37:51
  to the level of a baking powder advertisement. Don't you remember what Professor Hamilton
• 1:37:57
  used to tell us in the literature class at Queen's. He said, we
• 1:38:00
  were never to write a word for a lower unworthy motive, but always to
• 1:38:03
  cling to the very highest ideals. What will he think when he hears I've
• 1:38:09
  written a story to advertise rollings reliable and oh when it gets out at Redmond,
• 1:38:14
  think how I'll be teased and laughed at that. You won't, said
• 1:38:18
  Gilbert, wondering uneasily if it were that confounded Junior's opinion, in particular,
• 1:38:24
  over which Anne was worried. The Reds will think, just as I thought
• 1:38:28
  that you, being like nine out of ten of us, not overburdened with
• 1:38:31
  worldly wealth, and taken this way of earning an honest penny to help yourself
• 1:38:35
  through the year. I don't see that there's anything lower unworthy about that,
• 1:38:40
  or anything ridiculous either. One would rather write masterpieces of literature, no doubt.
• 1:38:45
  But meanwhile, bored and tuition fees have to be paid. This common
• 1:38:48
  sense, matter of fact view of the case cheered Anne a little. At
• 1:38:53
  least it removed her dread of being laughed at, though the deeper hurt of
• 1:38:56
  an outraged ideal remained. End of Chapter fifteen, Chapter sixteen, Adjusted Relationships.
• 1:39:06
  It's the homiest spot I ever saw. It's homier than home, avowed
• 1:39:12
  Philippa Gordon, looking about her with delighted eyes. They were all assembled at
• 1:39:16
  twilight in the big living room at Patty's place. Anne and Priscilla, Phil
• 1:39:21
  and Stella, Aunt, Jamesina, Rusty, Joseph, the Sarah Cat,
• 1:39:27
  and Gog and Magog. The firelight shadows were dancing over the walls, the
• 1:39:31
  cats were purring, and a huge bowl of hot house chrysanthemums, sent to
• 1:39:35
  fill by one of the victims, shone through the golden gloom like creamy moons.
• 1:39:41
  It was three weeks since they had considered themselves settled, and already all
• 1:39:45
  believed the experiment would be a success. The first fortnight after their return had
• 1:39:50
  been a pleasantly exciting one. They had been busy setting up their household goods,
• 1:39:55
  organizing their little establishment, and adjusting different opinions. Anne was not over
• 1:40:00
  sorry to leave Avonlea when the time came to return to college. The last
• 1:40:05
  few days of her vacation had not been pleasant. Her prize story had been
• 1:40:10
  published in the Island papers, and mister William Blair had upon the counter of
• 1:40:15
  his store a huge pile of pink, green and yellow pamphlets containing it,
• 1:40:19
  one of which he gave to every customer. He sent a complimentary bundle to
• 1:40:25
  Anne, who promptly dropped them all in the kitchen stove. Her humiliation was
• 1:40:30
  the consequence of her own ideals. Only for Avonleaf folks thought it quite splendid
• 1:40:33
  that she should have won the prize. Her many friends regarded her with honest
• 1:40:38
  admiration, her few foes with scornful envy. Josie Pye said she believed Anne
• 1:40:45
  Shirley had just copied the story. She was sure she remembered reading it in
• 1:40:47
  a paper years before. The Sloanes, who had found out or guessed that
• 1:40:53
  Charley had been turned down, said they didn't think it was much to be
• 1:40:57
  proud of. Almost any one could have done it if she tried. Aunt
• 1:41:00
  Atossa told Anne she was very sorry to hear she had taken to writing novels.
• 1:41:04
  Nobody born and bred in Avonlea would do it. That was what came
• 1:41:09
  of adopting orphans from goodness knows where, with goodness knew what kind of parents.
• 1:41:14
  Even missus Rachel Lynde was darkly dubious about the propriety of writing fiction,
• 1:41:18
  though she was almost reconciled to it by that twenty five dollar check. It
• 1:41:23
  is perfectly amazing the price they pay for such lies, That's what she said,
• 1:41:28
  half proudly, half severely. All things considered, it was a relief
• 1:41:32
  when going away time came, and it was very jolly to be back at
• 1:41:36
  Redmond, a wise experienced soft with hosts of friends to greet on the merry
• 1:41:42
  opening day. Chris and Stella and Gilbert were there. Charlie Sloane, looking
• 1:41:46
  more important than ever a sophomore, looked before Phil with the Alec and Alonzo
• 1:41:50
  questions still unsettled, and Moody Spurgeon Macpherson. Moody Spurgeon had been teaching school
• 1:41:57
  ever since leaving Queen's, but his mother had concluded it was high time he
• 1:42:00
  gave it up and turned his attention to learning how to be a minister.
• 1:42:04
  Poor Moody Spurgeon fell on hard luck at the very beginning of his college career.
• 1:42:10
  Half a dozen ruthless softs who were among his fellow boarders, swooped down
• 1:42:14
  upon him one night and shaved half of his head. In this guise,
• 1:42:17
  the luckless Moody Spurgeon had to go about until his hair grew again. He
• 1:42:23
  told Anne bitterly that there were times when he had his doubts as to whether
• 1:42:26
  he was really called to be a minister. Aunt Jamesina did not come until
• 1:42:30
  the girls had Patty's place ready for her. Miss Patty had sent the key
• 1:42:34
  to Anne with a letter in which she said Gog and Magog were packed in
• 1:42:38
  a box under the spare room bed, but might be taken out when wanted.
• 1:42:42
  In a PostScript, she added that she hoped the girls would be careful
• 1:42:45
  about putting up pictures. The living room had been newly papered five years before,
• 1:42:50
  and she and Miss Maria did not want any more holes made in that
• 1:42:54
  new paper than was absolutely necessary for the rest. She trusted everything to Anne.
• 1:43:00
  How those girls enjoyed putting their nest in order, as Phil said,
• 1:43:02
  it was almost as good as getting married. You have the fun of homemaking
• 1:43:06
  without the bother of a husband. All brought something with them to adorn or
• 1:43:11
  make comfortable the little house. Chris and Phil and Stella had knickknacks and pictures
• 1:43:15
  galore, which latter they proceeded to hang according to taste, in reckless disregard
• 1:43:20
  of Miss Patty's new paper. We'll putty the holes up when we leave.
• 1:43:24
  Dear, she'll never know, they said, to protesting Anne. Diana had
• 1:43:30
  given Anne a pine needle cushion, and miss Ada had given both her and
• 1:43:33
  Priscilla a fearfully and wonderfully embroidered one. Marilla had sent a big box of
• 1:43:39
  preserves and darkly hinted at a hamper for Thanksgiving, and missus Lynde gave Anne
• 1:43:44
  a patchwork quilt and loaned her five more. You take them, she said
• 1:43:48
  authoritatively. They might as well be in use as packed away in that trunk
• 1:43:54
  in the garret. For moss tonaw, no moths would ever have ventured near
• 1:43:58
  those quilts, for they reeked of mothballs to such an extent that they had
• 1:44:01
  to be hung in the orchard of Patty's Place for a full fortnight before they
• 1:44:04
  could be injured indoors. Verily aristocratic Spofford Avenue had rarely beheld such a display.
• 1:44:13
  The gruff old millionaire who lived next door came over and wanted to buy
• 1:44:15
  the gorgeous red and yellow tulip pattern one which Missus Rachel had given Anne.
• 1:44:20
  He said his mother used to make quilts like that, and by jove,
• 1:44:24
  he wanted one to remind him of her. Anne would not sell it,
• 1:44:28
  much to his disappointment, but she wrote all about it to Missus Lynde.
• 1:44:31
  That highly gratified lady sent word back that she had one just like it to
• 1:44:35
  spare. So the tobacco king got his quilt after all, and insisted on
• 1:44:41
  having it spread on his bed, to the disgust of his fashionable wife.
• 1:44:45
  Missus Lynde's quilts served a very useful purpose that winter. Patty's Place, for
• 1:44:49
  all its many virtues, had its faults. Also. It was really a
• 1:44:54
  rather cold house, and when the frosty nights came, the girls were very
• 1:44:58
  glad to snuggle down under Missus lynde'squth wilts, and hoped that the loan of
• 1:45:00
  them might be accounted unto her for righteousness. Anne had the blue room she
• 1:45:05
  had coveted at sight, Priscilla and Stella had the large one. Phil was
• 1:45:11
  blissfully content with the little one over the kitchen, and Aunt Jamesina was to
• 1:45:15
  have the downstairs one off the living room. Rusty, at first slept on
• 1:45:18
  the doorstep. Anne, walking home from Redmond. A few days after her
• 1:45:23
  return, became aware that the people that she met surveyed her with a covert,
• 1:45:28
  indulgent smile. Anne wondered uneasily, what was the matter with her?
• 1:45:31
  Was her hat crooked? Was her belt loose? Craning her head to investigate,
• 1:45:36
  Anne for the first time saw Rusty trotting along behind her, close to
• 1:45:41
  her heels. Was quite the most forlorn specimen of the cat tribe she had
• 1:45:45
  ever beheld. The animal was well past kittenhood, lank, thin, disreputable
• 1:45:50
  looking. Pieces of both ears were lacking, one eye was temporarily out of
• 1:45:56
  repair, and one jowl ludicrously swollen. As for color, if a once
• 1:46:00
  black cat had been well and thoroughly singed, the result would have resembled the
• 1:46:04
  hue of this waif's thin, draggled, unsightly fur. Anne showed, but
• 1:46:10
  the cat would not show as long as she stood. He sat back on
• 1:46:14
  his haunches and gazed at her reproachfully out of his one good eye. When
• 1:46:17
  she resumed her walk, he followed. Anne resigned herself to his company until
• 1:46:23
  she reached the gate of Patty's place, which she coldly shut in his face,
• 1:46:27
  fondly supposing she had seen the last of him. But when fifteen minutes
• 1:46:30
  later Phil opened the door, there sat the rusty brown cat on the step
• 1:46:36
  more. He promptly darted in and sprang upon Anne's lap with a half pleading,
• 1:46:41
  half triumphant me ow. Anne said, Stella, severely, do you
• 1:46:46
  own that animal? No? I do not, protested disgusted Anne. The
• 1:46:51
  creature followed me home from somewhere I couldn't get rid of him. Ah,
• 1:46:56
  get down. I like decent cats reasonably well, but I do like beasties
• 1:47:00
  of your complexion. Pussy, however, refused to get down. He coolly
• 1:47:04
  curled up in Anne's lap and began to purr. He has evidently adopted you,
• 1:47:10
  laughed Priscilla. I won't be adopted, said Anne stubbornly. The poor
• 1:47:15
  creature is starving, said Phil pityingly. Why his bones are almost coming through
• 1:47:21
  his skin. Well, I'll give him a square meal, and then he
• 1:47:25
  must return to whence he came, said Anne resolutely. The cat was fed
• 1:47:30
  and put out. In the morning, he was still on the doorstep.
• 1:47:33
  On the doorstep, he continued to sit, bolting in whenever the door was
• 1:47:38
  opened. No coolness of welcome had the least effect on him. Of nobody
• 1:47:42
  save Anne did he take the least notice. Out of compassion, the girls
• 1:47:46
  fed him, but when a week had passed, they decided that something must
• 1:47:49
  be done. The cat's appearance had improved, His eye and cheek had resumed
• 1:47:55
  their normal appearance. He was not quite so thin, and he had been
• 1:47:58
  seen washing his face. But for all that, we can't keep him,
• 1:48:02
  said Stella. Aunt Jimsie is coming next week, and she will bring the
• 1:48:06
  Sarah cat with her. We can't keep two cats, and if we did
• 1:48:10
  this, Rusty Coat would fight all the time with the Sarah cat. He's
• 1:48:13
  a fighter by nature. He had a pitched battle last evening with the Tobacco
• 1:48:16
  King's cat and routed him horse foot and artillery. We must get rid of
• 1:48:21
  him, agreed Anne, looking darkly at the subject of their discussion, who
• 1:48:26
  was purring on the hearth rug with an air of lamb like meekness. But
• 1:48:30
  the question is how how can four unprotected females get rid of a cat who
• 1:48:34
  won't be got rid of? We must chloroform him, said Phil briskly.
• 1:48:40
  That is the most humane way. Who of us knows anything about chloroforming a
• 1:48:45
  cat, demanded Anne gloomily. I do, honey. It's one of my
• 1:48:48
  few, sadly few useful accomplishments. I've disposed of several at home. You
• 1:48:55
  take the cat in the morning and give him a good breakfast. Then you
• 1:48:58
  take an old burlap bag, there's one in the back porch, put the
• 1:49:01
  cat on it and turn over him a wooden box. Then take a two
• 1:49:04
  ounce bottle of chloroform, uncork it and slip it under the edge of the
• 1:49:09
  box. Put a heavyweight on top of the box, and leave it till
• 1:49:12
  evening. The cat will be dead, curled up peacefully as if he were
• 1:49:15
  asleep. No pain, no struggle. It sounds easy, said Anne dubiously.
• 1:49:21
  It is easy. Just leave it to me. I'll see to it,
• 1:49:25
  said Phil, reassuringly. Accordingly, the chloroform was procured, and the
• 1:49:30
  next morning Rusty was lured to his doom. He ate his breakfast, licked
• 1:49:34
  his chops, and climbed into Anne's lap. Anne's heart misgave her this poor
• 1:49:40
  creature, loved her, trusted her. How could she be a party to
• 1:49:44
  this destruction? Here take him, she said hastily to Phil. I feel
• 1:49:48
  like a murderess. He won't suffer, you know, comforted Phil. But
• 1:49:54
  Anne had fled. The fatal deed was done in the back porch. Nobody
• 1:49:59
  went near it that day, but at dusk Phil declared that Rusty must be
• 1:50:02
  buried prison Stella must dig his grave in the orchard, declared Phil. And
• 1:50:08
  Anne must come with me to lick the box off. That's the part I
• 1:50:11
  always hate. The two conspirators tiptoed reluctantly to the back porch. Phil gingerly
• 1:50:16
  lifted the stone she had put on the box. Suddenly, faint but distinct,
• 1:50:21
  sounded an unmistakable mew under the box. He he isn't dead, gasped
• 1:50:28
  Anne, sitting blankly down on the kitchen doorstep. He must be, said
• 1:50:32
  Phil incredulously. Another tiny mew proved that he wasn't. The two girls stared
• 1:50:39
  at each other. What will we do? Questioned Anne? Why in the
• 1:50:44
  world don't you come, demanded Stella, appearing in the doorway. We've got
• 1:50:48
  the grave ready, What silent? Still and silent all? She quoted teasingly.
• 1:50:55
  Oh no, the voices of the dead sound like the distant torrents fall.
• 1:51:00
  Promptly, counter quoted Anne, pointing solemnly to the box. A burst
• 1:51:03
  of laughter broke the tension. We must leave him here till morning, said
• 1:51:08
  Phil, replacing the stone. He hasn't mewed for five minutes. Perhaps the
• 1:51:13
  mews we heard were he's dying grown, or perhaps we merely imagine them under
• 1:51:16
  the strain of our guilty consciences. But when the box was lifted in the
• 1:51:20
  morning, Rusty bounded at one gay leap to Anne's shoulder, where he began
• 1:51:26
  to lick her face affectionately. Never was there a cat more decidedly alive.
• 1:51:30
  Here's a knot hole in the box, groaned Phil. I never saw it.
• 1:51:35
  That's why I didn't die. Now we've got to do it all over
• 1:51:39
  again. No, we haven't, declared Anne. Suddenly, Rusty isn't going
• 1:51:44
  to be killed again. He's my cat and you've just got to make the
• 1:51:46
  best of it. Oh well, if you'll settle with Aunt Jimsie and the
• 1:51:50
  Sarah cat, said Stella with the air of one washing her hands of the
• 1:51:55
  whole affair. From that time, Rusty was one of the family. He
• 1:52:00
  slept a knight's on the scrubbing cushion in the back porch and lived on the
• 1:52:02
  fat of the land. By the time Aunt Jamesina came he was plump and
• 1:52:06
  glossy and tolerably respectable. But like Kipling's cat, he walked by himself.
• 1:52:13
  His paw was against every cat, and every cat's paw against him. One
• 1:52:17
  by one he vanquished the aristocratic felines of Spofford Avenue. As for human beings,
• 1:52:24
  he loved Anne, and Anne alone. Nobody else even dared stroke him.
• 1:52:29
  An angry spit and something that sounded much like very improper language greeted anyone
• 1:52:32
  who did. The airs that cat puts on are perfectly intolerable, declared Stella.
• 1:52:40
  Him was a nice old Pussin's hymn was vowed Anne, cuddling her pet
• 1:52:45
  defiantly. Well, I don't know how he and the Sarah cat will ever
• 1:52:48
  make out to live together, said Stella pessimistically. Cat Fights in the orchard
• 1:52:54
  a knights are bad enough, but cat fights here in the living room are
• 1:52:58
  unthinkable. In due time time, Aunt Jamesina arrived. Anne and Priscilla and
• 1:53:02
  Phil had awaited her advent rather dubiously, but when Aunt Jamesina was enthroned in
• 1:53:08
  the rocking chair before the open fire, they figuratively bowed down and worshiped her.
• 1:53:13
  Aunt Jamesina was a tiny old woman with a little, softly triangular face
• 1:53:17
  and large, soft blue eyes that were alight with unquenchable youth and as full
• 1:53:21
  of hopes as a girl's. She had pink cheeks and snow white hair,
• 1:53:26
  which she wore in quaint little puffs over her ears. It's a very old
• 1:53:30
  fashioned way, she said, knitting industriously at something as dainty and pink as
• 1:53:35
  a sunset cloud. But I am old fashioned. My clothes are, and
• 1:53:42
  it stands to reason my opinions are too. I don't say they're any the
• 1:53:47
  better of that, mind you. In fact, I dare say they're a
• 1:53:53
  good deal the worse. But they've worn nice and easy. New shoes are
• 1:54:00
  smarter than old ones. But the old ones are more comfortable. I'm old
• 1:54:08
  enough to indulge myself in the matter of shoes and opinions. I mean to
• 1:54:14
  take it real easy here. I know you expect me to look after you
• 1:54:20
  and keep you proper, but I'm not going to do it. You're old
• 1:54:27
  enough to know how to behave if you're ever going to be so, as
• 1:54:33
  far as I am concerned, concluded Aunt Jamesina, with a twinkle in her
• 1:54:40
  young eyes. You can all go to destruction in your own way. Oh
• 1:54:46
  will somebody separate those cats, pleaded Stella, shudderingly. Aunt Jamesina had brought
• 1:54:53
  with her not only the Sarah cat, but Joseph. Joseph, she explained,
• 1:54:58
  had belonged to a dear friend of hers who had gone to live in
• 1:55:00
  Vancouver. She couldn't take Joseph with her, so she begged me to take
• 1:55:05
  him. I really couldn't refuse. He's a beautiful cat, that is,
• 1:55:12
  his disposition is beautiful. She called him Joseph because his coat is of many
• 1:55:18
  colors. It certainly was Joseph, as the disgusted Stella said, looked like
• 1:55:26
  a walking rag bag. It was impossible to say what his ground color was.
• 1:55:30
  His legs were white with black spots on them. His back was gray,
• 1:55:33
  with a huge patch of yellow on one side and a black patch on
• 1:55:36
  the other. His tail was yellow with a gray tip. One ear was
• 1:55:42
  black and one yellow. A black patch over one eye gave him a fearfully
• 1:55:45
  rakish look. In reality, he was meek and inoffensive, of a sociable
• 1:55:49
  disposition. In one respect, if in no other. Joseph was like a
• 1:55:55
  lily of the field. He toiled not, neither did he spin or catch
• 1:55:59
  mice. Yet Solomon, in all his glory, slept not on softer cushions
• 1:56:03
  or feasted more fully on fat things. Joseph and the Sarah cat arrived by
• 1:56:09
  express in separate boxes. After they had been released and fed, Joseph selected
• 1:56:14
  the cushion and corner which appealed to him, and the Sarah cat gravely sat
• 1:56:17
  herself down before the fire and proceeded to wash her face. She was a
• 1:56:21
  large, sleek, gray and white cat with an enormous dignity which was not
• 1:56:27
  at all impaired by any consciousness of her Plebeian origin. She had been given
• 1:56:31
  to Aunt Jamesina by her washerwoman. Her name was Sarah, so my husband
• 1:56:36
  always called Puss the Sarah Cat, explained Aunt Jamesina. She is eight years
• 1:56:44
  old and a remarkable mouser. Don't worry, Stella. The Sarah Cat never
• 1:56:50
  fights, and Joseph rarely. They'll have to fight here in self defense,
• 1:56:58
  said Stella. At this juncture, sure Rusty arrived on the scene. He
• 1:57:01
  bounded joyously half way across the room before he saw the intruders. Then he
• 1:57:06
  stopped short. His tail expanded until it was as big as three tails.
• 1:57:11
  The fur on his back rose up in a defiant arch. Rusty lowered his
• 1:57:15
  head, uttered a fearful shriek of hatred and defiance, and launched himself at
• 1:57:19
  the Sarah Cat. The stately animal had stopped washing her face and was looking
• 1:57:24
  at him curiously. She met his onslaught with one contemptuous sweep of her capable
• 1:57:29
  paw. Rusty went rolling helplessly over on the rug. He picked himself up
• 1:57:34
  dazedly. What sort of a cat was this? Who had boxed his ears?
• 1:57:39
  He looked dubiously at the Sarah Cat. Would he or would he not?
• 1:57:44
  The Sarah Cat deliberately turned her back on him and resumed her toilet operations.
• 1:57:48
  Rusty decided that he would not he never did. From that time on,
• 1:57:53
  the Sarah cat ruled the roost. Rusty never again interfered with her,
• 1:57:58
  but Joseph rashly said up and yawned. Rusty, burning to avenge his disgrace,
• 1:58:03
  swooped down upon him. Joseph, pacific by nature, could fight upon
• 1:58:08
  occasion, and fight well. The result was a series of drawn battles.
• 1:58:13
  Every day, Rusty and Joseph fought at sight. Anne took Rusty's part and
• 1:58:16
  detested Joseph. Stella was in despair, but Aunt Jamesina only laughed. Haha.
• 1:58:26
  Let them fight it out, she said tolerantly. They'll make friends after
• 1:58:31
  a bit. Joseph needs some exercise he was getting too fat, and Rusty
• 1:58:40
  has to learn he isn't the only cat in the world. Eventually, Joseph
• 1:58:45
  and Rusty accepted the situation, and from sworn enemies became sworn friends. They
• 1:58:51
  slept on the same cushion with their paws about each other, and gravely washed
• 1:58:55
  each other's faces. We've all got used to each other, said Phil,
• 1:59:00
  and I've learned how to wash dishes and sweep a floor. But you needn't
• 1:59:03
  try to make us believe you can chloroform a cat, laughed Anne. It
• 1:59:08
  was all the fault of the nthole, protested Phil. It was a good
• 1:59:13
  thing the not hole was there, said Aunt Jamesina rather severely. Kittens have
• 1:59:18
  to be drowned, I admit, or the world would be overrun. But
• 1:59:25
  no decent grown up cat should be done to death unless he sucks eggs.
• 1:59:31
  You wouldn't have thought Rusty very decent if you'd seen him when he came here,
• 1:59:35
  said Stella. He positively looked like old Nick. I don't believe old
• 1:59:41
  Nick can be so very ugly, said Aunt Jamesina reflectively. He wouldn't do
• 1:59:47
  so much harm if he was. I always think of him as a rather
• 1:59:53
  handsome gentleman. End of chapter sixteen. Chapter seventeen, a letter from Davy.
• 2:00:02
  It's beginning to snow girls, said Phil. Coming in one November evening,
• 2:00:08
  and there are the loveliest little stars and crosses all over the garden walk.
• 2:00:13
  I never noticed before what exquisite things snowflakes really are. One has time
• 2:00:16
  to notice things like that in the simple life. Bless you all for permitting
• 2:00:20
  me to live it. It's really delightful to feel worried because butter has gone
• 2:00:25
  up five cents a pound, has it, demanded Stella, who kept the
• 2:00:29
  household accounts it has? And here's your butter. I'm getting quite expert at
• 2:00:33
  marketing. It's better fun than flirting, concluded Phil Gravely. Everything is going
• 2:00:39
  up scandalously, sighed Stella. Never mind, Thank goodness, Air and Salvation
• 2:00:46
  are still free, said Aunt Jamesina, and so is laughter, added Anne.
• 2:00:54
  There's no tax on it yet, and that is well, because you're
• 2:00:57
  all going to laugh presently, I'm going to read you Davy's letter. His
• 2:01:00
  spelling has improved immensely this past year, though he is not strong on apostrophes,
• 2:01:05
  and he certainly possesses the gift of writing an interesting letter. Listen and
• 2:01:10
  laugh before we settle down to the evening's study. Grind Dear Anne ran Davy's
• 2:01:15
  letter. I take my pen to tell you that we are all pretty well,
• 2:01:19
  and hope this will find you the same. It's snowing some today,
• 2:01:24
  and Marilla says, the old woman in the sky is shaking her feather beds.
• 2:01:29
  Is the old woman in the sky God's wife? Anne? I want
• 2:01:31
  to know missus. Lynde has been real sick, but she is better now.
• 2:01:36
  She fell down the cellar stairs last week. When she fell, she
• 2:01:41
  grabbed hold of the shelf with all the milk pails and stewpans on it,
• 2:01:45
  and it gave way and went down with her and made a splendid crash.
• 2:01:49
  Marilla thought it was an earthquake at first. One of the stewpans was all
• 2:01:55
  dinged up, and missus Lynde strained her ribs. The doctor came and gave
• 2:01:59
  her metace and to rub on her ribs, but she didn't understand him and
• 2:02:02
  took it all inside instead. The doctor said it was a wonder it didn't
• 2:02:08
  kill her, But it didn't and it cured her ribs. And missus Lynde
• 2:02:12
  says, doctors don't know much anyhow. But we couldn't fix up the stewpan.
• 2:02:16
  Marilla had to throw it out. Thanksgiving was last week. There was
• 2:02:21
  no school and we had a great dinner. I et mince pie and roast
• 2:02:26
  turkey and fruit cake and doughnuts and cheese and jam and chocolate cake. Marilla
• 2:02:31
  said I'd die, but I didn't. Dora had earache after it, only
• 2:02:36
  it wasn't in her ears, it was in her stomach. I didn't have
• 2:02:41
  earache anywhere. Our new teacher is a man. He does things for jokes.
• 2:02:46
  Last week he made all us third class boys write a composition on what
• 2:02:50
  kind of a wife we'd like to have, and the girls on what kind
• 2:02:55
  of a husband he left fit to kill. When he read them, this
• 2:02:59
  was my I thought you'd like to see it. The kind of wife I'd
• 2:03:02
  like to have. She must have good manners and get my meals on time,
• 2:03:08
  and do what I tell her, and always be very polite to me.
• 2:03:12
  She must be fifteen years old. She must be good to the poor,
• 2:03:15
  and keep her house tidy, and be good tempered, and go to
• 2:03:19
  church regularly. She must be very handsome and have curly hair. If I
• 2:03:25
  get a wife that is just what I like, I'll be an awful good
• 2:03:28
  husband to her. I think a woman ought to be awful good to her
• 2:03:31
  husband. Some poor women haven't any husbands. The end. I was at
• 2:03:38
  missus Isaac Wright's funeral at White Sands last week. The husband of the corpse
• 2:03:43
  felt real sorry. Missus Lynde says Missus Wright's grandfather stole a sheep. But
• 2:03:47
  Marilla says, we mustn't speak ill of the dead. Why mustn't we?
• 2:03:53
  Anne? I want to know It's pretty safe, ain't it. Missus Lynde
• 2:03:58
  was awful mad the other day because I asked her if she was alive in
• 2:04:00
  Noah's time. I didn't mean to hurt her feelings. I just wanted to
• 2:04:05
  know was she Anne. Mister Harrison wanted to get rid of his dog,
• 2:04:11
  so he hugged him once, but he come to life and scooted for the
• 2:04:15
  barn. While mister Harrison was digging the grave, so he hugged him again
• 2:04:19
  and he stayed dead that time. Mister Harrison has a new man working for
• 2:04:24
  him. He's awful awkward. Mister Harrison says he is left handed in both
• 2:04:30
  his feet. Mister Barry's hired man is lazy. Missus Barry says that,
• 2:04:35
  but mister Barry says he ain't lazy exactly, only he thinks it easier to
• 2:04:41
  pray for things than to work for them. Missus Harmon Andrew's prize pig that
• 2:04:45
  she talked of so much died in a fit. Missus Lynde says it was
• 2:04:50
  a judgment on her for pride, but I think it was hard on the
• 2:04:55
  pig. Milty Bolter has been sick. The doctor gave him medicine, and
• 2:05:00
  it tasted horrid. I offered to take it for him for a quarter,
• 2:05:03
  but the Bolters are so mean. Milty says he'd rather take it himself and
• 2:05:09
  save his money. I asked Missus Bolter how a person would go about catching
• 2:05:14
  a man, and she got awful mad and said she didn't know. She'd
• 2:05:17
  never chase men. The A V I s is going to paint the hall
• 2:05:21
  again. They're tired of having it blue. The new minister was here to
• 2:05:27
  tea last night. He took three pieces of pie. If I did that,
• 2:05:30
  Missus Lynde would call me piggy. And he at fast and took big
• 2:05:35
  bites. And Marilla is always telling me not to do that. Why can
• 2:05:41
  ministers do what boys can't? I want to know. I haven't any more
• 2:05:45
  news. Here are six kisses x x x x x X. Dora sends
• 2:05:51
  one. Here's hers x your loving friend David Keith p s Anne. What
• 2:06:00
  was the Devil's father? I want to know? End of Chapter seventeen.
• 2:06:05
  Chapter eighteen, Miss Josephine remembers the Anne girl. When Christmas holidays came,
• 2:06:13
  the girls of Patty's Place scattered to their respective homes, but Aunt Jamesina elected
• 2:06:17
  to stay where she was. I couldn't go to any of the places I've
• 2:06:23
  been invited and take those three cats, she said. And I'm not going
• 2:06:29
  to leave the poor creatures here alone for nearly three weeks. If we had
• 2:06:35
  any decent neighbors who would feed them, I might, but there's nothing except
• 2:06:43
  millionaires on this street. So I'll stay here and keep Patty's place warm for
• 2:06:54
  you. Anne went home with the usual joyous anticipations, which were not wholly
• 2:06:59
  fulfilled. She found Avonlea in the grip of such an early, cold and
• 2:07:02
  stormy winter as even the oldest inhabitant could not recall. Green Gables was literally
• 2:07:09
  hemmed in by huge drifts. Almost every day of that ill starred vacation,
• 2:07:14
  it stormed fiercely, and even on fine days it drifted unceasingly. No sooner
• 2:07:18
  were the roads broken than they filled in again. It was almost impossible to
• 2:07:23
  stir out. The Avs tried on three evenings to have a party in honor
• 2:07:29
  of the college students, and on each evening the storm was so wild that
• 2:07:32
  nobody could go, so they gave up the attempt in despair. Anne,
• 2:07:36
  despite her love of and loyalty to green Gables, could not help thinking longingly
• 2:07:42
  of Patty's place, its cozy, open fire aunt, Jamesina's mirthful eyes,
• 2:07:46
  the three cats, the merry chatter of the girls, the pleasantness of Friday
• 2:07:51
  evenings when college friends dropped in to talk of Grave and gay. Anne was
• 2:07:57
  lonely. Diana, during the whole of the Hollow, was imprisoned at home
• 2:08:01
  with a bad attack of bronchitis. She could not come to green Gables,
• 2:08:05
  and it was rarely Anne could get to Orchard Slope, for the old way
• 2:08:09
  through the haunted wood was impassable with drifts, and the long way over the
• 2:08:13
  frozen leg of Shining Waters was almost as bad. Ruby Gillis was sleeping in
• 2:08:18
  the white heaped graveyard. Jane Andrews was teaching a school on western prairies.
• 2:08:22
  Gilbert, to be sure, was still faithful and waded up to Green Gables
• 2:08:26
  every possible evening. But Gilbert's visits were not what they once were. Anne
• 2:08:31
  almost dreaded them. It was very disconcerting to look up in the midst of
• 2:08:35
  a sudden silence and find Gilbert's hazel eyes fixed upon her with a quite unmistakable
• 2:08:41
  expression. In their grave depths, and it was still more disconcerting to find
• 2:08:46
  herself blushing hotly and uncomfortably under his gaze, just as if, just as
• 2:08:52
  if. Well, it was very embarrassing. Anne wished herself back at Patty's
• 2:08:56
  place, where there was always somebody else about to take the edge off a
• 2:09:00
  delicate situation. At Green Gables, Marilla went promptly to Missus Lynde's domain when
• 2:09:05
  Gilbert came and insisted on taking the twins with her. The significance of this
• 2:09:09
  was unmistakable, and Anne was in a helpless fury over it. Davy,
• 2:09:15
  however, was perfectly happy. He reveled in getting out in the morning and
• 2:09:18
  shoveling out the paths to the well and hen house. He gloried in the
• 2:09:22
  Christmas tide delicacies which Marilla and Missus Lynde vied with each other in preparing for
• 2:09:26
  Anne. And he was reading an enthralling tale in a school library book of
• 2:09:31
  a wonderful hero who seemed blessed with a miraculous faculty for getting into scrapes from
• 2:09:37
  which he was usually delivered by an earthquake or a volcanic explosion, which blew
• 2:09:41
  him high and dry. Out of his troubles, landed him in a fortune,
• 2:09:45
  and closed the story with proper a claw. I'd tell you it's a
• 2:09:50
  bully story, Anne, he said ecstatically. I'd ever so much rather read
• 2:09:54
  it than the Bible, would you, smiled? Anne? Davy peered curiously
• 2:10:00
  at her. You don't seem a bit shocked, Anne. Missus Lynde was
• 2:10:03
  awful shocked when I said that to her. No, I'm not shocked,
• 2:10:07
  Davy. I think it's quite natural that a nine year old boy would sooner
• 2:10:11
  read an adventure story than the Bible. But when you are older, I
• 2:10:15
  hope and think that you will realize what a wonderful book the Bible is.
• 2:10:18
  Oh, I think some parts of it are fine, conceded Davy. That
• 2:10:22
  story about Joseph, now, it's bully. But if I'd been Joseph,
• 2:10:28
  I wouldn't have forgive the brothers no surree, Anne, I'd have cut all
• 2:10:33
  their heads off. Missus Lynde was awful mad when I said that, and
• 2:10:37
  shut the Bible up and said she'd never read me any more of it if
• 2:10:41
  I talked like that. So I don't talk now. When she reads it
• 2:10:45
  Sunday afternoons, I just think things and say them to Milty Bolter. Next
• 2:10:50
  day in school, I told Milty the story about Elisha and the bears,
• 2:10:54
  and it scared him, so he's never made fun of mister Harrison's bald head.
• 2:10:58
  Since are there any bears on p E Island? Anne? I want
• 2:11:03
  to know? Not nowadays, said Anne absently, as the wind blew a
• 2:11:07
  scud of snow against the window. Oh dear, will it ever stop storming?
• 2:11:13
  God knows, said Davy, airily, preparing to resume his reading.
• 2:11:18
  Anne was shocked this time, Davy, she exclaimed, reproachfully. Missus Lynde
• 2:11:24
  says that, protested Davy. One night last week, Marilla said, will
• 2:11:30
  Ludovic Speed and Theodora Dix ever get married? And missus Lynde said, God
• 2:11:35
  knows, just like that. Well, it wasn't right for her to say
• 2:11:39
  it, said Anne, promptly, deciding upon which horn of this dilemma to
• 2:11:43
  impale herself. It isn't right for anybody to take that name in vain or
• 2:11:48
  speak it lightly. Davy, don't ever do it again, not if I
• 2:11:50
  say it slow and solemn like the minister, queried Davy gravely. No,
• 2:11:56
  not even then, Well, I won't Ludovic Speed and Theodora Dix live in
• 2:12:01
  middle Grafton, and missus Rachel says he has been courting her for a hundred
• 2:12:07
  years. Won't they soon be too old to get married? Anne? I
• 2:12:11
  hope Gilbert won't court you that long. When are you going to be married?
• 2:12:15
  Anne? Missus Lynde says, it's a sure thing. Missus Lynde is
• 2:12:18
  up, began Anne hotly, then stopped. Awful old gossip completed Davy calmly,
• 2:12:26
  that's what every one calls her. But is it a sure thing?
• 2:12:30
  Anne? I want to know. You're a very silly little boy, Davy
• 2:12:33
  said Anne, stalking haughtily out of the room. The kitchen was deserted,
• 2:12:39
  and she sat down by the window in the fast falling wintery twilight. The
• 2:12:43
  sun had set and the wind had died down. A pale, chilly moon
• 2:12:48
  looked out behind a bank of purple clouds. In the west. The sky
• 2:12:50
  faded out, but the strip of yellow along the western horizon grew brighter and
• 2:12:56
  fiercer, as if all the stray gleams of light were concentrating in one spot.
• 2:13:01
  The distant hills, rimmed with priestlike firs, stood out in dark distinctness
• 2:13:05
  against it. Anne looked across the still white fields, cold and lifeless in
• 2:13:11
  the harsh light of that grim sunset, and sighed. She was very lonely,
• 2:13:16
  and she was sad at heart, for she was wondering if she would
• 2:13:18
  be able to return to Redmond next year. It did not seem likely.
• 2:13:24
  The only scholarship possible in the sophomore year was a very small affair. She
• 2:13:28
  would not take Marilla's money, and there seemed little prospect of being able to
• 2:13:33
  earn enough in the summer vacation. I suppose I'll just have to drop out
• 2:13:37
  next year, she thought, drearily, and teach a district school again until
• 2:13:43
  I earn enough to finish my course. And by that time all my old
• 2:13:46
  class will have graduated and Patty's place will be out of the question. But
• 2:13:50
  there I'm not going to be a coward. I'm thankful I can earn my
• 2:13:54
  way through if necessary. Here's mister Harrison waiting up the lane, announced Davy
• 2:14:00
  running out. I hope he's brought the mail. It's three days since we
• 2:14:03
  got it. I want to see what them pesky grits are doing. I'm
• 2:14:07
  a conservative, Anne, and I tell you you have to keep your eye
• 2:14:11
  on them grits. Mister Harrison had brought the mail and merry letters from Stella
• 2:14:16
  and Priscilla, and Phil soon dissipated Anne's blues. Aunt Jamesina too had written,
• 2:14:22
  saying that she was keeping the hearth fire alight and that the cats were
• 2:14:26
  all well and the house plants doing fine. The weather has been real cold,
• 2:14:31
  she wrote, So I let the cat sleep in the house, Rusty
• 2:14:37
  and Joseph on the sofa in the living room, and the Sarah cat on
• 2:14:43
  the foot of my bed. It's real company to hear her purring when I
• 2:14:50
  wake up in the night and think of my poor daughter in the foreign field.
• 2:14:56
  If it was anywhere but in India, I wouldn't worry. But they
• 2:15:03
  say the snakes out there are terrible. It takes all the Sarah Cat's purring
• 2:15:11
  to drive away the thought of those snakes. I have enough faith for everything,
• 2:15:16
  but the snakes. I can't think why Providence ever made them. Sometimes
• 2:15:24
  I don't think he did. I'm inclined to believe the old Harry had a
• 2:15:31
  hand in making them. Anne had left a thin typewritten communication till the last,
• 2:15:37
  thinking it unimportant. When she had read it. She sat very still
• 2:15:41
  with tears in her eyes. What is the matter, Anne asked Marilla.
• 2:15:46
  Miss Josephine Barry is dead, said Anne, in a low tone. So
• 2:15:52
  she has gone at last, said Marilla. Well, she has been sick
• 2:15:56
  for over a year, and the Barrys have been expecting to hear of her
• 2:16:01
  death any time. It is well. She is at rest, for she
• 2:16:05
  has suffered dreadfully. Anne. She was always kind to you. She has
• 2:16:11
  been kind to the last Marilla. This letter is from her lawyer. She
• 2:16:16
  has left me a thousand dollars in her will. Gracious, ain't that an
• 2:16:20
  awful lot of money? Exclaimed Davy. She's the woman you and Diana lit
• 2:16:24
  on when you jumped into the spare room bed. Ain't she Diana told me
• 2:16:30
  that story? Is that why she left you so much? Hush, Davy,
• 2:16:35
  said Anne gently. She slipped away to the porch gable with a full
• 2:16:39
  heart, leaving Marilla and missus Lynde to talk over the news to their heart's
• 2:16:43
  content. Do you suppose Anne will ever get married now, speculated Davy anxiously.
• 2:16:50
  When Dorcas Slong got married last summer, she said, if she'd had
• 2:16:52
  enough money to live on. She'd never have been bothered with a man,
• 2:16:56
  but even a widower with eight children was better than living with a sister in
• 2:17:01
  law Davy Keith. Do hold your tongue, said missus Rachel severely. The
• 2:17:05
  way you talk is scandalous for a small boy. That's what end of chapter
• 2:17:11
  eighteen Chapter nineteen an interlude to think that this is my twentieth birthday and that
• 2:17:20
  I've left my teens behind me forever, said Anne, who was curled up
• 2:17:24
  on the hearth rug with Rusty in her lap, to Aunt Jamesina, who
• 2:17:28
  was reading in her pet chair. They were alone in the living room.
• 2:17:31
  Stella and Priscilla had gone to a committee meeting, and phil was upstairs adorning
• 2:17:37
  herself for a party. I suppose you feel kind of sorry, said Aunt
• 2:17:41
  Jamesina. The teens are such a nice part of life. I'm glad I've
• 2:17:48
  never gone out of them myself. Anne laughed. You never will, Auntie.
• 2:17:54
  You'll be eighteen when you should be one hundred. Yes, I'm sorry
• 2:17:58
  and a little dissatisfied as well. Miss Stacy told me long ago that by
• 2:18:01
  the time I was twenty, my character would be formed for good or evil.
• 2:18:07
  I don't feel that it's what it should be. It's full of flaws.
• 2:18:11
  Sow's everybody's, said Aunt Jamesina, cheerfully. Mine's correct in a hundred
• 2:18:16
  places. Your miss Stacy likely meant that when you are twenty, your character
• 2:18:24
  would have got its permanent bent in one direction or t'other and would go on
• 2:18:30
  developing in that line. Don't worry over it, Dan, do your duty
• 2:18:37
  by God and your neighbor and yourself and have a good time. That's my
• 2:18:43
  philosophy, and it's always worked pretty well. Where's Phil off to tonight?
• 2:18:52
  She's going to a dance and she's got the sweetest dress for it, creamy
• 2:18:56
  yellow silk and cobwebby lace. It just suits those brown tints of hers.
• 2:19:01
  There's magic in the words silk and lace, isn't there? Said Aunt Jamesina.
• 2:19:09
  The very sound of them makes me feel like skipping off to a dance.
• 2:19:16
  And yellow silk it makes one think of a dress of sunshine. I
• 2:19:24
  always wanted a yellow silk dress, but first my mother and then my husband
• 2:19:30
  wouldn't hear of it. The very first thing I'm going to do when I
• 2:19:35
  get to Heaven is to get a yellow silk dress. Amid Anne's peal of
• 2:19:41
  laughter. Phil came downstairs, trailing clouds of glory and surveyed herself in the
• 2:19:46
  long oval mirror on the wall. A flattering looking glass is a promoter of
• 2:19:50
  amiability, she said. The one in my room does certainly make me green.
• 2:19:56
  Do I look pretty nice? Anne? Do you really know how pretty
• 2:19:58
  you are? Phil asked Anne in honest admiration. Of course I do.
• 2:20:05
  What are looking glasses and men? For? That wasn't what I meant?
• 2:20:07
  Are all my ends tucked in? Is my skirt straight? And would this
• 2:20:11
  rose look better lower down? I'm afraid it's too high. It will make
• 2:20:15
  me look lopsided. But I hate things tickling my ears. Everything is just
• 2:20:20
  right, and that southwest dimple of yours is lovely. Anne. There's one
• 2:20:24
  thing in particular I like about you. You're so ungrudging. There isn't a
• 2:20:28
  particle of envy in you. Why should she be envious? Demanded Aunt Jamesina,
• 2:20:35
  she's not quite as good looking as you, maybe, but she's got
• 2:20:39
  a far handsomer nose. I know it, conceded Phil. My nose always
• 2:20:46
  has been a great comfort to me, confessed Anne. And I love the
• 2:20:50
  way your hair grows on your forehead, Anne, And that one wee curl,
• 2:20:54
  always looking as if it were going to drop, but never dropping is
• 2:20:58
  delicious. But as for no, mine is a dreadful worry to me.
• 2:21:01
  I know by the time I'm forty it will be Bernie. What do you
• 2:21:05
  think I'll look like when I'm forty, Anne, like an old, matronly
• 2:21:09
  married woman, teased Anne. I won't, said Phil, sitting down comfortably
• 2:21:15
  to wait for her escort. Joseph, you calico beastie. Don't you dare
• 2:21:18
  jump on my lap. I won't go to a dance all over cat hairs.
• 2:21:22
  No, Anne, I won't look matronly, but no doubt I'll be
• 2:21:26
  married to Alec or Alonzo, asked Anne. To one of them, I
• 2:21:31
  suppose, sighed Phil. If I can ever decide which, it shouldn't be
• 2:21:37
  hard to decide, scolded aunt Jamesina. I was born, as he saw,
• 2:21:41
  Auntie, and nothing can ever prevent me from teetering. You ought to
• 2:21:46
  be more level headed, Philippa. It's best to be level headed, of
• 2:21:50
  course, agreed Philippa. But you miss lots of fun. As for Alec
• 2:21:54
  and Alonzo, if you knew them, you'd understand why it's difficult to choose
• 2:21:58
  between them. They're will he nice? Then take somebody who is nicer,
• 2:22:03
  suggested Aunt Jamisina. There's that senior who is so devoted to you, will
• 2:22:09
  Leslie. He has such nice, large mild eyes. They're a bit too
• 2:22:18
  large and too mild, like a cow's, said Phil cruelly. What do
• 2:22:24
  you say about George Parker? There's nothing to say about him except that he
• 2:22:28
  always looks as if he had just been starched and ironed mar holeworthy. Then
• 2:22:33
  you can't find a fault with him. No, he would do if he
• 2:22:37
  wasn't poor. I must marry a rich man, Aunt Jamesina. That Anne
• 2:22:43
  good looks is an indispensable qualification. I'd marry Gilbert blythe if you were rich?
• 2:22:48
  Oh would you? Said Anne, rather viciously. We don't like that
• 2:22:52
  idea a little bit, although we don't want Gilbert ourselves. Oh no,
• 2:22:58
  mocked Phil. But don't let me talk of disagreeable subjects. I'll have to
• 2:23:01
  marry some time, I suppose, but I shall put off the evil day
• 2:23:05
  as long as I can. You mustn't marry anybody you don't love, Phil,
• 2:23:11
  when all's said and done, said Aunt Jamesina. Oh, hearts that
• 2:23:16
  loved in the good old way have been out of the fashion this many a
• 2:23:18
  day, trilled Phil mockingly. There's the carriage I fly, Bye bye,
• 2:23:24
  you two old fashioned darlings. When Phil had gone, Aunt Jamesina looked solemnly
• 2:23:30
  at Anne. That girl is pretty and sweet and good hearted. But do
• 2:23:37
  you think she is quite right in her mind? By spells? Anne?
• 2:23:43
  Oh, I don't think there's anything the matter with Phil's mind, said Anne,
• 2:23:46
  hiding a smile. It's just her way of talking. Aunt Jamesina shook
• 2:23:52
  her head. Well, I hope so, Anne. I do hope so,
• 2:23:56
  because I love her, but I can't understand her. She beats me.
• 2:24:05
  She isn't like any of the girls I ever knew, or any of
• 2:24:09
  the girls I was myself. How many girls were you, Aunt Jimsie,
• 2:24:15
  About half a dozen, my dear. End of Chapter nineteen, Chapter two,
• 2:24:22
  Garlands of Autumn. The following week sped swiftly, crowded with innumerable last
• 2:24:31
  things, as Anne called them. Good Bye. Calls had to be made
• 2:24:35
  and received, being pleasant or otherwise, according to whether callers and called upon
• 2:24:39
  were heartily in sympathy with Anne's hopes or thought she was too much puffed up
• 2:24:43
  over going to college, and that it was their duty to take her down
• 2:24:48
  a peg or two. The A v I. S gave a farewell party
• 2:24:52
  in honor of Anne and Gilbert one evening at the home of Josie Pye,
• 2:24:56
  choosing that place partly because mister Pye's house was large and convenient, partly because
• 2:25:01
  it was strongly suspected that the Pie Girls would have nothing to do with the
• 2:25:05
  affair if their offer of the house for the party was not accepted. It
• 2:25:09
  was a very pleasant little time, for the Pie Girls were gracious and said
• 2:25:13
  and did nothing to mar the harmony of the occasion, which was not according
• 2:25:18
  to their wont Josie was unusually amiable, so much so that she even remarked
• 2:25:24
  condescendingly to Anne, your new dress is rather becoming to you. Anne,
• 2:25:28
  Really, you look almost pretty in it. How kind of you to say
• 2:25:33
  so, responded Anne with dancing eyes. Her sense of humor was developing,
• 2:25:37
  and the speeches that would have hurt her at fourteen were becoming merely food for
• 2:25:41
  amusement. Now. Josie suspected that Anne was laughing at her behind those wicked
• 2:25:46
  eyes, but she contented herself with whispering to Gerty as they went downstairs that
• 2:25:52
  Anne Shirley would put on more airs than ever now that she was going to
• 2:25:56
  college. You'd see all the old crowd was there, full of mirth and
• 2:26:01
  zest and youthful, lightheartedness. Diana Barry rosy and dimpled, shadowed by the
• 2:26:07
  faithful Fred, Jane Andrews, neat and sensible and plain. Ruby Gillis looking
• 2:26:13
  her handsomest and brightest in a cream silk blouse with red geraniums in her golden
• 2:26:16
  hair. Gilbert Blythe and Charlie Sloane, both trying to keep as near the
• 2:26:22
  elusive Anne as possible. Carrie Sloane looking pale and melancholy, because, so
• 2:26:28
  it was reported, her father would not allow Oliver Kimball to come near the
• 2:26:31
  place. Moody Spurgeon McPherson, whose round face and objectionable ears were as round
• 2:26:37
  and objectionable as ever. And Billy Andrews, who sat in a corner all
• 2:26:41
  the evening chuckled when anyone spoke to him, and watched Anne Shirley with a
• 2:26:46
  grin of pleasure on his broad, freckled countenance. Anne had known beforehand of
• 2:26:52
  the party, but she had not known that she and Gilbert were, as
• 2:26:54
  the founders of the society, to be presented with a very complimentary address and
• 2:27:01
  tokens of respect, in her case, a volume of Shakespeare's plays in Gilbert's
• 2:27:05
  fountain pen. She was so taken by surprise and pleased by the nice things
• 2:27:11
  said in the address, read in Moody Spurgeon's most solemn and ministerial tones,
• 2:27:16
  that the tears quite drowned the sparkle of her big gray eyes. She had
• 2:27:20
  worked hard and faithfully for the A V I S. And it warmed the
• 2:27:24
  cockles of her heart that the members appreciated her efforts so sincerely, and they
• 2:27:30
  were all so nice and friendly and jolly. Even the pie girls had their
• 2:27:33
  merits. At that moment, Anne loved all the world. She enjoyed the
• 2:27:39
  evening tremendously, but the end of it rather spoilt all. Gilbert again made
• 2:27:43
  the mistake of saying something sentimental to her as they ate their supper on the
• 2:27:48
  moonlit veranda, and Anne, to punish him, was gracious to Charlie Sloane
• 2:27:52
  and allowed the latter to walk home with her. She found, however,
• 2:27:56
  that revenge hurts nobody quite so much as the one who tries to inflict it.
• 2:28:01
  Gilbert walked airily off with Ruby Gillis, and Anne could hear them laughing
• 2:28:05
  and talking gaily as they loitered along in the still crisp autumn air. They
• 2:28:11
  were evidently having the best of good times, while she was horribly bored by
• 2:28:15
  Charlie Sloane, who talked unbrokenly on and never even by accident, said one
• 2:28:20
  thing that was worth listening to. Anne gave an occasional absent yes or no,
• 2:28:26
  and thought how beautiful Ruby had looked that night, how very goggly Charley's
• 2:28:31
  eyes were in the moonlight, worse even than by daylight, and that the
• 2:28:35
  world somehow wasn't quite such a nice place as she had believed it to be
• 2:28:39
  earlier in the evening. I'm just tired out, that is what is the
• 2:28:45
  matter with me, she said, when she thankfully found herself alone in her
• 2:28:48
  own room, And she honestly believed it was but a certain little gush of
• 2:28:54
  joy, as from some secret, unknown spring, bubbled up in her heart.
• 2:28:58
  The next evening, when she saw Gilbert's striding down through the haunted wood
• 2:29:03
  and crossing the old log bridge with that firm quick step of his. So
• 2:29:07
  Gilbert was not going to spend this last evening with Ruby Gillis. After all,
• 2:29:11
  you look tired, eh, he said, I am tired, and
• 2:29:16
  worse than that, I'm disgruntled. I'm tired because I've been packing my trunk
• 2:29:20
  and sewing all day. But I'm disgruntled because six women have been here to
• 2:29:24
  say good bye to me, and every one of the six managed to say
• 2:29:28
  something that seemed to take the color right out of life and leave it as
• 2:29:31
  gray and dismal and cheerless as a November morning. Spiteful old cat was Gilbert's
• 2:29:37
  elegant comment. Oh no, they weren't, said Anne. Seriously, that
• 2:29:43
  is just the trouble. If they had been spiteful cats, I wouldn't have
• 2:29:46
  minded them. But they are all nice, kind, motherly souls who like
• 2:29:52
  me and whom I like, And that is why what they said or hinted
• 2:29:56
  had such undue weight with me. They let me see they thought I was
• 2:30:00
  crazy going to Redmond and trying to take a b A and ever since I've
• 2:30:03
  been wondering if I am missus. Peter Sloane sighed and said she hoped my
• 2:30:07
  strength would hold out till I got through, and at once I saw myself
• 2:30:11
  a hopeless victim of nervous prostration. At the end of my third year,
• 2:30:16
  Missus Eben Wright said it must cost an awful lot to put in four years
• 2:30:20
  at Redmond, and I felt all over me that it was unpardonable of me
• 2:30:24
  to squander Marilla's money and my own on such a folly. Missus Jasper Bell
• 2:30:28
  said she hoped I wouldn't let college spoil me as it did some people.
• 2:30:31
  And I felt in my bones that the end of my four Redmond years would
• 2:30:35
  see me a most insufferable creature, thinking I knew it all, and looking
• 2:30:39
  down on everything and everybody. In Avonlea, Missus Alicia Wright said she understood
• 2:30:46
  that Redmond girls, especially those who belonged to Kingsport, were dreadful, dressy
• 2:30:50
  and stuck up, and she guessed I wouldn't feel much at home among them,
• 2:30:54
  and I saw myself a snubbed, dowdy, humiliated country girl shuffling through
• 2:30:58
  red Edmund's classic halls in copper toned boots. Anne ended with a laugh and
• 2:31:03
  a sigh, commingled with her sensitive nature. All disapproval had wait, even
• 2:31:09
  the disapproval of those for whose opinion she had scant respect. For the time
• 2:31:13
  being, life was savorless and ambition had gone out like a snuffed candle.
• 2:31:18
  You surely don't care for what they said, protested Gilbert. You know exactly
• 2:31:22
  how narrow their outlook on life is excellent creatures, though they are to do
• 2:31:26
  anything they have never done is anathema. Meronantha, you're the first Avonlea girl
• 2:31:31
  who has ever gone to college, and you know that all pioneers are considered
• 2:31:35
  to be afflicted with the moonstruck madness. Oh, I know, but feeling
• 2:31:41
  is so different from knowing. My common sense tells me all you can say.
• 2:31:45
  But there are times when common sense has no power over me. Common
• 2:31:48
  nonsense takes possession of my soul. Really, after missus Alicia went away,
• 2:31:54
  I hardly had the heart to finish packing. You're just tired, Ane.
• 2:31:58
  Come forget it all and take a walk with me. I'll ramble back through
• 2:32:01
  the woods beyond the marsh. There should be something that I want to show
• 2:32:03
  you should be don't you know if it is there? No, I only
• 2:32:09
  know it should be from something I saw there in spring. Come on,
• 2:32:13
  we'll pretend we're two children again. And we'll go the way the wind.
• 2:32:16
  They started gaily off. Anne, remembering the unpleasantness of the preceding evening,
• 2:32:22
  was very nice to Gilbert, and Gilbert, who was learning wisdom, took
• 2:32:26
  care to be nothing save the schoolboy comrade. Again. Missus Lynde and Marilla
• 2:32:30
  watched them from the kitchen window. That'll be a match some day, missus
• 2:32:35
  Lynde said, approvingly. Marilla winced slightly in her heart. She hoped it
• 2:32:39
  would, but it went against her grain to hear the matter spoken of in
• 2:32:43
  missus Lynde's gossipy, matter of fact way. They're only children yet, she
• 2:32:48
  said shortly. Missus Lynde laughed good naturedly. Anne's eighteen. I was married
• 2:32:56
  when I was that age. We old folks, Marilla, are too given
• 2:33:00
  to thinking children never grow up. That's what. Anne's a young woman,
• 2:33:03
  and Gilbert's a man, and he worships the ground she walks on, as
• 2:33:07
  any one can see. He's a fine fellow, and Anne can't do better.
• 2:33:13
  I hope she won't get any romantic nonsense into her head at Redmond.
• 2:33:16
  I don't approve of them coeducational places, and never did. That's what I
• 2:33:22
  don't believe, concluded Missus Lynde solemnly, that the students at such colleges ever
• 2:33:26
  do much else than flirt. They must study a little, said Marilla with
• 2:33:31
  a smile. Precious little sniffed Missus Rachel. However, I think Anne will.
• 2:33:37
  She never was flirtatious, but she doesn't appreciate Gilbert at his full value.
• 2:33:43
  That's what oh, I know, girls, Charlie Sloane is wild about
• 2:33:48
  her too, but I'd never advise her to marry a Sloane. The Sloans
• 2:33:52
  are good, honest, respectable people, of course, but when all's said
• 2:33:56
  and done, they're Sloans. Marilla nodded to an outsider. The statement that
• 2:34:03
  Sloanes were Sloanes might not be very illuminating, but she understood every village has
• 2:34:07
  such a family. Good honest, respectable people they may be, but Sloanes
• 2:34:13
  they are, and must ever remain, though they speak with the tongues of
• 2:34:16
  men and angels. Gilbert and Anne, happily unconscious that their future was thus
• 2:34:20
  being settled by Missus Rachel, were sauntering through the shadows of the Haunted wood
• 2:34:26
  beyond the Harvest Hills, were basking in an amber sunset radiance under a pale
• 2:34:31
  aerial sky of rose and blue. The distant spruce groves were burnished bronze,
• 2:34:37
  and their long shadows barred the upland meadows. But around them a little wind
• 2:34:41
  sang among the fir tassels, and in it there was the note of autumn.
• 2:34:46
  This wood really is haunted now by old memories, said Anne, stooping
• 2:34:52
  to gather a spray of ferns bleached to waxen whiteness by frost. It seems
• 2:34:56
  to me that the little girls Diana and I used to be play here still,
• 2:35:01
  and sit by the dryad's bubble in the twilights, trysting with the ghosts.
• 2:35:05
  Do you know I can never go up this path in the dusk without
• 2:35:09
  feeling a bit of the old fright and shiver. There was one especially horrifying
• 2:35:13
  phantom which we created, the ghost of the murdered child that crept up behind
• 2:35:18
  you and laid cold fingers on yours. I confess that to this day I
• 2:35:22
  cannot help fancying its little furtive footsteps behind me when I come here after nightfall.
• 2:35:28
  I'm not afraid of the white lady, or the headless man, or
• 2:35:31
  the skeletons. But I wish I had never imagined that baby's ghost into existence.
• 2:35:35
  How angry Marilla and missus Barry were over that affair, concluded Anne with
• 2:35:41
  reminiscent laughter. The woods around the head of the marsh were full of purple
• 2:35:46
  vistas threaded with gossamers, past a dour plantation of gnarled spruces, and a
• 2:35:52
  maple fringed sun warm valley. They found the something Gilbert was looking for.
• 2:35:56
  I hear it is, he said, with sut ae faction. An apple
• 2:36:01
  tree, and away back here, exclaimed Anne delightedly. Yes, a veritable
• 2:36:07
  apple bearing apple tree too, here in the very midst of pines and beeches,
• 2:36:11
  a mile away from any orchard. I was here one day last spring
• 2:36:15
  and found it all white with blossom. So I resolved I'd come again in
• 2:36:18
  the fall and see if it had been apples seeds loaded. They were good
• 2:36:24
  too, Tawny's rusts, but with a dusky red cheek. Most wild seedlings
• 2:36:30
  are green and uninviting. I suppose it sprang years ago from some chance stone
• 2:36:35
  seed, said Anne dreamily. And how it has grown and flourished and held
• 2:36:39
  its own here, all alone among aliens, the brave determined thing. Here's
• 2:36:45
  a fallen tree with a cushion of moss. Sit down, Anne, it'll
• 2:36:48
  serve for a woodland throne. I'll climb for some apples. They all grow
• 2:36:52
  high. The tree had to reach up to the sunlight. The apples proved
• 2:36:56
  to be delicious. Under the tawny skin was a white white flesh faintly veined
• 2:37:01
  with red, and besides their own proper apple taste, they had a certain
• 2:37:07
  wild, delightful tang. No orchard grown apple, ever possessed the fatal apple
• 2:37:13
  of Eden, couldn't have had a rarer flavor, commented Anne. But it's
• 2:37:16
  time we were going home. See it was twilight three minutes ago, and
• 2:37:20
  now it's moonlight. What a pity. We couldn't have caught the moment of
• 2:37:24
  transformation. But such moments never are caught. I suppose let's go back around
• 2:37:28
  the marsh and home by way of Lover's Lane. Do if you as disgruntled
• 2:37:33
  now as when you started out, Anne, not, I those apples have
• 2:37:37
  been as manna to a hungry soul. I feel that I shall love Redmond
• 2:37:41
  and have a splendid four years there. And uh after those four years,
• 2:37:46
  what, oh, there's another bend in the road at their end, answered
• 2:37:50
  Anne lightly, I've no idea what may be around it. I don't want
• 2:37:54
  to have. It's nicer not to know. Lover's Lane was a dear place
• 2:37:58
  that night, still and mysteriously dim in the pale radiance of the moonlight.
• 2:38:03
  They loitered through it in a pleasant, chummy silence, neither caring to talk.
• 2:38:09
  If Gilbert were always as he has been this evening, how nice and
• 2:38:13
  simple everything would be, reflected Anne. Gilbert was looking at Anne as she
• 2:38:18
  walked along in her light dress. With her slender delicacy, she made him
• 2:38:24
  think of a white iris. I wonder if I can ever make a care
• 2:38:26
  for me, he thought, with a pang of self distrust. End of
• 2:38:31
  Chapter two, Chapter twenty, Gilbert speaks, this has been a dull,
• 2:38:41
  prosy day, yawned phil stretching herself idly on the sofa, having previously dispossessed
• 2:38:48
  two exceedingly indignant cats. Anne looked up from Pickwick papers. Now that spring
• 2:38:54
  examinations were over, she was treating herself to dickens. It has been a
• 2:38:58
  prosy day for us, she said, thoughtfully. But to some people it
• 2:39:03
  has been a wonderful day. Someone has been rapturously happy in it. Perhaps
• 2:39:07
  a great deed has been done somewhere today, or a great poem written,
• 2:39:13
  or a great man born, and some heart has been broken? Phil,
• 2:39:16
  Why did you spoil your pretty thought by tagging that last sentence on honey?
• 2:39:22
  Grumbled? Phil? I don't like to think of broken hearts or anything unpleasant.
• 2:39:26
  Do you think you'll be able to shirk unpleasant things all your life?
• 2:39:30
  Phil? Dear me, No, am I not up against them? Now?
• 2:39:33
  You don't call Alec and Alonzo pleasant things? Do you? When they
• 2:39:37
  simply plague my life out? You never take anything seriously? Phil? Why
• 2:39:43
  should I? There are enough folks who do the world needs people like me,
• 2:39:46
  Anne, just to amuse it. It would be a terrible place if
• 2:39:50
  everybody were intellectual and serious and in deep, deadly earnest. My mission is,
• 2:39:56
  as Josiah Allen says to charm and allure, confess. Now, hasn't
• 2:40:01
  life at Patty's Place been really much brighter and pleasanter this past winter? Because
• 2:40:07
  I've been here to levin you. Yes, it has owned, Anne,
• 2:40:11
  and you all love me, even Aunt Jamesina, who thinks I'm stark mad?
• 2:40:16
  So why should I try to be different. Oh dear, I'm so
• 2:40:20
  sleepy. I was awake until one last night reading a harrowing ghost story.
• 2:40:24
  I read it in bed, and after I had finished it, do you
• 2:40:28
  suppose I could get out of bed to put the light out. No,
• 2:40:31
  and if Stella had not fortunately come in late, that lamp would have burned
• 2:40:35
  good and bright till morning. When I heard Stella, I called her in,
• 2:40:39
  explained to my predicament, and got her to put out the light.
• 2:40:41
  If I had got out myself to do it, I knew something would grab
• 2:40:45
  me by the feet when I was getting in again. By the way,
• 2:40:48
  Anne has aunt Jamesina decided what to do this summer. Yes, she's going
• 2:40:52
  to stay here. I know she's doing it for the sake of those blessed
• 2:40:56
  cats, although she says it's too much trouble to open her own house and
• 2:41:00
  she hates visiting. What are you reading Pickwick? That's a book that always
• 2:41:03
  makes me hungry, said Phil. There's so much good eating in it.
• 2:41:09
  The character seem always to be reveling on ham and eggs and milk punch.
• 2:41:13
  I generally go on a covered rummage after reading Pickwick. The mere thought reminds
• 2:41:16
  me that I'm starving. Is there any tidbit in the pantry, Queen Anne,
• 2:41:20
  I made a lemon pie this morning. You may have a piece of
• 2:41:24
  it. Phil dashed out to the pantry, and Anne betook herself to the
• 2:41:28
  orchard in company with Rusty. It was a moist, pleasantly odorous night in
• 2:41:33
  early spring. The snow was not quite all gone from the park. A
• 2:41:37
  little dingy bank of it yet lay under the pines of the harbor Road,
• 2:41:41
  screened from the influence of april suns. It kept the harbor Road muddy and
• 2:41:46
  chilled the evening air. But grass was growing green in sheltered spots, and
• 2:41:52
  Gilbert had found some pale, sweet arbutus in a hidden corner. He came
• 2:41:56
  up from the park, his hands full of it. Anne was sitting on
• 2:42:00
  the big gray boulder in the orchard, looking at the poem of a bare
• 2:42:03
  birchen bough hanging against the pale red sunset. With the very perfection of grace.
• 2:42:09
  She was building a castle in air, a wondrous mansion whose sunlit courts
• 2:42:15
  and stately halls were steeped in Araby's perfume, and where she reigned. Queen
• 2:42:20
  Ann Chatelaine. She frowned as she saw Gilbert coming through the orchard. Of
• 2:42:24
  late, she had managed not to be left alone with Gilbert, but he
• 2:42:28
  had caught her fairly now, and even Rusty had deserted her. Gilbert sat
• 2:42:33
  down beside her on the boulder and held out his mayflowers, please remind you
• 2:42:39
  of home in our old schoolbay picnics. An Anne took them and buried her
• 2:42:43
  face in them. I'm in, mister sideless Sloan's barrens this very minute,
• 2:42:48
  she said, rapturously. I suppose you'll be there in reality in a few
• 2:42:52
  days. No, not for a fortnight. I'm going to visit with Phil
• 2:42:56
  and Bolingbrook before I go home. You'll be in Avonlea before I will.
• 2:43:00
  No, I shall not be an Avonlea at all this summer. Anne.
• 2:43:03
  I've been offered a job in the Daily News office, and I'm going to
• 2:43:07
  take it. Oh, said Anne vaguely. She wondered what a whole Avonlea
• 2:43:11
  summer would be like without Gilbert. Somehow she did not like the prospect.
• 2:43:16
  Well, she concluded flatly, it is a good thing for you, of
• 2:43:20
  course. Well, yes, I've been hoping I will get it. It'll
• 2:43:24
  help me out next year. You mustn't work too hard, said Anne,
• 2:43:30
  without any very clear idea of what she was saying. She wished desperately that
• 2:43:33
  Phil would come out. You studied very constantly this winter. Isn't this a
• 2:43:39
  delightful evening? Do you know? I found a cluster of white violets under
• 2:43:43
  that old twisted tree over there today. I felt as if I had discovered
• 2:43:46
  a gold mine, always discovering gold mines, said Gilbert, also absently,
• 2:43:52
  Let us go and see if we can find some more, suggested Anne eagerly.
• 2:43:58
  I'll call Phil and i'd fill in the violets. Just now, Anne,
• 2:44:01
  said Gilbert, quietly, taking her hand in a clasp from which she
• 2:44:05
  could not free it. There's something I want to say to you. Oh,
• 2:44:09
  don't say it, cried Anne pleadingly. Don't please Gilbert. I must.
• 2:44:16
  Things can't go on like this any longer. Anne. I love you,
• 2:44:22
  you know I do. I can't tell you how much? Will you
• 2:44:26
  promise me that someday you'll be my wife? I can't, said Anne miserably.
• 2:44:35
  Oh Gilbert, you you've spoiled everything. Don't you care for me at
• 2:44:39
  all? Gilbert asked, after a very dreadful pause, during which Anne had
• 2:44:45
  not dared to look up. Not in that way. I do care a
• 2:44:50
  great deal for you as a friend, but I don't love you, Gilbert.
• 2:44:54
  But can you give me some hope that you will? Yet? No,
• 2:44:58
  I can't, can't, exclaimed Anne desperately. I never, never can
• 2:45:03
  love you in that way. Gilbert. You must never speak of this to
• 2:45:07
  me again. There was another pause, so long and so dreadful that Anne
• 2:45:13
  was driven at last to look up. Gilbert's face was white to the lips
• 2:45:18
  and his eyes, but Anne shuddered and looked away. There was nothing romantic
• 2:45:24
  about this. Must proposals be either grotesque or horrible? Could she ever forget
• 2:45:30
  Gilbert's face? Is there anybody else? He asked at last in a low
• 2:45:35
  voice. No, no, said Anne eagerly. I don't care for anyone
• 2:45:41
  like that, and I like you better than anybody else in the world,
• 2:45:43
  Gilbert. And we must we must go on being friends, Gilbert. Gilbert
• 2:45:50
  gave a bitter little laugh. Friends you have. Friendship can't satisfy me,
• 2:45:54
  Anne. I want your love and you tell me I can never have that.
• 2:46:00
  I'm sorry forgive me, Gilbert was all Anne could say, where,
• 2:46:05
  oh, where were all the gracious and graceful speeches wherewith in imagination she had
• 2:46:11
  been wont to dismiss rejected suitors. Gilbert released her hand gently. There isn't
• 2:46:16
  anything to forgive. There have been times when I thought you did care.
• 2:46:22
  I've deceived myself. That's all. Goodbye, Anne. Anne got herself to
• 2:46:28
  her room, sat down on her window seat behind the pines, and cried
• 2:46:33
  bitterly. She felt as if something incalculably precious had gone out of her life.
• 2:46:39
  It was Gilbert's friendship, of course, Oh why must she lose it?
• 2:46:43
  After this fashion? What is the matter? Honey, asked Phil,
• 2:46:46
  coming in through the moonlit gloom. Anne did not answer. At that moment,
• 2:46:52
  she wished Phil were a thousand miles away. I suppose you've gone and
• 2:46:56
  refused, Gilbert blythe You are an idiot, Anne? Do you call it
• 2:47:01
  idiotic to refuse to marry a man I don't love? Said Anne, coldly,
• 2:47:05
  goaded to reply, you don't know love when you see it. You've
• 2:47:09
  tricked something out with your imagination that you think love, and you expect the
• 2:47:13
  real thing to look like that. There, that's the first sensible thing I've
• 2:47:16
  ever said in my life. I wonder how I managed it. Phil pleaded
• 2:47:22
  Anne, please go away and leave me alone for a little while. My
• 2:47:26
  world has tumbled into pieces. I want to reconstruct it without any Gilbert in
• 2:47:33
  it, said Phil, going a world without any Gilbert in it. Anne
• 2:47:39
  repeated the words drearily. Would it not be a very lonely, forlorn place?
• 2:47:45
  Well, it was all Gilbert's fault. He had spoiled their beautiful comradeship.
• 2:47:50
  She must just learn to live without it. End of Chapter twenty Chapter
• 2:47:56
  twenty one, Roses of Yesterday. The fortnight Anne spent in bowling Brook was
• 2:48:03
  a very pleasant one, with a little undercurrent of vague pain and dissatisfaction running
• 2:48:07
  through it. Whenever she thought about Gilbert. There was not, however,
• 2:48:11
  much time to think about him. Mount Holly, the beautiful Old Gordon Homestead,
• 2:48:16
  was a very gay place, overrun by Phil's friends of both sexes.
• 2:48:22
  There was quite a bewildering succession of drives, dances, picnics and boating parties,
• 2:48:26
  all expressively lumped together by Phil under the head of jamborees. Alec and
• 2:48:33
  Alonzo were so constantly on hand that Anne wondered if they ever did anything but
• 2:48:37
  dance attendants on that willow the wisp of a Phil. They were both nice,
• 2:48:41
  manly fellows, but Anne would not be drawn into any opinion as to
• 2:48:46
  which was the nicer. And I depended so on you to help me make
• 2:48:50
  up my mind which of them I should promise to marry, mourned Phil.
• 2:48:54
  You must do that for yourself. You are quite expert at making up your
• 2:48:58
  mind as to who other people should marry, retorted Anne rather caustically. Oh
• 2:49:03
  that's a very different thing, said Phil. Truly, but the sweetest incident
• 2:49:09
  of Anne's sojourn and bowling Brook was the visit to her birthplace, the little
• 2:49:13
  shabby yellow house in an out of the way street she had so often dreamed
• 2:49:18
  about. She looked at it with delighted eyes as she and Phil turned in
• 2:49:22
  at the gate. It's almost exactly as I've pictured it, she said.
• 2:49:28
  There is no honeysuckle over the windows, but there is a lilac tree by
• 2:49:31
  the gate, and yes, there are the muslin curtains in the windows.
• 2:49:35
  How glad I am it is still painted yellow. A very tall, very
• 2:49:39
  thin woman opened the door. Yes, the Shirley's lived here twenty years ago,
• 2:49:46
  she said, in answer to Anne's question. They had it rented.
• 2:49:50
  I'll remember em. They both died of favor at once. It was terrible
• 2:49:54
  sad they left a baby. I guess it's dead long ago. It was
• 2:49:58
  us sick thing. Old Thomas and his wife took it as if they hadn't
• 2:50:03
  enough of their own. It didn't die, said Anne, smiling. I
• 2:50:09
  was that baby. You don't say so. Why you have grown, exclaimed
• 2:50:16
  the woman, as if she were much surprised that Anne was not still a
• 2:50:18
  baby. Come to look at you, ask you the resemblance. You're complected
• 2:50:24
  like your paw. He had red hair. But if they were your ma
• 2:50:28
  in your eyes and mouth. She was a nice little thing. My daughter
• 2:50:33
  went to school to her. An was naw crazy about her. They was
• 2:50:37
  buried in the one grave, and the school board put up a tombstone to
• 2:50:43
  them as a reward of faithful service. Will you come in? Will you
• 2:50:48
  let me go all over the house, asked Anne eagerly. The laws,
• 2:50:52
  yes you can if you like twon't take you lung. There ain't much of
• 2:50:56
  it. I'll keep a my man to build a new kitchen, but he
• 2:51:00
  ain't one of your hustlers. The parlor's in there, an, there's two
• 2:51:03
  rooms upstairs. Just prowl about yourselves. I've got to see the baby.
• 2:51:09
  The east room was the one you were born in. I remember your ma
• 2:51:13
  saying she loved to see the sunrise. And I mind hearing that you was
• 2:51:16
  born just as the sun was rising, and is la on your face was
• 2:51:22
  the first thing your ma saw. Anne went up the narrow stairs and into
• 2:51:26
  that little east room with a full heart. It was as a shrine to
• 2:51:30
  her. Here her mother had dreamed the exquisite, happy dreams of anticipated motherhood.
• 2:51:35
  Here that red sunrise light had fallen over them both in the sacred hour
• 2:51:39
  of birth. Here her mother had died. Anne looked about her reverently,
• 2:51:46
  her eyes filled with tears. It was for her one of the jeweled hours
• 2:51:50
  of life that gleam out radiantly forever in memory. Just to think of it.
• 2:51:56
  Mother was younger than I am now when I was born, she whispered.
• 2:52:01
  When Anne went downstairs, the lady of the house met her in the
• 2:52:03
  hall. She held out a dusty little packet tied with faded blue ribbon.
• 2:52:09
  Here's a bundle of old letters I found in that closet upstairs. When I
• 2:52:11
  came here, she said, I know what they are. I never bothered
• 2:52:16
  to look in em. But the address in the top one is miss Bertha
• 2:52:22
  willis An. That was your ma's maiden name. You can take him if
• 2:52:24
  you'd care to have em. Oh, thank you, thank you, cried
• 2:52:30
  Anne, clasping the packet rapturously. That was all it was in the house,
• 2:52:35
  said her hostess. The furniture was all sold to pay the doctor bills.
• 2:52:39
  And missus Thomas got your MoU's clothes a little things, I reckon they
• 2:52:43
  didn't last long. Among that drove of Thomas youngsters, there was destructive young
• 2:52:48
  animals. As I mind em, I haven't one thing that belonged to my
• 2:52:52
  mother, said Anne chokily I. I can never thank you enough for these
• 2:52:56
  letters. You're quite welcome, laws, But your eyes is like your ma's.
• 2:53:03
  She could just about talk with hers. Your father was sort of homely,
• 2:53:07
  but awful nice. I mind hearing folks say when they was married that
• 2:53:11
  there never was two people more in love with each other. Poor creatures.
• 2:53:16
  They didn't live much longer, but they was awful happy while they was alive.
• 2:53:22
  And I s'pose that counts for a good deal. Anne longed to get
• 2:53:26
  home to read her precious letters, but she made one little pilgrimage. First,
• 2:53:31
  she went alone to the green corner of the old Bowling Brook Cemetery,
• 2:53:35
  where her father and mother were buried, and left on their grave the white
• 2:53:39
  flowers she carried. Then she hastened back to Mount Holly, shut herself up
• 2:53:43
  in her room and read the letters. Some were written by her father,
• 2:53:48
  some by her mother. There were not many, only a dozen in all,
• 2:53:52
  for Walter and Bertha Shirley had not been often separated during their courtship.
• 2:53:58
  The letters were yellow and faded and dim blurred with the touch of passing years.
• 2:54:03
  No profound words of wisdom were traced on the stained and wrinkled pages,
• 2:54:07
  but only lines of love and trust. The sweetness of forgotten things clung to
• 2:54:11
  them, the far off fond imaginings of those long dead lovers. Bertha Shirley
• 2:54:18
  had possessed the gift of writing letters, which embodied the charming personality of the
• 2:54:22
  writer in words and thoughts that retained their beauty and fragrance after the lapse of
• 2:54:28
  time. The letters were tender, intimate, sacred to Anne. The sweetest
• 2:54:33
  of all was the one written after her birth to the father on a brief
• 2:54:37
  absence. It was full of a proud young mother's accounts of baby, her
• 2:54:43
  cleverness, her brightness, her thousand sweetnesses. I love her best when she
• 2:54:48
  is asleep, and better still when she is awake. Bertha Shirley had written
• 2:54:52
  in the PostScript. Probably it was the last sentence she had ever penned.
• 2:54:56
  The end was very near for her. This has been the most beautiful day
• 2:55:01
  of my life. Anne said to Phil that night. I've found my father
• 2:55:07
  and mother. Those letters have made them reel to me. I'm not an
• 2:55:11
  orphan any longer. I feel as if I had opened a book and found
• 2:55:15
  roses of yesterday, sweet and beloved between its leaves. End of Chapter twenty
• 2:55:22
  one. Chapter twenty two, Spring and Anne returned to Green Gables. The
• 2:55:30
  firelight shadows were dancing over the kitchen walls at Green Gables for the spring evening
• 2:55:35
  was chilly. Through the open east window, drifted in the subtly sweet voices
• 2:55:39
  of the night. Marilla was sitting by the fire, at least in body
• 2:55:45
  in spirit. She was roaming old in ways with feet grown young of late.
• 2:55:50
  Marilla had thus spent many an hour when she thought she should have been
• 2:55:54
  knitting for the twins. I suppose I'm growing old, she said. Yet
• 2:56:00
  Marilla had changed but little in the past nine years, save to grow something
• 2:56:03
  thinner and even more angular. There was a little more gray in the hair
• 2:56:07
  that was still twisted up in the same hard knot with two hairpins. Were
• 2:56:13
  they the same hairpins still stuck through it? But her expression was very different.
• 2:56:18
  The something about the mouth which had hinted at a sense of humor,
• 2:56:22
  had developed wonderfully. Her eyes were gentler and milder, her smile more frequent
• 2:56:28
  and tender. Marilla was thinking of her whole past life, her cramped but
• 2:56:33
  not unhappy childhood, the jealously hidden dreams and the blighted hopes of her girlhood,
• 2:56:39
  the long, gray, narrow, monotonous years of dull middle life that
• 2:56:43
  followed, and the coming of Anne, the vivid, imaginative, impetuous child
• 2:56:48
  with her heart of love and her world of fancy, bringing with her color
• 2:56:52
  and warmth and radiance, until the wilderness of existence had blossomed like the rose.
• 2:56:58
  Marilla I felt that out of her sixty years she had lived only the
• 2:57:03
  nine that had followed. The advent of Anne, and Anne would be home
• 2:57:07
  tomorrow night. The kitchen door opened, Marilla looked up, expecting to see
• 2:57:11
  missus Lynde. Anne stood before her, tall and starry eyed, with her
• 2:57:16
  hands full of mayflowers and violets. Anne surely exclaimed Marilla, for once in
• 2:57:24
  her life, she was surprised. Out of her reserve. She caught her
• 2:57:26
  girl in her arms and crushed her and her flowers against her heart, kissing
• 2:57:31
  the bright hair and sweet face warmly. I never looked for you till tomorrow
• 2:57:35
  night. How did you get from Carmody, walked, dearest of Marilla's Haven't
• 2:57:41
  I done it a score of times in the Queen's days? The mailman is
• 2:57:45
  to bring my trunk tomorrow. I just got homesick all at once and came
• 2:57:48
  a day earlier. And oh, I've had such a lovely walk in the
• 2:57:52
  May twilight. I stopped by the barrens and picked these mayflowers. I came
• 2:57:56
  through Violet Vale. It's just a big bull full of violets. Now,
• 2:58:01
  the dear sky tinted things. Smell them, Marilla, drink them in.
• 2:58:05
  Marilla sniffed obligingly, but she was more interested in Anne than in drinking violets.
• 2:58:11
  Sit down, child, you must be real tired. I'm going to
• 2:58:16
  get you some supper. There's a darling moonrise behind the hills tonight, Marilla.
• 2:58:22
  And oh how the frogs sang me home from Carmody. I do love
• 2:58:24
  the music of the frogs. It seems bound up with all my happiest recollections
• 2:58:30
  of old spring evenings, and it always reminds me of the night I came
• 2:58:33
  here first. Do you remember it, Marilla, Well, yes, said
• 2:58:39
  Marilla, with emphasis, I'm not likely to forget it. Ever. They
• 2:58:43
  used to sing so madly in the marsh and Brook that year. I would
• 2:58:48
  listen to them at my window in the dusk and wonder how they could seem
• 2:58:50
  so glad and so sad at the same time. Oh, but it's good
• 2:58:54
  to be home again. Redmond was splendid, and Bowlingbrooke delightful. But Green
• 2:59:00
  Gables is home. Gilbert isn't coming home this summer, I hear, said
• 2:59:05
  Marilla. No. Something in Anne's tone made Marilla glance at her sharply,
• 2:59:11
  But Anne was apparently absorbed in arranging her violets in a bowl. See aren't
• 2:59:16
  they sweet? She went on hurriedly, The year is a book, isn't
• 2:59:20
  it, Marilla. Spring's pages are written in mayflowers and violets, summers and
• 2:59:24
  roses, autumns and red maple leaves, and winter in holly and evergreen.
• 2:59:28
  Did Gilbert do well in his examinations? Persisted Marilla excellently well. He led
• 2:59:35
  his class. But where are the twins? And Missus Lynde? Rachel and
• 2:59:39
  Dora are over at mister Harrison's. Davy is down at Bolter's. I think
• 2:59:45
  I hear him coming now. Davy burst in. Saw Anne stopped, and
• 2:59:50
  then hurled himself upon her with a joyful yell. Oh Anne, ain't I
• 2:59:54
  glad to see you? Say Anne, I've grown two inches since last fall.
• 3:00:00
  Well, Missus Lynde measured me with her tape today, and say,
• 3:00:03
  Anne, see my front tooth. It's gone. Missus Lynde tied one end
• 3:00:07
  of a string to it and the other end to the door, and then
• 3:00:11
  shut the door. I sold it to Milty for two cents. Milty's collecting
• 3:00:16
  teeth. What in the world does he want teeth for? Asked Marilla to
• 3:00:22
  make a necklace for playing Indian chief, explained Davy, Climbing upon Anne's lap,
• 3:00:28
  he's got fifteen already, and everybody else's promised, so there's no use
• 3:00:33
  in the rest of us starting to collect too. I tell you the Bolters
• 3:00:37
  are great business people. Were you a good boy at missus Bolter's, asked
• 3:00:41
  Marilla severely. Yes, But say Marilla, I'm tired of being good.
• 3:00:46
  You'd get tired of being bad much sooner, Davy boy said Anne. Well,
• 3:00:52
  it'd be fun while it lasted, wouldn't it, persisted Davy. I
• 3:00:56
  could be sorry for it afterwards, couldn't I being I'm sorry wouldn't do away
• 3:01:01
  with the consequences of being bad? Davy? Don't you remember the Sunday last
• 3:01:05
  summer when you ran away from Sunday School. You told me then that being
• 3:01:07
  bad wasn't worthwhile. What were you and Milty doing today? Oh? We've
• 3:01:13
  fished and chased the cat and hunted for eggs and yelled at the echo.
• 3:01:18
  There's a great echo in the bush behind the Bolter barn. Say what is
• 3:01:22
  echo? Anne? I want to know. Echo is a beautiful nymph,
• 3:01:26
  Davy, living far away in the woods and laughing at the world from among
• 3:01:30
  the hills. What does she look like? Her hair and eyes are dark,
• 3:01:35
  but her neck and arms are white as snow. No mortal can ever
• 3:01:39
  see how fair she is. She's fleeter than a deer, and that mocking
• 3:01:43
  voice of hers is all we can know of her. You can hear her
• 3:01:46
  calling at night, you can hear her laughing under the stars, but you
• 3:01:50
  can never see her. She flies afar if you follow her, and laughs
• 3:01:54
  at you, always just over the next hill. Is that true, Anne,
• 3:01:58
  or is it a whopper? Demanded Davy. Staring Davy said Anne despairingly.
• 3:02:05
  Haven't you sense enough to distinguish between a fairy tale and a falsehood?
• 3:02:09
  Then what is it that sass is back from the bolter bush? I want
• 3:02:13
  to know, insisted Davy. When you are a little older, Davy,
• 3:02:18
  I'll explain it all to you. The mention of age evidently gave a new
• 3:02:22
  turn to Davy's thoughts, for after a few moments of reflection, he whispered
• 3:02:26
  solemnly, Anne, I'm going to be married, when asked Anne, with
• 3:02:33
  equal solemnity, Oh not until I'm grown up, of course. Well that's
• 3:02:37
  a relief, Davy. Who is the lady Stella Fletcher? She's in my
• 3:02:43
  class at school, and say, Anne, she's the prettiest girl you ever
• 3:02:46
  saw. If I died before I grow up, you'll keep an eye on
• 3:02:50
  her, won't you. Davy Keith, do stop talking such nonsense, said
• 3:02:56
  Marilla severely. Tisn't nonsense, protested Davy in an injured tone. She's my
• 3:03:03
  promised wife, and if I was to die, she'd be my promised widow,
• 3:03:07
  wouldn't she. And she hasn't got a soul to look after her except
• 3:03:11
  her old grandmother. Come and have your supper, Anne, said Marilla,
• 3:03:16
  And don't encourage that child in his absurd talk. End of chapter twenty two.
• 3:03:22
  Chapter twenty three, Paul cannot find the rock people. Life was very
• 3:03:30
  pleasant in Avonlea that summer, although Anne, amid all her vacation joys,
• 3:03:35
  was haunted by a sense of something gone which should be there. She would
• 3:03:39
  not admit, even in her inmost reflections that this was caused by Gilbert's absence.
• 3:03:45
  But when she had to walk home alone from prayer meetings and a v
• 3:03:48
  I s pow wows while Diana and Fred and many other gay couples loitered along
• 3:03:54
  the dusky starlit country roads, there was a queer, lonely ache in her
• 3:03:58
  heart which she could not explain away Gilbert did not even write to her,
• 3:04:03
  as she thought he might have done. She knew he wrote to Diana occasionally,
• 3:04:07
  but she would not inquire about him, and Diana, supposing that Anne
• 3:04:11
  heard from him, volunteered no information. Gilbert's mother, who was a gay,
• 3:04:18
  frank, light hearted lady but not overburdened with tact, had a very
• 3:04:22
  embarrassing habit of asking Anne, always in a painfully distinct voice, and always
• 3:04:26
  in the presence of a crowd, if she had heard from Gilbert lately.
• 3:04:31
  Poor Anne could only blush horribly and murmur not very lately, which was taken
• 3:04:37
  by all missus blythe included to be merely a maidenly evasion. Apart from this,
• 3:04:43
  Anne enjoyed her summer. Priscilla came for a merry visit in June,
• 3:04:46
  and when she had gone, mister and Missus, irving Paul and Charlotta the
• 3:04:50
  Fourth, came home for July and August. Echo Lodge was the scene of
• 3:04:56
  gaieties once more, and the echoes over the river were kept busy mimicking the
• 3:05:01
  laughter that rang in the old garden behind the spruces. Miss Lavender had not
• 3:05:05
  changed except to grow even sweeter and prettier. Paul adored her, and the
• 3:05:11
  companionship between them was beautiful to see. But I don't call her mother just
• 3:05:16
  by itself, he explained to Anne. You see, that name belongs to
• 3:05:20
  just my own little mother, and they can't give it to anyone else,
• 3:05:24
  you know, teacher, But I call her mother lavender, and I love
• 3:05:28
  her next best of father. I even love her a little better than you,
• 3:05:31
  teacher, which is just as it ought to be, answered Anne.
• 3:05:35
  Paul was thirteen now and very tall for his years. His face and eyes
• 3:05:41
  were as beautiful as ever, and his fancy was still like a prism,
• 3:05:45
  separating everything that fell upon it into rainbows. He and Anne had delightful rambles
• 3:05:50
  to wood and field and shore. Never were there two more thoroughly kindred spirits.
• 3:05:56
  Charlotta the fourth had blossomed out into young ladies hood. She wore her
• 3:06:01
  hair now in an enormous pompadour, and had discarded the blue ribbon bows of
• 3:06:05
  auld Lang's sign. But her face was as freckled, her nose as snubbed,
• 3:06:09
  and her mouth and smiles as wide as ever. You don't think I
• 3:06:13
  talk with the Yankee accent, do you miss Shirley, ma'am, she demanded
• 3:06:16
  anxiously. I didn't notice it, Charlotta. I'm real glad of that they
• 3:06:22
  said I did at home, but I thought likely they just wanted to aggravate
• 3:06:26
  me. I don't want no Yankee accent, not that I've a word to
• 3:06:28
  say against the Yankees, Miss Shirley, ma'am. They're real civilized. But
• 3:06:33
  give me Old p e Island every time. Paul spent his first fortnight with
• 3:06:37
  his grandmother, irving in Avonlea. Anne was there to meet him when he
• 3:06:41
  came and found him wild with eagerness to get to the shore. Nora and
• 3:06:46
  the Golden Lady and the Twin Sailors would be there. He could hardly wait
• 3:06:50
  to eat his supper. Could he not see Nora's elfin face peering around the
• 3:06:54
  point watching for him wistfully. But it was a very sober Paul who came
• 3:06:58
  back from the shore in the tight didn't you find your rock, people asked
• 3:07:03
  Anne. Paul shook his chestnut curls sorrowfully. The Twin Sailors and the Golden
• 3:07:09
  Lady never came at all. He said, Nora is there, but Nora
• 3:07:13
  is not the same. Teacher she's changed. Oh, Paul, it is
• 3:07:18
  you who are changed, said Anne. You have grown too old for the
• 3:07:22
  rock people. They like only children for playfellows. I am afraid the twin
• 3:07:26
  Sailors will never again come to you in the pearly enchanted boat with the sail
• 3:07:31
  of moonshine, and the Golden Lady will play no more for you on her
• 3:07:35
  golden harp. Even Nora will not meet you much longer. You must pay
• 3:07:39
  the penalty of growing up, Paul. You must leave fairyland behind you.
• 3:07:43
  You too talk as much foolishness as ever you did, said old missus Irving,
• 3:07:50
  half indulgently, half reprovingly. Oh no, we don't, said Anne,
• 3:07:56
  shaking her head gravely. We are getting very very and it is such
• 3:08:01
  a pity. We are never half so interesting when we have learned that language
• 3:08:05
  is given us to enable us to conceal our thoughts. But it isn't.
• 3:08:09
  It is given us to exchange our thoughts, said missus Irvings seriously. She
• 3:08:16
  had never heard of Talleyrand and did not understand epigrams. Anne spent a fortnight
• 3:08:20
  of halcyon days at Echo Lodge in the Golden Prime of August. While there
• 3:08:26
  she incidentally contrived to hurry Ludovic's speed in his leisurely courting of Theodora Dix,
• 3:08:31
  as related duly in another chronicle of her history. Arnold Sherman, an elderly
• 3:08:37
  friend of the Irvings, was there at the same time and added not a
• 3:08:41
  little to the general pleasantness of life. What a nice playtime this has been,
• 3:08:46
  said, Anne, I feel like a giant refreshed. And it's only
• 3:08:50
  a fortnight more till I go back to Kingsport and Redmond and Patty's Place.
• 3:08:54
  Patty's Place is the dearest spot, Miss Lavendar. I feel as if I
• 3:08:58
  had two homes, one at Green Gables and one at Patty's Place. But
• 3:09:03
  where has the summer gone? It doesn't seem a day since I came home
• 3:09:07
  that spring evening with the mayflowers. When I was little, I couldn't see
• 3:09:11
  from one end of the summer to the other. It stretched before me like
• 3:09:15
  an unending season. Now tis a hand breath, tis a tale, Anne,
• 3:09:20
  Are you and Gilbert blythe as good friends as you used to be?
• 3:09:22
  Asked Miss Lavendar quietly. I am just as much Gilbert's friend as I ever
• 3:09:28
  was, Miss Lavendar. Miss Lavendar shook her head. I see something's gone
• 3:09:33
  wrong. Anne. I'm going to be impertinent and ask what have you quarreled?
• 3:09:39
  No, it's only that Gilbert wants more than friendship, and I can't
• 3:09:43
  give him more. Are you sure of that, Anne? Perfectly sure.
• 3:09:48
  I'm very very sorry. I wonder why everybody seems to think I ought to
• 3:09:52
  marry Gilbert blythe said Anne petulantly, Because you were made and meant for each
• 3:09:58
  other. Anne. That is why you needn't toss that young head of yours.
• 3:10:03
  It's a fact. End of Chapter twenty three, Chapter twenty four,
• 3:10:09
  Enter Jonas Prospect Point, August twentieth. Dear Anne, spelled with an e,
• 3:10:18
  wrote Phil, I must prop my eyelids open long enough to write you.
• 3:10:22
  I've neglected you shamefully this summer, honey. But all my other correspondents
• 3:10:26
  have been neglected too. I have a huge pile of letters to answer,
• 3:10:31
  so I must gird up the loins of my mind and hoe in. Excuse
• 3:10:33
  my mixed metaphors. I'm fearfully sleepy. Last night, cousin Emily and I
• 3:10:39
  were calling in a neighbor's There were several other callers there, and as soon
• 3:10:43
  as those unfortunate creatures left our hostess and her three daughters picked them all to
• 3:10:48
  pieces. I knew they would begin on Cousin Emily and me as soon as
• 3:10:52
  the door shut behind us. When we came home, Missus Lily informed us
• 3:10:56
  that the aforesaid neighbor's hired boy was supposed to be down with scarlet fever.
• 3:11:01
  You can always trust missus Lilly to tell you cheerful things like that. I
• 3:11:05
  have a horror of scarlet fever. I couldn't sleep when I went to bed
• 3:11:09
  for thinking of it. I tossed and tumbled about, dreaming fearful dreams.
• 3:11:13
  When I did snooze for a minute, and at three I wakened up with
• 3:11:18
  a high fever, a sore throat, and a raging headache. I knew
• 3:11:22
  I had scarlet fever. I got up in a panic and hunted up Cousin
• 3:11:26
  Emily's doctor book to read up the symptoms, and I had them all.
• 3:11:31
  So I went back to bed, and, knowing the worst, slept like
• 3:11:35
  a top the rest of the night. Though why a top should sleep sounder
• 3:11:39
  than anything else I never could understand. But this morning I was quite well,
• 3:11:43
  so it couldn't have been the fever. I suppose if I did catch
• 3:11:46
  it last night, it couldn't have developed so soon. I can remember that
• 3:11:50
  in daytime, but at three o'clock at night I never can be logical.
• 3:11:54
  I suppose you wonder what I'm doing at Prospect Point. Well, I always
• 3:11:58
  liked to spend a month of summer at the shore, and father insists that
• 3:12:03
  I come to his second cousin, Emily's select boarding house at Prospect Point.
• 3:12:07
  So a fortnight ago I came as usual, and as usual, old Uncle
• 3:12:11
  Mark Miller brought me from the station with his ancient buggy and what he calls
• 3:12:16
  his generous purpose horse. He is a nice old man, and gave me
• 3:12:20
  a handful of pink peppermints. Peppermins always seemed to me such a religious sort
• 3:12:24
  of candy, I suppose because when I was a little girl, Grandmother Gordon
• 3:12:28
  always gave them to me in church. Once I asked, referring to the
• 3:12:31
  smell of peppermints, is that the odor of sanctity? I didn't like to
• 3:12:37
  eat Uncle Mark's peppermints because he just fished them loose out of his pocket and
• 3:12:41
  had to pick some rusty nails and other things from among them before he gave
• 3:12:45
  them to me. But I wouldn't hurt his dear old feelings for anything,
• 3:12:48
  so I carefully sewed them along the road at intervals. When the last one
• 3:12:52
  was gone, Uncle Mark said a little rebukingly, YE shouldn't at all them
• 3:12:58
  candies to unct, miss Phil, you'll likely have the stomach ache. Cousin
• 3:13:01
  Emily has only five borders besides myself, four old ladies and one young man.
• 3:13:07
  My right hand neighbor is missus Lily. She is one of those people
• 3:13:11
  who seem to take a gruesome pleasure in detailing all their many aches and pains
• 3:13:16
  and sicknesses. You cannot mention any ailment, but she says, shaking her
• 3:13:20
  head, ah, I know too well what that is, and then you
• 3:13:24
  get all the details. Jonas declares he once spoke of locomotive a taxia in
• 3:13:30
  hearing, and she said she knew too well what that was. She suffered
• 3:13:33
  from it for ten years and was finally cured by a traveling doctor who is
• 3:13:39
  Jonas. Just wait, Anne, Shirley, you'll hear all about Jonas in
• 3:13:43
  the proper time and place. He is not to be mixed up with estimable
• 3:13:46
  old ladies. My left hand neighbor at the table is missus Finney. She
• 3:13:50
  always speaks with a wailing, dolorous voice. You are nervously expecting her to
• 3:13:56
  burst into tears every moment. She gives you the impression that life to her
• 3:14:00
  is indeed a veil of tears, and that a smile, never to speak
• 3:14:03
  of a laugh, is a frivolity, truly reprehensible. She has a worse
• 3:14:07
  opinion of me than aunt Jamesina, and she doesn't love me hard to atone
• 3:14:11
  for it, as Auntie Jay does either. Miss Maria Grimsby sits caddy corner
• 3:14:16
  from me. The first day I came, I remarked to Miss Maria that
• 3:14:20
  it looked a little like rain, and Miss Maria laughed. I said the
• 3:14:24
  road from the station was very pretty, and Miss Maria laughed. I said
• 3:14:28
  there seemed to be a few mosquitoes left yet, and Miss Maria laughed.
• 3:14:31
  I said that Prospect Point was as beautiful as ever, and Miss Maria laughed.
• 3:14:37
  If I were to say to Miss Maria, my father has hanged himself,
• 3:14:41
  my mother has taken poison, my brother is in the penitentiary, and
• 3:14:45
  I am in the last stages of consumption. Miss Maria would laugh. She
• 3:14:48
  can't help it. She was born so, but is very sad and awful.
• 3:14:54
  The fifth old lady is Missus Grant. She is a sweet old thing,
• 3:14:58
  but she never says anything but good of anybody, and so she is
• 3:15:00
  a very uninteresting conversationalist. And now for Jonas Anne. That first day I
• 3:15:05
  came, I saw a young man sitting opposite me at the table, smiling
• 3:15:09
  at me as if he had known me from my cradle. I knew,
• 3:15:13
  for Uncle Mark had told me that his name was Jonas Blake, that he
• 3:15:16
  was a theological student from Saint Columbia, and that he had taken charge at
• 3:15:20
  the Point Prospect Mission Church for the summer. He is a very ugly young
• 3:15:24
  man, really the ugliest man I've ever seen. He has a big,
• 3:15:30
  loose jointed figure with absurdly long legs. His hair is tow color and lank.
• 3:15:35
  His eyes are green, and his mouth is big, and his ears
• 3:15:39
  but I never think about his ears, if I can help it. He
• 3:15:43
  has a lovely voice if you shut your eyes, he is adorable, and
• 3:15:46
  he certainly has a beautiful soul and disposition. We were good chums right away.
• 3:15:52
  Of course, he is a graduate of Redmond, and that is a
• 3:15:54
  link between us. We fished and boted together, and we walked on the
• 3:15:58
  sands by moonlight. He didn't look so homely by moonlight, and oh he
• 3:16:01
  was nice. Niceness fairly exhaled from him. The old ladies, except missus
• 3:16:07
  Grant, don't approve of Jonas because he laughs and jokes Anne, because he
• 3:16:13
  evidently likes the society of frivolous me better than theirs. Somehow, Anne,
• 3:16:18
  I don't want him to think me frivolous. This is ridiculous. Why should
• 3:16:22
  I care what a tow haired person called Jonas, whom I never saw before,
• 3:16:26
  thinks of me. Last Sunday, Jonas preached in the village church.
• 3:16:31
  I went, of course, but I couldn't realize that Jonas was going to
• 3:16:33
  preach the fact that he was a minister or going to be one persisted in
• 3:16:37
  seeming a huge joke to me. Well, Jonas preached, and by the
• 3:16:41
  time he had preached ten minutes, I felt so small and insignificant that I
• 3:16:46
  thought I must be invisible to the naked eye. Jonas never said a word
• 3:16:50
  about women, and he never looked at me. But I realized then and
• 3:16:54
  there, what a pitiful, frivolous, small soul, little butterfly I was,
• 3:16:58
  And how horror different I must be from Jonas's ideal woman. She would
• 3:17:03
  be grand and strong and noble. He was so earnest and tender and true.
• 3:17:09
  He was everything a minister ought to be. I wondered how I could
• 3:17:11
  ever have thought him ugly, But he really is, with those inspired eyes
• 3:17:16
  and that intellectual brow which the roughly falling hair hid. On week days.
• 3:17:22
  It was a splendid sermon, and I could have listened to it forever,
• 3:17:24
  and it made me feel utterly wretched. Oh I wish I were like you,
• 3:17:28
  Anne. He caught up with me on the road home and grinned as
• 3:17:33
  cheerfully as usual, But his grin could never deceive me again. I had
• 3:17:37
  seen the real Jonas. I wondered if he could ever see the real phil
• 3:17:41
  whom nobody, not even you, Anne, has ever seen yet. Jonas,
• 3:17:46
  I said, I forgot to call him mister Blake. Wasn't it dreadful?
• 3:17:50
  But there are times when things like that don't matter. Jonas, you
• 3:17:54
  were born to be a minister. You couldn't be anything else. No,
• 3:17:58
  I couldn't, he said soberly. I tried to be something else. For
• 3:18:01
  a long time. I didn't want to be a minister. But I came
• 3:18:05
  to see at last that it was the work given me to do, and
• 3:18:09
  God helping me. I shall try to do it. His voice was low
• 3:18:13
  and reverent. I thought that he would do his work, and do it
• 3:18:16
  well and nobly and happy. The woman, fitted by nature and training to
• 3:18:20
  help him do it, she would be no feather blown about by every fickle
• 3:18:24
  wind of fancy. She would always know what hat to put on. Probably
• 3:18:28
  she would have only one. Ministers never have much money, but she wouldn't
• 3:18:33
  mind having one hat or none at all, because she would have Jonas,
• 3:18:37
  Anne, Shirley. Don't you dare to say, or hint or think that
• 3:18:41
  I've fallen in love with mister Blake. Could I care for a lank,
• 3:18:46
  poor, ugly theologue named Jonas As Uncle Mark says it's impossible, and what's
• 3:18:52
  more, it's improbable. Good night, Phil p s it is impossible,
• 3:18:58
  but I am horribly afraid it's true. I'm happy and wretched and scared he
• 3:19:03
  can never care for me. I know. Do you think I could ever
• 3:19:07
  develop into a passable minister's wife? Anne? And would they expect me to
• 3:19:11
  lead in prayer peg end of chapter twenty four. Chapter twenty five, Enter
• 3:19:20
  Prince Charming. I'm contrasting the claims of indoors and out, said Anne,
• 3:19:26
  looking from the window of Patty's place to the distant pines of the park.
• 3:19:31
  I've an afternoon to spend in sweet doing nothing, Aunt Jimsy. Shall I
• 3:19:35
  spend it here, where there is a cozy fire, a plate full of
• 3:19:39
  delicious russets, three purring and harmonious cats, and two impeccable China dogs with
• 3:19:45
  green noses? Or shall I go to the park, where there is the
• 3:19:48
  lure of gray woods and of gray water lapping on the harbor rocks. If
• 3:19:52
  I was as young as you, I decide in favor of the park,
• 3:19:56
  said Aunt Jamesina, tickling Joseph's yellow ear with a knitting needle. I thought
• 3:20:01
  that you claimed to be as young as any of us, Auntie teased Anne.
• 3:20:05
  Yes, and my soul, but I'll admit my legs aren't as young
• 3:20:11
  as yours. You go and get some fresh air, Anne, you look
• 3:20:16
  pale lately. I think I'll go to the park, said Anne restlessly.
• 3:20:22
  I don't feel like tame domestic joys. Today. I want to feel alone
• 3:20:26
  and free and wild. The park will be empty, for everyone will be
• 3:20:31
  at the football match. Why didn't you go to it? Nobody asked me,
• 3:20:35
  Sir, She said, at least nobody but that horrid little Dan Ranger.
• 3:20:39
  I wouldn't go anywhere with him. But rather than hurt his poor little
• 3:20:43
  tender feelings, I said, I wasn't going to the game at all.
• 3:20:46
  I don't mind. I'm not in the mood for football today. Somehow,
• 3:20:50
  you go and get some fresh air, repeated Aunt Jamesina, But take your
• 3:20:54
  umbrella, for I believe it's going to rain. I've rheumatism in my leg.
• 3:21:01
  Only old people should have rheumatism, Auntie. Anybody is liable to rheumatism
• 3:21:07
  in her legs. Anne, it's only old people who should have rheumatism in
• 3:21:13
  their souls, though, thank goodness, I never have. When you get
• 3:21:18
  rheumatism in your soul, you might as well go and pick out your coffin.
• 3:21:24
  It was November, the month of crimson sunsets, parting birds, deep
• 3:21:28
  sad hymns of the sea, passionate wind songs in the pines. Anne roamed
• 3:21:33
  through the Pineland Alleys in the Park, and as she said, let that
• 3:21:37
  great sweeping wind blow the fogs out of her soul. Anne was not wont
• 3:21:41
  to be troubled with soul fog. But somehow, since her return to Redmond
• 3:21:46
  for this third year, life had not mirrored her spirit back to her with
• 3:21:50
  its old, perfect, sparkling clearness. Outwardly, existence at Patty's Place was
• 3:21:56
  the same pleasant round of work and study and record creation that it had always
• 3:22:01
  been. On Friday evenings, the big fire lighted living room was crowded by
• 3:22:05
  callers and echoed to endless jest and laughter, while Aunt Jamesina smiled beamingly on
• 3:22:11
  them. All the Jonas of Phil's letter came, often running up from Saint
• 3:22:16
  Columbia on the early train and departing on the late. He was a general
• 3:22:20
  favorite at Patty's Place, though Aunt Jamesina shook her head and opined that Divinity
• 3:22:24
  students were not what they used to be. He's very nice, my dear,
• 3:22:31
  she told Phil, But ministers ought to be graver and more dignified.
• 3:22:39
  Can't a man laugh and laugh and be a Christian? Still, demanded Phil
• 3:22:43
  oh Man. Yes, but I was speaking of ministers, my dear,
• 3:22:52
  said Aunt Jamesina rebukingly, and you shouldn't flirt so with mister Blake. You
• 3:22:56
  really shouldn't. I'm not flirting with him, protested Phil. Nobody believed her,
• 3:23:03
  except Anne. The others thought she was amusing herself as usual, and
• 3:23:07
  told her roundly that she was behaving very badly. Mister Blake isn't the Alec
• 3:23:13
  and Alonzo type, Phil, said Stella severely. He takes things seriously.
• 3:23:18
  You may break his heart. Do you really think I could, asked Phil,
• 3:23:22
  I'd love to think so, Philip Gordon, I never thought you were
• 3:23:26
  utterly unfeeling the idea of you saying you'd love to break a man's heart.
• 3:23:31
  I didn't say so, Honey, Quote me correctly. I said, I'd
• 3:23:35
  like to think I could break it. I would like to know I had
• 3:23:39
  the power to do it. I don't understand you, Phil. You are
• 3:23:43
  leading that man on deliberately, and you know you don't mean anything by it.
• 3:23:46
  I mean to make him ask me to marry him, if I can,
• 3:23:50
  said Phil, calmly. I give you up, said Stella hopelessly.
• 3:23:56
  Gilbert came occasionally on Friday evenings. He seemed always in good spirits and held
• 3:24:01
  his own In the jests and repartee that flew about, he neither sought nor
• 3:24:05
  avoided Anne. When circumstances brought them in contact, he talked to her pleasantly
• 3:24:09
  and courteously as to any newly made acquaintance. The old camaraderie was gone entirely.
• 3:24:16
  Anne felt it keenly, but she told herself she was very glad and
• 3:24:20
  thankful that Gilbert had got so completely over his disappointment in regard to her.
• 3:24:26
  She had really been afraid that April evening in the orchard that she had hurt
• 3:24:30
  him terribly, and that the wound would be long in healing. Now she
• 3:24:35
  saw that she need not have worried. Men have died and the worms have
• 3:24:37
  eaten them, but not for love. Gilbert evidently was in no danger of
• 3:24:43
  immediate dissolution. He was enjoying life, and he was full of ambition and
• 3:24:46
  zest. For him. There was to be no wasting in despair because a
• 3:24:50
  woman was fair and cold. Anne, as she listened to the ceaseless badinage
• 3:24:56
  that went on between him and Phil wondered if she had only a imagined that
• 3:25:00
  look in his eyes when she had told him she could never care for him.
• 3:25:03
  There were not lacking those who would have gladly stepped into Gilbert's vacant place,
• 3:25:09
  But Anne snubbed them without fear and without reproach. If the real Prince
• 3:25:13
  Charming was never to come, she would have none of a substitute, so
• 3:25:18
  she sternly told herself that gray day in the windy park. Suddenly the rain
• 3:25:22
  of Aunt Jamesina's prophecy came with a swish and rush. Anne put up her
• 3:25:28
  umbrella and hurried down the slope. As she turned out on the harbor road,
• 3:25:31
  a savage gust of wind tore along it. Instantly, her umbrella turned
• 3:25:37
  wrong side out. Anne clutched at it in despair. And then there came
• 3:25:41
  a voice close to her, Pardon me, May I offer you the shelter
• 3:25:46
  of my umbrella? Anne looked up, tall and handsome and distinguished, looking
• 3:25:52
  dark, melancholy, inscrutable eyes, melting, musical, sympathetic voice. Yes,
• 3:25:58
  the very hero of if her dreams stood before her in the flesh.
• 3:26:01
  He could not have more closely resembled her ideal if he had been made to
• 3:26:05
  order. Thank you, she said, confusedly. We'd better hurry over to
• 3:26:11
  that little pavilion on the point, suggested the unknown. We could wait there
• 3:26:16
  until the shower is over. It is not likely to rain so heavily,
• 3:26:18
  very long. The words were very commonplace, but oh the tone and the
• 3:26:24
  smile which accompanied them. Anne felt her heart beating strangely. Together they scurried
• 3:26:30
  to the pavilion and sat breathlessly down under its friendly roof. Anne laughingly held
• 3:26:35
  up her false umbrella. It is when my umbrella turns inside out that I
• 3:26:39
  am convinced of the total depravity of inanimate things, she said gaily. The
• 3:26:46
  raindrops sparkled on her shining hair, its loosened rings curled around her neck and
• 3:26:50
  forehead. Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes big and starry. Her companion
• 3:26:56
  looked down at her admiringly. She felt herself blushing under his gaze. Who
• 3:27:01
  could he be? Why there was a bit of the Redmond white and scarlet
• 3:27:05
  pinned to his coat lapel. Yet she had thought she knew by sight at
• 3:27:09
  least all the Redmond students except the freshmen, and this courtly youth surely was
• 3:27:13
  no freshman. We are schoolmates, I see, he said, smiling at
• 3:27:18
  Anne's colors. That ought to be sufficient introduction. My name is world Gardner.
• 3:27:24
  And you are the miss Shirley who read the tennis and paper at the
• 3:27:26
  fellow Mathic the other evening, aren't you? Yes? But I cannot place
• 3:27:30
  you at all, said Anne frankly. Please, where do you belong?
• 3:27:35
  I feel as if I didn't belong anywhere yet. I put in my freshmen
• 3:27:39
  and sophomore years at Redmond two years ago. I've been in Europe ever since.
• 3:27:45
  Now I've come back to finish my arts course. This is my junior
• 3:27:48
  year too, said Anne. So we are classmates as well as college mates.
• 3:27:52
  I am reconciled to the loss of the years that the locusts has eaten,
• 3:27:56
  said her companion, with a world of meaning in those wonderful eyes of
• 3:28:01
  his. The rain came steadily down for the best part of an hour,
• 3:28:05
  but the time seemed really very short. When the clouds parted and a burst
• 3:28:09
  of pale November sunshine fell athwart the harbor and the pines, Anne and her
• 3:28:13
  companion walked home together. By the time they had reached the gate of Patty's
• 3:28:18
  place, he had asked permission to call and had received it. Anne went
• 3:28:22
  in with cheeks of flame and her heart beating to her fingertips. Rusty,
• 3:28:28
  who climbed into her lap and tried to kiss her, found a very absent
• 3:28:31
  welcome. Anne, with her soul full of romantic thrills, had no attention
• 3:28:37
  to spare just then for a crop eared pussy cat. That evening, a
• 3:28:41
  parcel was left at Patty's place for miss Shirley. It was a box containing
• 3:28:46
  a dozen magnificent roses. Phil pounced impertinently on the card that fell from it,
• 3:28:52
  read the name and the poetical quotation written on the back, Royal Gardener.
• 3:28:58
  She exclaimed, Why, Anne, I didn't know you were acquainted with
• 3:29:01
  Roy Gardner. I met him in the park this afternoon in the rain,
• 3:29:05
  explained Anne hurriedly. My umbrella turned inside out, and he came to my
• 3:29:09
  rescue with his Oh. Phil peered curiously at Anne, And is that exceedingly
• 3:29:16
  commonplace incident? Any reason why he should send us long stemmed roses by the
• 3:29:20
  dozen with a very sentimental rhyme, Or why we should blush diviness rosy red
• 3:29:26
  when we look at his card? Anne, thy face betrayeth thee. Don't
• 3:29:31
  talk nonsense, Phil, Do you know mister Gardner. I've met his two
• 3:29:35
  sisters, and I know of him, so does everybody worth while in Kingsport,
• 3:29:39
  the Gardeners are among the richest bluest of blue noses. Roy is adorably
• 3:29:45
  handsome and clever. Two years ago his mother's health failed and he had to
• 3:29:48
  leave college and go abroad with her. His father is dead. He must
• 3:29:52
  have been greatly disappointed to have to give up his class, but they say
• 3:29:56
  he was perfectly sweet about it. Phi by five Fox FuMB Anne, I
• 3:30:01
  smell romance. Almost do I envy you? But not quite. After all,
• 3:30:07
  Roy Gardner isn't jonas you goose, said Anne loftily. But she lay
• 3:30:13
  long awake that night, nor did she wish for sleep. Her waking fancies
• 3:30:18
  were more alluring than any vision of dreamland. Had the real prince come at
• 3:30:22
  last, recalling those glorious dark eyes which had gazed so deeply into her own,
• 3:30:28
  Anne was very strongly inclined to think he had. End of Chapter twenty
• 3:30:33
  five, Chapter twenty six, Enter Christine. The girls at Patty's Place were
• 3:30:41
  dressing for the reception which the juniors were giving for the seniors in February.
• 3:30:46
  Anne surveyed herself in the mirror of the Blue Room with girlish satisfaction. She
• 3:30:50
  had a particularly pretty gown on. Originally it had been only a simple little
• 3:30:54
  slip of cream silk with a chiffon overdress, but Phil had insisted on taking
• 3:31:00
  it home with her in the Christmas holidays and embroidering tiny rosebuds all over the
• 3:31:03
  chiffon. Phil's fingers were deft, and the result was a dress which was
• 3:31:09
  the envy of every Redmond girl. Even Allie Boone, whose frocks came from
• 3:31:13
  Paris, was wont to look with longing eyes on that rosebud concoction as Anne
• 3:31:18
  trailed up the main staircase at Redmond. In it, Anne was trying the
• 3:31:22
  effect of a white orchid in her hair. Roy Gardner had sent her white
• 3:31:26
  orchids for the reception, and she knew no other Redmond girl would have them.
• 3:31:31
  That night, when Phil came in with admiring gaze, Anne, this
• 3:31:35
  is certainly your night for looking handsome. Nine nights out of ten I can
• 3:31:39
  easily outshine you. The tenth you blossom out suddenly into something that eclipses me
• 3:31:45
  altogether. How do you manage it? It's the dress, dear fine feathers.
• 3:31:50
  'tisn't the last evening you flamed out into beauty. You wore your old
• 3:31:54
  blue flannel shirtwaist that missus Lynde made you. If Roy hadn't already lost head
• 3:31:58
  and heart of you, he certainly would tonight. But I don't like orchids
• 3:32:03
  on you, Anne, No, it isn't jealousy. Orchids don't seem to
• 3:32:07
  belong to you. They're too exotic, too tropical, too insolent. Don't
• 3:32:13
  put them in your hair anyway, Well I won't. I admit I'm not
• 3:32:16
  fond of orchids myself. I don't think they're related to me. Roy doesn't
• 3:32:20
  often send them. He knows I like flowers I can live with. Orchids
• 3:32:24
  are only things you can visit with. Jonas sent me some dear pink rosebuds
• 3:32:28
  for the evening, but he isn't coming himself. He said he had to
• 3:32:33
  lead a prayer meeting in the slums. I don't believe he wanted to come,
• 3:32:37
  Anne. I'm horribly afraid Jonas doesn't really care anything about me, And
• 3:32:41
  I'm trying to decide whether I'll pine away and die or go on and get
• 3:32:46
  my b a and be sensible and useful. You couldn't possibly be sensible and
• 3:32:52
  useful, Phil, So you'd better pine away and die, said Anne,
• 3:32:54
  cruelly. Heartless Anne, silly Phil, You know quite well that Jonas loves
• 3:33:01
  you, but he won't tell me so, and I can't make him.
• 3:33:05
  He looks it, I'll admit, but speak to me only with thine eyes.
• 3:33:09
  Isn't a really reliable reason for embroidering doili's and hamstitching tablecloths. I don't
• 3:33:15
  want to begin such work until I'm really engaged. It would be tempting fate.
• 3:33:20
  Mister Blake is afraid to ask you to marry him, Phil. He
• 3:33:22
  is poor and can't offer you a home such as you've always had. You
• 3:33:26
  know that is the only reason he hasn't spoken long ago, I suppose so,
• 3:33:31
  agreed Phil, dolefully well, brightening up. If he won't ask me
• 3:33:35
  to marry him, I'll ask him, that's all, so it's bound to
• 3:33:39
  come right. I won't worry. By the way, Gilbert Blythe is going
• 3:33:45
  about constantly with Christine Stewart, did you know Anne was trying to fasten the
• 3:33:48
  little gold chain about her throat. She suddenly found the clasp difficult to manage.
• 3:33:54
  What was the matter with it or with her fingers. No, she
• 3:33:58
  said si carelessly. Who is Christine Stuart, Ronald Stuart's sister. She's in
• 3:34:05
  Kingsport this winter studying music. I haven't seen her, but they say she's
• 3:34:09
  very pretty, and that Gilbert is quite crazy over her. How angry I
• 3:34:13
  was when you refused Gilbert, Anne, But Roy Gardner was foreordained for you.
• 3:34:18
  I can see that now you were right after all. Anne did not
• 3:34:22
  blush as she usually did when the girls assumed that her eventual marriage to Roy
• 3:34:26
  Gardner was a settled thing all at once. She felt rather dull. Phil's
• 3:34:31
  chatter seemed trivial in the reception of Bore. She boxed, poor Rusty's ears.
• 3:34:37
  Get off that cushion instantly, You cat, you, Why don't you
• 3:34:41
  stay down where you belong. Anne picked up her orchids and went downstairs,
• 3:34:46
  where Aunt Jamesina was presiding over a row of coats hung before the fire to
• 3:34:50
  warm. Roy Gardner was waiting for Anne and teasing the Sarah Cat while he
• 3:34:54
  waited. The Sarah Cat did not approve of him. She always turned her
• 3:34:58
  back on him, but everybody else at Patty's place liked him very much.
• 3:35:03
  Aunt Jamessina carried away by his unfailing and deferential courtesy and the pleading tones of
• 3:35:09
  his delightful voice, declared he was the nicest young man she ever knew,
• 3:35:13
  and that Anne was a very fortunate girl. Such remarks made Anne restive.
• 3:35:18
  Roy's wooing had certainly been as romantic as girlish heart could desire, but she
• 3:35:24
  wished Aunt Jamessina and the girls would not take things so for granted. When
• 3:35:28
  Roy murmured a poetical compliment as he helped her on with her coat, she
• 3:35:33
  did not blush and thrill as usual, and he found her rather silent in
• 3:35:37
  their brief walk to Redmond. He thought she looked a little pale when she
• 3:35:41
  came out of the co ed's dressing room, but as they entered the reception
• 3:35:45
  room, her color and sparkle suddenly returned to her. She turned to Roy
• 3:35:48
  with her gayest expression. He smiled back at her with what Phil called his
• 3:35:54
  deep black, velvety smile. Yet she really did not see Roy at all.
• 3:36:00
  She was acutely conscious that Gilbert was standing under the palms just across the
• 3:36:03
  room, talking to a girl who must be Christine Stuart. She was very
• 3:36:09
  handsome in the stately style destined to become rather massive in middle life. A
• 3:36:13
  tall girl with large, dark blue eyes, ivory outlines, and a gloss
• 3:36:18
  of darkness on her smooth hair. She looks just as I've always wanted to
• 3:36:24
  look, thought Anne, miserably. Rose leaf complexion, starry violet eyes,
• 3:36:30
  raven hair. Yes, she has them all. It's a wonder Her name
• 3:36:33
  isn't Cordelia Fitzgerald into the bargain? But I don't believe her figure is as
• 3:36:37
  good as mine, and her nose certainly isn't. Anne felt a little comforted
• 3:36:43
  by this conclusion end of chapter twenty six, Chapter twenty seven, Mutual Confidences.
• 3:36:52
  March came in that winter like the meekest and mildest of lambs, bringing
• 3:36:56
  days that were crisp and golden and tingling, each followed by a frosty,
• 3:37:01
  pink twilight, which gradually lost itself in an elfland of moonshine. Over the
• 3:37:07
  girls at Patty's Place was falling the shadow of April examinations. They were studying
• 3:37:13
  hard. Even Phil had settled down to text and notebooks with a doggedness not
• 3:37:16
  to be expected of her. I'm going to take the Johnson Scholarship in mathematics,
• 3:37:22
  she announced calmly. I could take the one in Greek easily, but
• 3:37:26
  I'd rather take the mathematical one because I want to prove to Jonas that I'm
• 3:37:30
  really enormously clever. Jonas likes you better for your big brown eyes and your
• 3:37:35
  crooked smile than for all the brains you carry under your curls, said Anne.
• 3:37:39
  When I was a girl, it wasn't considered lady like to know anything
• 3:37:43
  about mathematics, said Aunt Jamesina. But times have changed. I don't know
• 3:37:50
  that it's all for the better. Can you cook, Phil No, I
• 3:37:56
  never cooked anything in my life except a gingerbread, and it is a failure.
• 3:38:01
  Flat in the middle and hilly round the edges, you know the kind.
• 3:38:05
  But Auntie, when I begin, in good earnest to learn to cook,
• 3:38:07
  don't you think the brains that enable me to win a mathematical scholarship will
• 3:38:11
  also enable me to learn cooking just as well? Maybe? Said Aunt Jamesina
• 3:38:16
  cautiously. I am not decrying the higher education of women. My daughter is
• 3:38:24
  an m a. She can cook too, But I taught her to cook
• 3:38:30
  before I let a college professor teach her mathematics. In mid March came a
• 3:38:37
  letter from Miss Patty Spofford, saying that she and Miss Maria had decided to
• 3:38:41
  remain abroad for another year, so you may have Patty's place next winter too,
• 3:38:46
  she wrote, Maria and I are going to run over Egypt. I
• 3:38:50
  want to see the Sphinx once before I die. Fancy those two dames running
• 3:38:54
  over Egypt. I wonder if they'll look up at the Sphinx a knit,
• 3:38:58
  laughed Priscilla. I'm so glad we can keep Patty's place for another year,
• 3:39:03
  said Stella. I was afraid they'd come back, and then our jolly little
• 3:39:07
  nest here would have been broken up, and we poor callow nestlings thrown out
• 3:39:11
  on the cruel world of boarding houses again. I'm off for a tramp in
• 3:39:15
  the park, announced Phil, tossing her book aside. I think when I'm
• 3:39:18
  eighty, I'll be glad. I went for a walk in the park tonight.
• 3:39:22
  What do you mean? Asked Anne. Come with me and I'll tell
• 3:39:26
  you, honey. They captured in their ramble all the mysteries and magics of
• 3:39:30
  a march evening. Very still and mild, it was wrapped in a great
• 3:39:33
  white, brooding silence. A silence which was yet threaded through with many little
• 3:39:39
  silvery sounds, which you could hear if you hearkened as much with your soul
• 3:39:43
  as your ears. The girls wandered down a long Pineland aisle that seemed to
• 3:39:48
  lead right out into the heart of a deep, red, overflowing winter sunset.
• 3:39:52
  I'd go home and write a poem this blessed minute, if I only
• 3:39:56
  knew how, declared Phil, pausing in an open space where a rosy light
• 3:40:01
  was staining the green tips of the pines. It's all so wonderful here,
• 3:40:05
  this great white stillness, and those dark trees that always seemed to be thinking
• 3:40:09
  the woods were God's first temples, quoted Anne softly. One can't help feeling
• 3:40:16
  reverent and adoring in such a place. I always feel so near him when
• 3:40:20
  I walk among the pines. Anne, I'm the happiest girl in the world,
• 3:40:24
  confessed Phil. Suddenly, So mister Blake has asked you to marry him
• 3:40:30
  at last, said Anne calmly. Yes. And I sneezed three times while
• 3:40:33
  he was asking me. Wasn't that horrid? But I said yes almost before
• 3:40:39
  he finished. I was so afraid he might change his mind and stop I'm
• 3:40:43
  besottedly happy. I couldn't really believe before that Jonas would ever care for frivolous
• 3:40:46
  me. Phil You're not really frivolous, said Anne gravely. Way down underneath
• 3:40:52
  that frivolous exterior of yours, You've got a dear, loyal, womanly little
• 3:40:58
  soul. Why do you hide it so I can't help it? Queen Anne,
• 3:41:01
  you are right. I'm not frivolous at heart, but there's a sort
• 3:41:05
  of frivolous skin over my soul, and I can't take it off, As
• 3:41:11
  missus Poyser says, I'd have to be hatched over again and hatched different before
• 3:41:15
  I could change it. But Jonas knows the real me and loves me frivolity
• 3:41:20
  in all, and I love him. I never was so surprised in my
• 3:41:24
  life as I was when I found out I loved him. I'd never thought
• 3:41:28
  it possible to fall in love with an ugly man. Fancy me coming down
• 3:41:31
  to one solitary bow and one named Jonas. But I mean to call him
• 3:41:37
  Joe. That's such a nice, crisp little name. I couldn't nickname Alonzo.
• 3:41:41
  What about Alec and Alonzo? Oh? I told them at Christmas that
• 3:41:46
  I never could marry either of them. It seems so funny now to remember
• 3:41:48
  that I ever thought it possible that I might. They felt so badly.
• 3:41:52
  I just cried over both of them, howled, but I knew there was
• 3:41:56
  only one man in the world I could ever marry. I had made up
• 3:42:00
  my own mind for once, and it was real easy too. It's very
• 3:42:03
  delightful to feel so sure and know it's your own sureness and not somebody else's.
• 3:42:09
  Do you suppose you'll be able to keep it up? Making up my
• 3:42:11
  mind? You mean, I don't know. But Joe has given me a
• 3:42:15
  splendid rule, he says, when I'm perplexed, just to do what I
• 3:42:18
  would wish I had done when I shall be eighty. Anyhow, Joe can
• 3:42:22
  make up his mind quickly enough, and it would be uncomfortable to have too
• 3:42:26
  much mind in the same house. What will your father and mother say?
• 3:42:31
  Father won't say much. He thinks everything I do right. But mother will
• 3:42:35
  talk. Oh, her tongue will be as burny as her nose. But
• 3:42:39
  in the end it will be all right. You'll have to give up a
• 3:42:41
  good many things you've always had when you marry mister Blake Phil But I'll have
• 3:42:46
  him. I won't miss the other things. We're to be married a year
• 3:42:50
  from next June. Joe graduates from Saint Columbia this spring. You know.
• 3:42:54
  Then he's going to take a little mission church down on Patterson Street in the
• 3:42:58
  slums. Fancy me in the slums, but I'd go there or to Greenland's
• 3:43:03
  icy mountains with him. And this is the girl who would never marry a
• 3:43:07
  man who wasn't rich, commented Anne to a young pine tree. Oh don't
• 3:43:11
  cast up the follies of my youth to me. I shall be poor as
• 3:43:15
  gaily as i've been rich. You'll see. I'm going to learn how to
• 3:43:18
  cook and make over dresses. I've learned how to market since I've lived at
• 3:43:22
  Patty's place, and once I taught a Sunday school class for a whole summer.
• 3:43:26
  Aunt Jamesina says, I'll ruin Joe's career if I marry him, But
• 3:43:30
  I won't. I know. I haven't much sense or sobriety, but I've
• 3:43:33
  got what is ever so much better, the knack of making people like me.
• 3:43:37
  There is a man in Bowlingbroke who lisps and always testifies in prayer meeting,
• 3:43:41
  He says, if you can't fine like an electric star, fine like
• 3:43:46
  a candlestick, I'll be Joe's little candlestick fil your incorrigible Well, I love
• 3:43:54
  you so much that I can't make nice, light, congratulatory little speeches.
• 3:43:58
  But I'm heart glad of your happiness. I know those big gray eyes of
• 3:44:03
  yours are brimming over with real friendship. Anne, Someday I'll look the same
• 3:44:07
  way at you. You're going to marry Roy, aren't you, Anne?
• 3:44:11
  My dear Philippa, did you ever hear of the famous Betty Baxter who refused
• 3:44:16
  a man before he'd axed her. I am not going to emulate that celebrated
• 3:44:20
  lady by either refusing or accepting anyone before he axes me. All Redmond knows
• 3:44:26
  that Roy is crazy about you, said Phil candidly. And you do love
• 3:44:30
  him, don't you, Anne? I I suppose so, said Anne reluctantly.
• 3:44:37
  She felt that she ought to be blushing while making such a confession,
• 3:44:41
  but she was not. On the other hand, she always blushed hotly when
• 3:44:45
  anyone said anything about Gilbert Blythe or Christine Stuart. In her hearing, Gilbert
• 3:44:50
  Blythe and Christine Stuart were nothing to her, absolutely nothing. But Anne had
• 3:44:54
  given up trying to analyze the reason of her blushes. As for Roy,
• 3:44:58
  of course, she was in love with him madly, so how could she
• 3:45:03
  help It was he, not her ideal who could resist? Those glorious dark
• 3:45:07
  eyes and that pleading voice were not half the Redmond girls wildly envious, And
• 3:45:13
  what a charming sonnet he had sent her with a box of violets on her
• 3:45:16
  birthday. Anne knew every word of it by heart. It was very good
• 3:45:22
  stuff of its kind, too, not exactly up to the level of Keats
• 3:45:26
  or Shakespeare. Even Anne was not so deeply in love as to think that,
• 3:45:30
  but it was very tolerable. Magazine verse, and it was addressed to
• 3:45:33
  her, not to Laura or Beatrice or the Maid of Athens, but to
• 3:45:37
  her Anne Shirley. To be told in rhythmical cadences that her eyes were stars
• 3:45:43
  of the morning, that her cheek had the flush it stole from the sunrise,
• 3:45:48
  that her lips were redder than the roses of Paradise was thrillingly romantic.
• 3:45:52
  Gilbert would never have dreamed of writing a sonnet to her eyebrows. But then
• 3:45:58
  Gilbert could see a joke. She had once told Roy a funny story,
• 3:46:01
  and he had not seen the point of it. She recalled the chummy laugh
• 3:46:05
  she and Gilbert had had together over it, and wondered uneasily if life with
• 3:46:09
  a man who had no sense of humor might not be somewhat uninteresting in the
• 3:46:13
  long run. But who could expect a melancholy, inscrutable hero to see the
• 3:46:18
  humorous side of things? It would be flatly unreasonable. End of Chapter twenty
• 3:46:26
  seven. Chapter twenty eight. A June evening, I wonder what it would
• 3:46:31
  be like to live in a world where it was always June, said Anne,
• 3:46:35
  as she came through the spice and bloom of the twilet orchard to the
• 3:46:39
  front door steps, where Marilla and Missus Rachel were sitting talking over Missus Samson
• 3:46:45
  Coate's funeral, which they had attended that day. Dora sat between them,
• 3:46:50
  diligently studying her lessons, but Davy was sitting tailor fashion on the grass,
• 3:46:54
  looking as gloomy and depressed as his single dimple would let him. You'd get
• 3:47:00
  tired of it, said Marilla, with a sigh. I dare say,
• 3:47:05
  but just now I feel that it would take me a long time to get
• 3:47:07
  tired of it. If it were all as charming as to day, everything
• 3:47:11
  loves June. Davy, boy, why this melancholy November face in blossomed time?
• 3:47:18
  I'm just sick and tired of living, said the youthful pessimist at ten
• 3:47:24
  years Dear me, how sad? I'm not making fun, said Davy with
• 3:47:30
  dignity. I'm dis dis discouraged, bringing out the big word with a valiant
• 3:47:37
  effort. Why and where for, asked Anne, sitting down beside him,
• 3:47:41
  Cause the new teacher that come when mister Holmes got sick, give me ten
• 3:47:46
  sums to do for Monday. It'll take me all day tomorrow to do them.
• 3:47:52
  It isn't fair to have to work saturdays. Milty Bolter said he wouldn't
• 3:47:56
  do them, but Marilla says, I've got too. I don't like miss
• 3:48:01
  Carson a bit. Don't talk like that about your teacher, Davy Keith said
• 3:48:05
  missus Rachel severely. Miss Carson is a very fine girl. There is no
• 3:48:09
  nonsense about her. That doesn't sound very attractive, laughed Anne. I like
• 3:48:16
  people to have a little nonsense about them, but I'm inclined to have a
• 3:48:18
  better opinion of Miss Carson than you have. I saw her in prayer meeting
• 3:48:22
  last night, and she has a pair of eyes that can't always look sensible.
• 3:48:26
  Now, Davy boy, take heart of grace. Tomorrow will bring another
• 3:48:31
  day, and I'll help you with the psalms as far as in me.
• 3:48:33
  Lies. Don't waste this lovely hour TwixT light and dark worrying over arithmetic.
• 3:48:39
  Well I won't, said Davy, brightening up. If you'll help me with
• 3:48:43
  the sums, I'll have em done in time to go fishing with Milty.
• 3:48:48
  I wish old aunt Atosa's funeral was tomorrow instead of today. I wanted to
• 3:48:52
  go to it because Milty said his mother said aunt Atosa would be sure to
• 3:48:56
  rise up in her coffin and say sarcastic things to the folks that come to
• 3:49:01
  see her buried. But Marilla said she didn't. Poor Atossa laid in her
• 3:49:05
  coffin peaceful enough, said missus Lynde solemnly. I never saw her look so
• 3:49:11
  pleasant before. That's what Well, there weren't many tears shed over her poor
• 3:49:16
  old soul. The Elisha writes are thankful to be rid of her, And
• 3:49:20
  I can't say I blame them. My might it seems to me a most
• 3:49:22
  dreadful thing to go out of the world and not leave one person behind you
• 3:49:26
  who was sorry you are gone, said Anne, shuddering. Nobody except her
• 3:49:31
  parents ever loved poor Tasa, that's certain, not even her husband, averred
• 3:49:37
  missus Lynde. She was his fourth wife. He had sort of got into
• 3:49:41
  the habit of marrying. He only lived a few years after he married her.
• 3:49:46
  The doctor said he died of dyspepsia, but I shall always maintain that
• 3:49:50
  he died of atossa's tongue. That's what poor soul. She always knew everything
• 3:49:56
  about her neighbors, but she never was very well acquainted with herself. Well,
• 3:50:01
  she's gone anyhow, and I suppose the next excitement will be Diana's wedding.
• 3:50:07
  It seems funny and horrible to think of Diana's being married, sighed Anne,
• 3:50:11
  hugging her knees and looking through the gap in the haunted wood to the
• 3:50:15
  light that was shining in Diana's room. I don't see what's horrible about it
• 3:50:18
  when she's doing so well, said missus Lynde emphatically. Fred Wright has a
• 3:50:24
  fine farm, and he is a model young man. He certainly isn't the
• 3:50:28
  wild, dashing, wicked young man Diana once wanted to marry, smiled Anne.
• 3:50:33
  Fred is extremely good. That's just what he ought to be. Do
• 3:50:37
  you want Diana to marry a wicked man or marry one yourself? Oh?
• 3:50:43
  No, I wouldn't want to marry anybody who was wicked, but I think
• 3:50:46
  i'd like it if he could be wicked, and wouldn't. Now Fred is
• 3:50:50
  hopelessly good. You'll have more sense someday, I hope, said Marilla.
• 3:50:56
  Marilla spoke rather bitterly. She was grievously disappointed. She knew Anne had refused
• 3:51:01
  Gilbert Blythe AVONLEA gossip buzzed over the fact which had leaked out. Nobody knew
• 3:51:07
  how. Perhaps Charlie Sloane had guessed and told his guesses for truth. Perhaps
• 3:51:11
  Diana had betrayed it to Fred, and Fred had been indiscreet at all events.
• 3:51:16
  It was known missus Blythe no longer asked Anne in public or private if
• 3:51:20
  she had heard lately from Gilbert, but passed her by with a frosty bow.
• 3:51:26
  Anne, who had always liked Gilbert's merry, young hearted mother, was
• 3:51:30
  grieved in secret over this. Marilla said nothing, but missus Lynde gave Anne
• 3:51:35
  many exasperated digs about it, until fresh gossip reached that worthy lady, through
• 3:51:39
  the medium of Moody Spurgeon mac Pherson's mother, that Anne had another beau at
• 3:51:43
  college who was rich and handsome and good all in one. After that,
• 3:51:48
  missus Rachel held her tongue, though she still wished in her inmost heart that
• 3:51:52
  Anne had accepted Gilbert. Riches were all very well, but even missus Rachel,
• 3:51:58
  practical soul though she was, did not consider them the one essential.
• 3:52:03
  If Anne liked the handsome unknown better than Gilbert, there was nothing more to
• 3:52:07
  be said. But missus Rachel was dreadfully afraid that Anne was going to make
• 3:52:11
  the mistake of marrying for money. Marilla knew Anne too well to fear this,
• 3:52:16
  but she felt that something in the universal scheme of things had gone sadly
• 3:52:18
  awry. What is to be will be, said missus Rachel, gloomily,
• 3:52:24
  and what isn't to be happened? Sometimes I can't help believing it's going to
• 3:52:30
  happen in Nann's case, if Providence doesn't interfere. That's what missus Rachel sighed.
• 3:52:35
  She was afraid Providence wouldn't interfere, and she didn't dare to. Anne
• 3:52:41
  had wandered down to the Dryad's bubble and was curled up among the ferns at
• 3:52:45
  the root of the big white birch, where she and Gilbert had so often
• 3:52:48
  sat in summers gone by. He had gone into the newspaper office again when
• 3:52:52
  college closed, and Avonlea seemed very dull without him. He never wrote to
• 3:52:58
  her, and Anne missed the letters that never came. To be sure,
• 3:53:03
  Roy wrote twice a week. His letters were exquisite compositions which would have read
• 3:53:07
  beautifully in a memoir or biography. Anne felt herself more deeply in love with
• 3:53:11
  him than ever when she read them, But her heart never gave the queer
• 3:53:16
  quick, painful bound at sight of his letters, which it had given one
• 3:53:20
  day, when missus Hiram Sloane had handed her at an envelope addressed in Gilbert's
• 3:53:24
  black upright handwriting. Anne had hurried home to the east gable and opened it
• 3:53:28
  eagerly to find a typewritten copy of some college society report. Only that and
• 3:53:35
  nothing more. Anne flung the harmless screed across her room and sat down to
• 3:53:41
  write an especially nice epistle to Roy. Diana was to be married in five
• 3:53:46
  more days. The Gray House at Orchard Slope was in a turmoil of baking
• 3:53:50
  and brewing and boiling and stewing, for there was to be a big,
• 3:53:52
  old timey wedding. Anne, of course, was to be bridesmaid, as
• 3:53:56
  had been arranged when they were twelve years old, and Gilbert was coming from
• 3:54:01
  Kingsport to be best man. Anne was enjoying the excitement of the various preparations,
• 3:54:07
  but under it all she carried a little heartache. She was, in
• 3:54:09
  a sense losing her dear old chum. Diana's new home would be two miles
• 3:54:15
  from green Gables, and the old constant companionship could never be theirs again.
• 3:54:20
  Anne looked up at Diana's light and thought how it had beckoned to her for
• 3:54:24
  many years, but soon it would shine through the summer twilights no more.
• 3:54:28
  Two big, painful tears welled up in her gray eyes. Oh, she
• 3:54:33
  thought, how horrible it is that people have to grow up and marry and
• 3:54:39
  change. End of Chapter twenty eight. Chapter twenty nine, Diana's wedding.
• 3:54:48
  After all, the only real roses are the pink ones, said Anne,
• 3:54:52
  as she tied white ribbon around Diana's bouquet in the westward looking gable at Orchard
• 3:54:56
  Slope. They are the flowers of life and faith. Diana was standing nervously
• 3:55:03
  in the middle of the room, arrayed in her bridal white, her black
• 3:55:05
  curls frosted over with the film of her wedding veil. Anne had draped that
• 3:55:11
  veil in accordance with the sentimental compact of years before. It's all pretty much
• 3:55:16
  as I used to imagine it long ago, when I wept over your inevitable
• 3:55:20
  marriage and our consequent parting, she laughed. You are the bride of my
• 3:55:24
  dreams, Diana with the lovely, misty veil, and I am your bridesmaid.
• 3:55:30
  But alas, I haven't the puffed sleeves, though these short lace ones
• 3:55:33
  are even prettier. Neither is my heart wholly breaking, nor do I exactly
• 3:55:37
  hate Fred. We are not really parting, Anne protested Diana. I'm not
• 3:55:43
  going far away. We'll love each other just as much as ever. We've
• 3:55:46
  always kept that oath of friendship we swore long ago, haven't we. Yes,
• 3:55:52
  we've kept it faithfully. We've had a beautiful friendship. Diana We've never
• 3:55:56
  marred it by one quarrel or coolness or unkind word, and I hope it
• 3:56:00
  will always be so. But things can't be quite the same after this.
• 3:56:03
  You'll have other interests. I'll just be on the outside. But such is
• 3:56:09
  life, as Missus Rachel says. Missus Rachel has given you one of her
• 3:56:11
  beloved knitted quilts of the tobacco stripe pattern, and she says, when I
• 3:56:16
  am married, she'll give me one too. The mean thing about your getting
• 3:56:18
  married is that I won't be able to be your bridesmaid, lamented Diana.
• 3:56:24
  I'm to be Phil's bridesmaid next June when she marries mister Blake. And then
• 3:56:28
  I must stop, for you know the proverb. Three times a bridesmaid,
• 3:56:31
  never a bride, said Anne, peeping through the window over the pink and
• 3:56:35
  snow of the blossoming orchard. Beneath Here comes the minister, Diana. Oh,
• 3:56:41
  Anne, gasped Diana, suddenly turning very pale and beginning to tremble.
• 3:56:46
  Oh Anne, I'm so nervous. I can't go through with it. Anne,
• 3:56:50
  I know I'm going to faint. If you do, I'll drag you
• 3:56:52
  down to the rainwater hogshead and drop you in, said Anne, unsympathetically.
• 3:56:56
  Cheer up, dearest, Getting married can't be so very terrible when so many
• 3:57:01
  people survive the ceremony. See how cool and composed I am, and take
• 3:57:05
  courage. Wait till your turn comes, Miss Anne. Oh, Anne,
• 3:57:09
  I hear father coming upstairs. Give me my bouquet? Is my veil?
• 3:57:11
  Right? Am? I very pale? You look just lovely, Die darling,
• 3:57:16
  kiss me goodbye for the last time. Diana Barry will never kiss me
• 3:57:20
  again. Diana Wright will, though there mother's calling come, following the simple
• 3:57:26
  old fashioned way in vogue. Then Anne went down to the parlor on Gilbert's
• 3:57:31
  arm. They met at the top of the stairs for the first time since
• 3:57:33
  they had left Kingsport, for Gilbert had arrived only that day. Gilbert shook
• 3:57:39
  hands courteously. He was looking very well, though, as Anne instantly noted,
• 3:57:43
  rather thin. He was not pale. There was a flush on his
• 3:57:48
  cheek that had burned into it. As Anne came along the hall towards him
• 3:57:52
  in her soft white dress with lilies of the valley and the shining masses of
• 3:57:56
  her hair. As they entered the crowded parlor together, a little murmur of
• 3:58:01
  admiration ran around the room. What a fine looking pair they make, whispered
• 3:58:05
  the impressible Missus Rachel to Marilla. Fred ambled in alone with a very red
• 3:58:11
  face, and then Diana swept in on her father's arm. She did not
• 3:58:15
  faint, and nothing untoward occurred to interrupt the ceremony. Feasting and merry making
• 3:58:20
  followed. Then, as the evening waned, Fred and Diana drove away through
• 3:58:24
  the moonlight to their new home, and Gilbert walked with Anne to Green Gables.
• 3:58:30
  Something of their old comradeship had returned during the informal mirth of the evening.
• 3:58:35
  Oh, it was nice to be walking over that well known road with
• 3:58:37
  Gilbert again. The night was so very still that one should have been able
• 3:58:41
  to hear the whisper of roses in blossom, the laughter of daisies, the
• 3:58:46
  piping of grasses, many sweet sounds, all tangled up together. The beauty
• 3:58:52
  of moonlight on familiar fields irradiated the world. Can't we think of ramble up
• 3:58:56
  lover's lane before you go in, asked Gilbert as they crossed the bridge over
• 3:59:01
  the Lake of Shining Waters, in which the moon lay like a great drowned
• 3:59:05
  blossom of gold. Anne assented readily. Lover's Lane was a veritable path in
• 3:59:11
  a fairy land that night, a shimmering, mysterious place full of wizardry in
• 3:59:16
  the white, woven enchantment of moonlight. There had been a time when such
• 3:59:20
  a walk with Gilbert through Lover's Lane would have been far too dangerous, but
• 3:59:24
  Roy and Christine had made it very safe. Now. Anne found herself thinking
• 3:59:28
  a good deal about Christine as she chatted lightly to Gilbert. She had met
• 3:59:33
  her several times before leaving Kingsport and had been charmingly sweet to her. Christine
• 3:59:37
  had also been charmingly sweet. Indeed, they were a most cordial pair.
• 3:59:43
  But for all that their acquaintance had not ripened into friendship, evidently Christine was
• 3:59:48
  not a kindred spirit. Are you going to be in Avonlea all summer,
• 3:59:52
  asked Gilbert. No, I'm going down east to Valley Road next week.
• 3:59:58
  Aster Hathorne wants me to teach for her through July and August. They have
• 4:00:01
  a summer term in that school, and Esther isn't feeling well, so I'm
• 4:00:05
  going to substitute for her in one way. I don't mind, do you
• 4:00:09
  know, I'm beginning to feel a little bit like a stranger in Avonlea now.
• 4:00:13
  It makes me sorry, but it's true. It's quite appalling to see
• 4:00:16
  the number of children who have shot up into big boys and girls, really
• 4:00:20
  young men and women these past two years. Half of my pupils are grown
• 4:00:24
  up. It makes me feel awfully old to see them in the places you
• 4:00:28
  and I and our mates used to fill. Anne laughed and sighed. She
• 4:00:33
  felt very old and mature and wise, which showed how young she was.
• 4:00:37
  She told herself that she longed greatly to go back to those dear, merry
• 4:00:41
  days when life was seen through a rosy mist of hope and illusion, and
• 4:00:46
  possessed an indefinable something that had passed away forever. Where was it now?
• 4:00:50
  The glory and the dream so Wegg's the world away, quoted Gilbert, practically,
• 4:00:56
  and a trifle absently, Anne wondered if he were thinking of Christine.
• 4:01:01
  Oh Avonlea was going to be so lonely now with Diana gone. End of
• 4:01:07
  chapter twenty nine, Chapter three, Greeting and Farewell, Charlie, Sloane,
• 4:01:16
  Gilbert, Blythe and Anne Shirley left Avonlea the following Monday morning, Anne had
• 4:01:22
  hoped for a fine day. Diana was to drive her to the station,
• 4:01:26
  and they wanted this their last drive together for some time, to be a
• 4:01:30
  pleasant one. But when Anne went to bed Sunday night, the east wind
• 4:01:35
  was moaning around Green Gables with an ominous prophecy, which was fulfilled. In
• 4:01:39
  the morning, Anne awoke to find raindrops pattering against her window and shadowing the
• 4:01:43
  pond's gray surface with widening rings. Hills and sea were hidden and mist,
• 4:01:50
  and the whole world seemed dim and dreary. Anne dressed in the cheerless gray
• 4:01:54
  dawn for an early start was necessary to catch the boat train. She struggled
• 4:01:58
  against the tears that would well up in her eyes. In spite of herself.
• 4:02:03
  She was leaving the home that was so dear to her, and something
• 4:02:07
  told her that she was leaving it forever, save as a holiday refuge.
• 4:02:11
  Things would never be the same again, coming back for vacations, would not
• 4:02:16
  be living there. And oh, how dear and beloved everything was that little
• 4:02:20
  white porch room sacred to the dreams of girlhood. The old snow queen at
• 4:02:24
  the window, the brook in the hollow, the Dryad's Bubble, the haunted
• 4:02:28
  woods and Lovers Lane, all the thousand and one dear spots where memories of
• 4:02:33
  the old years bided. Could she ever be really happy anywhere else? Breakfast
• 4:02:39
  at green Gables that morning was a rather doleful meal. Davy, for the
• 4:02:43
  first time in his life, probably could not eat, but blubbered shamelessly over
• 4:02:48
  his porridge. Nobody else seemed to have much appetite save Dora, who tucked
• 4:02:54
  away her rations comfortably. Dora, like the immortal and most prudent Charlotte,
• 4:03:00
  who went on cutting bread and butter when her frenzied lover's body had been carried
• 4:03:03
  past on a shutter, was one of those fortunate creatures who are seldom disturbed
• 4:03:09
  by anything. Even at eight. It took a great deal to ruffle Dora's
• 4:03:13
  placidity. She was sorry Anne was going away, of course, but was
• 4:03:16
  that any reason why she should fail to appreciate a poached egg on toast,
• 4:03:20
  not at all, And seeing that Davy could not eat his, Dora ate
• 4:03:26
  it for him promptly. On time, Diana appeared with horse and buggy,
• 4:03:31
  her rosy face glowing above her raincoat. The good byes had to be said.
• 4:03:35
  Then somehow missus Lynde came in from her quarters to give Anne a hearty
• 4:03:39
  embrace and warn her to be careful of her health. Whatever she did.
• 4:03:43
  Marilla, brusque and tearless, pecked Anne's cheek and said she supposed they'd hear
• 4:03:48
  from her when she got settled. A casual observer might have concluded that Anne's
• 4:03:52
  going mattered very little to her, unless said observer had happened to get a
• 4:03:58
  good look in her eyes. Dora kissed Anne primly and squeezed out two decorous
• 4:04:03
  little tears. But Davy, who had been crying on the back porch step
• 4:04:07
  ever since they rose from the table, refused to say goodbye at all.
• 4:04:11
  When he saw Anne coming towards him, he sprang to his feet, bolted
• 4:04:15
  up the back stairs, and hid in a clothes closet, out of which
• 4:04:18
  he would not come. His muffled howls were the last sounds Anne heard as
• 4:04:22
  she left Green Gables. It rained heavily all the way to Bright River,
• 4:04:28
  to which station they had to go, since the Branch line train from Carmody
• 4:04:31
  did not connect with the boat train. Charlie and Gilbert were on the station
• 4:04:35
  platform When they reached it and the train was whistling, Anne had just time
• 4:04:41
  to get her ticket and trunk check, say a hurried farewell to Diana,
• 4:04:45
  and hasten on board. She wished she were going back with Diana to Avonlea.
• 4:04:50
  She knew she was going to die of home sickness, and oh,
• 4:04:54
  if only that dismal rain would stop pouring down, as if the whole world
• 4:04:58
  were weeping over, summer vanish and joys departed. Even Gilbert's presence brought her
• 4:05:03
  no comfort, for Charlie Sloane was there too, and slownishness could be tolerated
• 4:05:07
  only in fine weather. It was absolutely insufferable in rain. But when the
• 4:05:13
  boats steamed out of Charlottetown Harbor, things took a turn for the better.
• 4:05:16
  The rain ceased, and the sun began to burst out goldenly now and again
• 4:05:20
  between the rents and the clouds, burnishing the gray seas with copper hued radiance,
• 4:05:26
  and lighting up the mists that curtained the island's red shores with gleams of
• 4:05:30
  gold, foretokening a fine day after all. Besides, Charlie Sloane promptly became
• 4:05:35
  so seasick that he had to go below, and Anne and Gilbert were left
• 4:05:39
  alone on deck. I am very glad that all the Sloanes get seasick as
• 4:05:43
  soon as they go on water, thought Anne mercilessly. I am sure I
• 4:05:48
  couldn't take my farewell. Look at the old sod with Charlie standing there pretending
• 4:05:52
  to look sentimentally at it too. Well, we're off, remarked Gilbert unsentimentally.
• 4:06:00
  Yes, I feel like Byron's child Herald. Only it isn't really my
• 4:06:03
  native shore that I'm watching, said Anne, winking her gray eyes vigorously.
• 4:06:09
  Nova Scotia is that, I suppose. But one's native shore is the land
• 4:06:13
  one loves the best, and that's good, old p e I. For
• 4:06:16
  me, I can't believe I didn't always live here. Those eleven years before
• 4:06:20
  I came seemed like a bad dream. It's seven years since I crossed on
• 4:06:26
  this boat the evening Missus Spencer brought me over from Hopetown. I can see
• 4:06:30
  myself in that dreadful old wincey dress and faded sailor hat, exploring decks and
• 4:06:35
  cabins with enraptured curiosity. It was a fine evening, and how those red
• 4:06:41
  Island shores did gleam in the sunshine. Now I'm crossing the strait again,
• 4:06:46
  Oh Gilbert. I do hope I'll like Redmond and Kingsport, but I'm sure
• 4:06:50
  I won't. Where's all your philosophy gone, Anne, It's all submerged under
• 4:06:56
  a great swamping wave of loneliness and homes. I've longed for three years to
• 4:07:01
  go to Redmond, and now I'm going, and I wish I weren't.
• 4:07:05
  Never mind, I shall be cheerful and philosophical again after I have just one
• 4:07:09
  good cry. I must have that as a went, and I'll have to
• 4:07:15
  wait until I get into my boarding house bed tonight, wherever it may be,
• 4:07:18
  before I can have it. Then Anne will be herself again. I
• 4:07:22
  wonder if Davy has come out of the closet yet. It was nine that
• 4:07:26
  night when their train reached Kingsport and they found themselves in the blue white glare
• 4:07:31
  of the crowded station. Anne felt horribly bewildered, but a moment later she
• 4:07:35
  was seized by Priscilla Grant, who had come to Kingsport on Saturday. Here
• 4:07:41
  you are, beloved, and I suppose you're as tired as I was when
• 4:07:43
  I got here Saturday night. Tired, Priscilla, don't talk of it.
• 4:07:48
  I'm tired and green and provincial and only about ten years old. For pity's
• 4:07:54
  sake, Take your poor, broken down chum to some place where she can
• 4:07:58
  hear herself. Think, I'll take you right up to our boarding house.
• 4:08:01
  I've a cab ready outside. It's such a blessing you're here, Prissy.
• 4:08:05
  If you weren't, I think I should just sit down on my suit case
• 4:08:09
  here and now and weep bitter tears. What a comfort one familiar face is
• 4:08:13
  in a howling wilderness of strangers? Is that Gilbert blythe over there? Anne?
• 4:08:18
  How he has grown up this past year. He was only a schoolboy
• 4:08:20
  when I taught in Carmody. And of course that's Charlie Slan. He hasn't
• 4:08:24
  changed. Couldn't He looked as like that when he was born, and he'll
• 4:08:28
  look like that when he's eighty. This way, dear, will be home
• 4:08:30
  in twenty minutes. Home, groaned Anne. You mean we'll be in some
• 4:08:35
  horrible boarding house, in a still more horrible hall bedroom looking out on a
• 4:08:39
  dingy back yard. It isn't a horrible boarding house, Anne, girl.
• 4:08:45
  Here's our cab hop in the driver will get your trunk. Oh. Yes,
• 4:08:48
  the boarding house is really a very nice place of its kind, as
• 4:08:50
  you'll admit tomorrow morning, when a good night's sleep has turned your blues rosy
• 4:08:54
  pink. It's a big, old fashioned gray stone house on Saint John Street,
• 4:08:58
  just a nice little constitutional from Redmond. It used to be the residence
• 4:09:01
  of great folk, but fashion has deserted Saint John Street and its houses only
• 4:09:05
  dream now of better days. They're so big that people living in them have
• 4:09:09
  to take borders just to fill up. At least that is the reason our
• 4:09:11
  landladies are very anxious to impress on us. They're delicious, Anne, our
• 4:09:16
  landladies. I mean, how many are there? Two? Miss Hannah Harvey
• 4:09:20
  and Miss Ada Harvey. They were born twins about fifty years ago. I
• 4:09:24
  can't get away from twins, it seems, smiled, Anne. Wherever I
• 4:09:28
  go, they confront me. Oh not twins, now, dear, After
• 4:09:33
  they reach the age of thirty, there never were twins again. Miss Hannah
• 4:09:35
  has grown old, not too gracefully, and Miss Ada has stayed thirty less
• 4:09:39
  gracefully. Still, I don't know whether Miss Hannah can smile or not I've
• 4:09:43
  never caught her at it so far, but miss Ada smiles all the time,
• 4:09:46
  and that's worse. However, they're nice kind souls, and they take
• 4:09:50
  two borders every year because Miss Hannah's economical soul cannot bear to waste room space,
• 4:09:54
  not because they need to or have to, as miss Ada has told
• 4:09:56
  me seven times since Saturday night. As our rooms, I admit they are
• 4:10:01
  whole bedrooms. And mine does look out on the back yard. Your room
• 4:10:03
  is a front one and looks out in Old Saint John's Graveyard, which is
• 4:10:07
  just across the street. That sounds gruesome, shivered, Anne. I think
• 4:10:11
  I'd rather have the back yard view. Oh no, you wouldn't. Wait
• 4:10:15
  and see. Old Saint John's a darling place. It's been a graveyard so
• 4:10:18
  long that it ceased to be one and has become one of the sights of
• 4:10:22
  Kingspoort. I was all through it yesterday for a pleasure exertion. There's a
• 4:10:26
  big stone wall and a roll of enormous trees all around it, and rolls
• 4:10:28
  of trees all through it, and the queerest old tombstones with the queerest and
• 4:10:33
  quaintest inscriptions. You'll go there to study, Anne, see if you don't.
• 4:10:37
  Of course, nobody's ever buried there now, But a few years ago
• 4:10:39
  that I put up a beautiful monument to the memory of Nova Scotian soldiers who
• 4:10:43
  fell in the Crimean War. It's just opposite the entrance gates, and there's
• 4:10:46
  scope for imagination in it. As he used to say, here's your trunk
• 4:10:50
  at last, and the boys are coming to say good night. Must I
• 4:10:52
  really shake hands with Charlie Sloane, Anne, his hands always so cold and
• 4:10:56
  fishy feeling. We must ask him to call occasionally. Miss Hannah gravely told
• 4:11:01
  me we could have young gentleman callers two evenings in the week if they went
• 4:11:05
  away at a reasonable hour. And Miss Ada asked me, smiling, pleased,
• 4:11:07
  to be sure they didn't sit on her beautiful cushions. I promised to
• 4:11:11
  say to it, But goodness knows where else they can sit unless they sit
• 4:11:13
  on the floor. There are cushions on everything. Miss Ada even has an
• 4:11:18
  elaborate Battenberg one on top of the piano. Anne was laughing. By this
• 4:11:22
  time. Priscilla's gay chatter had the intended effect of cheering her up. Homesickness
• 4:11:26
  vanished for the time being. Anne did not even return in full force.
• 4:11:31
  When she finally found herself alone in her little bedroom, she went to her
• 4:11:35
  window and looked out. The street below was dim and quiet. Across it,
• 4:11:39
  the moon was shining above the trees in Old Saint John's, just behind
• 4:11:43
  the great dark head of the lion on the monument. Anne wondered if it
• 4:11:48
  could have been only that morning that she had left Green Gables. She had
• 4:11:52
  the sense of a long passage of time which one day of change in travel
• 4:11:56
  gives. I suppose that very moon is looking down on green Gables now,
• 4:12:01
  she mused. But I won't think about it that way. Homesickness lies.
• 4:12:07
  I'm not even going to have my good cry. I'll put that off to
• 4:12:11
  a more convenient season, And just now I'll go calmly and sensibly to bed
• 4:12:15
  and to sleep. End of chapter three, Chapter thirty, Missus Skinner's Romance.
• 4:12:24
  Anne stepped off the train at Valley Road station and looked about to see
• 4:12:28
  if anyone had come to meet her. She was to board with a certain
• 4:12:31
  Misjanet Suite, but she saw no one who answered. In the least to
• 4:12:35
  her preconception of that lady, as formed from Esther's letter, the only person
• 4:12:39
  in sight was an elderly woman sitting in a wagon with mail bags piled around
• 4:12:43
  her. Two hundred would have been a charitable guess at her weight. Her
• 4:12:48
  face was as round and red as a harvest moon, and almost as featureless.
• 4:12:52
  She wore a tight black cashmere dress made in the fashion of ten years
• 4:12:58
  ago, a little dusty black strap our hat trimmed with bows of yellow ribbon
• 4:13:01
  and faded black lay smiths. Here you, she called, waving her whip
• 4:13:07
  at Anne. Are you the new Valley Road school, ma'am? Yes,
• 4:13:13
  well, I thought so. Valley Road is noted for its good looking school,
• 4:13:18
  ma'ams, just as Millersville is noted for its humbly ones. Janet Sweet
• 4:13:24
  asked me this morning if I could bring you out. I said, certain,
• 4:13:30
  I Kane, if she don't mind being scrunched up Sam this week of
• 4:13:35
  mine's kind of small for the mail bags, and I'm some hiftier than Thomas.
• 4:13:41
  Just wait, miss, till I shaft these bags a bit and I'll
• 4:13:45
  tuck you in somehow. It's only two miles to Janet's and next door neighbor's
• 4:13:50
  hard boys coming for your trank to night. My name is Skinner. I'm
• 4:13:56
  Melia Skinner. Anne was eventually tucked in, exchanging amused smiles with herself during
• 4:14:01
  the process. Jug Along black Mare commanded Missus Skinner, gathering up the reins
• 4:14:07
  in her pudgy hands. This is my first trip on the mail route.
• 4:14:13
  Thomas wanted to hoe his turnips to day, so he asked me to come.
• 4:14:16
  So I just sat down and took a standing gap snack and started.
• 4:14:22
  I sort of like it, of course, it's rather tege's. Part of
• 4:14:26
  the time, I sits and thinks, and the rest I just sits.
• 4:14:31
  Jug Along black Mare. I want to get home merely tall missus terbull lawnsome
• 4:14:37
  when I'm away. You see, we haven't been married very long, oh,
• 4:14:41
  said Anne politely, just a month. Thomas courted me for quite a
• 4:14:48
  spell, though it was real romantic. Anne tried to picture Missus Skinner on
• 4:14:54
  speaking terms with romance and failed. Oh she said again, yea, As
• 4:15:00
  you see, there was another man after me, Jack Alonge black Mare.
• 4:15:05
  I'd been a whiter so long, Fox had given up expecting me to marry
• 4:15:09
  again. But when my daughter, she's a schoolman like you, went out
• 4:15:15
  west to teach, I felt real lonesome and wasn't no wise set against the
• 4:15:20
  idea by me. By termers began to come up, and so did the
• 4:15:24
  other fellow, William Abadiah Seaman his name was. For a long time I
• 4:15:30
  couldn't make up my mind which of them to take, and they keeper coming
• 4:15:35
  and coming, and I kep her worrying. You see, w O was
• 4:15:39
  rich, He had a fine place and carried considerable style. He was by
• 4:15:43
  far the best match Jack a long black mare. Why didn't you marry him?
• 4:15:50
  Asked Anne. Well, you see he didn't love me, answered missus
• 4:15:54
  Skinner solemnly. Anne opened her eyes widely and looked at missus Skinner. But
• 4:16:00
  there was not a glint of humor on that lady's face. Evidently Missus Skinner
• 4:16:03
  saw nothing amusing in her own case. He'd been a widow man for three
• 4:16:08
  years and his sister kept house for him. Then she got married, and
• 4:16:12
  he just wanted Sammon to look after his house. It was worth looking after
• 4:16:18
  two, mind you that it's a handsome house, Jock, a long blackmaire.
• 4:16:23
  As for Thomas, he was poor, and if his house didn't lick
• 4:16:27
  and dry weather, it was about all that could be set for it.
• 4:16:32
  Though it looks kind of picturesque bad, you see, I laughed Thomas,
• 4:16:37
  and I didn't care one red cent for w O. So I argued it
• 4:16:41
  out with myself. Sarah Crows say, I my fast was a crow.
• 4:16:48
  You can marry your rich man if you like, but you won't be happy.
• 4:16:52
  Fox can't get along together in this world without a little bit of love.
• 4:16:57
  You'd just better tie up to Thomas, for he loves you and you
• 4:17:02
  love him, and nothing else ain't going to do you. Jug Along Blackmere,
• 4:17:07
  so I told Thomas I to take him. All the time I was
• 4:17:11
  getting ready, I never dared to drive past w O's place for fear the
• 4:17:15
  sight of that fine has of his would put me in the swiers again.
• 4:17:19
  But now I never think of it at all, and I'm just that comfortable
• 4:17:25
  and happy with Tharmis. Jug Along Blackmere. How did William Obadiah take it,
• 4:17:30
  queried Anne. Oh, he ran past a bit, but he's going
• 4:17:34
  to see skinny old maid in Millersville now, and I guess she'll take him
• 4:17:37
  fast enough. She'll make him a better wife than his first did. W
• 4:17:42
  O never wanted to marry her. He just asks her to marry him cause
• 4:17:47
  his father wanted him to never dreaming, but that she'd say, no bird
• 4:17:52
  mind you. She said, yes, there was a prettigament for you.
• 4:17:56
  Jug Along black Mare. She was a great house keepper, but most awful
• 4:18:02
  mean. She war the same bonnet for eighteen years, then she got a
• 4:18:07
  new one and w O met her on the road and didn't know her Jugglange
• 4:18:11
  Blackmare. I feel that i'd anner escape. I might have married him and
• 4:18:18
  been most awful miserable, like my poor cousin Jane Anne. Jane Anne married
• 4:18:22
  a rich man she didn't care anything about, and she hasn't the life of
• 4:18:26
  a dog. She come to see me last week and says, says she
• 4:18:30
  Sarah Skinner, I envy you. I'd rather live in a little hat on
• 4:18:34
  the side of the road with the man I was fond of, than in
• 4:18:37
  my big hats with the one I've got. Jane Ann's man ain't such a
• 4:18:41
  bad sword neither, though he's so contrary that he wears his fair coat when
• 4:18:45
  the temometer's at ninety. The only way to get him to do anything is
• 4:18:49
  to coax him to do the opposite. But there ain't any love to smooth
• 4:18:53
  things down, and it's a poor way of living Jugglange, Black Mare.
• 4:19:00
  There's Giant's place in the hollow way side. She calls it quite picturesque,
• 4:19:06
  ain't it. I guess you'll be glad to get out of this with all
• 4:19:10
  them mail bags jamming round you. Yes, but I have enjoyed my drive
• 4:19:15
  with you very much, said Anne, sincerely. Get away now, said
• 4:19:19
  missus Skinner, highly flattered. Wait till I tell Tams that he always feels
• 4:19:26
  dreadful tickled when I get a compliment. Jog along Blackmare. Well here we
• 4:19:32
  are. I hope you'll get on well in the school. Miss There's a
• 4:19:36
  short cut to it, through the mash back of janets. If you take
• 4:19:40
  that way, be awful careful. If you once got stuck in that black
• 4:19:44
  mat, you'd be sacked right down an never seen or het. Tell off
• 4:19:47
  again till the day of judgment, like Adam Palmer's cow. Jug Along Blackmare,
• 4:19:55
  end of chapter thirty Chapter thirty one, and to Philippa Anne Shirley to
• 4:20:02
  Philippa Gordon, greeting, well beloved, it's high time I was writing you.
• 4:20:07
  Here. I am installed once more as a country school, ma'am at
• 4:20:11
  Valley road Boarding at Wayside, the home of miss Janet. Sweet Janet is
• 4:20:15
  a dear soul and very nice looking, tall but not over tall, stoutish,
• 4:20:21
  yet with a certain restraint of outline, suggestive of a thrifty soul who
• 4:20:25
  was not going to be over lavish, even in the matter of a bois
• 4:20:27
  du bois. She has a knot of soft, crimpy brown hair with a
• 4:20:32
  thread of gray in it, a sunny face with rosy cheeks, and big,
• 4:20:36
  kind eyes as blue as forget me nots. Moreover, she is one
• 4:20:40
  of those delightful old fashioned cooks who don't care a bit if they ruin your
• 4:20:44
  digestion as long as they can give you feasts of fat things. I like
• 4:20:48
  her, and she likes me, principally, it seems, because she had
• 4:20:52
  a sister named Anne, who died young. I'm real glad to see you,
• 4:20:56
  she said briskly when I landed in her yard. My you don't look
• 4:21:00
  a mite like I expected. I was sure you'd be dark. My sister
• 4:21:03
  Anne was dark, and here you're red headed. For a few minutes I
• 4:21:07
  thought I wasn't going to like Janet as much as I had expected at first
• 4:21:11
  sight. Then I reminded myself that I really must be more sensible than to
• 4:21:15
  be prejudiced against any one simply because she called my hair red. Probably the
• 4:21:19
  word auburn was not in Janet's vocabulary at all. Wayside is a dear sort
• 4:21:26
  of little spot. The house is small and white, set down in a
• 4:21:30
  delightful little hollow that drops away from the road. Between road and house is
• 4:21:33
  an orchard and flower garden, all mixed up together. The front door walk
• 4:21:37
  is bordered with coe hog clam shells cowhawks, Janet calls them. There is
• 4:21:42
  Virginia creeper over the porch, and moss on the roof My room is a
• 4:21:47
  neat little spot off the parlor, just big enough for the bed and me.
• 4:21:52
  Over the head of my bed there is a picture of Robbie Burns standing
• 4:21:55
  at Highland Mary's grave, shadowed by an enormous weeping willow tree. Robbie's face
• 4:22:00
  is so lugubrious that it is no wonder I have bad dreams. Why the
• 4:22:04
  first night I was here I dreamed I couldn't laugh. The parlor is tiny
• 4:22:08
  and neat. Its one window is so shaded by a huge willow that the
• 4:22:14
  room has a grotto like effect of emerald gloom. There are wonderful tidies on
• 4:22:18
  the chairs, and gay mats on the floor, and books and cards carefully
• 4:22:22
  arranged on a round table, and vases of dried grass on the mantelpiece.
• 4:22:26
  Between the vases is a cheerful decoration of preserved coffin plates, five in all,
• 4:22:32
  pertaining respectively to Janet's father and mother, a brother, her sister Anne,
• 4:22:37
  and a hired man who died here once. If I go suddenly insane
• 4:22:41
  some of these days, know all men by these presents that those coffin plates
• 4:22:45
  have caused it. But it's all delightful, And I said so. Janet
• 4:22:49
  loved me for it, just as she detested poor Esther, because Esther had
• 4:22:52
  said so much shade was unhygienic, and had objected to sleeping on a feather
• 4:22:56
  bed. Now I glory in feather beds, and the more unhygienic and feathery
• 4:23:02
  they are, the more I glory. Janet says, it is such a
• 4:23:04
  comfort to see me eat. She had been so afraid I would be like
• 4:23:07
  miss Haythorne, who wouldn't eat anything but fruit and hot water for breakfast,
• 4:23:12
  and tried to make Janet give up frying things. Esther is really a dear
• 4:23:17
  girl, but she is rather given to fads. The trouble is that she
• 4:23:21
  hasn't enough imagination and has a tendency to indigestion. Janet told me I could
• 4:23:26
  have the use of the parlor when any young men called. I don't think
• 4:23:30
  there are many to call. I haven't seen a young man in Valley Road
• 4:23:33
  yet except the next door hired boy, Sam Tolliver, a very tall,
• 4:23:37
  lank, tow haired youth. He came over one evening recently and sat for
• 4:23:41
  an hour on the garden fence near the front porch where Janet and I were
• 4:23:45
  doing fancy work. The only remarks he volunteered in all that time were have
• 4:23:51
  a peppermint, miss do now, fine thing for Katar peppermints, and powerful
• 4:23:56
  lot of jump grasses round here tonight. Yeah, yup, but there is
• 4:24:00
  a love affair going on here. It seems to be my fortune to be
• 4:24:04
  mixed up more or less actively with elderly love affairs. Mister and Missus Irving
• 4:24:10
  always say that I brought about their marriage. Missus Stephen Clark of Carmody persists
• 4:24:15
  in being most grateful to me for a suggestion which somebody else would probably have
• 4:24:18
  made if I hadn't. I do really think though, that Ludovic Speed would
• 4:24:22
  never have got any further along than Placid Courtship if I had not helped him
• 4:24:26
  in Theodora Dix out. In the present affair, I am only a passive
• 4:24:32
  spectator. I've tried once to help things along and made an awful mess of
• 4:24:36
  it, so I shall not meddle again. I'll tell you all about it
• 4:24:38
  when we meet. End of Chapter thirty one, Chapter thirty two. Tea
• 4:24:45
  with Missus Douglas. On the first Thursday night of anne sojourn and Valley Road,
• 4:24:52
  Janet asked her to go to prayer meeting. Janet blossomed out like a
• 4:24:56
  rose to attend that prayer meeting. She wore a pale blue, pansy sprinkled
• 4:25:02
  muslin dress with more ruffles than one would ever have supposed economical Janet could be
• 4:25:06
  guilty of, and a white leghorn hat with pink roses and three ostrich feathers
• 4:25:11
  on it. Anne felt quite amazed. Later on, she found out Janet's
• 4:25:15
  motive in so arraying herself, a motive as old as Eden. Valley Road
• 4:25:22
  prayer meetings seemed to be essentially feminine. There were thirty two women present,
• 4:25:26
  two half grown boys, and one solitary man. Beside the minister, Anne
• 4:25:33
  found herself studying this man. He was not handsome or young or graceful.
• 4:25:37
  He had remarkably long legs, so long that he had to keep them coiled
• 4:25:41
  up under his chair to dispose of them, and he was stoop shouldered.
• 4:25:45
  His hands were big, his hair wanted barbering, and his mustache was unkempt.
• 4:25:51
  But Anne thought she liked his face. It was kind and honest and
• 4:25:55
  tender. There was something else in it, too, just what Anne found
• 4:26:00
  it hard to define. She finally concluded that this man had suffered and been
• 4:26:06
  strong, and it had been made manifest in his face. There was a
• 4:26:10
  sort of patient, humorous endurance in his expression, which indicated that he would
• 4:26:14
  go to the stake if need be, but would keep on looking pleasant until
• 4:26:18
  he really had to begin squirming. When prayer meeting was over, this man
• 4:26:22
  came up to Janet and said, may I see you home, Janet.
• 4:26:26
  Janet took his arm as primly and shyly as if she were no more than
• 4:26:32
  sixteen. Having her first escort home, Anne told the girls at Patty's place
• 4:26:36
  later on, Miss Shirley, permit me to introduce mister Douglas, she said
• 4:26:41
  stiffly. Mister Douglas nodded and said, I was looking at you in prayer
• 4:26:45
  meeting Miss and thinking what a nice little girl you were. Such a speech
• 4:26:51
  from ninety nine people out of one hundred would have annoyed Anne bitterly, but
• 4:26:55
  the way in which mister Douglas said it made her feel that she had received
• 4:26:57
  a very real and pleasing compliment. She smiled appreciatively at him and dropped obligingly
• 4:27:03
  behind on the moonlit road. So Janet had a beau. Anne was delighted.
• 4:27:10
  Janet would make a paragon of a wife, cheery, economical, tolerant,
• 4:27:14
  and a very queen of cooks. It would be a flagrant waste on
• 4:27:17
  nature's part to keep her a permanent old maid. John Douglas asked me to
• 4:27:22
  take you up to see his mother, said Janet the next day. She's
• 4:27:26
  bed rid a lot of the time and never goes out of the house,
• 4:27:29
  but she's powerful, fond of company and always wants to see my boarders.
• 4:27:33
  Can you go up this evening? Anne assented, But later in the day
• 4:27:37
  mister Douglas called on his mother's behalf to invite them up to tea on Saturday
• 4:27:41
  evening. Oh why didn't you put on your pretty pansy dress, said Anne
• 4:27:45
  when they left home. It was a hot day, and poor Janet,
• 4:27:48
  between her excitement and her heavy black cashmere dress, looked as if she were
• 4:27:52
  being broiled alive. Old missus Douglas would think it terrible, frivolous and and
• 4:27:57
  suitable. I'm afraid drawn likes that dress, though, she added wistfully.
• 4:28:03
  The old Douglas homestead was half a mile from Wayside, cresting a windy hill.
• 4:28:08
  The house itself was large and comfortable, old enough to be dignified,
• 4:28:12
  and girdled with maple groves and orchards. There were big trim barns behind it,
• 4:28:18
  and everything bespoke prosperity. Whatever the patient endurance in mister Douglas's face had
• 4:28:22
  meant, it hadn't, so, Anne reflected, meant debts and duns.
• 4:28:27
  John Douglas met them at the door and took them into the sitting room,
• 4:28:30
  where his mother was enthroned in an arm chair. Anne had expected old Missus
• 4:28:36
  Douglas to be tall and thin, because mister Douglas was Instead, she was
• 4:28:41
  a tiny scrap of a woman with soft pink cheeks, mild blue eyes,
• 4:28:45
  and a mouth like a baby's. Dressed in a beautiful, fashionably made black
• 4:28:49
  silk dress with a fluffy white shawl over her shoulders, and her snowy hair
• 4:28:55
  surmounted by a dainty lace cap. She might have posed as a grandmother doll.
• 4:29:00
  How do you do, Janet, dear, she said sweetly. I
• 4:29:04
  am so glad to see you again. Dear. She put up her pretty
• 4:29:10
  old face to be kissed. And this is our new teacher. I am
• 4:29:15
  delighted to meet you. My son has been singing your praises until I'm half
• 4:29:21
  jealous, and I'm sure Janet ought to be wholyso poor Janet blushed. Anne
• 4:29:26
  said something polite and conventional, and then everybody sat down and made talk.
• 4:29:33
  It was hard work, even for Anne, for nobody seemed at ease,
• 4:29:36
  except old Missus Douglas, who certainly did not find any difficulty in talking.
• 4:29:41
  She made Janet sit by her and stroked her hand occasionally. Janet sat and
• 4:29:45
  smiled, looking horribly uncomfortable in her hideous dress, and John Douglas sat without
• 4:29:51
  smiling at the tea table. Missus Douglas gracefully asked Janet to pour the tea.
• 4:29:57
  Janet turned redder than ever, but did it. Anne wrote a description
• 4:30:00
  of that meal to Stella. We had cold tongue and chicken and strawberry preserves,
• 4:30:07
  lemon pie, and tarts, and chocolate cake and raisin cookies, and
• 4:30:11
  pound cake and fruit cake, and a few other things, including more pie
• 4:30:15
  caramel pie. I think it was after I had eaten twice as much as
• 4:30:18
  was good for me. Missus Douglas sighed and said she feared she had nothing
• 4:30:22
  to tempt my appetite. I'm afraid dear Janet's cooking has spoiled you for any
• 4:30:27
  other she said sweetly. Of course, nobody in Valley Rode aspires to rival
• 4:30:32
  her. Won't you have another piece of pie? Miss Shirley, you haven't
• 4:30:36
  eaten anything, Stella. I had eaten a helping of tongue and one of
• 4:30:40
  chicken, three biscuits, a generous allowance of preserves, a piece of pie,
• 4:30:44
  a tart, and a square of chocolate cake. After tea, missus
• 4:30:48
  Douglas smiled benevolently and told John to take dear Janet out into the garden and
• 4:30:53
  get her some roses. Miss Shirley will keep me company while you are out,
• 4:31:00
  won't you, she said plaintively. She settled down in her armchair with
• 4:31:03
  a sigh. I am a very frail old woman, Miss Shirley. For
• 4:31:10
  over twenty years, I've been a great sufferer for twenty long, very years.
• 4:31:17
  I've been dying by inches. How painful, said Anne, trying to
• 4:31:22
  be sympathetic and succeeding only in feeling idiotic. There have been scores of nights
• 4:31:27
  when they fought I could never live to see the dawn, went John,
• 4:31:32
  missus Douglas solemnly. Nobody knows what I've gone through. Nobody can know but
• 4:31:40
  myself. Well, it can't last very much longer now my very pilgrimage will
• 4:31:47
  soon be over, Miss Shirley. It is a great comfort to me that
• 4:31:52
  John will have such a good wife to look after him when his mother is
• 4:31:56
  gone. A great comfort, Miss Shadley. Janet is a lovely woman,
• 4:32:02
  said Anne warmly. Lovely, a beautiful character, assented missus Douglas. I'm
• 4:32:10
  the perfect housekeeper, something I never was. My health would not permit it.
• 4:32:18
  Miss Sharley. I am indeed thankful that John has made such a wise
• 4:32:22
  choice. I hope and believe that he will be happy. He is my
• 4:32:30
  only son, Miss Sharley, and his happiness lies very near my heart,
• 4:32:36
  of course, said Anne stupidly. For the first time in her life.
• 4:32:40
  She was stupid, yet she could not imagine why she seemed to have absolutely
• 4:32:45
  nothing to say to this sweet, smiling, angelic old lady who was patting
• 4:32:48
  her hand so kindly. Come and see me soon again, dear Janet,
• 4:32:55
  said Missus Douglas lovingly when they left. You don't come half off enough.
• 4:33:00
  But then I suppose John will be bringing you here to stay all the time
• 4:33:06
  one of these days. Anne, happening to glance at John Douglas as his
• 4:33:11
  mother spoke, gave a positive start of dismay. He looked as a tortured
• 4:33:15
  man might look when his tormentors gave the rack the last turn of possible endurance.
• 4:33:21
  She felt sure he must be ill and hurried. Poor blushing Janet.
• 4:33:25
  Away, isn't all, Missus Douglas a sweet woman, asked Janet as they
• 4:33:30
  went down the road. M answered Anne absently. She was wondering why John
• 4:33:36
  Douglas had looked so She's been a terrible sufferer, said Janet, feelingly she
• 4:33:41
  takes terrible spells. It keeps John all worried up. He's scared to leave
• 4:33:45
  home for fear his mother will take a spell. And nobody there but the
• 4:33:48
  hired girl. End of chapter thirty two, Chapter thirty three. He just
• 4:33:56
  kept coming and coming. Three days later, Anne came home from school and
• 4:34:00
  found Janet crying tears, and Janet seemed so incongruous that Anne was honestly alarmed.
• 4:34:07
  Oh what is the matter, she cried anxiously. I'm I'm forty today,
• 4:34:14
  sobbed Janet. Well you were nearly that yesterday and it didn't hurt,
• 4:34:18
  comforted Anne, trying not to smile, but but went on Janet with a
• 4:34:26
  big gulp. John Douglas will ask me to marry him. Oh but he
• 4:34:30
  will, said Anne lamely. You must give him time, Janet. Time,
• 4:34:37
  said Janet with indescribable scorn. He has had twenty years. How much
• 4:34:41
  time does he want? Do you mean that John Douglas has been coming to
• 4:34:47
  see you for twenty years? He has, and he has never swart as
• 4:34:52
  mentioned marriage to me. And I don't believe he ever will know. I've
• 4:34:56
  never said a word to immortal about it. But it seems to me just
• 4:35:00
  got to talk it out with someone at last, or go crazy. John
• 4:35:04
  Douglas began to go with me twenty years ago before mother died. Well.
• 4:35:08
  He kept coming and coming, and after a spell, I began making quilts
• 4:35:12
  and things. But he never said anything about getting married, only just kept
• 4:35:17
  coming and coming. There wasn't anything I could do. Mother died when we'd
• 4:35:22
  been going together for eight years. I thought he maybe would speak out then,
• 4:35:29
  seeing as I was left alone in the world. He was real kind
• 4:35:32
  and feeling and did everything he could for me. But he never said Mary.
• 4:35:36
  And that's the way it has been going on ever since. People blame
• 4:35:38
  me for it. They say I won't marry him because his mother is so
• 4:35:42
  sickly and I don't want the bother of waiting on her. Why I'd love
• 4:35:47
  to wait on John's mother, but I let them think so. I'd rather
• 4:35:52
  they blame me than pity me. It's so dreadful, humiliating that John would
• 4:35:56
  ask me, and why won't he seems to be If I alway knew his
• 4:36:00
  reason, I wouldn't mind so much. Perhaps his mother doesn't want him to
• 4:36:06
  marry Anybody, suggested Anne. Oh, she does She's told me time and
• 4:36:11
  again it. She'd love to see John's settle before time comes. She's always
• 4:36:15
  giving him hints. You heard her yourself the other day. I thought I'd
• 4:36:19
  gone through the floor. It's beyond me, said Anne helplessly. She thought
• 4:36:26
  of Ludovic speed, but the cases were not parallel. John Douglas was not
• 4:36:30
  a man of Ludovic's type. You should show more spirit, Janet, She
• 4:36:34
  went on resolutely. Why didn't you send him about his business long ago?
• 4:36:40
  I couldn't, said poor Janet pathetically. You see, Anne, I've always
• 4:36:45
  been awful fond of John. He might just as well keep coming as not,
• 4:36:48
  for there was never anybody else I'd want, so it didn't matter.
• 4:36:52
  But it might have made him speak out like a man, urged Anne.
• 4:36:56
  Janet shook her head. No, I guess I was afraid to try anyway,
• 4:37:03
  perfer I'd think I meant it and just go. I suppose I'm a
• 4:37:07
  poor, sperrited creature. But that is how I feel, and I can't
• 4:37:10
  help it. Oh you could help it, Janet. It isn't too late
• 4:37:14
  yet. Take a firm stand. Let that man know you are not going
• 4:37:18
  to endure his shilly shallying any longer, I'll back you up. I don't
• 4:37:22
  know, said Janet hopelessly. I don't know if I could ever get up
• 4:37:26
  enough spunk. Things have drifted so long. But I'll think it over.
• 4:37:32
  Anne felt that she was disappointed in John Douglas. She had liked him so
• 4:37:36
  well, and she had not thought him the sort of man who would play
• 4:37:38
  fast and loose with a woman's feelings for twenty years. He certainly should be
• 4:37:42
  taught a lesson, and Anne felt vindictively that she would enjoy seeing the process.
• 4:37:48
  Therefore, she was delighted when Janet told her, as they were going
• 4:37:51
  to prayer meeting the next night, that she meant to show some sperrit.
• 4:37:56
  I'll let John Douglas see I'm not going to be trodden on any longer.
• 4:38:00
  You are perfectly right, said Anne emphatically. When prayer meeting was over,
• 4:38:04
  John Douglas came up with his usual request. Janet looked frightened but resolute.
• 4:38:11
  No, thank you, she said icily. I know the road home pretty
• 4:38:15
  well alone. I ought to see. I've been traveling for forty years,
• 4:38:19
  so you didn't trouble yourself, mister Douglas. Anne was looking at John Douglas,
• 4:38:26
  and in that brilliant moonlight she saw the last twist of the rack again.
• 4:38:30
  Without a word, he turned and strode down the road. Stop.
• 4:38:34
  Stop, Anne called wildly after him, not caring in the least for the
• 4:38:38
  other dumbfounded onlookers. Mister Douglas, stop, come back. John Douglas stopped,
• 4:38:45
  but he did not come back. Anne flew down the road, caught
• 4:38:48
  his arm and fairly dragged him back to Janet. You must come back,
• 4:38:53
  she said, imploringly. It's all a mistake, mister Douglas, all my
• 4:38:56
  fault. I made Janet do it. She didn't want to. But it's
• 4:39:00
  all right now, isn't it Janet. Without a word, Janet took his
• 4:39:04
  arm and walked away. Anne followed them meekly home and slipped in by the
• 4:39:08
  back door. Well you are a nice person to back me up, said
• 4:39:14
  Janet sarcastically. I couldn't help it, Janet, said Anne, repentantly.
• 4:39:19
  I just felt as if I had stood by and seen murder done. I
• 4:39:22
  had to run after him. Oh, I'm just as glad you did.
• 4:39:27
  When I saw John Douglas making you off down that road. I just felt
• 4:39:32
  as if every little bit of joy and happiness that was left in my life
• 4:39:34
  was going with him. It was an awful feeling. Did he ask you
• 4:39:38
  why you did it? Asked Anne. No, he never said a word
• 4:39:42
  about it, replied Janet Dully. End of chapter thirty three. Chapter thirty
• 4:39:51
  four, John Douglas speaks. At last. Anne was not without a feeble
• 4:39:56
  hope that something might come of it after all, But nothing did. John
• 4:40:00
  Douglas came and took Janet driving and walked home from prayer meeting with her,
• 4:40:04
  as he had been doing for twenty years, and as he seemed likely to
• 4:40:08
  do for twenty years more. The summer waned. Anne taught her school and
• 4:40:12
  wrote letters and studied a little. Her walks to and from school were pleasant.
• 4:40:18
  She always went by way of the swamp. It was a lovely place,
• 4:40:22
  a boggy soil green with the greenest of mossy hillocks. A silvery brook
• 4:40:26
  meandered through it, and spruces stood erectly their boughs, a trail with gray
• 4:40:30
  green mosses, their roots overgrown with all sorts of woodland lovelinesses. Nevertheless,
• 4:40:37
  Anne found life and valley road a little monotonous, to be sure, There
• 4:40:42
  was one diverting incident. She had not seen the lank, tow headed Samuel
• 4:40:47
  of the Peppermints since the evening of his call, save for chance meetings on
• 4:40:51
  the road, But one warm August night he appeared and solemnly seated himself on
• 4:40:56
  the rustic bench by the porch. He wore his usual working habiliments, consisting
• 4:41:02
  of very patched trousers, a blue jean shirt out at the elbows, and
• 4:41:07
  a ragged straw hat. He was chewing a straw, and he kept on
• 4:41:11
  chewing it while he looked solemnly at Anne. Anne laid her book aside with
• 4:41:15
  a sigh and took up her doily. Conversation with Sam was really out of
• 4:41:19
  the question. After a long silence, Sam suddenly spoke, I'm leavin over
• 4:41:26
  there, he said, abruptly, waving his straw in the direction of the
• 4:41:30
  neighboring house. Oh are you, said Anne politely, yep, And where
• 4:41:37
  are you going now? Wall I've been thinking some of getting the place of
• 4:41:41
  my own. There's one that had suit me over at Millsville. But if
• 4:41:45
  I rinted, I'll want a woman. I suppose, so, said Anne
• 4:41:49
  vaguely. Yeah. There was another long silence. Finally, Sam removed his
• 4:41:56
  straw again and said, will you have me? Wh what? Gasped Anne?
• 4:42:02
  Will you have me? Do you mean marry you? Queried poor Anne
• 4:42:07
  feebly. Yep, why, I'm hardly acquainted with you, cried Anne indignantly.
• 4:42:12
  But you'd get acquainted with me after we was married, said Sam.
• 4:42:18
  Anne gathered up her poor dignity. Certainly, I won't marry you, she
• 4:42:22
  said, haughtily, while you might do worse, expostulated Sam. I'm a
• 4:42:29
  good worker and I've got some money in the bank. Don't speak of this
• 4:42:33
  to me again. Whatever puts such an idea into your head, said Anne,
• 4:42:37
  her sense of humor getting the better of her wrath. It was such
• 4:42:41
  an absurd situation. You are a likely looking girl and have a right smart
• 4:42:45
  way of stepping, said Sam. I don't want no old lazy woman think
• 4:42:51
  it over. I won't change my mind yet. Awhile, while I must
• 4:42:55
  be getting got to milk the cows. Anne's elude concerning proposals had suffered so
• 4:43:02
  much of late years that there were few of them left, so she could
• 4:43:06
  laugh wholeheartedly over this one. Not feeling any secret sting, she mimicked poor
• 4:43:11
  Sam to Janet that night, and both of them laughed immoderately over his plunge
• 4:43:15
  into sentiment. One afternoon, when Anne's sojourn in Valley Road was drawing to
• 4:43:21
  a close, Alec Ward came driving down to wayside in hot haste for Janet.
• 4:43:26
  They want you at the Douglas place quick, he said, I really
• 4:43:30
  believe old missus Douglas is going to die at last, after pretending to do
• 4:43:33
  it for twenty years. Janet ran to get her hat. Anne asked if
• 4:43:37
  Missus Douglas was worse than usual. She's not half as bad, said Alec
• 4:43:44
  solemnly. And that's what makes me think it serious. Other times she'd be
• 4:43:48
  screaming and throwing herself all over the place. This time she's lying still and
• 4:43:52
  mum when Missus Douglas's mum, she is pretty sick. You bet you don't
• 4:43:56
  like old missus Douglas, said Anne curiously. I like cats as is cats.
• 4:44:03
  I don't like cats as his women, was Alec's cryptic reply. Janet
• 4:44:07
  came home in the twilight. Missus Douglas is dead, she said, wearily.
• 4:44:14
  She died soon after I got there. She just spoke to me once.
• 4:44:18
  I suppose you'll marry John now, she said. It cut me to
• 4:44:22
  the heart. Anne to think John's own mother thought I wouldn't marry him because
• 4:44:26
  of her. I couldn't say a word either. There were other women there.
• 4:44:30
  I was thankful John had gone out. Janet began to cry drearily,
• 4:44:36
  but Anne brewed her a hot drink of ginger tea to her comforting. To
• 4:44:40
  be sure. Anne discovered later on that she had used white pepper instead of
• 4:44:42
  ginger, but Janet never knew the difference. The evening after the funeral,
• 4:44:48
  Janet and Anne were sitting on the front porch steps at sunset. The wind
• 4:44:52
  had fallen asleep in the pine lands, and lurid sheets of heat lightning flickered
• 4:44:56
  across the northern skies. Janet wore her o ugly black dress and looked her
• 4:45:00
  very worst, her eyes and nose red from crying. They talked little,
• 4:45:06
  for Janet seemed faintly to resent Anne's efforts to cheer her up. She plainly
• 4:45:11
  preferred to be miserable. Suddenly, the gate latch clicked and John Douglas strode
• 4:45:15
  into the garden. He walked towards them, straight over the geranium bed.
• 4:45:21
  Janet stood up, so did Anne. Anne was a tall girl and wore
• 4:45:25
  a white dress. But John Douglas did not see her. Janet, He
• 4:45:30
  said, will you marry me? The words burst out as if they had
• 4:45:33
  been wanting to be said for twenty years and must be uttered now before anything
• 4:45:37
  else. Janet's face was so red from crying that it couldn't turn any redder,
• 4:45:42
  so it turned a most unbecoming purple. Why didn't you ask me before?
• 4:45:48
  She said slowly, I couldn't. She made me promise not to.
• 4:45:52
  Mother made me promise not to. Nineteen years ago she took a terrible spell.
• 4:45:59
  We thought she couldn't live through it. She implored me to promise not
• 4:46:03
  to ask you to marry me while she was alive. I didn't want to
• 4:46:07
  promise such a thing, even though we all thought she couldn't live very long.
• 4:46:11
  The doctor only gave her six months, but she begged it on her
• 4:46:15
  knees, sick and suffering. I had to promise. Why had your mother
• 4:46:21
  against me? Cried Janet. Nothing, nothing. She just didn't want another
• 4:46:27
  woman, any woman there while she was living. She said, if I
• 4:46:33
  didn't promise, she'd die right there and I'd have killed her. So I
• 4:46:37
  promised, and she's held me to that promise ever since, though I've gone
• 4:46:41
  on my knees to her in my turn to beg her to let me off.
• 4:46:45
  Why didn't you tell me this, asked Janet chokingly. If I only
• 4:46:51
  known, why didn't you just tell me? She made me promise. I
• 4:46:55
  wouldn't tell a soul, said John hoarsely. She wore me to it.
• 4:47:00
  I'm the Bible, Janet. I'd never have done it if i'd dreamed it
• 4:47:03
  was to be for so long, Janet, You'll never know what I've suffered
• 4:47:07
  these nineteen years. I know I've made you suffer too, But you'll marry
• 4:47:11
  me for all, won't you? Janet? Oh, Janet, won't you.
• 4:47:15
  I've come as soon as I could to ask you. At this moment,
• 4:47:19
  the stupefied Anne came to her senses and realized that she had no business
• 4:47:23
  to be there. She slipped away and did not see Janet until the next
• 4:47:27
  morning, when the latter told her the rest of the story. That cruel,
• 4:47:33
  relentless, deceitful old woman cried Anne. Hush, she's dead, said
• 4:47:38
  Janet solemnly. If she wasn't, but she is, so, we mustn't
• 4:47:42
  speak evil of her. But I'm happy at last, Anne, and I
• 4:47:47
  wouldn't have minded waiting so long a bit if i'd only known why when are
• 4:47:52
  you to be married next month? Of course it will be very quiet.
• 4:47:56
  I suppose people will talk terrible. They'll say I made enough haste to snap
• 4:48:02
  John up as soon as as poor mother was out of the way. John
• 4:48:06
  want to let them know the truth, but I said no, John.
• 4:48:08
  After all, Sheoe is your mother, and we'll keep the secret between us
• 4:48:12
  and not cast any shadow on her memory. I don't mind what people say
• 4:48:17
  now that I know the truth myself. It don't matter. I might let
• 4:48:21
  it all be buried with the dead, says I to him. So I
• 4:48:23
  coaxed him round to agree with me. You're much more forgiving than I could
• 4:48:27
  ever be, Anne said, rather crossly. You'll feel differently about a good
• 4:48:32
  many things when you get to be my age, said Janet tolerantly. That's
• 4:48:37
  one of the things we learn as you grow older, how to forgive.
• 4:48:41
  It comes easier at forty than it did at twenty. End of chapter thirty
• 4:48:47
  four. Chapter thirty five, the Last Redmond Year opens. Here we are
• 4:48:53
  all back again, nicely, sunburned and rejoicing as a strong man to run
• 4:48:59
  a race, said Phil, sitting down on a suit case with a sigh
• 4:49:03
  of pleasure. Isn't it jolly to see this dear old Patty's place again,
• 4:49:07
  and Auntie and the cats. Rusty has lost another piece of ear, hasn't
• 4:49:11
  he? Rusty would be the nicest cat in the world if he had no
• 4:49:15
  years at all, declared Anne loyally from her trunk, while Rusty writhed about
• 4:49:19
  her lap in a frenzy of welcome Aren't you glad to see us back?
• 4:49:22
  Auntie demanded Phil. Yes, but I wish you'd tidy things up, said
• 4:49:30
  Aunt Jamesina, plaintively, looking at the wilderness of trunks and suit cases by
• 4:49:34
  which the four laughing, chattering girls were surrounded. You can talk just as
• 4:49:40
  well later on. Work first and then play. Used to be my motto
• 4:49:45
  when I was a girl. Oh we've just reversed that. In this generation,
• 4:49:49
  Auntie, our motto is play your play and then dig in. You
• 4:49:55
  can do your work so much better if you've had a good bout of play
• 4:49:57
  first. If you are are going to marry a minister, said Aunt Jamesina,
• 4:50:03
  picking up Joseph and her knitting and resigning herself to the inevitable with the
• 4:50:07
  charming grace that made her the queen of house mothers. You will have to
• 4:50:12
  give up such expressions as dig in, Why, moaned Phil, Oh,
• 4:50:21
  why must a minister's wife be supposed to utter only prunes and prisms? I
• 4:50:26
  shan't. Everybody on Patterson Street uses slang, that is to say, metaphorical
• 4:50:30
  language, and if I didn't, they would think me insufferably proud and stuck
• 4:50:34
  up. Have you broken the news to your family? Asked Priscilla, feeding
• 4:50:40
  the Sarah cat bits from her lunch basket. Phil nodded, how did that
• 4:50:45
  take it? Oh? Mother rampaged, but I stood rock firm, even
• 4:50:49
  I Philip a Gordon who never before could hold fast to anything. Father was
• 4:50:55
  calmer. Father's own daddy was a minister, So you see he has a
• 4:50:57
  soft spot in his heart. For I had Joe up to Mount Holly after
• 4:51:03
  Mother grew calm, and they both loved him. But Mother gave him some
• 4:51:06
  frightful hints in every conversation regarding what she had hoped for me. Oh,
• 4:51:11
  my vacation pathway hasn't been exactly strewn with roses, girls, Dear, but
• 4:51:15
  I've won out and I've got Joe. Nothing else matters to you, said
• 4:51:22
  Aunt Jamesina darkly, Nor to Joe either, retorted Phil, you keep on
• 4:51:27
  pitying him. Why pray? I think he's to be envied. He's getting
• 4:51:32
  brains, beauty and a heart of gold in me. It's well, we
• 4:51:37
  know how to take your speeches, said Aunt Jamesina patiently. I hope you
• 4:51:44
  don't talk like that before strangers. What would they think? Oh, I
• 4:51:49
  don't want to know what they think. I don't want to see myself as
• 4:51:52
  others see me. I'm sure it would be horribly uncomfortable most of the time.
• 4:51:56
  I don't believe Burns was really sincere in that either. Oh, I
• 4:52:02
  dare say we all pray for some things that we really don't want, if
• 4:52:07
  we were only honest enough to look into our hearts, owned Aunt Jamesina candidly.
• 4:52:14
  I've a notion that such prayers don't rise very far. I used to
• 4:52:19
  pray that I might be enabled to forgive a certain person, but I know
• 4:52:26
  now I really didn't want to forgive her. When I finally got that,
• 4:52:32
  I did want to, I forgave her without having to pray about it.
• 4:52:37
  I can't picture you as being unforgiving for long, said Stella. Oh I
• 4:52:41
  used to be, but holding spite doesn't seem worth while when you get along
• 4:52:48
  in years. That reminds me, said Anne, and told the tale of
• 4:52:52
  John and Janet. And now tell us about that romantic scene you hinted so
• 4:52:57
  darkly at in one of your letters, demanded Phil. Anne acted out Samuel's
• 4:53:03
  proposal with great spirit. The girl shrieked with laughter, and Aunt Jamesina smiled.
• 4:53:08
  It isn't good taste to make fun of your bows, she said severely,
• 4:53:15
  but she added calmly, I always did it myself. Tell us about
• 4:53:21
  your bows, Auntie, entreated Phil. You must have had any number of
• 4:53:25
  them. They're not in the past, tense retorted Aunt Jamesina. I've got
• 4:53:30
  them yet. There are three old widowers at home who have been casting sheep's
• 4:53:38
  eyes at me for some time. You children needn't think you own all the
• 4:53:45
  romance in the world. Widowers and sheep's eyes don't sound very romantic, Auntie,
• 4:53:52
  Well no, but young folks aren't always romantic either, So some of
• 4:54:00
  my bows certainly weren't. I used to laugh at them. Scandalous poor boys.
• 4:54:07
  There was Jim Elwood. He was always in a sort of day dream,
• 4:54:14
  never seemed to sense what was going on. He didn't wake up to
• 4:54:18
  the fact that I'd said no till a year after I'd said it. When
• 4:54:25
  he did get married, his wife fell out of the sleigh one night when
• 4:54:30
  they were driving home from church, and he never missed her. Then there
• 4:54:38
  was Dan Winston. He knew too much. He knew everything in this world
• 4:54:47
  and most of what is in the next. He could give you an answer
• 4:54:51
  to any question, even if you asked him when the judgment day was to
• 4:54:56
  be. Milton Edwards was real nice and I liked him, but I didn't
• 4:55:03
  marry him. For one thing, he took a week to get a joke
• 4:55:08
  through his head, and for another, he never asked me. Horatio Reeve
• 4:55:18
  was the most interesting bow I ever had, But when he told the story,
• 4:55:23
  he dressed it up so that you couldn't see it for frills. I
• 4:55:29
  never could decide whether he was lying or just letting his imagination run loose.
• 4:55:36
  And what about the others. Auntie go away and unpack, said aunt Jamesina,
• 4:55:42
  waving Joseph at them by mistake for a needle. The others were too
• 4:55:48
  nice to make fun of. I shall respect their memory. There's a box
• 4:55:52
  of flowers in your room, man, They came about an hour ago.
• 4:55:57
  After the first week, the girls of Patty's Place settled down to a steady
• 4:56:00
  grind of study, for this was their last year at Redmond, and graduation
• 4:56:06
  honors must be fought for Persistently. Anne devoted herself to English, Priscilla poured
• 4:56:11
  over classics, and Philippa pounded away at mathematics. Sometimes they grew tired,
• 4:56:17
  sometimes they felt discouraged. Sometimes nothing seemed worth the struggle for it. In
• 4:56:22
  one such mood, Stella wandered up to the Blue Room one rainy November evening.
• 4:56:27
  Anne sat on the floor in a little circle of light cast by the
• 4:56:30
  lamp beside her, amid a surrounding snow of crumpled manuscript. What in the
• 4:56:36
  world are you doing just looking over some old story club yarns. I wanted
• 4:56:41
  something to cheer and inebriate. I'd studied until the world seemed azure, so
• 4:56:45
  I came up here and dug these out of my trunk. They are so
• 4:56:49
  drenched in tears and tragedy that they are excruciatingly funny. I'm blue and discouraged
• 4:56:55
  myself, said Stella, throwing herself on the couch. Seems worthwhile. My
• 4:57:00
  very thoughts are old. I've thought them all before. What is the use
• 4:57:06
  of living? After all? Anne, honey, it's just brain fag that
• 4:57:08
  makes us feel that way. And the weather, a pouring, rainy night
• 4:57:12
  like this, coming after a hard day's grind, would squelch anyone but a
• 4:57:17
  Mark Tapley. You know it is worth while to live. Oh? I
• 4:57:21
  suppose so, but I can't prove it to myself. Just now, Just
• 4:57:25
  think of all the great and noble souls who have lived and worked in the
• 4:57:27
  world, said Anne dreamily. Isn't it worth while to come after them and
• 4:57:33
  inherit what they won and taught? Isn't it worth while to think we can
• 4:57:37
  share their inspiration? And then all the great souls that will come in the
• 4:57:41
  future. Isn't it worth while to work a little and prepare the way for
• 4:57:44
  them, make just one step in their path easier? Oh? My mind
• 4:57:48
  agrees with you, Anne, But my soul remains doleful and uninspired. I'm
• 4:57:52
  always grubby and dingy on rainy nights. Some nights I like the rain.
• 4:57:56
  I like to lie in bed and hear it pattering on the roof and drifting
• 4:58:00
  through the pines. I like it when it stays on the roof, said
• 4:58:04
  Stella. It doesn't always. I spent a gruesome night in an old country
• 4:58:10
  farmhouse last summer. The roof leaked and the rain came pattering down on my
• 4:58:15
  bed. There was no poetry in that. I had to get up in
• 4:58:18
  the murk midnight and shivy around to pull the bedstead out of the drip.
• 4:58:22
  And it was one of those solid, old fashioned beds that weigh a ton
• 4:58:25
  more or less. And then that drip, drop, drip drop kept up
• 4:58:29
  all night until my nerves just went to pieces. You've no idea what an
• 4:58:33
  eerie noise a great drop of rain falling with a mushy thud on a bare
• 4:58:37
  floor makes in the night. It sounds like the ghostly footsteps and all that
• 4:58:41
  sort of thing. What are you laughing over? Anne? These stories,
• 4:58:45
  as Phil would say, they are killing in more senses than one. For
• 4:58:48
  everybody died in them. What dazzlingly lovely heroines we had, and how we
• 4:58:53
  dressed them silks, satins, velvets, jewels, laces, They never or
• 4:59:00
  anything else here is one of Jane Andrews's stories, depicting her heroine as sleeping
• 4:59:04
  in a beautiful white satin night dress trimmed with seed pearls. Go on,
• 4:59:10
  said Stella, I begin to feel that life is worth living as long as
• 4:59:15
  there's a laugh in it. Here's one I wrote. My heroine is disporting
• 4:59:18
  herself at a ball, glittering from head to foot with large diamonds of the
• 4:59:22
  first water. But what booted beauty or rich attire. The paths of glory
• 4:59:27
  lead but to the grave. They must either be murdered or die of a
• 4:59:30
  broken heart. There was no escape for them. Let me read some of
• 4:59:34
  your stories. Well, here's my masterpiece. Note it's cheerful title My Graves.
• 4:59:41
  I shed quartz of tears while writing it, and the other girls shed
• 4:59:45
  gallons while I read it. Jane Andrew's mother scolded her frightfully because she had
• 4:59:49
  so many handkerchiefs in the wash that week. It's a harrowing tale of the
• 4:59:53
  wanderings of a Methodist minister's wife. I made her a Methodist because it was
• 4:59:57
  necessary that she should wander. She buried a child every place she lived in.
• 5:00:03
  There were nine of them, and their graves were severed far apart,
• 5:00:06
  ranging from Newfoundland to Vancouver. I described the children, pictured their several death
• 5:00:11
  beds, and detailed their tombstones and epitaphs. I had intended to bury the
• 5:00:15
  whole nine, but when I had disposed of eight, my invention of horrors
• 5:00:19
  gave out, and I permitted the ninth to live as a hopeless cripple.
• 5:00:23
  While Stella read my graves, punctuating its tragic paragraphs with chuckles, and Rusty
• 5:00:30
  slept the sleep of a just cat who has been out all night, curled
• 5:00:33
  up on a Jane Andrews's tale of a beautiful maiden of fifteen who went to
• 5:00:37
  nurse in a leper colony, of course, dying of the loathsome disease.
• 5:00:41
  Finally, Anne glanced over the other manuscripts and recalled the old days at Avonlea
• 5:00:45
  School, when the members of the story club, sitting under the spruce trees
• 5:00:49
  or down among the ferns by the brook, had written them what fun they
• 5:00:53
  had had, How the sunshine and mirth of those olden summers returned as she
• 5:00:59
  read. Not all the glory that was Grease, or the grandeur that was
• 5:01:03
  Rome, could weave such wizardry. As those funny, tearful tales of the
• 5:01:07
  story Club. Among the manuscripts, Anne found one written on sheets of wrapping
• 5:01:11
  paper. A wave of laughter filled her gray eyes as she recalled the time
• 5:01:17
  and place of its genesis. It was the sketch she had written the day
• 5:01:21
  she fell through the roof of the Cobb Duck house on the Tory Road.
• 5:01:25
  Anne glanced over it, then fell to reading it intently. It was a
• 5:01:29
  little dialogue between asters and sweet peas, wild canaries in the lilac bush,
• 5:01:33
  and the guardian spirit of the garden. After she had read it, she
• 5:01:37
  sat staring into space, and when Stella had gone, she smoothed out the
• 5:01:42
  crumpled manuscript. I believe I will, she said resolutely, end of chapter
• 5:01:51
  thirty five, Chapter thirty six, The Gardener's Call. Here is a letter
• 5:01:56
  with an Indian stamp for you, aunt, Jimsie, said Phil. Here
• 5:02:00
  are three for Stella and two for PRIs, and a glorious fat one for
• 5:02:03
  me from Joe. There's nothing for you, Anne except a circular. Nobody
• 5:02:08
  noticed Anne's flush as she took the thin letter. Phil tossed her carelessly,
• 5:02:14
  but a few minutes later Phil looked up to see a transfigured Anne, Honey,
• 5:02:18
  what good thing has happened? The youth's friend has accepted a little sketch
• 5:02:23
  I sent them a fortnight ago, said Anne, trying hard to speak as
• 5:02:26
  if she were accustomed to having sketches accepted every mail, but not quite succeeding,
• 5:02:33
  Anne, Shirley, how glorious? What was it? When is it
• 5:02:37
  to be published? Did they pay you for it? Yes, they've sent
• 5:02:40
  a check for ten dollars, and the editor writes that he would like to
• 5:02:42
  see more of my work. Dear man, he shall. It was an
• 5:02:47
  old sketch I found in my box. I re wrote it and sent it
• 5:02:49
  in, but I never really thought it could be accepted, because it had
• 5:02:52
  no plot, said Anne, recalling the bitter experience of Averil's atonement. What
• 5:02:57
  are you going to do with that ten dollars? Anne, let's all go
• 5:03:02
  uptown and get drunk, suggested Phil. I am going to squander it in
• 5:03:06
  a wild, soulless revel of some sort, declared Anne gaily. At all
• 5:03:10
  events, it isn't tainted money like the check I got for that horrible reliable
• 5:03:14
  baking powder story. I spent it usefully for clothes and hated them. Every
• 5:03:18
  time I put them on. Think of having a real live author at Patty's
• 5:03:22
  place, said Priscilla. It's a great responsibility, said Aunt Jamesina solemnly.
• 5:03:30
  Indeed, it is agreed Chris with equal solemnity. Autha's a kittle kettle.
• 5:03:34
  You never know when or how they will break up and may make copy of
• 5:03:38
  us. I meant that the ability to write for the press was a great
• 5:03:44
  responsibility, said Aunt Jamesina severely. And I hope Anne realizes it. My
• 5:03:52
  daughter used to write stories before she went to the foreign field, but now
• 5:03:57
  she has turned her attention to higher things. She used to say her motto
• 5:04:03
  was, never write a line you would be ashamed to read at your own
• 5:04:10
  funeral. You'd better take that for yours, Anne, if you are going
• 5:04:15
  to embark in literature. Though, to be sure, added Aunt Jamesina perplexedly,
• 5:04:22
  Elizabeth always used to laugh when she said it. She always laughed so
• 5:04:29
  much that I don't know how she ever came to decide on being a missionary.
• 5:04:34
  I'm thankful she did. I prayed that she might, but I wish
• 5:04:41
  she hadn't. Then Aunt Jamesina wondered why those giddy girls all laughed Anne's eyes
• 5:04:48
  shone all that day. Literary ambitions sprouted and butted in her brain. Their
• 5:04:52
  exhilaration accompanied her to Jennie Cooper's walking party, and not even the sight of
• 5:04:57
  Gilbert and Christine walking to just ahead of her and Roy could quite subdue the
• 5:05:02
  sparkle of her starry hopes. Nevertheless, she was not so wrapped from things
• 5:05:07
  of earth as to be unable to notice that Christine's walk was decidedly ungraceful.
• 5:05:11
  But I suppose Gilbert looks only at her face so like a man, thought
• 5:05:15
  Anne scornfully. Shall you be at home Saturday afternoon? Asked Roy. Yes,
• 5:05:22
  my mother and sisters are coming to call on you, said Roy quietly.
• 5:05:27
  Something went over Anne which might be described as a thrill, but it
• 5:05:30
  was hardly a pleasant one. She had never met any of Roy's family.
• 5:05:34
  She realized the significance of his statement, and it had somehow an irrevocableness about
• 5:05:41
  it that chilled her. I shall be glad to see them, she said
• 5:05:45
  flatly, and then wondered if she really would be glad. She ought to
• 5:05:48
  be, of course, but would it not be something of an ordeal?
• 5:05:52
  Gossip had filtered to Anne regarding the light in which the gardeners viewed. The
• 5:05:56
  infatuation of Sun and Roy must have brought pressure to bear in the matter of
• 5:06:03
  this call. Anne knew she would be weighed in the balance from the fact
• 5:06:07
  that they had consented to call. She understood that, willingly or unwillingly,
• 5:06:11
  they regarded her as a possible member of their clan. I shall just be
• 5:06:17
  myself, I shall not try to make a good impression, thought Anne loftily.
• 5:06:22
  But she was wondering what dress she had better wear Saturday afternoon, and
• 5:06:26
  if the new style of high hair dressing would suit her better than the old,
• 5:06:29
  and the walking party was rather spoiled for her. By night. She
• 5:06:33
  had decided that she would wear her brown chiffon on Saturday, but would do
• 5:06:37
  her hair low Friday afternoon. None of the girls had classes at Redmond.
• 5:06:41
  Stella took the opportunity to write a paper for the Philomathic Society, and was
• 5:06:45
  sitting at the table in the corner of the living room, with an untidy
• 5:06:48
  litter of notes and manuscript on the floor around her. Stella always vowed she
• 5:06:53
  could never write anything unless she threw each sheet down as she completed it.
• 5:06:59
  Anne, in her flannel blouse and serge skirt, with her hair rather blown
• 5:07:03
  from her windy walk home, was sitting squarely in the middle of the floor,
• 5:07:07
  teasing the Sarah cat with a wishbone. Joseph and Rusty were both curled
• 5:07:11
  up in her lap. A warm, plummy odor filled the whole house.
• 5:07:15
  For Priscilla was cooking in the kitchen. Presently she came in, enshrouded in
• 5:07:19
  a huge work apron, with a smudge of flour on her nose, to
• 5:07:23
  show Aunt Jamesina the chocolate cake she had just iced. At this auspicious moment,
• 5:07:29
  the knocker sounded. Nobody paid any attention to it, save Phil,
• 5:07:33
  who sprang up and opened it, expecting a boy with the hat she had
• 5:07:37
  bought that morning. On the doorsteps stood missus Gardner and her daughter's Anne.
• 5:07:41
  Scrambled to her feet, somehow emptying two indignant cats out of her lap as
• 5:07:47
  she did so, and mechanically shifting her wishbone from her right hand to her
• 5:07:51
  left. Priscilla, who would have had to cross the room to reach the
• 5:07:55
  kitchen door, lost her head wildly plunged the chocolate cake under a cushion,
• 5:08:00
  The inglenook sofa and dashed upstairs, Stella began feverishly gathering up her manuscript.
• 5:08:06
  Only Aunt Jamesina and Phil remained normal. Thanks to them, everybody was soon
• 5:08:11
  sitting at ease, even Anne. Priscilla came down apronless and smudgeless. Stella
• 5:08:18
  reduced her corner to decency, and Phil saved the situation by a stream of
• 5:08:22
  ready small talk. Missus Gardner was tall and thin and handsome, exquisitely gowned,
• 5:08:27
  cordial, with a cordiality that seemed a trifle forced. Aileen Gardner was
• 5:08:33
  a younger edition of her mother. Lacking the cordiality. She endeavored to be
• 5:08:37
  nice, but succeeded only in being haughty and patronizing. Dorothy Gardner was slim
• 5:08:44
  and jolly and rather tomboyish. Anne knew she was Royle's favorite sister and warmed
• 5:08:48
  to her. She would have looked very much like Royle if she had had
• 5:08:52
  dreamy dark eyes instead of roguish hazel ones. Thanks to her and Phil,
• 5:08:56
  the call really went off very well, except for a slight sense of strain
• 5:09:00
  in the atmosphere and two rather untoward incidents. Rusty and Joseph, left to
• 5:09:07
  themselves, began a game of chase and sprang madly into missus Gardner's silken lap
• 5:09:11
  and out of it in their wild career. Missus Gardner lifted her lorn yet
• 5:09:17
  and gazed after their flying forms as if she had never seen cats before,
• 5:09:21
  and Anne, choking back slightly nervous laughter, apologized as best she could.
• 5:09:26
  You are fond of cats, said missus Gardner, with a slight intonation of
• 5:09:33
  tolerant wonder. Anne, despite her affection for Rusty, was not especially fond
• 5:09:38
  of cats, but missus Gardner's tone annoyed her. Inconsequently, she remembered that
• 5:09:44
  missus John Blythe was so fond of cats that she kept as many as her
• 5:09:48
  husband would allow. They are adorable animals, aren't they, she said wickedly.
• 5:09:53
  I have never liked cats, said missus Gardner remotely. I love them,
• 5:10:00
  said Dorothy. They're so nice and selfish, doctor too good nuns selfish.
• 5:10:06
  They make me feel uncomfortable. But cats are glorious. The human you
• 5:10:11
  have too delightful old China dogs. There, May I look at them closely,
• 5:10:15
  said Aileen, crossing the room towards the fireplace, and thereby becoming the
• 5:10:21
  unconscious cause of the other accident. Picking up magog. She sat down on
• 5:10:25
  the cushion, under which was secreted Priscilla's chocolate cake. Priscilla and Anne exchanged
• 5:10:30
  agonized glances, but could do nothing. The stately Aileen continued to sit on
• 5:10:36
  the cushion and discuss China dogs until the time of departure. Dorothy lingered behind
• 5:10:41
  a moment to squeeze Anne's hand and whisper impulsively, I know you and I
• 5:10:47
  are going to be chams. Oh if I told me all about you,
• 5:10:49
  I'm the only one in the family he talks to. Poor boy, nobody
• 5:10:53
  could confine in mamma or a line. You know what glorious times you girls
• 5:10:59
  must have. Won't you let me come often and have a share in them?
• 5:11:02
  Come as often as you like. Anne responded heartily, thankful that one
• 5:11:07
  of Roy's sisters was likable. She would never like a Lean so much was
• 5:11:11
  certain, and a Leen would never like her, though missus Gardner might be
• 5:11:15
  one altogether. Anne sighed with relief when the ordeal was over. Of all
• 5:11:19
  sad words of tongue or pen the saddest ah it might have been quoted Priscilla,
• 5:11:26
  tragically, lifting the cushion. This cake is now what you might call
• 5:11:30
  a flat failure, and the cushion is likewise ruined. Never tell me that
• 5:11:33
  Friday isn't unlucky. People who send word they are coming on Saturday shouldn't come
• 5:11:41
  on Friday, said Aunt Jamesina. I fancy it was Roy's mistake, said
• 5:11:48
  Phil. That boy isn't really responsible for what he says when he talks to
• 5:11:52
  Anne. Where is Anne? Anne had gone upstairs. She felt oddly like
• 5:11:56
  crying, but she made herself laugh instead. Rusty and Joseph had been too
• 5:12:02
  awful, and Dorothy was a dear end of chapter thirty six, Chapter thirty
• 5:12:10
  seven full fledged b a's I wish I were dead, or that it were
• 5:12:15
  tomorrow night, groaned Phil. If you live long enough, both wishes will
• 5:12:21
  come true. Said Anne calmly. It's easy for you to be serene.
• 5:12:25
  You're at home in philosophy. I'm not. And when I think of that
• 5:12:29
  horrible paper tomorrow, I quail if I should fail in it. What would
• 5:12:33
  Joe say? You won't fail? How did you get on in Greek today?
• 5:12:37
  I don't know. Perhaps it was a good paper, and perhaps it
• 5:12:41
  was bad enough to make Homer turn over in his grave. I've studied and
• 5:12:45
  mauled over notebooks until I'm incapable of forming an opinion of anything. How thankful
• 5:12:51
  little Phil will be when all this examinating is over examinating. I never heard
• 5:12:56
  such a word. Well, haven't I has good a right to make a
• 5:13:00
  word, as anyone else demanded Phil. Words aren't made, They grow,
• 5:13:04
  said Anne. Never mind, I begin faintly to discern clear water ahead,
• 5:13:10
  where no examination breakers loom. Girls. Do you can you realize that our
• 5:13:15
  Redmond life is almost over? I can't, said Anne sorrowfully. It seems
• 5:13:21
  just yesterday that PRIs and I were alone in that crowd of freshmen at Redmond,
• 5:13:25
  and now we are seniors in our final examinations. Potent wise and reverend
• 5:13:30
  seniors, quoted Phil, Do you suppose we really are any wiser than when
• 5:13:36
  we came to Redmond? You don't act as if you were by times,
• 5:13:41
  said Aunt Jamesina severely. Oh, Aunt Jimsie, haven't we been pretty good?
• 5:13:45
  Girls? Take us by and large, these three winters you've mothered us,
• 5:13:49
  pleaded Phil. You've been four of the dearest, sweetest, goodest girls
• 5:13:55
  that ever went together through college? Avert Aunt Jamison, who never spoiled a
• 5:14:00
  compliment by misplaced economy. But I mistrust you haven't any too much sense yet.
• 5:14:08
  It's not to be expected. Of course, experience teaches sense. You
• 5:14:14
  can't learn it in a college course. You've been to college four years and
• 5:14:19
  I never was. But I know heaps more than you do, young ladies.
• 5:14:27
  There are lots of things that never go by rule. There's a powerful
• 5:14:30
  pile of knowledge that you never get at college. There are heaps of things
• 5:14:34
  you never learn at school. Quoted Stella, have you learned anything at Redmond?
• 5:14:41
  Accept dead languages and geometry and such trash? Queried Aunt Jamesina, Oh,
• 5:14:48
  yes, I think we have, Auntie, protested Anne. We've learned
• 5:14:52
  the truth of what Professor Woodley told us last stillamathic, said Phil. He
• 5:14:57
  said, humor is the s iciest condiment in the feast of existence. Laugh
• 5:15:03
  at your mistakes, but learn from them. Joke over your troubles, but
• 5:15:07
  gather strength from them. Make a jest of your difficulties, but overcome them.
• 5:15:11
  Isn't that worth learning, Aunt Jimsie? Yes it is, Dearie,
• 5:15:15
  when you've learned to laugh at the things that should be laughed at, and
• 5:15:19
  not to laugh at those that shouldn't you've got wisdom and understanding. What have
• 5:15:27
  you got out of your Redmond cause? Anne murmured Priscilla aside, I think,
• 5:15:33
  said Anne slowly, that I really have learned to look upon each little
• 5:15:37
  hindrance as a jest, and each great one is the foreshadowing of victory.
• 5:15:41
  Summing up, I think that is what Redmond has given me. I shall
• 5:15:45
  have to fall back on another professor Woodleigh quotation to express what it has done
• 5:15:49
  for me, said Priscilla. You remember that he said in his address,
• 5:15:53
  there is so much in the world for us all, if we only had
• 5:15:56
  the eyes to see it, and the heart to love it, and the
• 5:15:59
  hand together to ourselves. So much in men and women, so much in
• 5:16:03
  art and literature, so much everywhere in which to delight and for which to
• 5:16:07
  be thankful. I think Redmond has taught me that in some measure, Anne,
• 5:16:11
  judging from what you all say, remarked Aunt Jamesina. The sum and
• 5:16:15
  substance is that you can learn, if you've got natural gumption enough in four
• 5:16:22
  years at college, what it would take about twenty years of living to teach
• 5:16:29
  you well. That justifies higher education. In my opinion. It's a matter
• 5:16:36
  I was always dubious about before. But what about people who haven't natural gumption?
• 5:16:41
  Aunt jen Z. People who haven't natural gumption never learn, retorted Aunt
• 5:16:48
  Jamesina, neither in college nor life. If they live to be a hundred,
• 5:16:55
  they really don't know anything more than when they were born. It's their
• 5:17:00
  misfortune, not their fault, poor souls. But those of us who have
• 5:17:07
  some gumption should duly thank the Lord for it. Will you please define what
• 5:17:12
  gumption is, Aunt Jimsie asked Phil. No, I won't, young woman.
• 5:17:19
  Any One who has gumption knows what it is, and anyone who hasn't
• 5:17:26
  can never know what it is, so there is no need of defining it.
• 5:17:32
  The busy days flew by and examinations were over. Anne took high honors
• 5:17:37
  in English, Priscilla took honors in classics, and Phil in mathematics. Stella
• 5:17:41
  obtained a good all round showing. Then came convocation. This is what I
• 5:17:47
  would once have called an epic in my life, said Anne, as she
• 5:17:51
  took Roy's violets out of their box and gazed at them thoughtfully. She meant
• 5:17:55
  to carry them, of course, but her eyes wandered to another box on
• 5:17:57
  her table. It was filled with lilies of the valley, as fresh and
• 5:18:02
  fragrant as those which bloomed in the green Gables yard. When June came to
• 5:18:06
  Avonlea, Gilbert Blythe's card lay beside it. Anne wondered why Gilbert should have
• 5:18:11
  sent her flowers for convocation. She had seen very little of him during the
• 5:18:15
  past winter. He had come to Patty's place only one Friday evening since the
• 5:18:21
  Christmas holidays, and they rarely met elsewhere. She knew he was studying very
• 5:18:26
  hard, aiming at high honors and the Cooper Prize, and he took little
• 5:18:30
  part in the social doings of Redmond. Anne's own winter had been quite gay
• 5:18:33
  socially, she had seen a good deal of the gardener's She and Dorothy were
• 5:18:37
  very intimate. College circles expected the announcement of her engagement to Roy any day.
• 5:18:44
  Anne expected it herself, Yet just before she left Patty's place for convocation,
• 5:18:49
  she flung Roy's violets aside and put Gilbert's lilies of the Valley in their
• 5:18:55
  place. She could not have told why she did it. Somehow, old
• 5:18:59
  Ana Heavenlea, days and dreams and friendships seemed very close to her. In
• 5:19:03
  this attainment of her long cherished ambitions. She and Gilbert had once pictured out
• 5:19:07
  merrily the day on which they should be capped and gowned Graduates and Arts.
• 5:19:11
  The wonderful day had come, and Roy's violets had no place in it.
• 5:19:15
  Only her old friend's flowers seemed to belong to this fruition of old, blossoming
• 5:19:21
  hopes, which he had once shared. For years. This day had beckoned
• 5:19:26
  and allured to her, But when it came, the one single, keen,
• 5:19:30
  abiding memory it left with her was not that of the breathless moment when
• 5:19:33
  the stately President of Redmond gave her cap and diploma and hailed her b a.
• 5:19:38
  It was not of the flash in Gilbert's eyes when he saw her lilies,
• 5:19:42
  nor the puzzled, pained glance Roy gave her as he passed her on
• 5:19:45
  the platform. It was not of Aileen Gardner's condescending congratulations or Dorothy's ardent,
• 5:19:52
  impulsive good wishes. It was of one strange, unaccountable pang that spoiled this
• 5:19:57
  long expected day forel her and left in it a certain faint but enduring flavor
• 5:20:03
  of bitterness. The Arts graduates gave a graduation dance that night. When Anne
• 5:20:08
  dressed for it, she tossed aside the pearl beads she usually wore and took
• 5:20:12
  from her trunk the small box that had come to Green Gables on Christmas Day.
• 5:20:18
  In it was a threadlike gold chain with a tiny pink enamel heart as
• 5:20:22
  a pendant. On the accompanying card was written with all good wishes from your
• 5:20:26
  old chum Gilbert. Anne, laughing over the memory the enamel heart, conjured
• 5:20:32
  up the fatal day when Gilbert had called her carrots and vainly tried to make
• 5:20:37
  his peace with a pink candy heart, had written him a nice little note
• 5:20:41
  of thanks, But she had never worn the trinket. Tonight, she fastened
• 5:20:45
  it about her white throat with a dreamy smile. She and Phil walked to
• 5:20:49
  Redmond together. Anne walked in silence. Phil chattered of many things. Suddenly,
• 5:20:56
  she said, I heard today that Gilbert Blice's engagement to Chris Dean Stuart
• 5:21:00
  was to be announced as soon as convocation was over. Did you hear anything
• 5:21:03
  of it? No, said Anne. I think it's true, said Phil
• 5:21:07
  lightly. Anne did not speak. In the darkness, she felt her face
• 5:21:12
  burning. She slipped her hand inside her collar and caught at the gold chain
• 5:21:18
  one energetic twist, and it gave way Anne thrust the broken trinket into her
• 5:21:22
  pocket. Her hands were trembling and her eyes were smarting, but she was
• 5:21:27
  the gayest of all the gay revelers that night, and told Gilbert unregretfully that
• 5:21:32
  her card was full when he came to ask her for a dance. Afterwards,
• 5:21:37
  when she sat with the girls before the dying embers at Patty's place,
• 5:21:40
  removing the spring chilliness from their satin skins, none chatted more blithely than she
• 5:21:45
  of the day's events. Ludy Spurgeon Macpherson called here tonight after you left,
• 5:21:52
  said Aunt Jamesina, who had sat up to keep the fire on. He
• 5:21:56
  didn't know about the graduation dance. That boy ought to sleep with a rubber
• 5:22:02
  band around his head to train his ears not to stick out. I had
• 5:22:07
  a bowl once who did that and improved him immensely. It was I who
• 5:22:14
  suggested it to him, and he took my advice, but he never forgave
• 5:22:18
  me for it. Moody Spurgeon is a very serious young man, yawned Priscilla.
• 5:22:26
  He is concerned with Graver matters than his ears. He is going to
• 5:22:29
  be a minister. You know, well, I suppose the Lord doesn't regard
• 5:22:33
  the ears of a man, said Aunt Jamesina, gravely, dropping all further
• 5:22:38
  criticism of moody Spurgeon. Aunt Jamesina had a proper respect for the cloth,
• 5:22:44
  even in the case of an unfledged parson. End of Chapter thirty seven,
• 5:22:49
  Chapter thirty eight, false Dawn. Just imagine this night week I'll be in
• 5:22:56
  avonlea delightful thought, said Anne, bending over the box in which she was
• 5:23:02
  packing missus Rachel Lynde's quilts. But just imagine this night week I'll be gone
• 5:23:07
  forever from Patty's place. Horrible thought. I wonder if the ghost of all
• 5:23:11
  our laughter will echo through the maiden dreams of Miss Patty and Miss Maria,
• 5:23:17
  speculated Phil. Miss Patty and Miss Maria were coming home after having trotted over
• 5:23:22
  most of the habitable globe. We'll be back the second week in May,
• 5:23:26
  wrote Miss Patty. I expect Patty's place will seem rather small after the Hall
• 5:23:32
  of the King's at Karnak, But I never did like big places to live
• 5:23:36
  in, and I'll be glad enough to be home again when you start traveling
• 5:23:40
  late in life, you're apt to do too much of it because you know
• 5:23:42
  you haven't much time left, and it's a thing that grows on you.
• 5:23:45
  I'm afraid Maria will never be contented again. I shall leave here my fancies
• 5:23:51
  and dreams to bless the next comer, said Anne, looking around the blue
• 5:23:55
  room wistfully, her pretty blue room, where she had spent three such half
• 5:24:00
  years. She had knelt at its window to prey, and had bent from
• 5:24:03
  it to watch the sunset behind the pines. She had heard the autumn rain
• 5:24:07
  drops beating against it, and had welcomed the spring robins at its sill.
• 5:24:12
  She wondered if old dreams could haunt rooms, if when one left forever the
• 5:24:18
  room where she had joyed and suffered and laughed and wept, something of her,
• 5:24:22
  intangible and invisible, yet none the less real, did not remain behind,
• 5:24:26
  like a voiceful memory. I think, said Phil, that a room
• 5:24:30
  where one dreams and grieves and rejoices and lives becomes inseparably connected with those processes
• 5:24:37
  and acquires a personality of its own. I am sure if I came into
• 5:24:41
  this room fifty years from now, it would say Anne. Anne to me,
• 5:24:48
  what nice times we've had here, honey, What chats and jokes and
• 5:24:52
  good chummy jamborees. Oh dear me. I'm to marry Joe and June,
• 5:24:56
  and I know I will be rapturously happy. But just now I feel as
• 5:25:00
  if I wanted this lovely Redmond life to go on forever. I'm unreasonable enough
• 5:25:06
  just now to wish that, too, admitted Anne. No matter what deeper
• 5:25:10
  joys may come to us later on, we'll never again have just the same
• 5:25:14
  delightful, irresponsible existence we've had here. It's over forever, Phil, What
• 5:25:18
  are you going to do with Rusty? Asked Phil, as that privileged pussy
• 5:25:22
  padded into the room. I'm going to take him home with me and Joseph
• 5:25:29
  and the Sarah cat, announced aunt Jamesina following Rusty. It would be a
• 5:25:34
  shame to separate those cats now that they have learned to live together. It's
• 5:25:41
  a hard lesson for cats and humans to learn. I'm sorry to part with
• 5:25:47
  Rusty, said Anne regretfully, but it would be no use to take him
• 5:25:51
  to Green Gables. Marilla detests cats, and Davy would tease his life out.
• 5:25:56
  Besides, I don't suppose I'll be home very long. I've been and
• 5:26:00
  offered the principalship of the Summerside High School. Are you going to accept it?
• 5:26:03
  Asked Phil. I I haven't decided yet, answered Anne, with a
• 5:26:10
  confused flush. Phil nodded understandingly. Naturally, Anne's plans could not be settled
• 5:26:15
  until Roy had spoken. He would soon. There was no doubt of that,
• 5:26:21
  and there was no doubt that Anne would say yes when he said,
• 5:26:23
  will you please? Anne herself regarded the state of affairs with a seldom ruffled
• 5:26:27
  complacency. She was deeply in love with Roy. True, it was not
• 5:26:33
  just what she had imagined love to be, But was anything in life,
• 5:26:37
  Anne asked herself, wearily, like one's imagination of it. It was the
• 5:26:41
  old diamond disillusion of childhood, repeated the same disappointment she had felt when she
• 5:26:48
  had first seen the chill sparkle instead of the purple splendor she had anticipated.
• 5:26:52
  That's not my idea of a diamond, she had said. But Roy was
• 5:26:56
  a dear fellow and they would be very happy together, even if some indefinable
• 5:27:00
  zest was missing out of life. When Roy came down that evening and asked
• 5:27:06
  Anne to walk in the Park. Everyone at Patty's place knew what he had
• 5:27:08
  come to say, and everyone knew or thought they knew, what Anne's answer
• 5:27:14
  would be. Anne is a very fortunate girl, said Aunt Jamesina. I
• 5:27:19
  suppose so, said Stella, shrugging her shoulders. Roy is a nice fellow
• 5:27:25
  and all that, but there's really nothing in him that sounds very like a
• 5:27:30
  jealous remark Stella Maynard, said Aunt Jamesina rebukingly. It does, But I'm
• 5:27:36
  not jealous, said Stella, calmly. I love Anne and I like Roy.
• 5:27:41
  Everybody says she is making a brilliant match, and even missus Gardner thinks
• 5:27:45
  her charming. Now it all sounds as if it were made in heaven,
• 5:27:48
  but I have my doubts. Make the most of that, Aunt Jamesina.
• 5:27:52
  Roy asked Anne to marry him in the little pavilion on the Harbor shore where
• 5:27:57
  they had talked on the rainy day of their first meeting. Anne thought it
• 5:28:00
  very romantic that he should have chosen that spot, and his proposal was as
• 5:28:06
  beautifully worded as if he had copied it, as one of Ruby Gillis's lovers
• 5:28:08
  had done. Out of a deportment of courtship and marriage The whole effect was
• 5:28:14
  quite flawless, and it was also sincere. There was no doubt that Roy
• 5:28:18
  meant what he said. There was no false note to jar the symphony.
• 5:28:22
  Anne felt that she ought to be thrilling from head to foot, but she
• 5:28:26
  wasn't. She was horribly cool. When Roy paused for his answer, she
• 5:28:32
  opened her lips to say her fateful yes, and then she found herself trembling,
• 5:28:37
  as if she were reeling back from a precipice. To her came one
• 5:28:41
  of those moments when we realize, as by a blinding flash of illumination,
• 5:28:45
  more than all our previous years have taught us. She pulled her hand from
• 5:28:49
  Roy's. Oh I can't marry you. I can't, I can't, she
• 5:28:56
  cried wildly. Roy turned pale and all so looked rather foolish. He had
• 5:29:02
  small blame to him. Felt very sure. What do you mean, he
• 5:29:07
  stammered. I mean that I can't marry you, repeated Anne desperately. I
• 5:29:12
  thought I could, but I can't. Why can't you, Roy asked,
• 5:29:17
  more calmly, Because I don't care enough for you. A crimson streak came
• 5:29:22
  into Roy's face. So you've just been amusing yourself. These two years,
• 5:29:29
  he said slowly. No, no, I haven't gasped poor Anne. Oh,
• 5:29:36
  how could she explain? She couldn't explain. There are some things that
• 5:29:40
  cannot be explained. I did think I cared, truly I did. But
• 5:29:45
  I know now I don't. You have ruined my life, said Roy bitterly.
• 5:29:49
  Forgive me, pleaded Anne miserably, with hot cheeks and stinging eyes.
• 5:29:56
  Roy turned away and stood for a few minutes, looking out seaward. When
• 5:30:00
  he came back to Anne, he was very pale again. You can give
• 5:30:03
  me no hope, he said. Anne shook her head mutely. Then good
• 5:30:10
  bye, said Roy. I can't understand it. I can't believe you are
• 5:30:15
  not the woman I believe you to be, But reproaches are ile between us.
• 5:30:19
  You are the only woman I can ever love. I thank you for
• 5:30:25
  your friendship at least. Goodbye, Anne, good bye, faltered Anne.
• 5:30:32
  When Roy had gone, she sat for a long time in the pavilion,
• 5:30:34
  watching a white mist creeping subtly and remorselessly landward up the harbor. It was
• 5:30:40
  her hour of humiliation and self contempt and shame. Their waves went over her,
• 5:30:47
  and yet underneath it all was a queer sense of recovered freedom. She
• 5:30:52
  slipped into Patty's place in the dusk and escaped to her room, but Phil
• 5:30:56
  was there on the window seat. Wait, said Ann, Anne, flushing
• 5:31:00
  to anticipate the scene. Wait till you hear what I have to say,
• 5:31:04
  Phil, Roy asked me to marry him, and I refused. You You
• 5:31:11
  refused him, said Phil blankly. Yes, Anne Shirley, are you in
• 5:31:17
  your senses? I think so, said Anne wearily. Oh, Phil,
• 5:31:22
  don't scold me. You don't understand. I certainly don't understand. You've encouraged
• 5:31:27
  Roy Gardner in every way for two years, and now you tell me you've
• 5:31:30
  refused him. Then you've just been flirting scandalously with him, Anne, I
• 5:31:36
  couldn't have believed it of you. I wasn't flirting with him. I honestly
• 5:31:41
  thought I cared up to the last minute, and then well I just knew
• 5:31:45
  I never could marry him. I suppose, said Phil cruelly, that you
• 5:31:51
  intended to marry him for his money, and then your better self rose up
• 5:31:55
  and prevented you. I didn't. I never thought about his money. Oh
• 5:31:59
  I can't excp explain it to you any more than I could to him.
• 5:32:02
  Well, I certainly think you have treated Roy shamefully, said Phil in exasperation.
• 5:32:07
  He's handsome and clever and rich and good. What more do you want?
• 5:32:12
  I want someone who belongs in my life. He doesn't. I was
• 5:32:18
  swept off my feet at first by his good looks and knack of paying romantic
• 5:32:22
  compliments, and later on I thought I must be in love because he was
• 5:32:26
  my dark eyed ideal. I am bad enough for not knowing my own mind,
• 5:32:30
  but you are worse, said Phil. I do know my own mind,
• 5:32:34
  protested Anne. The trouble is my mind changes, and then I have
• 5:32:38
  to get acquainted with it all over again. Well, I suppose there's no
• 5:32:41
  use in saying anything to you. There is no need, Phil, I'm
• 5:32:45
  in the dust. This has spoiled everything backwards. I can never think of
• 5:32:49
  Redmond days without recalling the humiliation of this evening. Roy despises me, and
• 5:32:55
  you despise me, and I despise myself. You poor darling, said Phil
• 5:33:00
  melting Just come here and let me comfort you. I've no right to scold
• 5:33:04
  you. I'd have married Alec or Alonso if I hadn't met Joe. Oh,
• 5:33:10
  Anne, things are so mixed up in real life. They aren't clear
• 5:33:14
  cut and trimmed off as they are in novels. I hope that no one
• 5:33:18
  will ever again ask me to marry him as long as I live. Sobbed
• 5:33:22
  poor Anne, devoutly believing that she meant it. End of chapter thirty eight.
• 5:33:30
  Chapter thirty nine deals with Weddings. Anne felt that life partook of the
• 5:33:37
  nature of an anticlimax. During the first few weeks after her return to Green
• 5:33:41
  Gables, she missed the merry comradeship of Patty's place. She had dreamed some
• 5:33:45
  brilliant dreams during the past winter, and now they lay in the dust around
• 5:33:51
  her. In her present mood of self disgust, she could not immediately begin
• 5:33:55
  dreaming again, and she discovered that while solitude with dream eames is glorious,
• 5:34:00
  solitude without them has few charms. She had not seen Roy again after their
• 5:34:06
  painful parting in the park pavilion, but Dorothy came to see her before she
• 5:34:10
  left Kingsport. I'm awfully sorry you won't marry Roy, she said. I
• 5:34:15
  did want you for a sister, but you're quite right, you would bore
• 5:34:18
  you to death. I love him and he is a dear, sweet boy,
• 5:34:22
  but he really isn't a bit interesting. You look as if he ought
• 5:34:26
  to be, but he isn't. This won't spoil our friendship, will it,
• 5:34:30
  Dorothy, Anne had asked wistfully. No, Indeed, you're too good
• 5:34:36
  to lose. If I can't have you for a sister, I mean to
• 5:34:38
  keep you as a chem anyway. But don't threat over Roy. He's feeling
• 5:34:44
  terrible just now. I have to listen to his outpourings every day. But
• 5:34:48
  he'll get over it. He always does, oh, always, said Anne,
• 5:34:53
  with a slight change of voice. So he has got over it before.
• 5:34:59
  Dear me, Yes, said Dorothy frankly, twice before, and he
• 5:35:03
  raved to me just the same both times. Not that the others actually refused
• 5:35:07
  him. They simply announced their engagements to someone else. Of course, when
• 5:35:12
  he met you, he vowed to me that he had never really loved before,
• 5:35:17
  that the previous affairs had been merely boyish fancies. But I don't think
• 5:35:22
  you need to worry. Anne decided not to worry. Her feelings were a
• 5:35:26
  mixture of relief and resentment. Roy had certainly told her she was the only
• 5:35:30
  one he had ever loved, No doubt he believed it, but it was
• 5:35:34
  a comfort to feel that she had not, in all likelihood ruined his life.
• 5:35:38
  There were other goddesses, and Roy, according to Dorothy, must needs
• 5:35:42
  be worshiping at some shrine. Nevertheless, life was stripped of several more illusions,
• 5:35:48
  and Anne began to think drearily that it seemed rather bare. She came
• 5:35:53
  down from the porch gable on the evening of her return with a sorrowful face.
• 5:35:57
  What has happened to the old snow Queen Marilla? Oh, I knew
• 5:36:02
  you'd feel bad over that, said Marilla. I felt bad myself. That
• 5:36:07
  tree was there ever since I was a young girl. It blew down in
• 5:36:11
  the big gale we had in March. It was rotten at the core.
• 5:36:17
  I'll miss it, so grieved Anne. The porch gable doesn't seem the same
• 5:36:21
  room without it. I'll never look from its window again without a sense of
• 5:36:25
  loss. And oh, I never came home to Green Gables before that.
• 5:36:29
  Diana wasn't here to welcome me. Diana has something else to think of just
• 5:36:33
  now, said missus Lynde significantly. Well tell me all the Avonlea news,
• 5:36:38
  said Anne, sitting down on the porch steps where the evening sunshine fell over
• 5:36:44
  her hair in a fine golden rain. There isn't much else except what we've
• 5:36:48
  wrote, you, said, Missus Lynde. I suppose you haven't heard that
• 5:36:52
  Simon fletcherbroke his leg last week. It's been a great thing for his family.
• 5:36:56
  They're getting a hundred things done that they've always wanted to do but couldn't.
• 5:37:00
  As long as he was about the old crank. He came of an
• 5:37:04
  aggravating family, remarked Marilla. Aggravating. Well, rather, his mother used
• 5:37:11
  to get up in prayer meeting and tell all her children's shortcomings and ask prayer
• 5:37:15
  for them. Course it made them mad and worse than ever. You haven't
• 5:37:19
  told Anne the news about Jane, suggested Marilla. Oh Jane, sniffed Missus
• 5:37:26
  Lynde. Well, she conceded grudgingly. Jane Andrews is home from the West
• 5:37:33
  come last week, and she's going to be married to a Winnipeg millionaire.
• 5:37:37
  You may be sure, Missus Harmon lost no time in telling it far and
• 5:37:41
  wide. Dear old Jane, I'm so glad, said Anne heartily. She
• 5:37:47
  deserves the good things of life. Oh, I ain't saying anything against Jane.
• 5:37:51
  She's a nice enough girl, but she isn't in the millionaire class,
• 5:37:56
  and you'll find there's not much to recommend the man but his money. That's
• 5:38:00
  what missus Harmon says. He's an Englishman who has made his money in mines,
• 5:38:04
  but I believe he'll turn out to be a Yankee. He certainly must
• 5:38:10
  have money, for he has just showered Jane with jewelry. Her engagement ring
• 5:38:14
  is a diamond cluster so big that it looked like a plaster on Jane's fat
• 5:38:18
  paw. Missus Lynde could not keep some bitterness out of her tone. Here
• 5:38:22
  was Jane Andrews, that plain little plotter engaged to a millionaire, while Anne,
• 5:38:27
  it seemed, was not yet bespoken by anyone rich or poor, and
• 5:38:32
  Missus Harmon Andrews did brag insufferably. What has Gilbert Blythe been doing to at
• 5:38:37
  college? Asked Marilla. I saw him when he came home last week,
• 5:38:41
  and he is so pale and thin. I hardly knew him. He studied
• 5:38:45
  very hard last winter, said Anne. You know he took high honors in
• 5:38:49
  classics and the Cooper Prize. It hasn't been taken for five years, so
• 5:38:55
  I think he's rather run down. We're all a little tired anyhow, And
• 5:39:00
  Jane Andrews isn't and never will be, said missus Lynde with gloomy satisfaction.
• 5:39:06
  A few evenings, Leader Anne went down to see Jane, but the latter
• 5:39:10
  was away in Charlottetown getting sewing done. Missus Harmon informed Anne proudly. Of
• 5:39:15
  course, an avonlea dressmaker wouldn't do for Jane under the circumstances. I've heard
• 5:39:22
  something very nice about Jane, said Anne. Yes, Jane has done pretty
• 5:39:26
  well, even if she isn't a ba, said missus Harmon with a slight
• 5:39:30
  tass of her head. Mister Inglis is worth millions, and they're going to
• 5:39:34
  Europe on their wedding tour. When they come back, they'll live in a
• 5:39:37
  perfect mansion of marble in Winnipeg. Jane has only one trouble. She can
• 5:39:42
  cook so well, and her husband won't let her cook. He is so
• 5:39:47
  rich he hires his cooking done. They're going to keep a cook and two
• 5:39:51
  other maids, and a coachman and a man of all work. But what
• 5:39:53
  about you, Anne, I don't hear anything of your being married after all
• 5:39:59
  your college going, Oh laughed Anne. I'm going to be an old maid.
• 5:40:04
  I really can't find anyone to suit me. It was rather wicked of
• 5:40:08
  her. She deliberately meant to remind missus Andrews that if she became an old
• 5:40:12
  maid, it was not because she had not had at least one chance of
• 5:40:15
  marriage. But missus Harmon took swift revenge. Well. The over particular girls
• 5:40:22
  generally get left. I notice, And what's this I hear about Gilbert Blythe
• 5:40:26
  being engaged to a Miss Stewart. Charlie Sloane tells me she is perfectly beautiful?
• 5:40:32
  Is it true? I don't know if it is true that he is
• 5:40:34
  engaged to Miss Stewart, replied Anne with spartan composure. But it is certainly
• 5:40:41
  true that she is very lovely. I once thought you and Gilbert would have
• 5:40:45
  made a match of it, said missus Harmon. If you don't take care,
• 5:40:48
  Anne, all of your bows will slip through your fingers. Anne decided
• 5:40:52
  not to continue her duel with missus Harmon. You could not fence with an
• 5:40:56
  antagonist who met rapier thrust with a blow of battle. Since Jane is away,
• 5:41:03
  she said, rising haughtily, I don't think I can stay longer this
• 5:41:07
  morning I'll come down when she comes home, do, said missus Harmon effusively.
• 5:41:11
  Jane isn't a bit proud. She just means to associate with her old
• 5:41:15
  friends the same as ever. She'll be real glad to see you. Jane's
• 5:41:19
  millionaire arrived the last of May and carried her off in a blaze of splendor.
• 5:41:25
  Missus Lynde was spitefully gratified to find that mister Inglis was every day of
• 5:41:29
  forty and short and thin and grayish. Missus Lynde did not spare him in
• 5:41:33
  her enumeration of his shortcomings. You may be sure it will take all his
• 5:41:37
  gold to gild a pill like him, That's what said Missus Rachel solemnly.
• 5:41:44
  He looks kind and good hearted, said Anne loyally. And I'm sure he
• 5:41:48
  thinks the world of Jane humph, said Missus Rachel. Phil Gordon was married
• 5:41:55
  the next week, and Anne went over to Bolingbrook to be her bridesmaid.
• 5:41:59
  Phil made a dainty fairy of a bride, and the Reverend Joe was so
• 5:42:02
  radiant in his happiness that nobody thought him plain. We're going for a lovers
• 5:42:07
  saunter through the land of Evangeline, said phil and then we'll settle down on
• 5:42:11
  Patterson Street. Mother thinks it is terrible. She thinks Joe might at least
• 5:42:15
  take a church in a decent place. But the wilderness of the Patterson slums
• 5:42:19
  will blossom like the rose for me if Joe is there. Oh, Anne,
• 5:42:25
  I'm so happy. My heart aches with it. Anne was always glad
• 5:42:29
  in the happiness of her friends, but it is sometimes a little lonely to
• 5:42:33
  be surrounded everywhere by a happiness that is not your own. And it was
• 5:42:37
  just the same when she went back to Avonlea. This time it was Diana
• 5:42:41
  who was bathed in the wonderful glory that comes to a woman when her first
• 5:42:45
  born is laid beside her. Anne looked at the white young mother with a
• 5:42:48
  certain awe that had never entered into her feelings for Diana before. Could this
• 5:42:53
  pale woman with the rapture in her eyes be the little black, curled,
• 5:42:56
  rosy cheeked Diana she had played with and vanished school days. It gave her
• 5:43:02
  a queer, desolate feeling that she herself somehow belonged only in those past years
• 5:43:07
  and had no business in the present at all. Isn't he perfectly beautiful,
• 5:43:11
  said Diana proudly. The little fat fellow was absurdly like Fred, just as
• 5:43:18
  round, just as red. Anne really could not say conscientiously that she thought
• 5:43:22
  him beautiful, but she vowed sincerely that he was sweet and kissable and altogether
• 5:43:26
  delightful. Before he came, I wanted a girl so that I could call
• 5:43:30
  her Anne, said Diana. But now that little Fred is here, I
• 5:43:34
  wouldn't exchange it for a million girls. He just couldn't have been anything but
• 5:43:37
  his own precious self. Every little baby is the sweetest and the best,
• 5:43:42
  quoted Missus Allan Gaily. If little Anne had come, you'd have felt just
• 5:43:47
  the same about her. Missus Allan was visiting in Avonlea for the first time
• 5:43:52
  since leaving it. She was as gay and sweet and sympathetic as ever.
• 5:43:56
  Her old girlfriends had welcomed her back rapturously. The reigning minister's wife was an
• 5:44:02
  estimable lady, but she was not exactly a kindred spirit. I can hardly
• 5:44:06
  wait till he gets old enough to talk, sighed Diana. I just longed
• 5:44:11
  to hear and say mother, and oh. I'm determined that his first memory
• 5:44:14
  of me shall be a nice one. The first memory I have of my
• 5:44:17
  mother is for slapping me for something I had done. I'm sure I deserved
• 5:44:21
  it, and mother was always a good mother, and I love her dearly,
• 5:44:23
  but I do wish my first memory of her was nicer. I have
• 5:44:26
  just one memory of my mother, and it is the sweetest of all my
• 5:44:30
  memories, said missus Allen. I was five years old and I had been
• 5:44:34
  allowed to go to school one day with my two older sisters. When school
• 5:44:38
  came out, my sisters went home in different groups, each supposing I was
• 5:44:41
  with the other. Instead, I had run off with the little girl I
• 5:44:45
  had played with at recess. We went to her home, which was near
• 5:44:48
  the school, and began making mud pies. We were having a glorious time
• 5:44:53
  when my older sister arrived, breathless and angry. You naughty girls, she
• 5:44:59
  cried, snatching my reluctant hand and dragging me along with her. Come home
• 5:45:03
  this minute. Oh you're going to catch it. Mother is awful cross.
• 5:45:07
  She's going to give you a good whipping. I had never been whipped.
• 5:45:12
  Dread and terror filled, my poor little heart. I have never been so
• 5:45:18
  miserable in my life as I was on that walk home. I had not
• 5:45:22
  meant to be naughty. Phoebe Cameron had asked me to go home with her,
• 5:45:26
  and I had not known it was wrong to go, and now I
• 5:45:30
  was to be whipped for it. When we got home, my sister dragged
• 5:45:33
  me into the kitchen where Mother was sitting by the fire in the twilight.
• 5:45:37
  My poor wee legs were trembling so that I could hardly stand and mother.
• 5:45:44
  Mother just took me up in her arms, without one word of rebuke or
• 5:45:48
  harshness, kissed me and held me close to her heart. I was so
• 5:45:53
  frightened. You were lost, darling, she said tenderly. I could see
• 5:45:56
  the love shining in her eyes as she looked down on me. She never
• 5:46:00
  scolded or reproached me for what I had done, only told me I must
• 5:46:04
  never go away again without asking permission. She died very soon afterwards. That
• 5:46:10
  is the only memory I have of her, Isn't it a beautiful one?
• 5:46:15
  Anne felt lonelier than ever as she walked home, going by way of the
• 5:46:18
  Birch Path and Willowmere. She had not walked that way from many moons.
• 5:46:22
  It was a darkly purple, bloomy night. The air was heavy with blossom
• 5:46:27
  fragrance almost too heavy. The Cloyd's senses recoiled from it as from an over
• 5:46:33
  full cup. The birches of the path had grown, from the fairy saplings
• 5:46:37
  of old to big trees. Everything had changed. Anne felt that she would
• 5:46:41
  be glad when the summer was over and she was away at work again.
• 5:46:45
  Perhaps life would not seem so empty. Then I've tried the world. It
• 5:46:51
  wears no more the coloring of romance it wore, sighed Anne, and was
• 5:46:56
  straightway much comforted by the romance in the idea of the world being denuded of
• 5:47:00
  romance. End of chapter thirty nine, Chapter four April's Lady. Kingsport is
• 5:47:10
  a quaint old town, HARKing back to early colonial days, and wrapped in
• 5:47:15
  its ancient atmosphere as some fine old dame in garments fashioned like those of her
• 5:47:19
  youth. Here and there it sprouts out into modernity, but at heart it
• 5:47:25
  is still unspoiled. It is full of curious relics and haloed by the romance
• 5:47:30
  of many legends of the past. Once it was a mere frontier station on
• 5:47:33
  the fringe of the wilderness, and those were the days when Indians kept life
• 5:47:37
  from being monotonous to the settlers. Then it grew to be a bone of
• 5:47:41
  contention between the British and the French, being occupied now by the one and
• 5:47:45
  now by the other, emerging from each occupation with some fresh scar of battling
• 5:47:51
  nations branded on it. It has in its park a Martello tower autographed all
• 5:47:56
  over by tourists, a dismantled old French four on the hills beyond the town,
• 5:48:00
  and several antiquated cannon in its public squares. It has other historic spots
• 5:48:07
  also, which may be hunted out by the curious. And none is more
• 5:48:11
  quaint and delightful than Old Saint John's Cemetery, at the very core of the
• 5:48:15
  town, with streets of quiet old time houses on two sides and busy,
• 5:48:19
  bustling modern thoroughfares on the others. Every citizen of Kingsport feels a thrill of
• 5:48:26
  possessive pride in Old Saint John's, for if he be of any pretensions at
• 5:48:30
  all, he has an ancestor buried there, with a queer crooked slab at
• 5:48:34
  his head, or else sprawling protectively over the grave on which all the main
• 5:48:38
  facts of his history are recorded. For the most part, no great art
• 5:48:44
  or skill was lavished on those old tombstones. The larger number are of roughly
• 5:48:48
  chiseled brown or gray native stone, and only in a few cases is there
• 5:48:52
  any attempt at ornamentation. Some are adorned with skull and crossbones, and this
• 5:48:57
  grisly decoration is frequently coupled with a cherub's head. Many are prostrate and in
• 5:49:03
  ruins. In almost all, time's tooth has been gnawing until some inscriptions have
• 5:49:08
  been completely effaced, and others can only be deciphered with difficulty. The graveyard
• 5:49:15
  is very full and very bowery, for it is surrounded and intersected by rows
• 5:49:21
  of elms and willows, beneath whose shade the sleepers must lie, very dreamlessly,
• 5:49:26
  forever crooned to by the winds and leaves over them, and quite undisturbed
• 5:49:30
  by the clamor of traffic just beyond. Anne took the first of many rambles
• 5:49:36
  and Old Saint John's the next afternoon. She and Priscilla had gone to Redmond
• 5:49:40
  in the forenoon and registered as students, after which there was nothing more to
• 5:49:45
  do that day. The girls gladly made their escape, for it was not
• 5:49:48
  exhilarating to be surrounded by crowds of strangers, most of whom had a rather
• 5:49:52
  alien appearance, as if not quite sure where they belonged. The freshettes stood
• 5:49:59
  about in detached groups of two or three, looking askance at each other.
• 5:50:03
  The freshies, wiser in their day and generation, had banded themselves together on
• 5:50:08
  the big staircase of the entrance hall, where they were shouting out glees with
• 5:50:12
  all the vigor of youthful lungs, as a species of defiance to their traditional
• 5:50:17
  enemies. The sophomores, a few of whom were prowling loftily about, looking
• 5:50:22
  properly disdainful of the unlicked cubs on the stairs. Gilbert and Charlie were nowhere
• 5:50:29
  to be seen. Little did I think the day would ever come when I'd
• 5:50:32
  be glad at the sight of a sloan, said Priscilla as they crossed the
• 5:50:36
  campus. But I'd welcome Charlie's goggle eyes almost ecstatically. At least they'd be
• 5:50:40
  familiar eyes, oh, sighed Anne. I can't describe how I felt when
• 5:50:45
  I was standing there, waiting my turn to be registered as insignificant as the
• 5:50:51
  teeniest drop in a most enormous bucket. It's bad enough to feel insignificant,
• 5:50:56
  but it's unbearable to have it grained into your soul that you will never,
• 5:51:00
  can, never be anything but insignificant. And that is how I did feel,
• 5:51:04
  as if I were invisible to the naked eye, and some of those
• 5:51:07
  softs might step on me. I knew I would go down to my grave
• 5:51:11
  unwept, unhonored, and unsung. Wait till next year, comforted Priscilla.
• 5:51:18
  Then we'll be able to look as bored and sophisticated as any sophomore of them
• 5:51:22
  all. No doubt, it is rather dreadful to feel insignificant, but I
• 5:51:25
  think it's better that than to feel as big and awkward as I did,
• 5:51:27
  as if I was sprawled all over Redmond. That's how I felt, I
• 5:51:32
  suppose because I was a good two inches taller than any one else in the
• 5:51:33
  crowd, I wasn't afraid a soft might walk all over me. I was
• 5:51:37
  afraid they'd take me for an elephant, or an overgrown sample of a potato
• 5:51:41
  fed islander. I suppose the trouble is we can't forgive big Redmond for not
• 5:51:45
  being little queens, said Anne, gathering about her the shreds of her old
• 5:51:49
  cheerful philosophy to cover her nakedness of spirit. When we left Queen's, we
• 5:51:55
  knew everybody and had a place of our own. I suppose we have been
• 5:51:59
  unconsciously expecting to take life up at Redmond just where we left off at Queen's,
• 5:52:03
  and now we feel as if the ground had slipped from under our feet.
• 5:52:07
  I'm thankful that neither missus Lynde nor missus Alisha Wright know or ever will
• 5:52:11
  know my state of mind at present. They would exult in saying I told
• 5:52:15
  you so, and be convinced it was the beginning of the end, whereas
• 5:52:19
  it is just the end of the beginning exactly that sounds more annish. In
• 5:52:26
  a little while will be acclimated and acquainted, and all will be well.
• 5:52:29
  And did you notice the girl who stood alone just outside the door of the
• 5:52:32
  co ed's dressing room all the morning, the pretty one with the brown eyes
• 5:52:36
  and the crooked mouth. Yes I did. I noticed her, particularly because
• 5:52:40
  she seemed the only creature there who looked as lonely and friendless as I felt.
• 5:52:45
  I had you, but she had no one. I think she felt
• 5:52:48
  pretty all by her selfish too. Several times I saw her make a motion
• 5:52:52
  as if to cross over to us, but she never did it too shy.
• 5:52:55
  I suppose I wish she would come if I hadn't felt so much like
• 5:52:57
  the aforesaid elephant eye gone to her. But I couldn't lumber across the big
• 5:53:02
  hall with all those boys howling on the stairs. She was the prettiest freshet
• 5:53:06
  I saw today, But probably favor is deceitful, and even beauty is vain
• 5:53:10
  on your first hit, Redmond concluded Priscilla with a laugh. I'm going across
• 5:53:15
  to Old Saint John's after lunch, said Anne. I don't know that a
• 5:53:19
  graveyard is a very good place to go to get cheered up, but it
• 5:53:22
  seems the only get atable place where there are trees, and trees I must
• 5:53:26
  have. I'll sit on one of those old slabs and shut my eyes and
• 5:53:30
  imagine I'm in the Avonlea woods. Anne did not do that, however,
• 5:53:36
  for she found enough of interest in Old Saint John's to keep her eyes wide
• 5:53:38
  open. They went in by the entrance gates, past the simple massive stone
• 5:53:45
  arch surmounted by the Great Lion of England, and on Inkerman. Yet the
• 5:53:48
  wild bramble is gory and those bleak heights henceforth shall be famous in story,
• 5:53:55
  quoted Anne, looking at it with a thrill. They found themselves in a
• 5:54:00
  dim, cool green place, where winds were fond of purring up and down
• 5:54:04
  the long grassy aisles. They wandered, reading the quaint, voluminous epitaphs carved
• 5:54:10
  in an age that had more leisure than our own. Here lieth the body
• 5:54:15
  of Albert Crawford, Esquire, read Anne from a worn gray slab. For
• 5:54:21
  many years, keeper of his Majesty's ordnance at Kingsport. He served in the
• 5:54:25
  army till the Peace of seventeen sixty three, when he retired from bad health.
• 5:54:30
  He was a brave officer, the best of husbands, the best of
• 5:54:33
  fathers, the best of friends. He died October twenty ninth, seventeen ninety
• 5:54:38
  two, aged eighty four years. There's an epitaph for you, prissy.
• 5:54:44
  There is certainly some scope for imagination in it. How full such a life
• 5:54:48
  must have been of adventure. And as for his personal qualities, I'm sure
• 5:54:52
  human eulogy couldn't go further. I wonder if they told him he was all
• 5:54:56
  those best things while he was alive. Here another said Priscilla, listen to
• 5:55:03
  the memory of Alexander Ross, who died on the twenty second of September eighteen
• 5:55:07
  forty, aged forty three years. This is raised as a tribute of affection
• 5:55:11
  by one whom he served so faithfully for twenty seven years, that he was
• 5:55:15
  regarded as a friend deserving the fullest confidence and attachment. A very good epitaph,
• 5:55:21
  commented Anne thoughtfully. I wouldn't wish you better. We are all servants
• 5:55:25
  of some sort, and if the fact that we are faithful can be truthfully
• 5:55:29
  inscribed on our tombstones, nothing more need be added. Here's a sorrowful,
• 5:55:33
  little gray stone, Prissy, to the memory of a favorite child. And
• 5:55:37
  here is another erected to the memory of one who is buried elsewhere. I
• 5:55:42
  wonder where that unknown grave is, really, Chris. The graveyards of today
• 5:55:47
  will never be as interesting as this. You were right. I shall come
• 5:55:51
  here often. I love it already. I see we're not alone here.
• 5:55:56
  There's a girl down at the end of this avenue. Yes, and Lave,
• 5:56:00
  it's the very girl we start redmand this morning. I've been watching her
• 5:56:03
  for five minutes. She has started to come up the avenue exactly half a
• 5:56:06
  dozen times, and half a dozen times she has turned and gone back.
• 5:56:10
  Either she's dreadfully shy, or she has got something on her conscience. Let's
• 5:56:14
  go and meet her. It's easier to get acquainted in a graveyard than at
• 5:56:17
  Redmond, I believe. They walked down the long grassy arcade towards the stranger,
• 5:56:22
  who was sitting on a gray slab under an enormous willow. She was
• 5:56:26
  certainly very pretty, with a vivid, irregular, bewitching type of prettiness.
• 5:56:30
  There was a gloss as of brown nuts on her satin smooth hair, and
• 5:56:34
  a soft ripe glow on her round cheeks. Her eyes were big and brown
• 5:56:38
  and velvety under oddly pointed black brows, and her crooked mouth was rose red.
• 5:56:45
  She wore a smart brown suit with two very modish little shoes peeping from
• 5:56:49
  beneath it, and her hat of dull pink straw wreathed with golden brown poppies
• 5:56:56
  had the indefinable unmistakable air which pertains to the creation of an artist in millinery.
• 5:57:03
  Priscilla had a sudden stinging consciousness that her own hat had been trimmed by
• 5:57:07
  her village store milliner and Anne wondered uncomfortably if the blouse she had made herself
• 5:57:12
  and which missus Lynde had fitted looked very countrified and home made beside the stranger's
• 5:57:18
  smart attire. For a moment, both girls felt like turning back, but
• 5:57:22
  they had already stopped and turned towards the gray slab. It was too late
• 5:57:26
  to retreat, for the brown eyed girl had evidently concluded that they were coming
• 5:57:30
  to speak to her. Instantly, she sprang up and came forward with outstretched
• 5:57:36
  hand and a gay, friendly smile in which there seemed not a shadow of
• 5:57:41
  either shyness or burdened conscience. Oh I want to know who you two girls
• 5:57:45
  are, she exclaimed eagerly. I've been dying to know. I saw you
• 5:57:51
  at Redmond this morning. Say, wasn't it awful there? For the time
• 5:57:55
  I wished I had stayed home and got married. Anne and Priscilla both broke
• 5:57:59
  into unconstrained laughter at this unexpected conclusion. The brown eyed girl laughed too,
• 5:58:04
  I really did, I could have you know. Come, let's all sit
• 5:58:10
  down on this gravestone and get acquainted. It won't be hard. I know
• 5:58:12
  we're going to adore each other. I knew it. As soon as I
• 5:58:15
  saw you at Redmond this morning. I wanted so much to go right over
• 5:58:19
  and hug you both. Why didn't you, asked Priscilla. Because I simply
• 5:58:25
  couldn't make up my mind to do it. I never can make up my
• 5:58:27
  mind about anything myself. I'm always afflicted with indecision. Just as soon as
• 5:58:33
  I decide to do something, I feel in my bones that another course would
• 5:58:36
  be the correct one. It's a dreadful misfortune, but I was born that
• 5:58:41
  way, and there is no use in blaming me for it, as some
• 5:58:44
  people do. So I couldn't make up my mind to go and speak to
• 5:58:47
  you, much as I wanted to. We thought you were too shy,
• 5:58:51
  said Anne. No, no, dear, shyness isn't among the many failings
• 5:58:56
  or virtues of Philip A. Gordon Phil for short. Do call me Phil
• 5:59:00
  right off. Now, what are your handles? She's Priscilla Grant, said
• 5:59:04
  Anne, pointing, And she's Anne Shirley, said Priscilla, pointing in turn.
• 5:59:11
  And we're we're from island, said both together. I hail from Bowlingbroke,
• 5:59:15
  Nova Scotia, said Philippa. Bowlingbrook exclaimed Anne. Why that is where
• 5:59:22
  I was born. Do you really mean it? Why that makes you a
• 5:59:26
  blue nose after all? No, it doesn't, retorted Anne. Wasn't it
• 5:59:30
  Dan O'Connell who said that if a man was born in a stable, it
• 5:59:33
  didn't make him a horse. I'm island to the core. Well, I'm
• 5:59:37
  glad you were born in Bowlingbroke anyway. It makes us kind of neighbors,
• 5:59:41
  doesn't it. And I like that because when I tell you secrets, it
• 5:59:45
  won't be as if I were telling them to a stranger. I have to
• 5:59:48
  tell them I can't keep secrets. It's no use to try. That's my
• 5:59:52
  worst failing that and indecision, As aforesaid, would you believe it? It
• 5:59:59
  took me half an hour to decide which hat to wear when I was coming
• 6:00:02
  here here to a graveyard. At first I inclined to my brown one with
• 6:00:07
  a feather, But as soon as I put it on, I thought this
• 6:00:10
  pink one with the floppy brim would be more becoming. When I got it
• 6:00:12
  pinned in place, I liked the brown one better. At last, I
• 6:00:15
  put them close together on the bed, shut my eyes and jabbed with a
• 6:00:19
  hat pin. The pin speared the pink one so I put it on.
• 6:00:23
  It is becoming, isn't it? Tell me what do you think of my
• 6:00:27
  looks? At this naive demand made in a perfectly serious tone, Priscilla laughed
• 6:00:33
  again, but Anne said, impulsively, squeezing Philip's hand, we thought this
• 6:00:38
  morning that you were the prettiest girl we saw at Redmond. Philippa's crooked mouth
• 6:00:44
  flashed into a bewitching, crooked smile over very white little teeth. I thought
• 6:00:48
  that myself was her next astounding statement, but I wanted some one else's opinion
• 6:00:55
  to bolster mine up. I can't decide even on my own appearance. Just
• 6:00:59
  as soon as I've decided that I'm pretty, I begin to feel miserably that
• 6:01:02
  I'm not. Besides, I have a horrible old great aunt who is always
• 6:01:06
  saying to me, with a mournful sigh, you are such a pretty baby.
• 6:01:11
  It's strange how children change when they grow up. I adore aunts,
• 6:01:15
  but I detest great aunts. Please tell me quite often that I am pretty,
• 6:01:19
  if you don't mind. I feel so much more comfortable when I can
• 6:01:22
  believe I'm pretty. And I'll be just as obliging to you if you want
• 6:01:26
  me to. I can be with a clear conscience. Thanks laughed, Anne.
• 6:01:32
  But Priscilla and I are so firmly convinced of our own good looks that
• 6:01:36
  we don't need any assurance about them, so you needn't trouble Oh you're laughing
• 6:01:40
  at me. I know you think I'm abominably vain, but I'm not.
• 6:01:45
  There really isn't one spark of vanity in me, and I'm never a bit
• 6:01:48
  grudging about paying compliments to other girls when they deserve them. I'm so glad
• 6:01:52
  I know you, folks. I came up on Saturday, and I've nearly
• 6:01:56
  died of homesickness ever since. It's a horrible feeling, isn't it. In
• 6:02:00
  Bowlingbroke, I'm an important personage, and in Kingsport I'm just nobody. There
• 6:02:06
  were times when I could feel my soul turning a delicate blue. Where do
• 6:02:10
  you hang out? Thirty eight Saint John's Street? Better and better? Why?
• 6:02:15
  I'm just around the corner on Wallace Street. I don't like my boarding
• 6:02:18
  house though. It's bleak and lonesome, and my room looks out on such
• 6:02:22
  an unholy backyard. It's the ugliest place in the world. As for cats,
• 6:02:27
  well, surely all the Kingsport cats can't congregate there at night, but
• 6:02:32
  half of them must. I adore cats on hearth rugs, snoozing before nice
• 6:02:37
  friendly fires, but cats and back yards at midnight are totally different animals.
• 6:02:41
  The first night I was here, I cried all night, and so did
• 6:02:45
  the cats. You should have seen my nose in the morning. How I
• 6:02:49
  wished I had never left home. I don't know how you managed to make
• 6:02:52
  up your mind to come to Redmond at all, if you're really such an
• 6:02:56
  undecided person, said amused Priscilla. Bless your heart, honey, I didn't.
• 6:03:02
  It was father who wanted me to come here. His heart was set
• 6:03:04
  on it. Why, I don't know. It seems perfectly ridiculous to think
• 6:03:08
  of me studying for a BA degree, doesn't it not? But what I
• 6:03:11
  can do it? All right? I have heaps of brains, oh,
• 6:03:15
  said Priscilla, vaguely, yes, but it's such hard work to use them.
• 6:03:21
  And bas are such learned, dignified, wise, solemn creatures. They
• 6:03:25
  must be. No, I didn't want to come to Redmond. I did
• 6:03:30
  it just to oblige father. He is such a duck. Besides, I
• 6:03:33
  knew if I stayed home i'd have to get married. Mother wanted that,
• 6:03:37
  wanted it decidedly. Mother has plenty of decision. But I really hated the
• 6:03:42
  thought of being married for a few years. Yet I want to have heaps
• 6:03:45
  of fun before I settle down. And ridiculous as the idea of my being
• 6:03:49
  a ba is, the idea of my being an old married woman is still
• 6:03:53
  more absurd, isn't it. I'm only eighteen. No, I concluded,
• 6:04:00
  I would rather come to Redmond than be married. Besides, how could I
• 6:04:03
  ever have made up my mind which man to marry? Were there so many?
• 6:04:07
  Laughed Anne heaps. The boys like me awfully, they really do,
• 6:04:12
  but they were only two that mattered. The rest were all too young and
• 6:04:15
  too poor. I must marry a rich man. You know, why must
• 6:04:21
  you? Honey? You couldn't imagine me being a poor man's wife, could
• 6:04:25
  you. I can't do a single useful thing, and I am very extravagant.
• 6:04:29
  Oh no, my husband must have heaps of money. So that narrowed
• 6:04:33
  them down to two. But I couldn't decide between two any easier than between
• 6:04:37
  two hundred. I knew perfectly well that whichever one I chose, i'd regret
• 6:04:41
  all my life that I hadn't married the other. Didn't you love either of
• 6:04:45
  them? Asked Anne a little hesitatingly. It was not easy for her to
• 6:04:51
  speak to a stranger of the great mystery and transformation of life goodness. No,
• 6:04:56
  I couldn't love anybody. It isn't in me. I wouldn't want to.
• 6:05:00
  Being in love makes you a perfect slave, I think, and it
• 6:05:04
  would give a man such power to hurt you. I'd be afraid. No.
• 6:05:08
  No. Alec and Alonzo are two dear boys, and I like them
• 6:05:12
  both so much that I really don't know which I like the better. That
• 6:05:17
  is the trouble. Alec is the best looking, of course, and I
• 6:05:19
  simply couldn't marry a man who wasn't handsome. He is good tempered, too,
• 6:05:23
  and has lovely, curly black hair. He's rather too perfect. I
• 6:05:27
  don't believe i'd like a perfect husband, somebody I could never find fault with.
• 6:05:33
  Then why not marry Alonzo, asked Priscilla gravely. Think of marrying a
• 6:05:37
  name like Alonzo, said Phil dolefully. I don't believe I could endure it.
• 6:05:44
  But he has a classic nose, and it would be a comfort to
• 6:05:47
  have a nose in the family that could be depended on I can't depend on
• 6:05:49
  mine. So far. It takes after the Gordon pattern, but I'm so
• 6:05:53
  afraid it will develop burn tendencies as I grow older. I examine it every
• 6:05:59
  day anxiously to make sure it's still Gordon. Mother was a burn and has
• 6:06:03
  the burn nose in the burnest degree. Wait till you see it. I
• 6:06:07
  adore nice noses. Your nose is awfully nice, Anne Shirley. Alonzo's nose
• 6:06:11
  nearly turned the balance in his favor, But Alonzo no, I couldn't decide.
• 6:06:18
  If I could have done as I did with the hats, stood them
• 6:06:21
  both up together, shut my eyes and jabbed with a hat pin, it
• 6:06:23
  would have been quite easy. What did Alec and Alonzo feel like when you
• 6:06:29
  came away, queried Priscilla. Oh they still have hope. I told them
• 6:06:33
  they have to wait till I could make up my mind. They're quite willing
• 6:06:36
  to wait. They both worshiped me, you know. Meanwhile, I intend
• 6:06:40
  to have a good time. I expect I shall have heaps of bows at
• 6:06:42
  Redmond. I can't be happy unless I have, you know, But don't
• 6:06:47
  you think the freshmen are fearfully homely? I saw only one really handsome fellow
• 6:06:52
  among them. He went away before you came. I heard his chum call
• 6:06:55
  him Gilbert. His chum had eyes that stuck out that far. But you're
• 6:07:00
  not going yet. Girls, don't go yet, I think we must,
• 6:07:03
  said Anne rather coldly. It's getting late and I've some work to do.
• 6:07:08
  But you'll both come to see me, won't you, asked Philippa, getting
• 6:07:12
  up and putting an arm around each and let me come to see you.
• 6:07:17
  I want to be chummy with you. I've taken such a fancy to you
• 6:07:21
  both, and I haven't quite disgusted you with my frivolity, have I?
• 6:07:25
  Not quite? Laughed Anne, responding to Phil's squeeze with a return of cordiality.
• 6:07:30
  Because I'm not half so silly as I seem on the surface. You
• 6:07:33
  know, you just accept Philippa Gordon as the Lord made her, with all
• 6:07:37
  her faults, and I believe you'll come to like her. Isn't this graveyard
• 6:07:41
  a sweet place? I'd love to be buried. Here here's a grave I
• 6:07:45
  didn't see before, this one in the iron railing. Oh girls, look
• 6:07:51
  see the stone says it's the grave of a middy who was killed in the
• 6:07:53
  fight between the Shannon and the Chesapeake. Just fancy. Anne paused by the
• 6:08:00
  railing and looked at the worn stone, her pulses thrilling with sudden excitement.
• 6:08:04
  The old graveyard, with its overarching trees and long aisles of shadows, faded
• 6:08:10
  from her sight. Instead, she saw the Kingsport Harbor of nearly a century
• 6:08:15
  Agone. Out of the mist came slowly a great frigate, brilliant with the
• 6:08:19
  meteor flag of England. Behind her was another with a still heroic form,
• 6:08:26
  wrapped in his own starry flag. Lying on the quarter deck. The gallant
• 6:08:30
  Lawrence Time's finger had turned back his pages, and that was the Shannon,
• 6:08:34
  sailing triumphant up the bay with the Chesapeake as her prize. Come back and
• 6:08:40
  Shirley, come back, laughed Philippa, pulling her arm. You're a hundred
• 6:08:45
  years away from us. Come back. Anne came back with a sigh.
• 6:08:51
  Her eyes were shining softly. I've always loved that old story, she said.
• 6:08:56
  And although the English won that victory, I think it was because of
• 6:09:00
  the brave defeated commander. I love it. This grave seems to bring it
• 6:09:03
  so near and make it so real. This poor little Mitty was only eighteen.
• 6:09:08
  He died of desperate wounds received in gallant action. So reads his epitaph,
• 6:09:15
  it is such as a soldier might wish for. Before she turned away,
• 6:09:19
  Anne unpinned the little cluster of purple pansies she wore and dropped it softly
• 6:09:25
  on the grave of the boy who had perished in the Great Sea Jewel.
• 6:09:27
  Well, what do you think of Anne, your friend? Asked Priscilla,
• 6:09:32
  when Phil had left them. I like her. There is something very lovable
• 6:09:37
  about her, in spite of all her nonsense. I believe, as she
• 6:09:41
  says herself, that she isn't half as silly as she sounds. She's a
• 6:09:45
  dear, kissable baby, and I don't know that she'll ever really grow up.
• 6:09:49
  I like her too, said Priscilla decidedly. She talks as much about
• 6:09:53
  boys as Ruby Gillis does, but it always enrages or sickens me to hear
• 6:09:57
  Ruby. Where's that? Just one? It's a laugh, good naturedly at
• 6:10:00
  Phil. Now, what is the why of that? There is a difference,
• 6:10:04
  said Anne meditatively. I think it's because Ruby is really so conscious of
• 6:10:10
  boys. She plays at love and love making. Besides, you feel when
• 6:10:15
  she is boasting of her bows, that she is doing it to rub it
• 6:10:18
  well into you, that you haven't half so many. Now. When Phil
• 6:10:22
  talks of her bows, it sounds as if she was just speaking of chums.
• 6:10:26
  She really looks upon boys as good comrades, and she is pleased when
• 6:10:30
  she has dozens of them tagging round, simply because she likes to be popular
• 6:10:33
  and to be thought popular. Even Alex and Alonzo. I'll never be able
• 6:10:38
  to think of those two names separately after this are to her just two playfellows
• 6:10:44
  who want her to play with them all their lives. I'm glad we met
• 6:10:48
  her, and I'm glad we went to Old Saint John's. I believe I've
• 6:10:52
  put forth a tiny soul rout into Kingsport soil this afternoon, I hope so.
• 6:10:56
  I hate to feel transplanted. End of chapter four, Chapter forty,
• 6:11:03
  A Book of Revelation. The Irvings came back to Echo Lodge for the summer,
• 6:11:10
  and Anne spent a happy three weeks there. In July, Miss Lavendar
• 6:11:14
  had not changed. Charlotta the Fourth was a very grown up young lady now,
• 6:11:18
  but still adored Anne sincerely. When all said and done, Miss Shirley
• 6:11:22
  ma'am, I haven't seen any one in Boston's equel to you, she said
• 6:11:26
  frankly. Paul was almost grown up too. He was sixteen. His chestnut
• 6:11:32
  curls had given place to close cropped brown locks, and he was more interested
• 6:11:36
  in football than fairies. But the bond between him and his old teachers still
• 6:11:41
  held kindred spirits alone do not change with changing years. It was a wet,
• 6:11:45
  bleak, cruel evening in July when Anne came back to Green Gables.
• 6:11:51
  One of the fierce summer storms which sometimes sweep over the Gulf was ravaging the
• 6:11:55
  sea. As Anne came in, the first rain drops dashed against the panes.
• 6:12:00
  Was that Paul who brought you home? Asked Marilla. Why didn't you
• 6:12:03
  make him stay all night? It's going to be a wild evening. He'll
• 6:12:07
  reach Echo Lodge before the rain gets very heavy, I think anyway, he
• 6:12:11
  wanted to go back tonight. Well, I've had a splendid visit, but
• 6:12:15
  I'm glad to see you dear folks again East West Hame's best. Davy,
• 6:12:21
  have you been growing again lately? I've growed a whole inch since you left,
• 6:12:26
  said Davy proudly. I'm ass Tala's milty bolter. Now, ain't I
• 6:12:30
  glad? He'll have to stop crowing about being bigger? Say Anne, do
• 6:12:36
  you know that Gilbert blythe is dying. Anne stood quite silent and motionless,
• 6:12:41
  looking at Davy. Her face had gone so white that Marilla thought she was
• 6:12:45
  going to faint. Davy, hold your tongue, said Missus Rachel angrily.
• 6:12:49
  Anne. Don't look like that. Don't look like that. We didn't mean
• 6:12:53
  to tell you so suddenly, Is it true, asked Anne, in a
• 6:13:00
  voice that was not hers. Gilbert is very ill, said Missus Lynde gravely.
• 6:13:06
  He took down with typhoid fever just after you left for Echo Lodge.
• 6:13:10
  Did you never hear of it? No, said that unknown voice. It
• 6:13:15
  was a very bad case from the start. The doctor said he'd been terrible,
• 6:13:18
  run down. They retrained nurse and everything's been done. Don't look like
• 6:13:25
  that, Anne, While there's life, there's hope. Mister Harrison was here
• 6:13:30
  this evening, and he said they had no hope of him, reiterated Davy.
• 6:13:37
  Marilla, looking old and worn and tired, got up and marched Davy
• 6:13:41
  grimly out of the kitchen. Oh don't look so dear, said missus Rachel,
• 6:13:47
  putting her kind old arms about the pallid girl. I haven't given up
• 6:13:51
  hope. Indeed I haven't. He's got the blithe Constitution in his favor.
• 6:13:56
  That's what Anne gently put Missus Lynde's arms away from her, walked blindly across
• 6:14:00
  the kitchen, through the hall, up the stairs to her old room.
• 6:14:04
  At its windows, she knelt down, staring out unseeingly. It was very
• 6:14:10
  dark. The rain was beating down over the shivering fields. The haunted woods
• 6:14:15
  was full of the groans of mighty trees rung in the tempest, and the
• 6:14:18
  air throbbed with the thunderous crash of billows on the distant shore. And Gilbert
• 6:14:23
  was dying. There is a book of revelation in everyone's life, as there
• 6:14:29
  is in the Bible. Anne read hers that bitter night, as she kept
• 6:14:33
  her agonized visil through the hours of storm and darkness. She loved Gilbert,
• 6:14:37
  had always loved him. She knew that now. She knew that she could
• 6:14:41
  no more cast him out of her life without agony than she could have cut
• 6:14:45
  off her right hand and cast it from her. And the knowledge had come
• 6:14:48
  too late, too late, even for the bitter solace of being with him
• 6:14:52
  at the last. If she had not been so blind, so foolish,
• 6:14:57
  she would have had the right to go to him now, But he would
• 6:15:00
  never know that she loved him. He would go away from this life thinking
• 6:15:03
  that she did not care. Oh, the black years of emptiness stretching before
• 6:15:08
  her. She could not live through them. She could not. She cowered
• 6:15:14
  down by her window and wished for the first time in her gay young life
• 6:15:18
  that she could die too. If Gilbert went away from her without one word
• 6:15:22
  or sign or message, she could not live. Nothing was of any value
• 6:15:26
  without him. She belonged to him, and he to her. In her
• 6:15:30
  hour of supreme agony, she had no doubt of that he did not love
• 6:15:34
  Christine Stuart, never had loved Christine Stuart. Oh what a fool she had
• 6:15:40
  been not to realize what the bond was that had held her to Gilbert,
• 6:15:44
  to think that the flattered fancy she had felt for Roy Gardner had been love.
• 6:15:48
  And now she must pay for her folly as for a crime. Missus
• 6:15:52
  Lynde and Marilla crept to her door before they went to bed, shook their
• 6:15:56
  heads doubtfully at each other over the silence, went away The storm raged all
• 6:16:02
  night, but when the dawn came it was spent. Anne saw a fairy
• 6:16:07
  fringe of light on the skirts of darkness. Soon the eastern hilltops had a
• 6:16:11
  fire shot ruby rim. The clouds rolled themselves away into great, soft white
• 6:16:17
  masses on the horizon. The sky gleamed blue and silvery. A hush fell
• 6:16:22
  over the world. Anne rose from her knees and crept downstairs. The freshness
• 6:16:27
  of the rain wind blew against her white face as she went out into the
• 6:16:30
  yard and cooled her dry burning eyes. A merry, rollicking whistle was lilting
• 6:16:37
  up the lane. A moment later, Pacifique Buote came in sight. Anne's
• 6:16:41
  physical strength suddenly failed her. If she had not clutched at a low willow
• 6:16:47
  bough, she would have fallen. Pacafique was George Fletcher's hired man, and
• 6:16:51
  George Fletcher lived next door to the Blythes. Missus Fletcher was Gilbert's aunt.
• 6:16:56
  Pacafiqu would know if if Pacifique would know what there was to be known.
• 6:17:02
  Pacafique strode sturdily on along the Red Lane, whistling. He did not see
• 6:17:07
  Anne. She made three feudal attempts to call him He was almost passed before
• 6:17:11
  she succeeded in making her quivering lips call Pacifique. Pacifique turned with a grin
• 6:17:18
  and a cheerful good morning, Pacifique, said Anne faintly. Did you come
• 6:17:23
  from George Fletcher's this morning? Sure, said Pacifique, amiably, I got
• 6:17:30
  the word last night that my father he was sick. I was so stormy
• 6:17:33
  that I couldn't go then, so I start very early this morning. I
• 6:17:38
  go in through the woods for shortcut. Did you hear how Gilbert blythe was
• 6:17:42
  this morning? Anne's desperation drove her to the question, even the worst would
• 6:17:48
  be more endurable than this hideous suspense. He's better, said Pacifique. He
• 6:17:53
  got the turn last night, and the doctor say he'll be all right now
• 6:17:57
  this soon. While at CLO, so shaved old that boy he'd just killed
• 6:18:03
  himself at college. Well, I must hurry de ol man, he'll be
• 6:18:07
  in hurry to see me. Pacafique resumed his walk and his whistle. Anne
• 6:18:11
  gazed after him with eyes where joy was driving out the strained anguish of the
• 6:18:15
  night. He was a very lank, very ragged, very homely youth,
• 6:18:19
  but in her sight he was as beautiful as those who bring good tidings on
• 6:18:23
  the mountains. Never as long as she lived would Anne see Pasafiq's brown,
• 6:18:29
  round, black eyed face without a warm remembrance of the moment when he had
• 6:18:33
  given to her the oil of joy for mourning. Long after Pacafiq's gay whistle
• 6:18:38
  had faded into the phantom of music and then into silence. Far up under
• 6:18:42
  the maples of Lover's Lane, Anne stood under the willows, tasting the poignant
• 6:18:48
  sweetness of life when some great dread has been removed from it. The morning
• 6:18:52
  was a cup filled with mist and glamor. In the corner near her was
• 6:18:57
  a rich surprise of new blown still dude roses. The trills and trickles of
• 6:19:03
  song from the birds in the big tree above her seemed in perfect accord with
• 6:19:07
  her mood. A sentence from a very old, very true, very wonderful
• 6:19:11
  book came to her lips. Weeping may endure for a night, but joy
• 6:19:17
  cometh in the morning. End of chapter forty Chapter forty one, Love takes
• 6:19:25
  up the glass of thyme. I've come up to ask you to go for
• 6:19:29
  one of our old time rambles through September woods and over hills where spices grow
• 6:19:33
  this afternoon, said Gilbert, coming suddenly around the porch corner. Suppose we
• 6:19:38
  visit hester Gray's garden. Anne, sitting on the stone step with her lap
• 6:19:44
  full of a pale, filmy green stuff, looked up rather blankly. Oh,
• 6:19:48
  I wish I could, she said slowly, but I really can't,
• 6:19:52
  Gilbert. I'm going to Alice Penhallow's wedding this evening. You know, I've
• 6:19:56
  got to do something to this dress, and by the time it's finished,
• 6:20:00
  I'll have to get ready. I'm so sorry. I'd love to go.
• 6:20:03
  Well, can you go tomorrow afternoon, then asked Gilbert, apparently not much
• 6:20:07
  disappointed. Yes, I think so. In that case, I shall hire
• 6:20:11
  me home at once to do something I should otherwise have to do tomorrow.
• 6:20:15
  So Alice penhallows to be married tonight. Three weddings for you in one summer,
• 6:20:22
  Anne, Phil's, Alice's and Jane's. I'll never forgive Jane for not
• 6:20:26
  inviting me to her wedding. You really can't blame her when you think of
• 6:20:30
  the tremendous Andrew's connection who had to be invited. The house could hardly hold
• 6:20:33
  them all. I was only bidden by grace of being Jane's old chum,
• 6:20:37
  at least on Jane's part. I think Missus Harmon's motive for inviting me was
• 6:20:41
  to let me see Jane's surpassing gorgeousness. Is it true that you wore so
• 6:20:45
  many diamonds that you couldn't tell where the diamonds left off? And Jane began.
• 6:20:49
  Anne laughed, She certainly wore a good many, what with all the
• 6:20:53
  diamonds and white satin and tool and lace and roses and orange blossoms. Prim
• 6:20:57
  little Jane was almost lost to sight, but she was very happy, and
• 6:21:02
  so was mister Inglis, and so was missus Harmon. Is that the dress
• 6:21:07
  you're going to wear tonight? Asked Gilbert, looking down at the fluffs and
• 6:21:10
  frills. Yes, isn't it pretty? And I shall wear starflowers in my
• 6:21:15
  hair. The Haunted Wood is full of them this summer. Gilbert had a
• 6:21:18
  sudden vision of Anne arrayed in a frilly green gown, with the virginal curves
• 6:21:23
  of arms and throats slipping out of it, and white stars shining against the
• 6:21:27
  coils of her ruddy hair. The vision made him catch his breath, but
• 6:21:32
  he turned lightly away. Well, I'll be up tomorrow. Hope you'll have
• 6:21:36
  a nice time tonight. Anne looked after him as he strode away and sighed.
• 6:21:41
  Gilbert was friendly, very friendly, far too friendly. He had come
• 6:21:45
  quite often to Green Gables after his recovery, and something of their old comradeship
• 6:21:49
  had returned, But Anne no longer found it satisfying. The rows of love
• 6:21:55
  made the blossom of friendship pale and scentless by contrast, and Anne had again
• 6:22:00
  begun to doubt if Gilbert now felt anything for her but friendship. In the
• 6:22:04
  common light of common day, her radiant certainty of that rapt morning had faded.
• 6:22:10
  She was haunted by a miserable fear that her mistake could never be rectified.
• 6:22:14
  It was quite likely that it was Christine whom Gilbert loved after all,
• 6:22:18
  perhaps he was even engaged to her. Anne tried to put all unsettling hopes
• 6:22:22
  out of her heart and reconcile herself to a future where work and ambition must
• 6:22:26
  take the place of love. She could do good, if not noble,
• 6:22:30
  work as a teacher, and the success her little sketches were beginning to meet
• 6:22:34
  with in certain editorial sanctums augured well for her budding literary dreams. But but
• 6:22:42
  Anne picked up her green dress and sighed again. When Gilbert came the next
• 6:22:47
  afternoon, he found Anne waiting for him, fresh as the dawn and fair
• 6:22:51
  as a star after all the gayety of the preceding night. She wore a
• 6:22:55
  green dress, not the one she had worn to the wedding, but an
• 6:22:59
  old one, which Gilbert had told her at a Redmond reception. He liked
• 6:23:02
  especially. It was just the shade of green that brought out the rich tints
• 6:23:06
  of her hair, and the starry gray of her eyes, and the iris
• 6:23:10
  like delicacy of her skin. Gilbert, glancing at her sideways as they walked
• 6:23:15
  along a shadowy woodpath, thought she had never looked so lovely. Anne glancing
• 6:23:19
  sideways at Gilbert now, and then thought how much older he looked since his
• 6:23:23
  illness. It was as if he had put boyhood behind him forever. The
• 6:23:29
  day was beautiful, and the way was beautiful. Anne was almost sorry when
• 6:23:33
  they reached hester Gray's garden and sat down on the old bench. But it
• 6:23:37
  was beautiful there too, as beautiful as it had been on the far away
• 6:23:41
  day of the Golden Picnic, when Diana and Jane and Priscilla and she had
• 6:23:45
  found it. Then it had been lovely with narcissus and violets. Now goldenrod
• 6:23:51
  had kindled its fairy torches in the corners, and asters dotted it bluely.
• 6:23:56
  The call of the brook came up through the woods from the valley of Birches
• 6:23:59
  with all its old life lorment. The mellow air was full of the purr
• 6:24:02
  of the sea. Beyond were fields rimmed by fences bleached silvery gray in the
• 6:24:07
  suns of many summers, and long hills scarfed with the shadows of autumnal clouds.
• 6:24:12
  With the blowing of the west wind. Old dreams returned, I think,
• 6:24:18
  said Anne softly, that the land where dreams come true is in the
• 6:24:22
  blue haze yonder over that little valley. Few and the unfulfilled dreams. Eh
• 6:24:27
  asked Gilbert. Something in his tone, something she had not heard since that
• 6:24:33
  miserable evening in the orchard at Patty's place, made Anne's heart beat wildly,
• 6:24:38
  but she made answer lightly. Of course, everybody has. It wouldn't do
• 6:24:44
  for us to have all our dreams fulfilled. We would be as good as
• 6:24:47
  dead if we had nothing left to dream about. What a delicious aroma that
• 6:24:51
  low descending sun is extracting from the asters and ferns. I wish we could
• 6:24:56
  see perfumes as well as smell them. I'm sure they would be very beautiful.
• 6:25:00
  Gilbert was not to be thus sidetracked. I have a dream, he
• 6:25:04
  said slowly. I persist in dreaming it, although it is often seemed to
• 6:25:08
  me that it could never come true. I dream of a home with a
• 6:25:12
  hearth fire in it, a cat and dog, the footsteps of friends,
• 6:25:18
  and you. Anne wanted to speak, but she could find no words.
• 6:25:22
  Happiness was breaking over her like a wave. It almost frightened her. I
• 6:25:26
  asked you a question over two years ago. Anne. If I ask it
• 6:25:32
  again today, will you give me a different answer. Still Anne could not
• 6:25:37
  speak, but she lifted her eyes, shining with all the love rapture of
• 6:25:41
  countless generations, and looked into his for a moment. He wanted no other
• 6:25:45
  answer. They lingered in the old garden until twilight, sweet as dusk,
• 6:25:51
  and Eden must have been crept over it. There was so much to talk
• 6:25:55
  over and recall, things said and done and heard and thought and felt and
• 6:26:00
  misunderstood. I thought you loved Christine Stewart, Anne told him, as reproachfully
• 6:26:06
  as if she had not given him every reason to suppose that she loved Roy
• 6:26:10
  Gardner. Gilbert laughed boyishly. Huh, Christine was engaged with somebody in her
• 6:26:15
  hometown. I knew it, and she knew. I knew it. When
• 6:26:18
  her brother graduated, he told me his sister was coming to Kingsport the next
• 6:26:22
  winter to take music and asked me if I would look after her a bit,
• 6:26:26
  as she knew no one and would be very lonely. And so I
• 6:26:29
  did. And then I liked Christine for her own sake. She's one of
• 6:26:33
  the nicest girls I've ever known. I knew college gossip credited us with being
• 6:26:37
  in love with each other. I didn't care. Nothing mattered much to me
• 6:26:40
  for a time there after you told me you could never love me. Anne.
• 6:26:42
  There's nobody else there ever could be anybody else for me but you.
• 6:26:48
  I've loved you ever since that day you broke your slate over my head in
• 6:26:51
  school. I don't see how you could keep on loving me when I was
• 6:26:53
  such a little fool, said Anne. Well. I tried to stop,
• 6:26:57
  said Gilbert frankly. Not because I thought you what you call yourself, but
• 6:27:02
  because I felt sure there was no chance for me after Gardner came on the
• 6:27:06
  scene, but I couldn't and I can't tell you either what it meant to
• 6:27:08
  me these two years to believe you're going to marry him and be told every
• 6:27:12
  week by some busybody that your engagement was on the point of being announced.
• 6:27:18
  I believed it until one blessed day, when I was sitting up after the
• 6:27:21
  fever, I got a letter from Phil Gordon, who will Phil blake rather,
• 6:27:26
  in which she told me there was really nothing between you and Roy and
• 6:27:30
  advised me to try again. Well, the doctor was amazed at my rapid
• 6:27:34
  recovery after that. Anne laughed, then shivered. I can never forget the
• 6:27:40
  night I thought you were dying, Gilbert. Oh, I knew, I
• 6:27:44
  knew then, and I thought it was too late, But it wasn't,
• 6:27:47
  sweetheart. Oh, and this makes up for everything, doesn't it. Let's
• 6:27:51
  resolve to keep this day sacred to perfect beauty all our lives, for the
• 6:27:55
  gift it has given us. It's the birthday of our happiness, said Anne's
• 6:28:00
  I've always loved this old garden of hester Gray's, and now it will be
• 6:28:03
  dearer than ever. But I'll have to ask you to wait a long time,
• 6:28:07
  eh, said Gilbert, sadly. It will be three years before I'll
• 6:28:11
  finish my medical course, and even then there'll be no diamonds, sunbursts and
• 6:28:17
  marble halls. Anne laughed, I don't want sunbursts and marble halls. I
• 6:28:22
  just want you. You see, I'm quite as shameless as Phil about it.
• 6:28:26
  Sunbursts and marble halls may be all very well, but there is more
• 6:28:30
  scope for imagination without them. And as for the waiting, that doesn't matter.
• 6:28:34
  We'll just be happy waiting and working for each other and dreaming. Oh,
• 6:28:40
  dreams will be very sweet now. Gilbert drew her close to him and
• 6:28:45
  kissed her. Then they walked home together in the dusk, crowned King and
• 6:28:49
  Queen in the bridal realm of love. Along winding paths fringed with the sweetest
• 6:28:55
  flowers that ever bloomed, and over haunted meadows were winds of hope and memory.
• 6:29:00
  Blue end of chapter forty one. End of Anne of the Island by
• 6:29:06
  Lucy Maud Montgomery, Chapter five, Letters from Home. For the next three
• 6:29:12
  weeks, Anne and Priscilla continued to feel as strangers in a strange land.
• 6:29:18
  Then suddenly everything seemed to fall into focus. Redmond professors, classes, students,
• 6:29:26
  studies, social doings. Life became homogeneous again. Instead of being made
• 6:29:30
  up of detached fragments, the freshmen, instead of being a collection of unrelated
• 6:29:36
  individuals, found themselves a class with a class spirit, a class yell,
• 6:29:41
  class interests, class antipathies, and class ambitions. They won the day in
• 6:29:47
  the annual arts rush against the sophomores, and thereby gained the respect of all
• 6:29:51
  the classes and an enormous confidence giving opinion of themselves. For three years the
• 6:29:56
  sophomores had won in the rush. That the victory of this year perched upon
• 6:30:02
  the freshman's banner was attributed to the strategic generalship of Gilbert Blythe, who marshaled
• 6:30:07
  the campaign and originated certain new tactics which demoralized the softs and swept the freshmen
• 6:30:12
  to triumph. As a reward of merit, he was elected president of the
• 6:30:18
  Freshman Class, a position of honor and responsibility from a fresh point of view,
• 6:30:22
  at least coveted by many. He was also invited to join the Lambs
• 6:30:27
  Redmond ease for Lambethada, a compliment rarely paid to a freshman. As a
• 6:30:33
  preparatory initiation ordeal. He had to parade the principal business streets of Kingsport for
• 6:30:37
  a whole day, wearing a sun bonnet and of a luminous kitchen apron of
• 6:30:41
  gaudily flowered calico. This he did, cheerfully, doffing his sun bonnet with
• 6:30:47
  courtly grace. When he met ladies of his acquaintance, Charlie Sloane, who
• 6:30:51
  had not been asked to join the Lambs, told Anne he did not see
• 6:30:55
  how blithe could do it, and he, for his part, could never
• 6:30:57
  humiliate himself. So fancy Tallie Sloane in a caliker apron and a sun bunnet,
• 6:31:03
  giggled Priscilla. He'd look exactly like his old grandmother Sloane. Gilbert now
• 6:31:08
  looked as much like a man in them as in his own proper habiliments.
• 6:31:11
  Anne and Priscilla found themselves in the thick of the social life of Redmond.
• 6:31:17
  That this came about so speedily was due in great measure to Philippa Gordon.
• 6:31:21
  Philippa was the daughter of a rich and well known man, and belonged to
• 6:31:25
  an old and exclusive blue nosed family. This, combined with her beauty and
• 6:31:30
  charm, a charm acknowledged by all who met her, promptly opened the gates
• 6:31:34
  of all cliques, clubs, and classes in Redmond to her, and where
• 6:31:37
  she went, Anne and Priscilla went too. Phil adored Anne and Priscilla,
• 6:31:42
  especially Anne. She was a loyal little soul, crystal free from any form
• 6:31:48
  of snobbishness. Love me, love my friends seemed to be her unconscious motto.
• 6:31:53
  Without effort, she took them with her into her ever widening circle of
• 6:31:57
  acquaintanceship, and the two two Avonlea girls found their social pathway at Redmond made
• 6:32:03
  very easy and pleasant for them, to the envy and wonderment of the other
• 6:32:07
  freshettes, who, lacking Philip's sponsorship, were doomed to remain rather on the
• 6:32:11
  fringe of things during their first college year. To Anne and Priscilla, with
• 6:32:17
  their more serious views of life, phil remained the amusing, lovable baby she
• 6:32:22
  had seemed on their first meeting. Yet, as she said herself, she
• 6:32:26
  had heaps of brains. When or where she found time to study was a
• 6:32:30
  mystery, for she seemed always in demand for some kind of fun, and
• 6:32:33
  her home evenings were crowded with callers. She had all the beaus that heart
• 6:32:38
  could desire for. Nine tenths of the freshmen and a big fraction of all
• 6:32:41
  the other classes were rivals. For her smiles, she was naively delighted over
• 6:32:47
  this, and gleefully recounted each new conquest to Anne and Priscilla with comments that
• 6:32:52
  might have made the unlucky lover's ears burn fiercely. Alec and Alonzo don't seem
• 6:32:57
  to have any serious rival, yet, remarked Anne teasingly. Not one agreed,
• 6:33:03
  Philippa. I write them both every week and tell them all about my
• 6:33:07
  young men here. I'm sure it must amuse them. But of course the
• 6:33:11
  one I like best I can't get, Gilbert Blythe won't take any notice of
• 6:33:15
  me, except to look at me as if I were a nice little kitten.
• 6:33:18
  He'd like to pat too. Well. I know the reason I owe
• 6:33:22
  you a grudge, Queen Anne. I really ought to hate you, and
• 6:33:25
  instead I love you madly, and I'm miserable if I don't see you every
• 6:33:29
  day. You're different from any girl I ever knew before. When you look
• 6:33:33
  at me in a certain way, I feel what an insignificant, frivolous little
• 6:33:37
  beast I am, and I long to be better and wiser and stronger.
• 6:33:41
  And then I make good resolutions, but the first nice looking manny who comes
• 6:33:45
  my way knocks them all out of my head. Isn't college life magnificent?
• 6:33:49
  It's so funny to think I hated it that first day, But if I
• 6:33:53
  hadn't, I might never got really acquainted with you. Anne. Please tell
• 6:33:57
  me over again that you like me a little bit. I yearned to hear
• 6:34:00
  it. I like you a big bit, and I think you're a dear,
• 6:34:03
  sweet, adorable, velvety, clawless little kitten, laughed Anne. But
• 6:34:08
  I don't see when you ever get time to learn your lessons. Phil must
• 6:34:14
  have found time, for she held her own in every class of her year.
• 6:34:18
  Even the grumpy old professor of mathematics, who detested co Ed's and had
• 6:34:22
  bitterly opposed their admission to Redmond, couldn't floor her. She led the freshets
• 6:34:27
  everywhere, except in English, where Anne Shirley left her far behind. Anne
• 6:34:33
  herself found the studies of her freshman year very easy, thanks in great part
• 6:34:37
  to the steady work she and Gilbert had put in during those two past years
• 6:34:41
  in Avonlea. This left her more time for a social life which she thoroughly
• 6:34:45
  enjoyed, but never for a moment did she forget Avonlea and the friends there.
• 6:34:49
  To her, the happiest moments in each week were those in which letters
• 6:34:53
  came from home. It was not until she had got her first letters that
• 6:34:57
  she began to think she could ever like Kingsport or feel at home there.
• 6:35:02
  Before they came, Avonlea had seemed thousands of miles away. Those letters brought
• 6:35:07
  it near and linked the old life to the news so closely that they began
• 6:35:11
  to seem one and the same instead of two hopelessly segregated existences. The first
• 6:35:17
  batch contained six letters from Jane Andrews, Ruby, Gillis, Diana Barry,
• 6:35:22
  Marilla, Missus Lynde, and Davy. Jane's was a copperplate production, with
• 6:35:27
  every tea nicely crossed and every eye precisely dotted, and not an interesting sentence
• 6:35:33
  in it. She never mentioned the school concerning which Anne was avid to hear.
• 6:35:38
  She never answered one of the questions Anne had asked in her letter,
• 6:35:42
  but she told Anne how many yards of lace she had recently crocheted, and
• 6:35:47
  the kind of weather they were having in Avonlea. And how she intended to
• 6:35:49
  have her new dress made, and the way she felt when her head ached.
• 6:35:53
  Ruby Gillis wrote a gushing epistle deploring Anne's absence, assuring her she was
• 6:35:59
  horribly meane and everything, asking what the Redmond fellows were like, and filling
• 6:36:03
  the rest with accounts of her own harrowing experiences with her numerous admirers. It
• 6:36:08
  was a silly, harmless letter, and Anne would have laughed over it had
• 6:36:12
  it not been for the PostScript. Yell but seems to be enjoying Redman,
• 6:36:18
  judging from his letters, wrote Ruby, I don't think Charlie's has chucken it.
• 6:36:22
  So Gilbert was writing to Ruby very well. He had a perfect right
• 6:36:27
  to, of course, Only Anne did not know that Ruby had written the
• 6:36:32
  first letter, and that Gilbert had answered it from mere courtesy. She tossed
• 6:36:37
  Ruby's letter aside contemptuously, but it took all Diana's breezy, newsy delightful epistle
• 6:36:42
  to banish the sting of Ruby's PostScript. Diana's letter contained a little too much
• 6:36:48
  Fred, but was otherwise crowded and crossed with items of interest, and Anne
• 6:36:52
  almost felt herself back in avonlea while reading it. Marilla's was a rather prim
• 6:36:57
  and colorless epistle, severely innocent of gossip or emotion. Yet somehow it conveyed
• 6:37:03
  to Anne a whiff of the wholesome simple life at Green Gables, with its
• 6:37:07
  savor of ancient peace and the steadfast, abiding love that was there for her.
• 6:37:12
  Missus Lynde's letter was full of church news. Having broken up housekeeping,
• 6:37:18
  Missus Lynde had more time than ever to devote to church affairs, and had
• 6:37:21
  flung herself into them heart and soul. She was at present much to work
• 6:37:25
  up over the poor supplies they were having in the vacant Avonlea pulpit. I
• 6:37:30
  don't believe any but fools enter the ministry nowadays, she wrote, bitterly,
• 6:37:36
  such candidates as they have sent us, and such stuff as they preach.
• 6:37:40
  Half of it ain't true, and what's worse, it ain't sound doctrine.
• 6:37:44
  The one we have now is the worst of the lot. He mostly takes
• 6:37:48
  a text and preaches about something else. And he says he doesn't believe all
• 6:37:52
  the heathen will be eternally lost the idea if they won't, all the money
• 6:38:00
  you've been giving to the foreign missions will be clean wasted. That's what last
• 6:38:03
  Sunday night he announced that the next Sunday he'd preach on the axe head that
• 6:38:08
  swam. I think he'd better confine himself to the Bible and leave sensational subjects
• 6:38:15
  alone. Things have come to a pretty pass. If a minister can't find
• 6:38:18
  enough in holy writ to preach about, that's what. What church do you
• 6:38:22
  attend? Anne? I hope you go regularly. People are apt to get
• 6:38:26
  so careless about church going away from home, and I understand college students are
• 6:38:32
  great sinners in this respect. I'm told many of them actually study their lessons
• 6:38:37
  on Sunday. I hope you'll never sink that low. Anne. Remember how
• 6:38:41
  you were brought up, and be very careful what friends you make. You
• 6:38:45
  never know what sort of creatures are in them colleges. Outwardly they may be
• 6:38:49
  as wided sepulchers, and inwardly as rabbiting wolves. That's what you'd better not
• 6:38:56
  have anything to say to any young man who isn't from the island. I
• 6:39:00
  forgot to tell you what happened the day the minister called here. It was
• 6:39:03
  the funniest thing I ever saw. I said to Marilla. If Anne had
• 6:39:07
  been here, wouldn't she have laughed? Even Marilla laughed. You know,
• 6:39:12
  he's a very short, fat little man with bow legs. Well, that
• 6:39:17
  old pig of mister Harrison's, the big tall one, had wandered over here
• 6:39:22
  that day again and broke into the yard, and it got on the back
• 6:39:26
  porch unbeknownst to us, and it was there when the minister appeared in the
• 6:39:30
  doorway. It made one wild bolt to get out, and there was nowhere
• 6:39:37
  to bolt except between them bowl' legs. So there it went, And being
• 6:39:41
  as it was so big and the minister so little, it took him clean
• 6:39:45
  off his feet and carried him away. His hat went one way, and
• 6:39:49
  his came another, just as Marilla and I got to the door. I'll
• 6:39:55
  never forget the look on him, and that poor pig was near scared to
• 6:39:59
  death. I'll never be able to read that account in the Bible of the
• 6:40:02
  swine that rushed madly down the steep place into the sea without seeing mister Harrison's
• 6:40:07
  pig creening down the hill with that minister. I guess the pig thought he
• 6:40:12
  had the old boy on his back instead of inside of him. I was
• 6:40:17
  thankful the twins weren't about. It wouldn't have been a right thing for them
• 6:40:21
  to have seen a minister in such an undignified predicament. Just before they got
• 6:40:26
  to the brook, the minister jumped off or fell off. The pig rushed
• 6:40:30
  through the brook like mad, and up through the woods. Marilla and I
• 6:40:33
  run down and helped the minister get up and brush his coat. He wasn't
• 6:40:37
  hurt, but he was mad. He seemed to hold Marilla and me responsible
• 6:40:44
  for it, all though we told him the pig didn't belong to us and
• 6:40:48
  had been pestering us all summer. Besides, what did he come to the
• 6:40:52
  back door for. You'd never have caught mister Allen doing that. It'll be
• 6:40:57
  a long time before we get a man like mister Allen. But it's an
• 6:41:03
  ill wind that blows no good. I've never seen hoof nor hair of that
• 6:41:07
  pig since, and it's my belief we never will. Things is pretty quiet
• 6:41:12
  in Avonlea. I don't find green gables as lonesome as I expected. I
• 6:41:18
  think I'll start another cotton warp quilt this winter. Missus Silas Sloane has a
• 6:41:22
  handsome new apple leaf pattern. When I feel that I must have some excitement.
• 6:41:26
  I'll read the murder trials in that Boston paper my niece sends me.
• 6:41:30
  I never used to do it, but they're real interesting. The States must
• 6:41:34
  be an awful place. I hope you'll never go there, Anne, But
• 6:41:40
  the Whig girls roam over the earth now is something terrible. It always makes
• 6:41:44
  me think of Satan in the Book of Job, going to and fro and
• 6:41:48
  walking up and down. I don't believe the Lord ever intended it. That's
• 6:41:52
  what. Davy has been pretty good since you went away. One day he
• 6:41:57
  was bad, and Marilla punished him by making him wear Dora's apron all day,
• 6:42:02
  and then he went and cut all doors aprons up. I spanked him
• 6:42:06
  for that, and then he went and chased my rooster to death. The
• 6:42:10
  mcphersons have moved down to my place. She's a great housekeeper and very particular.
• 6:42:15
  She's rooted all my June lilies up because she says that they make the
• 6:42:18
  garden look so untidy. Thomas set them lilies out when we were married.
• 6:42:23
  Her husband seems a nice sort of man, but she can't get over being
• 6:42:27
  an old maid. That's what. Don't study too hard and be sure to
• 6:42:32
  put your winter underclothes on as soon as the weather gets cold. Marilla worries
• 6:42:37
  about you a lot, but I tell her you've got a lot more sense
• 6:42:38
  than I ever thought you would have at one time, and that you'll be
• 6:42:42
  all right. Davy's letter plunged into a grievance at the start. Dear In,
• 6:42:48
  please write and tell Marilla not to timey to the rail of the bridge
• 6:42:52
  when I go fishing. The boys make fun of me when she does.
• 6:42:56
  It's awful lonesome here without you, but great fun in school. Jane Andrews
• 6:43:02
  is crosser than you. I scared missus Lynde with a Jackie lantern last night.
• 6:43:07
  She was awful mad. And she was mad because I chased her old
• 6:43:10
  rooster round the yard till he fell down dead. I didn't mean to make
• 6:43:15
  him fall down dead. What made him die? Anne? I want to
• 6:43:18
  know. Missus Lynde threw him into the pig pen. She might have sold
• 6:43:22
  him to mister Blair. Mister Blair is giving fifty cents apiece for good dead
• 6:43:26
  roosters. Now, I heard missus Lynde asking the minister to pray for her.
• 6:43:32
  What did she do that was so bad? Anne? I want to
• 6:43:34
  know. I've got a kite with a magnificent tail. Anne, Milty Bolter
• 6:43:40
  told me a great story in school yesterday. It is true. Old Joe
• 6:43:45
  Mosey and Leon were playing cards one night last week in the woods. The
• 6:43:48
  cards were on a stump, and a big black man bigger than the trees,
• 6:43:52
  came along and grabbed the cards and the stump and disappeared with a noise
• 6:43:57
  like thunder. I'll bet they were scared. Milty says the black man was
• 6:44:03
  the old Harry, was he? Anne? I want to know mister Kimball
• 6:44:07
  over at Spencervale is very sick and we'll have to go to the hospital.
• 6:44:11
  Ball please excuse me while I ask Marilla if that's spelled right. Marilla says
• 6:44:18
  it's the psylum he has to go to, not the other place. He
• 6:44:22
  thinks he has a snake inside of him. What's it like to have a
• 6:44:26
  snake inside of you? Anne? I want to know Missus Lawrence Bell is
• 6:44:30
  sick too. Missus Lynde says that all that is the matter with her is
• 6:44:34
  that she thinks too much about her insides. I wonder, said Anne,
• 6:44:41
  as she folded up her letters, what missus Lynde would think of Philippa end
• 6:44:47
  of chapter five, Chapter six in the park, what are you going to
• 6:44:52
  do with yourselves today, girls, asked Philippa, popping into Anne's room one
• 6:44:57
  Saturday afternoon. We are going for a walk in the park, answered Anne.
• 6:45:03
  I ought to stay in and finish my blouse, but I couldn't sew
• 6:45:07
  on a day like this. There's something in the air that gets into my
• 6:45:10
  blood and makes a sort of glory in my soul. My fingers would twitch
• 6:45:14
  and I'd sew a crooked seam. So it's ho for the park in the
• 6:45:17
  Pines? Does we include any one but yourself and Priscilla? Yes, it
• 6:45:22
  includes Gilbert and Charlie, and we'll be very glad if it will include you
• 6:45:26
  also, But said Philippa dolefully. If I go, I'll have to be
• 6:45:32
  Gooseberry, and that will be a new experience for philip A. Gordon,
• 6:45:36
  Well, new experiences are broadening. Come along, and you'll be able to
• 6:45:38
  sympathize with all poor souls who have to play Gooseberry often. But where are
• 6:45:42
  all the victims? Oh? I was tired of them all and simply couldn't
• 6:45:48
  be bothered with any of them. To day. Besides, I've been feeling
• 6:45:51
  a little blue, just a pale, elusive azure. It isn't serious enough
• 6:45:56
  for anything darker. I wrote Alec and Alonzo last week. I put the
• 6:46:00
  letters into envelopes and addressed them, but I didn't seal them up. That
• 6:46:03
  evening something funny happened. That is, Alec would think it funny, but
• 6:46:07
  Alonzo wouldn't be likely to. I was in a hurry, so I snatched
• 6:46:11
  Alec's letter as I thought out of the envelope and scribbled down a PostScript.
• 6:46:17
  Then I mailed both letters. I got Alonzo's reply this morning. Girls.
• 6:46:22
  I had put that PostScript to his letter, and he was furious. Of
• 6:46:26
  course he'll get over it, and I don't care if he doesn't, but
• 6:46:29
  it spoiled my day. So I thought i'd come to you, darlings,
• 6:46:32
  to get cheered up. After the football season opens, I won't have any
• 6:46:36
  spare Saturday afternoons. I adore football. I've got the most gorgeous cap and
• 6:46:41
  sweater striped in Redmond colors to wear to the games. To be sure,
• 6:46:45
  a little way off i'll look like a walking barber's pole. Do you know
• 6:46:49
  that that Gilbert of yours has been elected captain of the freshman football team.
• 6:46:55
  Yes, he told us so last evening, said Priscilla, seeing that,
• 6:46:59
  out raged Anne would not answer. He and Charlie were down. We knew
• 6:47:03
  they were coming, so we painstakingly put out of sight or out of reach
• 6:47:07
  all miss Ada's cushions. That very elaborate one with the raised embroidery I dropped
• 6:47:11
  on the floor in the corner behind the chair it was on. I thought
• 6:47:15
  it would be safe there, but would you believe it? Charlie Sloane made
• 6:47:18
  for that chair, noticed the cushion behind it, solemnly fished it up and
• 6:47:22
  sat on it the whole evening. Such a wreck of a cushion as it
• 6:47:26
  was. Poor miss Ada asked me to day, still smiling, but oh
• 6:47:30
  so reproachfully why I had allowed it to be sat upon. I told her
• 6:47:33
  I hadn't. That it was a matter of predestination coupled with inveterate slownishness,
• 6:47:38
  and I wasn't a match for both combined. Miss AIDA's cushions are really getting
• 6:47:44
  on my nerves, said Anne. She finished two new ones last week,
• 6:47:48
  stuffed and embroidered within an inch of their lives. There being absolutely no other
• 6:47:52
  cushionless place to put them, she stood them up against the wall on the
• 6:47:56
  stair landing. They topple over half the time, and if we come up
• 6:48:00
  or down the stairs in the dark, we fall over them. Last Sunday,
• 6:48:03
  when Doctor Davis prayed for all those exposed to the perils of the sea,
• 6:48:07
  I added in thought, and for all those who live in houses where
• 6:48:11
  cushions are loved, not wisely, but too well. There we're ready,
• 6:48:15
  and I see the boys coming through Old Saint John's. Do you cast in
• 6:48:18
  your lot with us? Phil I'll go. If I can walk with Priscilla
• 6:48:22
  and Charlie, that will be a bearable degree of gooseberry. That Gilbert of
• 6:48:26
  yours is a darling, Anne, But why does he go around so much
• 6:48:30
  with goggle eyes? Anne stiffened. She had no great liking for Charlie Sloane,
• 6:48:34
  but he was of Avonlea, so no outsider had any business to laugh
• 6:48:37
  at him. Charlie and Gilbert have always been friends, she said coldly.
• 6:48:44
  Charlie is a nice boy. He's not to blame for his eyes. Don't
• 6:48:48
  tell me that he is. He must have done something dreadful in a previous
• 6:48:52
  existence to be punished with such eyes. PRIs and I are going to have
• 6:48:56
  such sport with him this afternoon. We'll make fun of him to his face,
• 6:49:00
  and he'll never know it. Doubtless, the abandoned peas, as Anne
• 6:49:03
  called them, did carry out their amiable intentions, but Sloane was blissfully ignorant.
• 6:49:10
  He thought he was quite a fine fellow to be walking with two such
• 6:49:12
  coeds, especially Philippa Gordon, the class beauty and bell. It must surely
• 6:49:18
  impress Anne. She would see that some people appreciated him at his real value.
• 6:49:23
  Gilbert and Anne loitered a little behind the others, enjoying the calm,
• 6:49:27
  still beauty of the autumn afternoon, under the pines of the park, on
• 6:49:32
  the road that climbed and twisted round the harbor shore. The silence here is
• 6:49:37
  like a prayer, isn't it, said Anne, her face upturned to the
• 6:49:41
  shining sky. How I love the pines. They seemed to strike their roots
• 6:49:47
  deep into the romance of all the ages. It is so comforting to creep
• 6:49:51
  away now and then for a good talk with them. I always feel so
• 6:49:53
  happy out here, and so in mountain solitudes or taken as by some spell
• 6:50:00
  divine, their cares drop from them like the needles shaken from out the gusty
• 6:50:04
  pine. Quoted Gilbert, they make all little ambitions seem rather petty. Don't
• 6:50:11
  bear I think if ever any great sorrow came to me, I would come
• 6:50:15
  to the pines for comfort, said Anne dreamily. I hope no great sorrow
• 6:50:21
  ever will come to you, Anne, said Gilbert, who could not connect
• 6:50:25
  the idea of sorrow with the vivid, joyous creature beside him, unwitting that
• 6:50:30
  those who can soar to the highest heights can also plunge to the deepest depths,
• 6:50:33
  and that the natures which enjoy most keenly are those which also suffer most
• 6:50:37
  sharply. But there must sometime, mused Anne. Life seems like a cup
• 6:50:45
  of glory held to my lips just now, But there must be some bitterness
• 6:50:48
  in it. There is in every cup. I shall taste mine some day.
• 6:50:53
  Well. I hope I shall be strong and brave to meet it,
• 6:50:56
  and I hope it won't be through my own fault that it will come.
• 6:51:00
  Do you remember what doctor Davis said last Sunday evening, that the sorrow's God
• 6:51:03
  sent us brought comfort and strength with them, while the sorrows we brought on
• 6:51:07
  ourselves through folly or wickedness were by far the hardest to bear. But we
• 6:51:12
  mustn't talk of sorrow on an afternoon like this. It's meant for the sheer
• 6:51:17
  joy of living, isn't it. If I had my way, i'd shut
• 6:51:21
  everything out of your life but happiness and pleasure. Eh, said Gilbert,
• 6:51:25
  in the tone that meant danger ahead. Then you would be very unwise,
• 6:51:30
  rejoined Anne hastily. I'm sure no life can be properly developed and rounded out
• 6:51:33
  without some trial and sorrow, though I suppose it is only when we are
• 6:51:37
  pretty comfortable that we admit it. Come. The others have got to the
• 6:51:41
  pavilion and are beckoning to us. They all sat down in the little pavilion
• 6:51:47
  to watch an autumn sunset of deep red fire and pallid gold. To their
• 6:51:51
  left lay Kingsport, its roofs and spires dim in their shroud of violet smoke.
• 6:51:56
  To their right lay the harbor, taking on tints of road and copper
• 6:52:00
  as it stretched out into the sunset. Before them, the water shimmered satin
• 6:52:06
  smooth and silver, gray, and beyond clean shaven William's Island loomed out of
• 6:52:11
  the mist, guarding the town like a sturdy bulldog. It's lighthouse beacon flared
• 6:52:15
  through the mist like a baleful star, and was answered by another in the
• 6:52:19
  far horizon. Did you ever see such a strong looking place? Asked Philippa.
• 6:52:26
  I don't want William's Island especially, but I'm sure I couldn't get it
• 6:52:29
  if I did. Look at that sentry on the summit of the fort right
• 6:52:33
  beside the flag. Doesn't he look as if he had stepped out of a
• 6:52:36
  romance speaking a romance? Said Priscilla. We've been looking for heather, but
• 6:52:41
  of course we couldn't find any. It's too late in the season. I
• 6:52:44
  suppose heather, exclaimed Anne. Heather doesn't grow in America, does it.
• 6:52:49
  There are just two patches of it in the whole continent, said phil One,
• 6:52:55
  right here in the park and one somewhere else in Nova Scotia. I
• 6:52:57
  forget where the famous Highland regiment the Black Watch, camped here one year,
• 6:53:03
  and when the men shook out the straw of their beds in the spring,
• 6:53:06
  some seeds of heather took root. Oh, how delightful, said enchanted Anne.
• 6:53:11
  Let's go home around by Spofford Avenue, suggested Gilbert. We can see
• 6:53:17
  all the uh handsome houses where the wealthy nobles dwell. Spofford Avenue is the
• 6:53:22
  finest residential street in Kingsport. Nobody can build about it unless he's a millionaire.
• 6:53:29
  Oh do, said Phil. There's a perfectly killing little place I want
• 6:53:33
  to show you. Anne. It wasn't built by a millionaire. It's the
• 6:53:36
  first place after you leave the park and must have grown while Spofford Avenue was
• 6:53:40
  still a country road. It did grow. It wasn't built. I don't
• 6:53:44
  care for the house is on the avenue. They're too brand new and plate
• 6:53:47
  glassy. But this little spot is a dream and its name. But wait
• 6:53:52
  till you see it. They saw it as they walked up the pine fringed
• 6:53:56
  hill from the park. Just on the crest where Afford Avenue petered out into
• 6:54:00
  a plain road, was a little white frame house with groups of pines on
• 6:54:04
  either side of it, stretching their arms protectingly over its low roof. It
• 6:54:10
  was covered with red and gold vines through which its green shuttered windows peeped.
• 6:54:15
  Before it was a tiny garden surrounded by a low stone wall. October,
• 6:54:19
  though it was. The garden was still very sweet, with dear old fashioned,
• 6:54:23
  unworldly flowers and shrubs, sweet may, southern wood, lemon, verbena,
• 6:54:29
  alyssum, petunias, marigolds and chrysanthemums. A tiny brick wall in herringbone
• 6:54:34
  pattern led from the gate to the front porch. The whole place might have
• 6:54:40
  been transplanted from some remote country village. Yet there was something about it that
• 6:54:44
  made its nearest neighbor, the big lawn encircled palace of a tobacco king,
• 6:54:48
  look exceedingly crude and showy and ill bred. By contrast, as Phil said,
• 6:54:53
  it was the difference between being born and being made. It's the dearest
• 6:54:59
  place I ever saw, aw said Anne delightedly. It gives me one of
• 6:55:03
  my old, delightful funny aches. It's dearer and quainter than even Miss Lavender's
• 6:55:07
  stone house. It's the name I want you to notice, especially, said
• 6:55:11
  Phil. Look in white letters around the archway over the gate. Patty's Place.
• 6:55:18
  Isn't that killing? Especially on this avenue of Pinehurst and Elmwood's and Cedar
• 6:55:22
  Crofts. Patty's Place, if you please, I adore it. Have you
• 6:55:26
  any idea who Patty is? Asked Priscilla. Patty Spofford is the name of
• 6:55:32
  the old lady who owns it. I've discovered she lives there with her niece,
• 6:55:36
  and they've lived there for hundreds of years, more or less, maybe
• 6:55:40
  a little less. Anne exaggeration is merely a flight of poetic fancy. I
• 6:55:44
  understand that wealthy folk have tried to buy the lot time and again. It's
• 6:55:48
  really worth a small fortune, now, you know. But Patty won't sell
• 6:55:52
  upon any consideration. And there's an apple orchard behind the house in place of
• 6:55:56
  a back yard. You'll see it when we get a little past, a
• 6:55:59
  real apple orchard on Spofford Avenue. I'm going to dream about Patty's place tonight,
• 6:56:04
  said Anne. Why I feel as if I belonged to it. I
• 6:56:08
  wonder if, by any chance, we'll ever see the inside of it.
• 6:56:12
  It isn't likely, said Priscilla. Anne smiled mysteriously. No, it isn't
• 6:56:18
  likely, but I believe it will happen. I have a queer, creepy
• 6:56:23
  crawley feeling. You can call it a presentiment if you like. That.
• 6:56:26
  Patty's Place and I are going to be better acquainted yet. End of Chapter
• 6:56:33
  six, Chapter seven Home again. Those first three weeks at Redmond had seemed
• 6:56:41
  long, but the rest of the term flew by on wings of wind.
• 6:56:45
  Before they realized it. The Redmond students found themselves in the grind of Christmas
• 6:56:48
  examinations, emerging therefrom more or less triumphantly. The honor of leading in the
• 6:56:55
  freshman classes fluctuated between Anne Gilbert and Philippa. Priscilla did very well. Charlie
• 6:57:02
  Sloane scraped through respectably and comported himself as complacently as if he had led in
• 6:57:07
  everything. I can't really believe that this time tomorrow I'll be in Green Gables,
• 6:57:12
  said Anne on the night before departure. But I shall be, and
• 6:57:18
  you Phil will be in Bowlingbrook with Alec and Alonzo. I'm longing to see
• 6:57:22
  them, admitted Phil between the chocolate she was nibbling. They really are such
• 6:57:26
  dear boys. You know. There's to be no end of dances and drives
• 6:57:30
  in general jamborees. I shall never forgive you, Queen Anne, for not
• 6:57:34
  coming home with me for the holidays. Never means three days with you,
• 6:57:38
  Phil. It was dear of you to ask me, and I'd love to
• 6:57:41
  go to bowling Brook some day but I can't go this year. I must
• 6:57:45
  go home. You don't know how my heart longs for it. You won't
• 6:57:49
  have much of a time, said Phil scornfully. There'll be one or two
• 6:57:55
  quilting parties, I suppose, and all the old gossips will talk you over
• 6:57:59
  to your face and hind your back. You'll die of lonesome, this child
• 6:58:03
  in Avonlea, said Anne, highly amused. Now, if you'd come with
• 6:58:07
  me, you'd have a perfectly gorgeous time. Bowling broke would go wild over
• 6:58:12
  you, Queen Anne, your hair and your style and oh everything. You're
• 6:58:17
  so different. You'd be such a success, and I would bask in reflected
• 6:58:22
  glory, not the rose, but near the rose. Do come, after
• 6:58:26
  all, Anne, Your picture of social triumphs is quite fascinating, Phil,
• 6:58:30
  But I'll paint one to offset it. I'm going home to an old country
• 6:58:34
  farmhouse, once green rather faded, now set among leafless apple orchards. There
• 6:58:41
  is a brook below, and a december fir wood beyond, where I've heard
• 6:58:45
  harps swept by the fingers of rain and wind. There is a pond nearby
• 6:58:49
  that will be gray and brooding. Now there will be two oldish ladies in
• 6:58:53
  the house, one tall and thin, one short and fat. And there
• 6:58:57
  will be two twins, one and a perfect model, the other what missus
• 6:59:02
  Lynde calls a holy terror. There will be a little room upstairs, over
• 6:59:06
  the porch where old dreams hang thick, and a big, fat, glorious
• 6:59:10
  feather bed, which will almost seem the height of luxury after a boarding house
• 6:59:14
  mattress. How do you like my picture, Phil, It seems a very
• 6:59:18
  dull one, said Phil with a grimace. Oh but I've left out the
• 6:59:22
  transforming thing, said Anne softly. There'll be love there, Phil, faithful,
• 6:59:29
  tender love such as I'll never find anywhere else in the world, love
• 6:59:33
  that's waiting for me. That makes my picture a masterpiece, doesn't it?
• 6:59:37
  Even if the colors are not very brilliant. Phil silently got up, tossed
• 6:59:42
  her box of chocolates away, went up to Anne and put her arms about
• 6:59:47
  her. Anne, I wish I was like you, she said soberly.
• 6:59:53
  Diana met Anne at the Carmody station the next night, and they drove home
• 6:59:57
  together under silent stars. His own depths of sky green Gables had a very
• 7:00:03
  festal appearance as they drove up the lane. There was a light in every
• 7:00:07
  window, the glow breaking out through the darkness like flame. Red blossoms swung
• 7:00:11
  against the dark background of the haunted wood. And in the yard was a
• 7:00:15
  brave bonfire with two gay little figures dancing around it, one of which gave
• 7:00:19
  an unearthly yell as the buggy turned in under the poplars. Davy means that
• 7:00:25
  for an Indian war, whoop, said Diana. Mister Harrison's hired boy taught
• 7:00:30
  it to him, and he's been practicing it up to welcome you with Missus
• 7:00:33
  Lynde says it's worner nerves to a frazzle. He creeps up behind her,
• 7:00:37
  you know, and then let's go. He was determined to have a bonfire
• 7:00:38
  for you too. He's been piling up branches for a fortnight and pestering Marilla
• 7:00:42
  to be let course on kerosene oil over it before setting it on fire.
• 7:00:45
  I guess she did by the smell when Missus Lynde said up to the last
• 7:00:49
  that David would blow himself and everybody else up if he was let. Anne
• 7:00:53
  was out of the buggy by this time, and Davy was rapturously hugging her
• 7:00:57
  knees, while even Dora was clinging to her hand. Isn't that a bully
• 7:01:03
  bonfire? Anne? Just let me show you how to poke it. See
• 7:01:06
  the sparks. I did it for you, Anne, cause I was so
• 7:01:10
  glad you were coming home. The kitchen door opened, and Marilla's spare form
• 7:01:15
  darkened against the inner light. She preferred to meet Anne in the shadows,
• 7:01:18
  for she was horribly afraid that she was going to cry with joy. She
• 7:01:23
  stern repressed Marilla, who thought all display of deep emotion unseemly. Missus Lynde
• 7:01:30
  was behind her sonsy, kindly, matronly, as of your The love that
• 7:01:34
  Anne had told Phil was waiting for her surrounded her and enfolded her with its
• 7:01:38
  blessing and its sweetness. Nothing, after all, could compare with old ties,
• 7:01:44
  old friends, and old green gables. How starry Anne's eyes were as
• 7:01:48
  they sat down to the loaded supper table, how pink her cheeks, how
• 7:01:52
  silver clear her laughter. And Diana was going to stay all night too,
• 7:01:57
  how like the dear old times it was, And the rosebud tea set graced
• 7:02:02
  the table with Marilla. The force of nature could no further go. I
• 7:02:07
  suppose you and Diana will now proceed to talk all night, said Marilla sarcastically,
• 7:02:12
  as the girls went upstairs. Marilla was always sarcastic after any self betrayal.
• 7:02:18
  Yes, agreed Anne Gaily, but I'm going to put Davy to bed
• 7:02:22
  first. He insists on that, you bet, said Davy, as they
• 7:02:27
  went along the hall. I want somebody to say my prayers to again.
• 7:02:32
  It's no fun saying them alone. You don't say them alone, Davy.
• 7:02:36
  God is always with you to hear you. Well, I can't see him,
• 7:02:41
  objected Davy. I want to pray to somebody I can see, but
• 7:02:45
  I won't say them to missus, lynder Marilla there now. Nevertheless, when
• 7:02:49
  Davy was garbed in his gray flannel nighty, he did not seem in a
• 7:02:53
  hurry to begin. He stood before Anne, shuffling one bare foot over the
• 7:02:59
  other, and looked undecided. Come, dear, kneel down, said Anne.
• 7:03:03
  Davy came and buried his head in Anne's lap, but he did not
• 7:03:07
  kneel down. Anne. He said, in a muffled voice. I don't
• 7:03:12
  feel like praying after all. I haven't felt like it for a week now.
• 7:03:17
  I I didn't pray last night, nor the night before. Why not,
• 7:03:22
  Davy asked Anne gently. You you won't be mad if I tell you,
• 7:03:27
  implored Davy. Anne lifted the little gray flanneled body on her knee and
• 7:03:33
  cuddled his head on her arm. Do I ever get mad when you tell
• 7:03:37
  me things, Davy? No, you never do, but you get sorry,
• 7:03:42
  and that's worse. You'll be awful sorry when I tell you this,
• 7:03:47
  Anne, and you'll be shamed of me. I s'pose have you done something
• 7:03:52
  naughty, Davy? And is that why you can't say your prayers? No?
• 7:03:56
  I haven't done anything naughty yet, but I want to do it.
• 7:04:00
  What is it, Davy? I I want to say a bad word,
• 7:04:03
  Anne blurted out Davy with a desperate effort. I heard mister Harrison's hired boy
• 7:04:10
  say it one day last week, and ever since, I've been wanting to
• 7:04:14
  say it all the time, even when I'm saying my prayers. Say it,
• 7:04:18
  then, Davy. Davy lifted his flushed face in amazement. But Anne,
• 7:04:23
  it's an awful bad word. Say it. Davy gave her another incredulous
• 7:04:30
  look. Then, in a low voice, he said the dreadful word.
• 7:04:33
  The next minute, his face was burrowing against her oh, Anne, I'll
• 7:04:37
  never say it again. Never, I'll never want to say it again.
• 7:04:42
  I knew it was bad, but I didn't suppose it was so, so
• 7:04:47
  I didn't s'pose it was like that. No, I don't think you'll ever
• 7:04:51
  want to say it again, Davy, or think it either. And I
• 7:04:53
  wouldn't go about much with mister Harrison's hired boy if I were you. He
• 7:04:57
  can make bully warm. Whoops, said Davy a little regretfully. But you
• 7:05:03
  don't want your mind filled with bad words, do you, Davy, Words
• 7:05:07
  that will poison it and drive out all that is good and manly. No,
• 7:05:12
  said Davy, owl eyed with introspection. Then don't go with those people
• 7:05:18
  who use them. And now do you feel as if you could say your
• 7:05:21
  prayers Davy? Oh? Yes, said Davy, eagerly, wriggling down on
• 7:05:26
  his knees. I can say them now, all right. I ain't scared
• 7:05:30
  now to say if I should die before I wake, like I was when
• 7:05:33
  I was wanting to say that word. Probably Anne and Diana did empty out
• 7:05:37
  their souls to each other that night, but no record of their confidences has
• 7:05:41
  been preserved. They both looked as fresh and bright eyed at breakfast as only
• 7:05:45
  youth can look after unlawful hours of revelry and confession. There had been no
• 7:05:52
  snow up to this time, but as Diana crossed the old log bridge on
• 7:05:56
  her homeward way, the white flakes were beginning to flutter down over the field
• 7:06:00
  and woods russet and gray in their dreamless sleep. Soon the far away slopes
• 7:06:04
  and hills were dim and wraith like through their gauzy scarfing, as if pale
• 7:06:10
  Autumn had flung a misty bridle veil over her hair and was waiting for her
• 7:06:14
  wintry bridegroom. So they had a white Christmas after all, and a very
• 7:06:18
  pleasant day it was. In the forenoon. Letters and gifts came from Miss
• 7:06:22
  Lavendar and Paul. Anne opened them in the cheerful Green Gables kitchen, which
• 7:06:26
  was filled with what Davy, sniffing in ecstasy, called pretty smells. Miss
• 7:06:33
  Lavendar and mister Irving are settled in their new home now, reported Anne.
• 7:06:37
  I am sure Miss Lavendar is perfectly happy. I know it by the general
• 7:06:41
  tone of her letter. But there's a note from Charlotta the Fourth. She
• 7:06:45
  doesn't like Boston at all, and she is fearfully homesick. Miss Lavendar wants
• 7:06:49
  me to go through to Echo Lodge some day while I'm home and light a
• 7:06:52
  fire to air it and see that the cushions aren't getting moldy. I think
• 7:06:56
  I'll get Diana to go over with me next week and we can spend the
• 7:07:00
  evening with Theodora Dix. I want to see Theodora. By the way,
• 7:07:04
  is Ledovic speed still going to see her? They say, so, said
• 7:07:08
  Marilla, and he's likely to continue it. Folks have given up expecting that
• 7:07:14
  that courtship will ever arrive anywhere. I'd hurry him up a bit if I
• 7:07:18
  was Theodora. That's what said missus Lynde. And there is not the slightest
• 7:07:22
  doubt but that she would. There was also a characteristic scrawl from Philippa full
• 7:07:29
  of Alec and Alonzo, what they said and what they did, and how
• 7:07:32
  they looked when they saw her. But I can't make up my mind yet
• 7:07:36
  which to marry, wrote phil I do wish you would come with me to
• 7:07:40
  decide for me. Someone will have to. When I saw Alec, my
• 7:07:44
  heart gave a great thump, and I thought he might be the right one.
• 7:07:48
  And then when Alonzo came thump went my heart again. So that's no
• 7:07:52
  guide, though it should be according to all the novels I've ever read.
• 7:07:56
  Now, Anne, your heart wouldn't thump for anybody but the jin Prince Charming,
• 7:08:00
  would it. There must be something radically wrong with mine. But I'm
• 7:08:04
  having a perfectly gorgeous time. How I wish you were here. It's snowing
• 7:08:10
  today and I'm rapturous. I was so afraid we'd have a green Christmas,
• 7:08:14
  and I loathed them. You know, when Christmas is a dirty, gray,
• 7:08:18
  browny affair, looking as if it had been left over a hundred years
• 7:08:21
  ago and had been in soap ever since, it is called a green Christmas.
• 7:08:26
  Don't ask me why. As Lord Dundreary says, there are thumb things
• 7:08:30
  no fellow can understand. Anne, did you ever get on a street car
• 7:08:36
  and then discover that you hadn't any money with you to pay your fare?
• 7:08:38
  I did the other day. It's quite awful. I had a nickel with
• 7:08:42
  me when I got on the car. I thought it was in the left
• 7:08:45
  pocket of my coat. When I got settled down comfortably, I felt for
• 7:08:48
  it. It wasn't there. I had a cold chill, I felt in
• 7:08:52
  the other pocket not there. I had another chill. Then I felt in
• 7:08:56
  a little inside pocket all in vain. I had two chills at once.
• 7:09:02
  I took off my gloves, laid them on the seat, and went over
• 7:09:04
  all my pockets again. It was not there. I stood up and shook
• 7:09:10
  myself, and then looked on the floor. The car was full of people
• 7:09:12
  who were going home from the opera, and they all stared at me.
• 7:09:15
  But I was past caring for a little thing like that. But I could
• 7:09:19
  not find my fare. I concluded I must have put it in my mouth
• 7:09:22
  and swallowed it inadvertently. I didn't know what to do. Would the conductor,
• 7:09:27
  I wondered, stop the car and put me off in ignominy and shame.
• 7:09:32
  Was it possible that I could convince him that I was merely the victim
• 7:09:34
  of my own absent mindedness, and not an unprincipled creature trying to obtain a
• 7:09:40
  ride upon false pretenses? How I wished that Alec or Alonzo were there,
• 7:09:45
  but they weren't because I wanted them. If I hadn't wanted them, they
• 7:09:48
  would have been there by the dozen. And I couldn't decide what to say
• 7:09:52
  to the conductor when he came around. As soon as I got one sentence
• 7:09:56
  of explanation mapped out in my mind, I felt nobody could believe it,
• 7:10:00
  and I must compose another. It seemed there was nothing to do but trust
• 7:10:03
  in providence, and for all the comfort that gave me, I might as
• 7:10:06
  well have been the old lady who, when told by the captain during a
• 7:10:08
  storm that she must put her trust in the almighty, exclaimed, oh,
• 7:10:14
  Captain, is it as bad as that? Just at the conventional moment,
• 7:10:18
  when all hope had fled and the conductor was holding out his box to the
• 7:10:22
  passenger next to me, I suddenly remembered where I'd put that wretched coin of
• 7:10:26
  the realm. I hadn't swallowed it, after all. I meekly fished it
• 7:10:29
  out of the index finger of my glove and poked it in the box.
• 7:10:33
  I smiled at everybody and felt it was a beautiful world. The visit to
• 7:10:37
  Echo Lodge was not the least pleasant of many pleasant holiday outings. Anne and
• 7:10:42
  Diana went back to it by the old way of the beech Woods, carrying
• 7:10:47
  a lunch basket with them. Echo Lodge, which had been closed ever since
• 7:10:51
  Miss Lavender's wedding, was briefly thrown open to wind and sunshine once more,
• 7:10:56
  and firelight glimmered again in the little rooms. The perfume of Miss Lavender's rose
• 7:11:00
  bowl still filled the air. It was hardly possible to believe that Miss Lavender
• 7:11:04
  would not come tripping in presently with her brown eyes a star with welcome,
• 7:11:10
  and that Charlotta, the fourth blue of bow and wide of smile, would
• 7:11:14
  not pop through the door. Paul too seemed hovering around with his fairy fancies.
• 7:11:19
  It really makes me feel a little bit like a ghost revisiting the old
• 7:11:23
  time glimpses of the moon, laughed Anne. Let's go out and see if
• 7:11:27
  the echoes are at home. Bring the old horn, it is still behind
• 7:11:32
  the kitchen door. The echoes were at home over the White River, as
• 7:11:37
  silver, clear and multitudinous as ever, And when they had ceased to answer,
• 7:11:41
  the girls locked up Echo Lodge again and went away in the perfect half
• 7:11:45
  hour that follows the rose and saffron of a winter sunset end of chapter seven.
• 7:11:52
  Chapter eight, Anne's first proposal. The old year did not slip away
• 7:12:00
  in a green twilight with a pinky yellow sunset. Instead, it went out
• 7:12:04
  with a wild white bluster and blow. It was one of the nights when
• 7:12:08
  the storm wind hurtles over the frozen meadows and black hollows, and moans around
• 7:12:15
  the eaves like a lost creature, and drives the snow sharply against the shaking
• 7:12:18
  panes. Just the sort of night people liked to cuddle down between their blankets
• 7:12:23
  and count their mercies, said Anne to Jane Andrews, who had come up
• 7:12:27
  to spend the afternoon and stay all night. But when they were cuddled between
• 7:12:32
  their blankets in Anne's little porch room, it was not her mercies of which
• 7:12:37
  Jane was thinking. Anne, She said, very solemnly, I want to
• 7:12:41
  tell you something, may I. Anne was feeling rather sleepy after the party
• 7:12:47
  Ruby Gillis had given the night before. She would much rather have gone to
• 7:12:51
  sleep than listen to Jane's confidences, which she was sure would bore her.
• 7:12:55
  She had no prophetic inkling of what was coming. Probably Jane was in gaged
• 7:13:00
  too. Rumor averred that Ruby Gillis was engaged to the Spencervale school teacher,
• 7:13:04
  about whom all the girls were said to be quite wild. I'll soon be
• 7:13:08
  the only fancy freemaiden of her old quartet thought Anne drowsily. Aloud, she
• 7:13:15
  said, of course, Anne said Jane, still more solemnly, what do
• 7:13:21
  you think of my brother Billy? Anne gasped over this unexpected question and floundered
• 7:13:26
  helplessly in her thoughts. Goodness, what did she think of Billy Andrews?
• 7:13:32
  She had never thought anything about him? Round faced, stupid, perpetually smiling,
• 7:13:37
  good natured Billy Andrews. Did anybody ever think about Billy Andrews? I
• 7:13:44
  I don't understand, Jane, She stammered. What do you mean exactly?
• 7:13:49
  Do you like Billy? Asked Jane bluntly. Why? Why? Yes?
• 7:13:56
  I like him? Of course, gasped Anne, wonder if she were telling
• 7:14:00
  the literal truth. Certainly she did not dislike Billy, but could be indifferent.
• 7:14:04
  Tolerance with which she regarded him when he happened to be in her range
• 7:14:08
  of vision be considered positive enough for liking. What was Jane trying to elucidate?
• 7:14:15
  Would you like him for a husband? Asked Jane calmly, a husband.
• 7:14:22
  Anne had been sitting up in bed, the better to wrestle with the
• 7:14:26
  problem of her exact opinion of Billy Andrew's. Now she fell flatly back on
• 7:14:30
  her pillows, the very breath gone out of her. Whose husband yours?
• 7:14:36
  Of course, answered Jane. Billy wants to marry you. He's always been
• 7:14:41
  crazy about you, and now father has given him the upper farm in his
• 7:14:45
  own name, and there's nothing to prevent him from getting married. But he's
• 7:14:51
  so shy he couldn't ask you himself if you'd have him, so he got
• 7:14:55
  me to do it. I'd rather not have, but he gave me no
• 7:14:57
  peace till I said I would if I got a good chance. What do
• 7:15:02
  you think about it? Anne? Was it a dream? Was it one
• 7:15:06
  of those nightmare things in which you find yourself engaged or married to someone you
• 7:15:10
  hate or don't know without the slightest idea? How it ever came about?
• 7:15:14
  No? She? Anne Shirley was lying there, wide awake in her own
• 7:15:18
  bed, and Jane Andrews was beside her, calmly proposing for her brother Billy.
• 7:15:25
  Anne did not know whether she wanted to writhe or laugh, but she
• 7:15:29
  could do neither, for Jane's feelings must not be hurt. I I couldn't
• 7:15:34
  marry Bill, you know, Jane, She managed to gasp. Why such
• 7:15:38
  an idea never occurred to me? Never? I don't suppose it did,
• 7:15:44
  agreed Jane. Billy has always been far too shy to think of courting,
• 7:15:49
  but you might think it over. Anne. Billy is a good fellow.
• 7:15:52
  I must say that if he is my brother. He has no bad habits,
• 7:15:56
  and he's a great worker, and you can depen on him. A
• 7:16:00
  bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. He told me to
• 7:16:03
  tell you he'd be quite willing to wait till you got through college if you
• 7:16:08
  insisted, though he'd rather get married this spring before the planting begins. He'd
• 7:16:14
  always be very good to you, I'm sure, and you know, Anne,
• 7:16:18
  I'd love to have you for a sister. I can't marry Billy,
• 7:16:23
  said Anne decidedly. She had recovered her wits and was even feeling a little
• 7:16:27
  angry. It was also ridiculous. There is no use thinking of it,
• 7:16:33
  Jane. I don't care anything for him in that way, and you must
• 7:16:36
  tell him so well. I didn't suppose you would, said Jane with a
• 7:16:41
  resigned sigh, feeling that she had done her best. I told Billy I
• 7:16:45
  didn't believe it was a bit of use to ask you, but he insisted,
• 7:16:51
  Well, you've made your decision, Anne, and I hope you won't
• 7:16:53
  regret it. Jane spoke rather coldly. She had been perfectly sure that the
• 7:17:00
  enamored Billy had no chance at all of inducing Anne to marry him. Nevertheless,
• 7:17:04
  she felt a little resentment that Anne Shirley, who was after all merely
• 7:17:08
  an adopted orphan without kith or kin, should refuse her brother one of the
• 7:17:14
  Avonlea Andrews. Well, pride sometimes goes before a fall, Jane reflected ominously.
• 7:17:22
  Anne permitted herself to smile in the darkness over the idea that she might
• 7:17:26
  ever regret not marrying Billy Andrews. I hope Billy won't feel very badly over
• 7:17:32
  it, she said nicely. Jane made a movement as if she were tossing
• 7:17:36
  her head on her pillow. Oh, he won't break his heart. Billy
• 7:17:40
  has too much good sense for that. He likes Nettie Blewett pretty well too,
• 7:17:45
  and mother would rather he married her than any one. She's such a
• 7:17:48
  good manager and savor. I think when Billy's once sure you won't have him,
• 7:17:53
  he'll take Nettie. Please don't mention this to any one, will you.
• 7:17:57
  Anne? Certainly not, said Anne, who had no desire whatever to
• 7:18:03
  publish abroad the fact that Billy Andrews wanted to marry her, preferring her when
• 7:18:07
  all was said and done to Nettie blew It. Nettie blew It, and
• 7:18:11
  now I suppose we'd better go to sleep, suggested Jane. To sleep.
• 7:18:18
  Went Jane easily and speedily. But though very unlike Macbeth in most respects,
• 7:18:22
  she had certainly contrived to murder sleep for Anne that proposed to damsel lay on
• 7:18:29
  a wakeful pillow until the wee SMAs, but her meditations were far from being
• 7:18:33
  romantic. It was not, however, until the next morning, that she
• 7:18:37
  had an opportunity to indulge in a good laugh over the whole affair. When
• 7:18:42
  Jane had gone home still with a hint of frost in voice and manner,
• 7:18:47
  because Anne had declined so ungratefully and decidedly the honor of an alliance with the
• 7:18:52
  house of Andrew's, Anne retreated to the porch room, shut the door,
• 7:18:57
  and had her laugh out at last. If I could only share the joke
• 7:19:02
  with some one, she thought, but I can't. Diana's the only one
• 7:19:07
  I'd want to tell. And even if I hadn't sworn secrecy to Jane,
• 7:19:11
  I can't tell Diana things. Now she tells everything to Fred. I know
• 7:19:15
  she does. Well. I've had my first proposal. I supposed it would
• 7:19:19
  come some day, but I certainly never thought it would be by proxy.
• 7:19:23
  It's awfully funny, and yet there's a sting in it too. Somehow Anne
• 7:19:30
  knew quite well wherein the sting consisted, though she did not put it into
• 7:19:33
  words. She had had her secret dreams of the first time some one should
• 7:19:37
  ask her the great question, And it had in those dreams always been very
• 7:19:42
  romantic and beautiful, and the some one was to be very handsome and dark
• 7:19:48
  eyed, and distinguished looking and eloquent, whether he were prince charming to be
• 7:19:52
  enraptured with yes, or one to whom a regretful, beautifully worded, but
• 7:19:56
  hopeless refusal must be given. If the latter, the refusal was to be
• 7:20:02
  expressed so delicately that it would be next best thing to acceptance, and he
• 7:20:07
  would go away after kissing her hand, assuring her of his unalterable life long
• 7:20:11
  devotion, and it would always be a beautiful memory to be proud of and
• 7:20:17
  a little sad about also. And now this thrilling experience had turned out to
• 7:20:22
  be merely grotesque. Billy Andrews had got his sister to propose for him because
• 7:20:26
  his father had given him the upper farm, and if Anne wouldn't have him,
• 7:20:32
  Nettie Blewett would. There was romance for you. With a vengeance.
• 7:20:37
  Anne laughed, and then sighed. The bloom had been brushed from one little
• 7:20:41
  maiden dream. Would the painful process go on until everything became prosaic and humdrum
• 7:20:48
  end of chapter eight, Chapter nine, an unwelcome lover and a welcome friend.
• 7:20:56
  The second term at Redmond sped as quickly as he had the first actually
• 7:21:00
  whizzed away. Philippa said. Anne enjoyed it thoroughly, in all its phases.
• 7:21:07
  The stimulating class rivalry, the making and deepening of new and helpful friendships,
• 7:21:11
  the gay little social stunts, the doings of the various societies of which
• 7:21:15
  she was a member, the widening of horizons and interests. She studied hard,
• 7:21:22
  for she had made up her mind to win the Thorburne Scholarship in English.
• 7:21:26
  This being one meant that she could come back to Redmond the next year
• 7:21:29
  without trenching on Marilla's small savings. Something Anne was determined she would not do.
• 7:21:36
  Gilbert, too, was in full chase after a scholarship, but found
• 7:21:38
  plenty of time for frequent calls at thirty eight Saint John's. He was Anne's
• 7:21:44
  escort at nearly all the college affairs, and she knew that their names were
• 7:21:48
  coupled in Redmond gossip. Anne raged over this, but was helpless. She
• 7:21:52
  could not cast an old friend like Gilbert aside, especially when he had grown
• 7:21:56
  suddenly wise and wary as behold hooved him in the dangerous proximity of more than
• 7:22:02
  one Redmond youth who would gladly have taken his place by the side of the
• 7:22:06
  slender, red haired coed whose gray eyes were as alluring as stars of evening.
• 7:22:11
  Anne was never attended by the crowd of willing victims who hovered around Philippa's
• 7:22:15
  conquering march through her freshman year. But there was a lanky, brainy freshy,
• 7:22:21
  a jolly little round sophomore, and a tall learned junior who all liked
• 7:22:26
  to call at thirty eight Saint John's and talk over ologies and ISAMs as well
• 7:22:30
  as lighter subjects with Anne in the becushioned parlor of that domicile. Gilbert did
• 7:22:37
  not love any of them, and he was exceedingly careful to give none of
• 7:22:41
  them the advantage over him by any untimely display of his real feelings. Anneward
• 7:22:45
  to her, he had become again the boy comrade of Avonlea days, and
• 7:22:49
  as such could hold his own against any smitten Swain who had so far entered
• 7:22:55
  the lists against him As a companion. Anne honestly acknowledged nobody could be so
• 7:23:00
  satisfactory as Gilbert. She was very glad, so she told herself that he
• 7:23:06
  had evidently dropped all nonsensical ideas, though she spent considerable time secretly wondering why.
• 7:23:14
  Only one disagreeable incident marred that winter. Charlie Sloane, sitting bolt upright
• 7:23:18
  on miss Ada's most dearly beloved cushion, asked Anne one night if she would
• 7:23:23
  promise to become missus Charlie Sloane some day, coming after Billy Andrew's proxy effort.
• 7:23:30
  This was not quite the shock to Anne's romantic sensibilities that it would otherwise
• 7:23:34
  have been, but it was certainly another heartrending disillusion. She was angry,
• 7:23:40
  too, for she felt that she had never given Charlie the slightest encouragement to
• 7:23:44
  suppose such a thing possible. But what could you expect of a sloane,
• 7:23:48
  As missus Rachel Lynde would ask scornfully, Charlie's whole attitude, tone, air
• 7:23:53
  words fairly reeked with slownishness. He was conferring a great honor, no doubt
• 7:24:00
  whatever about that. And when Anne, utterly insensible to the honor, refused
• 7:24:04
  him as delicately and considerately as she could, for even a sloane had feelings
• 7:24:10
  which ought not to be unduly lacerated, slownishness still further betrayed itself. Charlie
• 7:24:17
  certainly did not take his dismissal as Anne's imaginary rejected suitors did. Instead,
• 7:24:22
  he became angry and showed it. He said two or three quite nasty things.
• 7:24:26
  Anne's temper flashed up mutinously, and she retorted with a cutting little speech
• 7:24:32
  whose keenness pierced even Charlie's protective slownishness, and reached the quick. He caught
• 7:24:37
  up his hat and flung himself out of the house with a very red face.
• 7:24:41
  Anne rushed upstairs, falling twice over miss Ada's cushions on the way,
• 7:24:45
  and threw herself on her bed in tears of humiliation and rage. Had she
• 7:24:51
  actually stooped to quarrel with a Sloane? Was it possible anything Charlie Sloane could
• 7:24:56
  say had power to make her angry? Oh? This was dead ration,
• 7:25:00
  indeed worse even than being the rival of Nettie Blewett. I wish I need
• 7:25:04
  never see the horrible creature again. She sobbed vindictively into her pillows. She
• 7:25:11
  could not avoid seeing him again, But the outraged Charlie took care that it
• 7:25:15
  should not be at very close quarters. Miss Ada's cushions were henceforth safe from
• 7:25:19
  his depredations, and when he met Anne on the street or in Redman's halls,
• 7:25:25
  his bow was icy in the extreme. Relations between these two old schoolmates
• 7:25:30
  continued to be thus strained for nearly a year. Then Charlie transferred his blighted
• 7:25:34
  affections to a round, rosy, snub nosed, blue eyed little sophomore who
• 7:25:40
  appreciated them as they deserved. Whereupon he forgave Anne and condescended to be civil
• 7:25:45
  to her again, in a patronizing manner, intended to show her just what
• 7:25:48
  she had lost. One day, Anne scurried excitedly into Priscilla's room. Read
• 7:25:56
  that she cried tossing Priscilla a letter from Stella, and she's coming to Redmond
• 7:26:02
  next year. And what do you think of her idea? I think it's
• 7:26:04
  a perfectly splendid one. If we can only carry it out. Do you
• 7:26:08
  suppose we can, PRIs I'll be better able to tell you when I find
• 7:26:12
  out what it is, said Priscilla, casting aside a Greek lexicon and taking
• 7:26:17
  up Stella's letter. Stella Maynard had been one of their chums at Queen's Academy
• 7:26:22
  and had been teaching school ever since. But I'm going to give it up,
• 7:26:26
  Anne dear, she wrote, and go to college next year. As
• 7:26:30
  I took the third year at Queen's, I can enter the sophomore year.
• 7:26:33
  I'm tired of teaching in a back country school. Some day I'm going to
• 7:26:37
  write a treatise on the trials of a country school, Marm. It will
• 7:26:40
  be a harrowing bit of realism. It seems to be the prevailing impression that
• 7:26:44
  we live in Clover and I've nothing to do but draw our quarter's salary.
• 7:26:48
  My treatise shall tell the truth about us. Why if a week should pass
• 7:26:52
  without some one telling me that I am doing easy work for big pay.
• 7:26:55
  I would conclude that I might as well order my ascension robe immediately, and
• 7:26:59
  to aunt, well, you get your money easy. Some rape pair will
• 7:27:03
  tell me condescendingly all you have to do is sit there and hear lessons.
• 7:27:07
  I used to argue the matter at first, but I'm wiser now. Facts
• 7:27:11
  are stubborn things, but as some one has wisely said, not half so
• 7:27:14
  stubborn as fallacies. So I only smile loftily now in eloquent silence. Why
• 7:27:19
  I have nine grades in my school, and I have to teach a little
• 7:27:22
  of everything, from investigating the interiors of earth worms to the study of the
• 7:27:26
  solar system. My youngest pupil is four. His mother sends him to school
• 7:27:30
  to get him out of the way. My oldest is twenty. It suddenly
• 7:27:34
  struck him that it would be easier to go to school and get an education
• 7:27:38
  than follow the plow any longer in the wild effort to cram all sorts of
• 7:27:42
  research into six hours a day. I don't wonder if the children feel like
• 7:27:45
  the little boy was taken to see the biograph. I have to look for
• 7:27:49
  what's coming next before I know what went last, he complained. I feel
• 7:27:53
  like that myself, and the letters I get Anne, Tommy's mother writes me
• 7:27:59
  that Tommy is not coming on an arithmetic as fast as she would like.
• 7:28:02
  He is only in simple reduction yet, and Johnny Johnson is in fractions,
• 7:28:06
  and Johnny isn't half as smart as her Tommy, and she can't understand it.
• 7:28:10
  And Susie's father wants to know why Susie can't write a letter without misspelling
• 7:28:12
  half the words. And Dick's aunt wants me to change his seat because that
• 7:28:17
  bad brown boy is sitting with is teaching him to say naughty words as to
• 7:28:22
  the financial part. But I'll not begin on that. Both whom the gods
• 7:28:26
  wish to destroy, they first make country school marms there. I feel better
• 7:28:30
  after that growl. After all, I've enjoyed these past two years. But
• 7:28:34
  I'm coming to Redmond and now, Anne, I've a little plan. You
• 7:28:38
  know how I loathe boarding. I've boarded for four years and I'm so tired
• 7:28:41
  of it. I don't feel like enduring three years more of it. Now.
• 7:28:45
  Why can't you and Priscilla and I club together? Rent a little house
• 7:28:48
  somewhere in Kingsport and board ourselves. It would be cheaper than any other way.
• 7:28:53
  Of course, we would have to have a housekeeper, and I have
• 7:28:56
  one ready on the spot. You've heard me speak of Aunt Jamesina. She's
• 7:28:59
  a sweetest aunt that ever lived. In spite of her name. She can't
• 7:29:03
  help that. She was called james Zina because her father, whose name is
• 7:29:06
  James, was drowned at sea a month before she was born. I always
• 7:29:10
  call her Aunt Jimsie. Well. Her only daughter is recently married and gone
• 7:29:14
  to the Foreign mission field. Aunt Jamesina is left alone in a big house,
• 7:29:18
  and she is horribly lonesome. She will come to Kingsport and keep house
• 7:29:21
  for us if we want her, and I know you'll both love her.
• 7:29:23
  The more I think of the plan, the more I like it. We
• 7:29:26
  can have such good independent times now if you and Priscilla agree to it,
• 7:29:30
  wouldn't it be a good idea for you, who are on the spot to
• 7:29:33
  look around and see if you can find a suitable house this spring. That
• 7:29:37
  would be better than leaving it till the fall. If you could get a
• 7:29:40
  furnished one, so much the better. But if not, we can scare
• 7:29:42
  up a few sticks of furniture between us and old family friends with attics.
• 7:29:47
  Anyhow, decide as soon as you can and write me so that Aunt Jamesina
• 7:29:49
  will know what plans to make for next year. I think it's a good
• 7:29:53
  idea, said Priscilla, so do, I agreed Anne delightedly. Of course,
• 7:30:00
  of course we have a nice boarding house here. But when all said
• 7:30:02
  and done, a boarding house isn't home. So let go house hunting at
• 7:30:06
  once before exams come on. I'm afraid it will be hard enough to get
• 7:30:10
  a really suitable house, warned Priscilla. Don't expect too much, Anne.
• 7:30:15
  Nice houses in nice localities will probably be away beyond our means. We'll likely
• 7:30:19
  have to content ourselves with a shabby little place on some street whereon live people
• 7:30:23
  whom to know is to be unknown, and make life inside compensate for the
• 7:30:27
  outside. Accordingly, they went house hunting, but to find just what they
• 7:30:32
  wanted proved even harder than Priscilla had feared. Houses there were galore, furnished
• 7:30:37
  and unfurnished, but one was too big, another too small, this one
• 7:30:41
  too expensive, that one too far from Redmond. Exams were on and over
• 7:30:45
  the last week of the term came, and still their house of dreams,
• 7:30:49
  as Anne called it, remained a castle in the air. We shall have
• 7:30:53
  to give up and waite to the fall, i suppose, said Priscilla wearily,
• 7:30:57
  as they rambled through the park on one of April's darling days of breeze
• 7:31:00
  and blue, when the harbor was creaming and shimmering beneath the pearl hued mists
• 7:31:06
  floating over it. We may find some shack to shelter us then, and
• 7:31:10
  if not, body houses we shall have always with us. I'm not going
• 7:31:14
  to worry about it just now anyway, and spoil this lovely afternoon, said
• 7:31:18
  Anne, gazing around her with delight. The fresh chill air was faintly charged
• 7:31:23
  with the aroma of pine balsam, and the sky above was crystal clear and
• 7:31:27
  blue. A great inverted cup of blessing spring is singing in my blood today,
• 7:31:33
  and the lure of April is abroad on the air. I'm seeing visions
• 7:31:37
  and dreaming dreams. Chris. That's because the wind is from the west.
• 7:31:41
  I do love the west wind. It's things of hope and gladness, doesn't
• 7:31:45
  it. When the east wind blows, I always think of sorrowful rain on
• 7:31:49
  the eaves and sad waves on a gray shore. When I get old,
• 7:31:52
  I shall have rheumatism when the wind is east. And isn't it jolly when
• 7:31:56
  you discard furs and winter garments for the first time and sally forth like this
• 7:32:00
  and spring attire, laughed Priscilla. Don't you feel as if you had been
• 7:32:04
  made over new? Everything is new in the spring, said Anne. Springs
• 7:32:10
  themselves are always so new too. No spring is ever just like any other
• 7:32:14
  spring. It always has something of its own to be its own peculiar sweetness.
• 7:32:18
  See how green the grass is around that little pond, and how the
• 7:32:22
  willow buds are bursting, And exams are over and gone. The time of
• 7:32:26
  convocation will come soon next Wednesday. This day next week, we'll be home.
• 7:32:32
  I'm glad, said Anne dreamily. There are so many things I want
• 7:32:36
  to do. I want to sit on the back porch steps and feel the
• 7:32:38
  breeze blowing down over mister Harrison's fields. I want to hunt ferns in the
• 7:32:42
  haunted wood and gather violets and violet vale. Do you remember the day of
• 7:32:48
  our golden picnic, Priscilla. I want to hear the frogs singing and the
• 7:32:51
  poplars whispering. But I've learned to love Kingsport too, and I'm glad I'm
• 7:32:56
  coming back next fall. If I hadn't won the Thorburn, I don't believe
• 7:33:00
  I could have. I couldn't take any of Marilla's little hoard. If only
• 7:33:03
  we could find a house, sighed Priscilla. Look over there at Kingsport,
• 7:33:08
  Anne, houses houses everywhere, and not one for us. Stop it,
• 7:33:14
  PRIs the best is yet to be, Like the old Roman, we'll find
• 7:33:17
  a house or build one on a day like this. There's no such word
• 7:33:21
  as fail in my bright lexicon. They lingered in the park until sunset,
• 7:33:26
  living in the amazing miracle and glory and wonder of the springtide. And they
• 7:33:30
  went home as usual, by way of Spofford Avenue, that they might have
• 7:33:33
  the delight of looking at Patty's place. I feel as if something mysterious were
• 7:33:38
  going to happen right away by the pricking of my thumbs, said Anne as
• 7:33:42
  they went up the slope. It's a nice story bookish feeling. Why why,
• 7:33:48
  why, Priscilla Grant look over there and tell me if it's true?
• 7:33:52
  Or am I seein things Priscilla looked. Anne's thumbs and eyes had not deceived
• 7:33:59
  her. Over the arched gateway of Patty's Place dangled a little modest sign.
• 7:34:03
  It said to let furnished inquire within. Priscilla said Anne in a whisper.
• 7:34:11
  Do you suppose it's possible that we could rent Patty's Place? No, I
• 7:34:15
  don't avered, Priscilla. It would be too good to be true. Fairy
• 7:34:21
  tales don't happen nowadays. I won't hope, Anne, The disappointment would be
• 7:34:25
  too awful to bear. They're sure to want more for it than we can
• 7:34:27
  afford. Remember, it's on Spofford Avenue. We must find out anyhow,
• 7:34:33
  said Anne resolutely. It's too late to call this evening, but we'll come
• 7:34:37
  tomorrow, Oh, PRIs if we can get this darling spot. I've always
• 7:34:41
  felt that my fortunes were linked with Patty's Place, ever since I saw it
• 7:34:45
  first end of Chapter nine