Anne of Green Gables - Lucy Maud Montgomery (read novels website .TXT) š
- Author: Lucy Maud Montgomery
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āWeāve got each other, Anne. I donāt know what Iād do if you werenāt hereāif youād never come. Oh, Anne, I know Iāve been kind of strict and harsh with you maybeā but you mustnāt think I didnāt love you as well as Matthew did, for all that. I want to tell you now when I can. Itās never been easy for me to say things out of my heart, but at times like this itās easier. I love you as dear as if you were my own flesh and blood and youāve been my joy and comfort ever since you came to Green Gables.ā
Two days afterwards they carried Matthew Cuthbert over his homestead threshold and away from the fields he had tilled and the orchards he had loved and the trees he had planted; and then Avonlea settled back to its usual placidity and even at Green Gables affairs slipped into their old groove and work was done and duties fulfilled with regularity as before, although always with the aching sense of āloss in all familiar things.ā Anne, new to grief, thought it almost sad that it could be soāthat they COULD go on in the old way without Matthew. She felt something like shame and remorse when she discovered that the sunrises behind the firs and the pale pink buds opening in the garden gave her the old inrush of gladness when she saw themāthat Dianaās visits were pleasant to her and that Dianaās merry words and ways moved her to laughter and smilesāthat, in brief, the beautiful world of blossom and love and friendship had lost none of its power to please her fancy and thrill her heart, that life still called to her with many insistent voices.
āIt seems like disloyalty to Matthew, somehow, to find pleasure in these things now that he has gone,ā she said wistfully to Mrs. Allan one evening when they were together in the manse garden. āI miss him so muchāall the timeā and yet, Mrs. Allan, the world and life seem very beautiful and interesting to me for all. Today Diana said something funny and I found myself laughing. I thought when it happened I could never laugh again. And it somehow seems as if I oughtnāt to.ā
āWhen Matthew was here he liked to hear you laugh and he liked to know that you found pleasure in the pleasant things around you,ā said Mrs. Allan gently. āHe is just away now; and he likes to know it just the same. I am sure we should not shut our hearts against the healing influences that nature offers us. But I can understand your feeling. I think we all experience the same thing. We resent the thought that anything can please us when someone we love is no longer here to share the pleasure with us, and we almost feel as if we were unfaithful to our sorrow when we find our interest in life returning to us.ā
āI was down to the graveyard to plant a rosebush on Matthewās grave this afternoon,ā said Anne dreamily. āI took a slip of the little white Scotch rosebush his mother brought out from Scotland long ago; Matthew always liked those roses the bestāthey were so small and sweet on their thorny stems. It made me feel glad that I could plant it by his graveāas if I were doing something that must please him in taking it there to be near him. I hope he has roses like them in heaven. Perhaps the souls of all those little white roses that he has loved so many summers were all there to meet him. I must go home now. Marilla is all alone and she gets lonely at twilight.ā
āShe will be lonelier still, I fear, when you go away again to college,ā said Mrs. Allan.
Anne did not reply; she said good night and went slowly back to green Gables. Marilla was sitting on the front doorsteps and Anne sat down beside her. The door was open behind them, held back by a big pink conch shell with hints of sea sunsets in its smooth inner convolutions.
Anne gathered some sprays of pale-yellow honeysuckle and put them in her hair. She liked the delicious hint of fragrance, as some aerial benediction, above her every time she moved.
āDoctor Spencer was here while you were away,ā Marilla said. āHe says that the specialist will be in town tomorrow and he insists that I must go in and have my eyes examined. I suppose Iād better go and have it over. Iāll be more than thankful if the man can give me the right kind of glasses to suit my eyes. You wonāt mind staying here alone while Iām away, will you? Martin will have to drive me in and thereās ironing and baking to do.ā
āI shall be all right. Diana will come over for company for me. I shall attend to the ironing and baking beautifullyā you neednāt fear that Iāll starch the handkerchiefs or flavor the cake with liniment.ā
Marilla laughed.
āWhat a girl you were for making mistakes in them days, Anne. You were always getting into scrapes. I did use to think you were possessed. Do you mind the time you dyed your hair?ā
āYes, indeed. I shall never forget it,ā smiled Anne, touching the heavy braid of hair that was wound about her shapely head. āI laugh a little now sometimes when I think what a worry my hair used to be to meābut I donāt laugh MUCH, because it was a very real trouble then. I did suffer terribly over my hair and my freckles. My freckles are really gone; and people are nice enough to tell me my hair is auburn nowāall but Josie Pye. She informed me yesterday that she really thought it was redder than ever, or at least my black dress made it look redder, and she asked me if people who had red hair ever got used to having it. Marilla, Iāve almost decided to give up trying to like Josie Pye. Iāve made what I would once have called a heroic effort to like her, but Josie Pye wonāt BE liked.ā
āJosie is a Pye,ā said Marilla sharply, āso she canāt help being disagreeable. I suppose people of that kind serve some useful purpose in society, but I must say I donāt know what it is any more than I know the use of thistles. Is Josie going to teach?ā
āNo, she is going back to Queenās next year. So are Moody Spurgeon and Charlie Sloane. Jane and Ruby are going to teach and they have both got schoolsāJane at Newbridge and Ruby at some place up west.ā
āGilbert Blythe is going to teach too, isnāt he?ā
āYesāābriefly.
āWhat a nice-looking fellow he is,ā said Marilla absently. āI saw him in church last Sunday and he seemed so tall and manly. He looks a lot like his father did at the same age. John Blythe was a nice boy. We used to be real good friends, he and I. People called him my beau.ā
Anne looked up with swift interest.
āOh, Marillaāand what happened?āwhy didnāt youāā
āWe had a quarrel. I wouldnāt forgive him when he asked me to. I meant to, after awhileābut I was sulky and angry and I wanted to punish him first. He never came backāthe Blythes were all mighty independent. But I always feltārather sorry. Iāve always kind of wished Iād forgiven him when I had the chance.ā
āSo youāve had a bit of romance in your life, too,ā said Anne softly.
āYes, I suppose you might call it that. You wouldnāt think so to look at me, would you? But you never can tell about people from their outsides. Everybody has forgot about me and John. Iād forgotten myself. But it all came back to me when I saw Gilbert last Sunday.ā
Marilla went to town the next day and returned in the evening. Anne had gone over to Orchard Slope with Diana and came back to find Marilla in the kitchen, sitting by the table with her head leaning on her hand. Something in her dejected attitude struck a chill to Anneās heart. She had never seen Marilla sit limply inert like that.
āAre you very tired, Marilla?ā
āYesānoāI donāt know,ā said Marilla wearily, looking up. āI suppose I am tired but I havenāt thought about it. Itās not that.ā
āDid you see the oculist? What did he say?ā asked Anne anxiously.
āYes, I saw him. He examined my eyes. He says that if I give up all reading and sewing entirely and any kind of work that strains the eyes, and if Iām careful not to cry, and if I wear the glasses heās given me he thinks my eyes may not get any worse and my headaches will be cured. But if I donāt he says Iāll certainly be stone-blind in six months. Blind! Anne, just think of it!ā
For a minute Anne, after her first quick exclamation of dismay, was silent. It seemed to her that she could NOT speak. Then she said bravely, but with a catch in her voice:
āMarilla, DONāT think of it. You know he has given you hope. If you are careful you wonāt lose your sight altogether; and if his glasses cure your headaches it will be a great thing.ā
āI donāt call it much hope,ā said Marilla bitterly. āWhat am I to live for if I canāt read or sew or do anything like that? I might as well be blindāor dead. And as for crying, I canāt help that when I get lonesome. But there, itās no good talking about it. If youāll get me a cup of tea Iāll be thankful. Iām about done out. Donāt say anything about this to any one for a spell yet, anyway. I canāt bear that folks should come here to question and sympathize and talk about it.ā
When Marilla had eaten her lunch Anne persuaded her to go to bed. Then Anne went herself to the east gable and sat down by her window in the darkness alone with her tears and her heaviness of heart. How sadly things had changed since she had sat there the night after coming home! Then she had been full of hope and joy and the future had looked rosy with promise. Anne felt as if she had lived years since then, but before she went to bed there was a smile on her lips and peace in her heart. She had looked her duty courageously in the face and found it a friendāas duty ever is when we meet it frankly.
One afternoon a few days later Marilla came slowly in from the front yard where she had been talking to a callerā a man whom Anne knew by sight as Sadler from Carmody. Anne wondered what he could have been saying to bring that look to Marillaās face.
āWhat did Mr. Sadler want, Marilla?ā
Marilla sat down by the window and looked at Anne. There were tears in her eyes in defiance of the oculistās prohibition and her voice broke as she said:
āHe heard that I was going to sell Green Gables and he wants to buy it.ā
āBuy it! Buy Green Gables?ā Anne wondered if she had heard aright. āOh, Marilla, you donāt mean to sell Green Gables!ā
āAnne, I donāt know what else is to be done. Iāve thought it all over. If my eyes were strong I could stay here and
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