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disappointing world after all,ā€ he remarked. ā€œMilty has a cat that takes fits . . . sheā€™s took a fit regular every day for three weeks. Milty says itā€™s awful fun to watch her. I went down today on purpose to see her have one but the mean old thing wouldnā€™t take a fit and just kept healthy as healthy, though Milty and me hung round all the afternoon and waited. But never mindā€ . . . Davy brightened up as the insidious comfort of the plum jam stole into his soul . . . ā€œmaybe Iā€™ll see her in one sometime yet. It doesnā€™t seem likely sheā€™d stop having them all at once when sheā€™s been so in the habit of it, does it? This jam is awful nice.ā€

Davy had no sorrows that plum jam could not cure.

Sunday proved so rainy that there was no stirring abroad; but by Monday everybody had heard some version of the Harrison story. The school buzzed with it and Davy came home, full of information.

ā€œMarilla, Mr. Harrison has a new wife . . . well, not ezackly new, but theyā€™ve stopped being married for quite a spell, Milty says. I always sā€™posed people had to keep on being married once theyā€™d begun, but Milty says no, thereā€™s ways of stopping if you canā€™t agree. Milty says one way is just to start off and leave your wife, and thatā€™s what Mr. Harrison did. Milty says Mr. Harrison left his wife because she throwed things at him . . . HARD things . . . and Arty Sloane says it was because she wouldnā€™t let him smoke, and Ned Clay says it was ā€˜cause she never let up scolding him. I wouldnā€™t leave MY wife for anything like that. Iā€™d just put my foot down and say, ā€˜Mrs. Davy, youā€™ve just got to do whatā€™ll please ME ā€˜cause Iā€™m a MAN.ā€™ THATā€™D settle her pretty quick I guess. But Annetta Clay says SHE left HIM because he wouldnā€™t scrape his boots at the door and she doesnā€™t blame her. Iā€™m going right over to Mr. Harrisonā€™s this minute to see what sheā€™s like.ā€

Davy soon returned, somewhat cast down.

ā€œMrs. Harrison was away . . . sheā€™s gone to Carmody with Mrs. Rachel Lynde to get new paper for the parlor. And Mr. Harrison said to tell Anne to go over and see him ā€˜cause he wants to have a talk with her. And say, the floor is scrubbed, and Mr. Harrison is shaved, though there wasnā€™t any preaching yesterday.ā€

The Harrison kitchen wore a very unfamiliar look to Anne. The floor was indeed scrubbed to a wonderful pitch of purity and so was every article of furniture in the room; the stove was polished until she could see her face in it; the walls were whitewashed and the window panes sparkled in the sunlight. By the table sat Mr. Harrison in his working clothes, which on Friday had been noted for sundry rents and tatters but which were now neatly patched and brushed. He was sprucely shaved and what little hair he had was carefully trimmed.

ā€œSit down, Anne, sit down,ā€ said Mr. Harrison in a tone but two degrees removed from that which Avonlea people used at funerals. ā€œEmilyā€™s gone over to Carmody with Rachel Lynde . . . sheā€™s struck up a lifelong friendship already with Rachel Lynde. Beats all how contrary women are. Well, Anne, my easy times are over . . . all over. Itā€™s neatness and tidiness for me for the rest of my natural life, I suppose.ā€

Mr. Harrison did his best to speak dolefully, but an irrepressible twinkle in his eye betrayed him.

ā€œMr. Harrison, you are glad your wife is come back,ā€ cried Anne, shaking her finger at him. ā€œYou neednā€™t pretend youā€™re not, because I can see it plainly.ā€

Mr. Harrison relaxed into a sheepish smile.

ā€œWell . . . well . . . Iā€™m getting used to it,ā€ he conceded. ā€œI canā€™t say I was sorry to see Emily. A man really needs some protection in a community like this, where he canā€™t play a game of checkers with a neighbor without being accused of wanting to marry that neighborā€™s sister and having it put in the paper.ā€

ā€œNobody would have supposed you went to see Isabella Andrews if you hadnā€™t pretended to be unmarried,ā€ said Anne severely.

ā€œI didnā€™t pretend I was. If anybodyā€™d have asked me if I was married Iā€™d have said I was. But they just took it for granted. I wasnā€™t anxious to talk about the matter . . . I was feeling too sore over it. It would have been nuts for Mrs. Rachel Lynde if she had known my wife had left me, wouldnā€™t it now?ā€

ā€œBut some people say that you left her.ā€

ā€œShe started it, Anne, she started it. Iā€™m going to tell you the whole story, for I donā€™t want you to think worse of me than I deserve . . . nor of Emily neither. But letā€™s go out on the veranda. Everything is so fearful neat in here that it kind of makes me homesick. I suppose Iā€™ll get used to it after awhile but it eases me up to look at the yard. Emily hasnā€™t had time to tidy it up yet.ā€

As soon as they were comfortably seated on the veranda Mr. Harrison began his tale of woe.

ā€œI lived in Scottsford, New Brunswick, before I came here, Anne. My sister kept house for me and she suited me fine; she was just reasonably tidy and she let me alone and spoiled me . . . so Emily says. But three years ago she died. Before she died she worried a lot about what was to become of me and finally she got me to promise Iā€™d get married. She advised me to take Emily Scott because Emily had money of her own and was a pattern housekeeper. I said, says I, ā€˜Emily Scott wouldnā€™t look at me.ā€™ ā€˜You ask her and see,ā€™ says my sister; and just to ease her mind I promised her I would . . . and I did. And Emily said sheā€™d have me. Never was so surprised in my life, Anne . . . a smart pretty little woman like her and an old fellow like me. I tell you I thought at first I was in luck. Well, we were married and took a little wedding trip to St. John for a fortnight and then we went home. We got home at ten oā€™clock at night, and I give you my word, Anne, that in half an hour that woman was at work housecleaning. Oh, I know youā€™re thinking my house needed it . . . youā€™ve got a very expressive face, Anne; your thoughts just come out on it like print . . . but it didnā€™t, not that bad. It had got pretty mixed up while I was keeping bachelorā€™s hall, I admit, but Iā€™d got a woman to come in and clean it up before I was married and thereā€™d been considerable painting and fixing done. I tell you if you took Emily into a brand new white marble palace sheā€™d be into the scrubbing as soon as she could get an old dress on. Well, she cleaned house till one oā€™clock that night and at four she was up and at it again. And she kept on that way . . . farā€™s I could see she never stopped. It was scour and sweep and dust everlasting, except on Sundays, and then she was just longing for Monday to begin again. But it was her way of amusing herself and I could have reconciled myself to it if sheā€™d left me alone. But that she wouldnā€™t do. Sheā€™d set out to make me over but she hadnā€™t caught me young enough. I wasnā€™t allowed to come into the house unless I changed my boots for slippers at the door. I darsnā€™t smoke a pipe for my life unless I went to the barn. And I didnā€™t use good enough grammar. Emilyā€™d been a schoolteacher in her early life and sheā€™d never got over it. Then she hated to see me eating with my knife. Well, there it was, pick and nag everlasting. But I sā€™pose, Anne, to be fair, I was cantankerous too. I didnā€™t try to improve as I might have done . . . I just got cranky and disagreeable when she found fault. I told her one day she hadnā€™t complained of my grammar when I proposed to her. It wasnā€™t an overly tactful thing to say. A woman would forgive a man for beating her sooner than for hinting she was too much pleased to get him. Well, we bickered along like that and it wasnā€™t exactly pleasant, but we might have got used to each other after a spell if it hadnā€™t been for Ginger. Ginger was the rock we split on at last. Emily didnā€™t like parrots and she couldnā€™t stand Gingerā€™s profane habits of speech. I was attached to the bird for my brother the sailorā€™s sake. My brother the sailor was a pet of mine when we were little tads and heā€™d sent Ginger to me when he was dying. I didnā€™t see any sense in getting worked up over his swearing. Thereā€™s nothing I hate worseā€™n profanity in a human being, but in a parrot, thatā€™s just repeating what itā€™s heard with no more understanding of it than Iā€™d have of Chinese, allowances might be made. But Emily couldnā€™t see it that way. Women ainā€™t logical. She tried to break Ginger of swearing but she hadnā€™t any better success than she had in trying to make me stop saying ā€˜I seenā€™ and ā€˜them things.ā€™ Seemed as if the more she tried the worse Ginger got, same as me.

ā€œWell, things went on like this, both of us getting raspier, till the CLIMAX came. Emily invited our minister and his wife to tea, and another minister and HIS wife that was visiting them. Iā€™d promised to put Ginger away in some safe place where nobody would hear him . . . Emily wouldnā€™t touch his cage with a ten-foot pole . . . and I meant to do it, for I didnā€™t want the ministers to hear anything unpleasant in my house. But it slipped my mind . . . Emily was worrying me so much about clean collars and grammar that it wasnā€™t any wonder . . . and I never thought of that poor parrot till we sat down to tea. Just as minister number one was in the very middle of saying grace, Ginger, who was on the veranda outside the dining room window, lifted up HIS voice. The gobbler had come into view in the yard and the sight of a gobbler always had an unwholesome effect on Ginger. He surpassed himself that time. You can smile, Anne, and I donā€™t deny Iā€™ve chuckled some over it since myself, but at the time I felt almost as much mortified as Emily. I went out and carried Ginger to the barn. I canā€™t say I enjoyed the meal. I knew by the look of Emily that there was trouble brewing for Ginger and James A. When the folks went away I started for the cow pasture and on the way I did some thinking. I felt sorry for Emily and kind of fancied I hadnā€™t been so thoughtful of her as I might; and besides, I wondered if the ministers would think that Ginger had learned his vocabulary from me. The long and short of it was, I decided that Ginger would have to be mercifully disposed of and when Iā€™d druv the cows home I went in to tell Emily so. But there was no Emily and there was a letter on the table . . . just according to the rule in story books. Emily writ that Iā€™d have to

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