"Where are you going, all dressed
up, Anne?" Davy wanted to know. "You
look bully in that dress."
Anne had come down to dinner
in a new dress of pale green
muslin . . .the first color she
had worn since Matthew's death.
It became her perfectly, bringing
out all the delicate, flower-like
tints of her face and the gloss
and burnish of her hair.
"Davy, how many times have
I told you that you mustn't use
that word," she rebuked. "I'm
going to Echo Lodge."
"Take me with you," entreated
Davy.
"I would if
I were driving. But I'm going
to walk and it's
too far for your eight-year-old
legs. Besides, Paul is going
with me and I fear you don't
enjoy yourself in his company."
"Oh, I like Paul lots better'n
I did," said Davy, beginning
to make fearful inroads into
his pudding. "Since I've got
pretty good myself I don't mind
his being gooder so much. If
I can keep on I'll catch up with
him some day, both in legs and
goodness. 'Sides, Paul's real
nice to us second primer boys
in school. He won't let the other
big boys meddle with us and he
shows us lots of games."
"How came Paul to fall into
the brook at noon hour yesterday?" asked
Anne. "I met him on the playground,
such a dripping figure that I
sent him promptly home for clothes
without waiting to find out what
had happened."
"Well, it was partly a zacksident," explained
Davy. "He stuck his head in on
purpose but the rest of him fell
in zacksidentally. We was all
down at the brook and Prillie
Rogerson got mad at Paul about
something. . .she's awful mean
and horrid anyway, if she IS
pretty. . .and said that his
grandmother put his hair up in
curl rags every night. Paul wouldn't
have minded what she said, I
guess, but Gracie Andrews laughed,
and Paul got awful red, 'cause
Gracie's his girl, you know.
He's CLEAN GONE on her. . .brings
her flowers and carries her books
as far as the shore road. He
got as red as a beet and said
his grandmother didn't do any
such thing and his hair was born
curly. And then he laid down
on the bank and stuck his head
right into the spring to show
them. Oh, it wasn't the spring
we drink out of. . ." seeing
a horrified look on Marilla's
face. . ."it was the little one
lower down. But the bank's awful
slippy and Paul went right in.
I tell you he made a bully splash.
Oh, Anne, Anne, I didn't mean
to say that. . .it just slipped
out before I thought. He made
a SPLENDID splash. But he looked
so funny when he crawled out,
all wet and muddy. The girls
laughed more'n ever, but Gracie
didn't laugh. She looked sorry.
Gracie's a nice girl but she's
got a snub nose. When I get big
enough to have a girl I won't
have one with a snub nose. .
.I'll pick one with a pretty
nose like yours, Anne."
"A boy who makes such a mess
of syrup all over his face when
he is eating his pudding will
never get a girl to look at him," said
Marilla severely.
"But I'll wash my face before
I go courting," protested Davy,
trying to improve matters by
rubbing the back of his hand
over the smears. "And I'll wash
behind my ears too, without being
told. I remembered to this morning,
Marilla. I don't forget half
as often as I did. But. . ." and
Davy sighed. . ."there's so many
corners about a fellow that it's
awful hard to remember them all.
Well, if I can't go to Miss Lavendar's
I'll go over and see Mrs. Harrison.
Mrs. Harrison's an awful nice
woman, I tell you. She keeps
a jar of cookies in her pantry
a-purpose for little boys, and
she always gives me the scrapings
out of a pan she's mixed up a
plum cake in. A good many plums
stick to the sides, you see.
Mr. Harrison was always a nice
man, but he's twice as nice since
he got married over again. I
guess getting married makes folks
nicer. Why don't YOU get married,
Marilla? I want to know."
Marilla's state of single blessedness
had never been a sore point with
her, so she answered amiably,
with an exchange of significant
looks with Anne, that she supposed
it was because nobody would have
her.
"But maybe you never asked
anybody to have you," protested
Davy.
"Oh, Davy," said Dora primly,
shocked into speaking without
being spoken to, "it's the MEN
that have to do the asking."
"I don't know why they have
to do it ALWAYS," grumbled Davy. "Seems
to me everything's put on the
men in this world. Can I have
some more pudding, Marilla?"
"You've had as much as was
good for you," said Marilla;
but she gave him a moderate second
helping.
"I wish people
could live on pudding. Why
can't they, Marilla?
I want to know."
"Because they'd
soon get tired of it."
"I'd like to try that for myself," said
skeptical Davy. "But I guess
it's better to have pudding only
on fish and company days than
none at all. They never have
any at Milty Boulter's. Milty
says when company comes his mother
gives them cheese and cuts it
herself. . .one little bit apiece
and one over for manners."
"If Milty Boulter talks like
that about his mother at least
you needn't repeat it," said
Marilla severely.
"Bless my soul,". . .Davy had
picked this expression up from
Mr. Harrison and used it with
great gusto. . ."Milty meant
it as a compelment. He's awful
proud of his mother, cause folks
say she could scratch a living
on a rock."
"I. . .I suppose them pesky
hens are in my pansy bed again," said
Marilla, rising and going out
hurriedly.
The slandered hens were nowhere
near the pansy bed and Marilla
did not even glance at it. Instead,
she sat down on the cellar hatch
and laughed until she was ashamed
of herself.
When Anne and Paul reached
the stone house that afternoon
they found Miss Lavendar and
Charlotta the Fourth in the garden,
weeding, raking, clipping, and
trimming as if for dear life.
Miss Lavendar herself, all gay
and sweet in the frills and laces
she loved, dropped her shears
and ran joyously to meet her
guests, while Charlotta the Fourth
grinned cheerfully.
"Welcome, Anne.
I thought you'd come today.
You belong to the
afternoon so it brought you.
Things that belong together are
sure to come together. What a
lot of trouble that would save
some people if they only knew
it. But they don't. . .and so
they waste beautiful energy moving
heaven and earth to bring things
together that DON'T belong. And
you, Paul. . .why, you've grown!
You're half a head taller than
when you were here before."
"Yes, I've begun to grow like
pigweed in the night, as Mrs.
Lynde says," said Paul, in frank
delight over the fact. "Grandma
says it's the porridge taking
effect at last. Perhaps it is.
Goodness knows. . ." Paul sighed
deeply. . ."I've eaten enough
to make anyone grow. I do hope,
now that I've begun, I'll keep
on till I'm as tall as father.
He is six feet, you know, Miss
Lavendar."
Yes, Miss Lavendar did know;
the flush on her pretty cheeks
deepened a little; she took Paul's
hand on one side and Anne's on
the other and walked to the house
in silence.
"Is it a good day for the echoes,
Miss Lavendar?" queried Paul
anxiously. The day of his first
visit had been too windy for
echoes and Paul had been much
disappointed.
"Yes, just the best kind of
a day," answered Miss Lavendar,
rousing herself from her reverie. "But
first we are all going to have
something to eat. I know you
two folks didn't walk all the
way back here through those beechwoods
without getting hungry, and Charlotta
the Fourth and I can eat any
hour of the day. . .we have such
obliging appetites. So we'll
just make a raid on the pantry.
Fortunately it's lovely and full.
I had a presentiment that I was
going to have company today and
Charlotta the Fourth and I prepared."
"I think you are one of the
people who always have nice things
in their pantry," declared Paul. "Grandma's
like that too. But she doesn't
approve of snacks between meals.
I wonder," he added meditatively, "if
I OUGHT to eat them away from
home when I know she doesn't
approve."
"Oh, I don't think she would
disapprove after you have had
a long walk. That makes a difference," said
Miss Lavendar, exchanging amused
glances with Anne over Paul's
brown curls. "I suppose that
snacks ARE extremely unwholesome.
That is why we have them so often
at Echo Lodge. We. . .Charlotta
the Fourth and I. . .live in
defiance of every known law of
diet. We eat all sorts of indigestible
things whenever we happen to
think of it, by day or night;
and we flourish like green bay
trees. We are always intending
to reform. When we read any article
in a paper warning us against
something we like we cut it out
and pin it up on the kitchen
wall so that we'll remember it.
But we never can somehow . .
.until after we've gone and eaten
that very thing. Nothing has
ever killed us yet; but Charlotta
the Fourth has been known to
have bad dreams after we had
eaten doughnuts and mince pie
and fruit cake before we went
to bed."
"Grandma lets me have a glass
of milk and a slice of bread
and butter before I go to bed;
and on Sunday nights she puts
jam on the bread," said Paul. "So
I'm always glad when it's Sunday
night. . . for more reasons than
one. Sunday is a very long day
on the shore road. Grandma says
it's all too short for her and
that father never found Sundays
tiresome when he was a little
boy. It wouldn't seem so long
if I could talk to my rock people
but I never do that because Grandma
doesn't approve of it on Sundays.
I think a good deal; but I'm
afraid my thoughts are worldly.
Grandma says we should never
think anything but religious
thoughts on Sundays. But teacher
here said once that every really
beautiful thought was religious,
no matter what it was about,
or what day we thought it on.
But I feel sure Grandma thinks
that sermons and Sunday School
lessons are the only things you
can think truly religious thoughts
about. And when it comes to a
difference of opinion between
Grandma and teacher I don't know
what to do. In my heart". . .
Paul laid his hand on his breast
and raised very serious blue
eyes to Miss Lavendar's immediately
sympathetic face. . ."I agree
with teacher. But then, you see,
Grandma has brought father up
HER way and made a brilliant
success of him; and teacher has
never brought anybody up yet,
though she's helping with Davy
and Dora. But you can't tell
how they'll turn out till they
ARE grown up. So sometimes I
feel as if it might be safer
to go by Grandma's opinions."
"I think it would," agreed
Anne solemnly. "Anyway, I daresay
that if your Grandma and I both
got down to what we really do
mean, under our different ways
of expressing it, we'd find out
we both meant much the same thing.
You'd better go by her way of
expressing it, since it's been
the result of experience. We'll
have to wait until we see how
the twins do turn out before
we can be sure that my way is
equally good." After lunch they
went back to the garden, where
Paul made the acquaintance of
the echoes, to his wonder and
delight, while Anne and Miss
Lavendar sat on the stone bench
under the poplar and talked.
"So you are going away in the
fall?" said Miss Lavendar wistfully. "I
ought to be glad for your sake,
Anne. . .but I'm horribly, selfishly
sorry. I shall miss you so much.
Oh, sometimes, I think it is
of no use to make friends. They
only go out of your life after
awhile and leave a hurt that
is worse than the emptiness before
they came."
"That sounds like something
Miss Eliza Andrews might say
but never Miss Lavendar," said
Anne. "NOTHING is worse than
emptiness. . .and I'm not going
out of your life. There are such
things as letters and vacations.
Dearest, I'm afraid you're looking
a little pale and tired."
"Oh. . .hoo. . .hoo. . .hoo," went
Paul on the dyke, where he had
been making noises diligently.
. .not all of them melodious
in the making, but all coming
back transmuted into the very
gold and silver of sound by the
fairy alchemists over the river.
Miss Lavendar made an impatient
movement with her pretty hands.
"I'm just tired of everything.
. .even of the echoes. There
is nothing in my life but echoes.
. .echoes of lost hopes and dreams
and joys. They're beautiful and
mocking. Oh Anne, it's horrid
of me to talk like this when
I have company. It's just that
I'm getting old and it doesn't
agree with me. I know I'll be
fearfully cranky by the time
I'm sixty. But perhaps all I
need is a course of blue pills." At
this moment Charlotta the Fourth,
who had disappeared after lunch,
returned, and announced that
the northeast corner of Mr. John
Kimball's pasture was red with
early strawberries, and wouldn't
Miss Shirley like to go and pick
some.
"Early strawberries for tea!" exclaimed
Miss Lavendar. "Oh, I'm not so
old as I thought. . .and I don't
need a single blue pill! Girls,
when you come back with your
strawberries we'll have tea out
here under the silver poplar.
I'll have it all ready for you
with home-grown cream."
Anne and Charlotta the Fourth
accordingly betook themselves
back to Mr. Kimball's pasture,
a green remote place where the
air was as soft as velvet and
fragrant as a bed of violets
and golden as amber.
"Oh, isn't it sweet and fresh
back here?" breathed Anne. "I
just feel as if I were drinking
in the sunshine."
"Yes, ma'am, so do I. That's
just exactly how I feel too,
ma'am," agreed Charlotta the
Fourth, who would have said precisely
the same thing if Anne had remarked
that she felt like a pelican
of the wilderness. Always after
Anne had visited Echo Lodge Charlotta
the Fourth mounted to her little
room over the kitchen and tried
before her looking glass to speak
and look and move like Anne.
Charlotta could never flatter
herself that she quite succeeded;
but practice makes perfect, as
Charlotta had learned at school,
and she fondly hoped that in
time she might catch the trick
of that dainty uplift of chin,
that quick, starry outflashing
of eyes, that fashion of walking
as if you were a bough swaying
in the wind. It seemed so easy
when you watched Anne. Charlotta
the Fourth admired Anne wholeheartedly.
It was not that she thought her
so very handsome. Diana Barry's
beauty of crimson cheek and black
curls was much more to Charlotta
the Fourth's taste than Anne's
moonshine charm of luminous gray
eyes and the pale, everchanging
roses of her cheeks.
"But I'd rather look like you
than be pretty," she told Anne
sincerely.
Anne laughed, sipped the honey
from the tribute, and cast away
the sting. She was used to taking
her compliments mixed. Public
opinion never agreed on Anne's
looks. People who had heard her
called handsome met her and were
disappointed. People who had
heard her called plain saw her
and wondered where other people's
eyes were. Anne herself would
never believe that she had any
claim to beauty. When she looked
in the glass all she saw was
a little pale face with seven
freckles on the nose thereof.
Her mirror never revealed to
her the elusive, ever-varying
play of feeling that came and
went over her features like a
rosy illuminating flame, or the
charm of dream and laughter alternating
in her big eyes.
While Anne was not beautiful
in any strictly defined sense
of the word she possessed a certain
evasive charm and distinction
of appearance that left beholders
with a pleasurable sense of satisfaction
in that softly rounded girlhood
of hers, with all its strongly
felt potentialities. Those who
knew Anne best felt, without
realizing that they felt it,
that her greatest attraction
was the aura of possibility surrounding
her. . .the power of future development
that was in her. She seemed to
walk in an atmosphere of things
about to happen.
As they picked, Charlotta the
Fourth confided to Anne her fears
regarding Miss Lavendar. The
warm-hearted little handmaiden
was honestly worried over her
adored mistress' condition.
"Miss Lavendar isn't well,
Miss Shirley, ma'am. I'm sure
she isn't, though she never complains.
She hasn't seemed like herself
this long while, ma'am. . .not
since that day you and Paul were
here together before. I feel
sure she caught cold that night,
ma'am. After you and him had
gone she went out and walked
in the garden for long after
dark with nothing but a little
shawl on her. There was a lot
of snow on the walks and I feel
sure she got a chill, ma'am.
Ever since then I've noticed
her acting tired and lonesome
like. She don't seem to take
an interest in anything, ma'am.
She never pretends company's
coming, nor fixes up for it,
nor nothing, ma'am. It's only
when you come she seems to chirk
up a bit. And the worst sign
of all, Miss Shirley, ma'am.
. ." Charlotta the Fourth lowered
her voice as if she were about
to tell some exceedingly weird
and awful symptom indeed. . ."is
that she never gets cross now
when I breaks things. Why, Miss
Shirley, ma'am, yesterday I bruk
her green and yaller bowl that's
always stood on the bookcase.
Her grandmother brought it out
from England and Miss Lavendar
was awful choice of it. I was
dusting it just as careful, Miss
Shirley, ma'am, and it slipped
out, so fashion, afore I could
grab holt of it, and bruk into
about forty millyun pieces. I
tell you I was sorry and scared.
I thought Miss Lavendar would
scold me awful, ma'am; and I'd
ruther she had than take it the
way she did. She just come in
and hardly looked at it and said,
`It's no matter, Charlotta. Take
up the pieces and throw them
away.' Just like that, Miss Shirley,
ma'am. . .`take up the pieces
and throw them away,' as if it
wasn't her grandmother's bowl
from England. Oh, she isn't well
and I feel awful bad about it.
She's got nobody to look after
her but me."
Charlotta the Fourth's eyes
brimmed up with tears. Anne patted
the little brown paw holding
the cracked pink cup sympathetically.
"I think Miss
Lavendar needs a change, Charlotta.
She stays
here alone too much. Can't we
induce her to go away for a little
trip?"
Charlotta shook her head, with
its rampant bows, disconsolately.
"I don't think
so, Miss Shirley, ma'am. Miss
Lavendar hates visiting.
She's only got three relations
she ever visits and she says
she just goes to see them as
a family duty. Last time when
she come home she said she wasn't
going to visit for family duty
no more. `I've come home in love
with loneliness, Charlotta,'
she says to me, `and I never
want to stray from my own vine
and fig tree again. My relations
try so hard to make an old lady
of me and it has a bad effect
on me.' Just like that, Miss
Shirley, ma'am. 'It has a very
bad effect on me.' So I don't
think it would do any good to
coax her to go visiting."
"We must see what can be done," said
Anne decidedly, as she put the
last possible berry in her pink
cup. "Just as soon as I have
my vacation I'll come through
and spend a whole week with you.
We'll have a picnic every day
and pretend all sorts of interesting
things, and see if we can't cheer
Miss Lavendar up."
"That will be the very thing,
Miss Shirley, ma'am," exclaimed
Charlotta the Fourth in rapture.
She was glad for Miss Lavendar's
sake and for her own too. With
a whole week in which to study
Anne constantly she would surely
be able to learn how to move
and behave like her.
When the girls got back to
Echo Lodge they found that Miss
Lavendar and Paul had carried
the little square table out of
the kitchen to the garden and
had everything ready for tea.
Nothing ever tasted so delicious
as those strawberries and cream,
eaten under a great blue sky
all curdled over with fluffy
little white clouds, and in the
long shadows of the wood with
its lispings and its murmurings.
After tea Anne helped Charlotta
wash the dishes in the kitchen,
while Miss Lavendar sat on the
stone bench with Paul and heard
all about his rock people. She
was a good listener, this sweet
Miss Lavendar, but just at the
last it struck Paul that she
had suddenly lost interest in
the Twin Sailors.
"Miss Lavendar, why do you
look at me like that?" he asked
gravely.
"How do I look,
Paul?"
"Just as if you were looking
through me at somebody I put
you in mind of," said Paul, who
had such occasional flashes of
uncanny insight that it wasn't
quite safe to have secrets when
he was about.
"You do put me in mind of somebody
I knew long ago," said Miss Lavendar
dreamily.
"When you were
young?"
"Yes, when
I was young. Do I seem very
old to you, Paul?"
"Do you know, I can't make
up my mind about that," said
Paul confidentially. "Your hair
looks old. . .I never knew a
young person with white hair.
But your eyes are as young as
my beautiful teacher's when you
laugh. I tell you what, Miss
Lavendar". . . Paul's voice and
face were as solemn as a judge's.
. ."I think you would make a
splendid mother. You have just
the right look in your eyes.
. . the look my little mother
always had. I think it's a pity
you haven't any boys of your
own."
"I have a little
dream boy, Paul."
"Oh, have you
really? How old is he?"
"About your
age I think. He ought to be
older because I dreamed
him long before you were born.
But I'll never let him get any
older than eleven or twelve;
because if I did some day he
might grow up altogether and
then I'd lose him."
"I know," nodded Paul. "That's
the beauty of dream-people. .
.they stay any age you want them.
You and my beautiful teacher
and me myself are the only folks
in the world that I know of that
have dream-people. Isn't it funny
and nice we should all know each
other? But I guess that kind
of people always find each other
out. Grandma never has dream-people
and Mary Joe thinks I'm wrong
in the upper story because I
have them. But I think it's splendid
to have them. YOU know, Miss
Lavendar. Tell me all about your
little dream-boy."
"He has blue
eyes and curly hair. He steals
in and wakens
me with a kiss every morning.
Then all day he plays here in
the garden. . . and I play with
him. Such games as we have. We
run races and talk with the echoes;
and I tell him stories. And when
twilight comes. . ."
"I know," interrupted Paul
eagerly. "He comes and sits beside
you. . . SO. . .because of course
at twelve he'd be too big to
climb into your lap . . .and
lays his head on your shoulder.
. .SO. . .and you put your arms
about him and hold him tight,
tight, and rest your cheek on
his head. . . yes, that's the
very way. Oh, you DO know, Miss
Lavendar."
Anne found the two of them
there when she came out of the
stone house, and something in
Miss Lavendar's face made her
hate to disturb them.
"I'm afraid
we must go, Paul, if we want
to get home before
dark. Miss Lavendar, I'm going
to invite myself to Echo Lodge
for a whole week pretty soon."
"If you come for a week I'll
keep you for two," threatened
Miss Lavendar.
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