Anne of Green Gables
“What on earth put such a notion into your head?” she demanded
disapprovingly.
This had been done without her advice being asked, and must perforce be
disapproved.
“Well, we’ve been thinking about it for some time--all winter in fact,”
returned Marilla. “Mrs. Alexander Spencer was up here one day before
Christmas and she said she was going to get a little girl from the
asylum over in Hopeton in the spring. Her cousin lives there and Mrs.
Spencer has visited her and knows all about it. So Matthew and I have
talked it over off and on ever since. We thought we’d get a boy. Matthew
is getting up in years, you know--he’s sixty--and he isn’t so spry as he
once was. His heart troubles him a good deal. And you know how desperate
hard it’s got to be to get hired help. There’s never anybody to be had
but those stupid, half-grown little French boys; and as soon as you do
get one broke into your ways and taught something he’s up and off to the
lobster canneries or the States. At first Matthew suggested getting a
Home boy. But I said ‘no’ flat to that. ‘They may be all right--I’m not
saying they’re not--but no London street Arabs for me,’ I said. ‘Give
me a native born at least. There’ll be a risk, no matter who we get. But
I’ll feel easier in my mind and sleep sounder at nights if we get a born
Canadian.’ So in the end we decided to ask Mrs. Spencer to pick us out
one when she went over to get her little girl. We heard last week she
was going, so we sent her word by Richard Spencer’s folks at Carmody
to bring us a smart, likely boy of about ten or eleven. We decided that
would be the best age--old enough to be of some use in doing chores
right off and young enough to be trained up proper. We mean to give him
a good home and schooling. We had a telegram from Mrs. Alexander Spencer
today--the mail-man brought it from the station--saying they were coming
on the five-thirty train tonight. So Matthew went to Bright River to
meet him. Mrs. Spencer will drop him off there. Of course she goes on to
White Sands station herself.”
Mrs. Rachel prided herself on always speaking her mind; she proceeded to
speak it now, having adjusted her mental attitude to this amazing piece
of news.
“Well, Marilla, I’ll just tell you plain that I think you’re doing a
mighty foolish thing--a risky thing, that’s what. You don’t know what
you’re getting. You’re bringing a strange child into your house and home
and you don’t know a single thing about him nor what his disposition is
like nor what sort of parents he had nor how he’s likely to turn out.
Why, it was only last week I read in the paper how a man and his wife up
west of the Island took a boy out of an orphan asylum and he set fire to
the house at night--set it _on purpose_, Marilla--and nearly burnt them to
a crisp in their beds. And I know another case where an adopted boy used
to suck the eggs--they couldn’t break him of it. If you had asked my
advice in the matter--which you didn’t do, Marilla--I’d have said for
mercy’s sake not to think of such a thing, that’s what.”
This Job’s comforting seemed neither to offend nor to alarm Marilla. She
knitted steadily on.
“I don’t deny there’s something in what you say, Rachel. I’ve had some
qualms myself. But Matthew was terrible set on it. I could see that, so
I gave in. It’s so seldom Matthew sets his mind on anything that when he
does I always feel it’s my duty to give in. And as for the risk, there’s
risks in pretty near everything a body does in this world. There’s risks
in people’s having children of their own if it comes to that--they don’t
always turn out well. And then Nova Scotia is right close to the Island.
It isn’t as if we were getting him from England or the States. He can’t
be much different from ourselves.”
“Well, I hope it will turn out all right,” said Mrs. Rachel in a tone
that plainly indicated her painful doubts. “Only don’t say I didn’t
warn you if he burns Green Gables down or puts strychnine in the well--I
heard of a case over in New Brunswick where an orphan asylum child did
that and the whole family died in fearful agonies. Only, it was a girl
in that instance.”
“Well, we’re not getting a girl,” said Marilla, as if poisoning wells
were a purely feminine accomplishment and not to be dreaded in the case
of a boy. “I’d never dream of taking a girl to bring up. I wonder at
Mrs. Alexander Spencer for doing it. But there, _she_ wouldn’t shrink
from adopting a whole orphan asylum if she took it into her head.”
Mrs. Rachel would have liked to stay until Matthew came home with his
imported orphan. But reflecting that it would be a good two hours at
least before his arrival she concluded to go up the road to Robert
Bell’s and tell the news. It would certainly make a sensation second
to none, and Mrs. Rachel dearly loved to make a sensation. So she took
herself away, somewhat to Marilla’s relief, for the latter felt
her doubts and fears reviving under the influence of Mrs. Rachel’s
pessimism.
“Well, of all things that ever were or will be!” ejaculated Mrs. Rachel
when she was safely out in the lane. “It does really seem as if I must
be dreaming. Well, I’m sorry for that poor young one and no mistake.
Matthew and Marilla don’t know anything about children and they’ll
expect him to be wiser and steadier than his own grandfather, if so be’s
he ever had a grandfather, which is doubtful. It seems uncanny to think
of a child at Green Gables somehow; there’s never been one there, for
Matthew and Marilla were grown up when the new house was built--if they
ever _were_ children, which is hard to believe when one looks at them.
I wouldn’t be in that orphan’s shoes for anything. My, but I pity him,
that’s what.”
So said Mrs. Rachel to the wild rose bushes out of the fulness of her
heart; but if she could have seen the child who was waiting patiently
at the Bright River station at that very moment her pity would have been
still deeper and more profound.
CHAPTER II. Matthew Cuthbert Is Surprised
MATTHEW Cuthbert and the sorrel mare jogged comfortably over the eight
miles to Bright River. It was a pretty road, running along between
snug farmsteads, with now and again a bit of balsamy fir wood to drive
through or a hollow where wild plums hung out their filmy bloom. The air
was sweet with the breath of many apple orchards and the meadows sloped
away in the distance to horizon mists of pearl and purple; while
“The little birds sang as if it were
The one day of summer in all the year.”
Matthew enjoyed the drive after his own fashion, except during the
moments when he met women and had to nod to them--for in Prince Edward
Island you are supposed to nod to all and sundry you meet on the road
whether you know them or not.
Matthew dreaded all women except Marilla and Mrs. Rachel; he had an
uncomfortable feeling that the mysterious creatures were secretly
laughing at him. He may have been quite right in thinking so, for he
was an odd-looking personage, with an ungainly figure and long iron-gray
hair that touched his stooping shoulders, and a full, soft brown beard
which he had worn ever since he was twenty. In fact, he had looked
at twenty very much as he looked at sixty, lacking a little of the
grayness.
When he reached Bright River there was no sign of any train; he thought
he was too early, so he tied his horse in the yard of the small Bright
River hotel and went over to the station house. The long platform was
almost deserted; the only living creature in sight being a girl who was
sitting on a pile of shingles at the extreme end. Matthew, barely noting
that it _was_ a girl, sidled past her as quickly as possible without
looking at her. Had he looked he could hardly have failed to notice the
tense rigidity and expectation of her attitude and expression. She was
sitting there waiting for something or somebody and, since sitting and
waiting was the only thing to do just then, she sat and waited with all
her might and main.
Matthew encountered the stationmaster locking up the ticket office
preparatory to going home for supper, and asked him if the five-thirty
train would soon be along.
“The five-thirty train has been in and gone half an hour ago,” answered
that brisk official. “But there was a passenger dropped off for you--a
little girl. She’s sitting out there on the shingles. I asked her to
go into the ladies’ waiting room, but she informed me gravely that she
preferred to stay outside. ‘There was more scope for imagination,’ she
said. She’s a case, I should say.”
“I’m not expecting a girl,” said Matthew blankly. “It’s a boy I’ve come
for. He should be here. Mrs. Alexander Spencer was to bring him over
from Nova Scotia for me.”
The stationmaster whistled.
“Guess there’s some mistake,” he said. “Mrs. Spencer came off the train
with that girl and gave her into my charge. Said you and your sister
were adopting her from an orphan asylum and that you would be along for
her presently. That’s all I know about it--and I haven’t got any more
orphans concealed hereabouts.”
“I don’t understand,” said Matthew helplessly, wishing that Marilla was
at hand to cope with the situation.
“Well, you’d better question the girl,” said the stationmaster
carelessly. “I dare say she’ll be able to explain--she’s got a tongue
of her own, that’s certain. Maybe they were out of boys of the brand you
wanted.”
He walked jauntily away, being hungry, and the unfortunate Matthew was
left to do that which was harder for him than bearding a lion in its
den--walk up to a girl--a strange girl--an orphan girl--and demand of
her why she wasn’t a boy. Matthew groaned in spirit as he turned about
and shuffled gently down the platform towards her.
She had been watching him ever since he had passed her and she had her
eyes on him now. Matthew was not looking at her and would not have seen
what she was really like if he had been, but an ordinary observer would
have seen this: A child of about eleven, garbed in a very short, very
tight, very ugly dress of yellowish-gray wincey. She wore a faded brown
sailor hat and beneath the hat, extending down her back, were two braids
of very thick, decidedly red hair. Her face was small, white and thin,
also much freckled; her mouth was large and so were her eyes, which
looked green in some lights and moods and gray in others.
So far, the ordinary observer; an extraordinary observer might have seen
that the chin was very pointed and pronounced; that the big eyes
were full of spirit and vivacity; that the mouth was sweet-lipped
and expressive; that the forehead was broad and full; in short,
our discerning extraordinary observer might have concluded that no
commonplace soul inhabited the body of this stray woman-child of whom
shy Matthew Cuthbert was so ludicrously afraid.
Matthew, however, was spared the ordeal of speaking first, for as soon
as she concluded that he was coming to her she stood up, grasping with
one thin brown hand the handle of a shabby, old-fashioned carpet-bag;
the other she held out to him.
“I suppose you are Mr. Matthew Cuthbert of Green Gables?” she said in
a peculiarly clear, sweet voice. “I’m very glad to see you. I was
beginning to be afraid you weren’t coming for me and I was imagining
all the things that might have happened to prevent you. I had made up
my mind that if you didn’t come for me tonight I’d go down the track to
that big wild cherry-tree at the bend, and climb up into it to stay all
night. I wouldn’t be a bit afraid, and it would be lovely to sleep in a
wild cherry-tree all white with bloom in the moonshine, don’t you think?
You could imagine you were dwelling in marble halls, couldn’t you? And
I was quite sure you would come for me in the morning, if you didn’t
tonight.”