ANNE TO THE RESCUE
All things great are wound up with all things little. At first glance
it might not seem that the decision of a certain Canadian Premier to
include Prince Edward Island in a political tour could have much or
anything to do with the fortunes of little Anne Shirley at Green
Gables. But it had.
It was in January the Premier came, to address his loyal supporters and
such of his non-supporters as chose to be present at the monster mass
meeting held in Charlottetown. Most of the Avonlea people were on the
Premier’s side of politics; hence, on the night of the meeting nearly
all the men and a goodly proportion of the women had gone to town,
thirty miles away. Mrs. Rachel Lynde had gone too. Mrs. Rachel Lynde
was a red-hot politician and couldn’t have believed that the political
rally could be carried through without her, although she was on the
opposite side of politics. So she went to town and took her
husband—Thomas would be useful in looking after the horse—and Marilla
Cuthbert with her. Marilla had a sneaking interest in politics herself,
and as she thought it might be her only chance to see a real live
Premier, she promptly took it, leaving Anne and Matthew to keep house
until her return the following day.
Hence, while Marilla and Mrs. Rachel were enjoying themselves hugely at
the mass meeting, Anne and Matthew had the cheerful kitchen at Green
Gables all to themselves. A bright fire was glowing in the
old-fashioned Waterloo stove and blue-white frost crystals were shining
on the window-panes. Matthew nodded over a _Farmers’ Advocate_ on the
sofa and Anne at the table studied her lessons with grim determination,
despite sundry wistful glances at the clock shelf, where lay a new book
that Jane Andrews had lent her that day. Jane had assured her that it
was warranted to produce any number of thrills, or words to that
effect, and Anne’s fingers tingled to reach out for it. But that would
mean Gilbert Blythe’s triumph on the morrow. Anne turned her back on
the clock shelf and tried to imagine it wasn’t there.
“Matthew, did you ever study geometry when you went to school?”
“Well now, no, I didn’t,” said Matthew, coming out of his doze with a
start.
“I wish you had,” sighed Anne, “because then you’d be able to
sympathize with me. You can’t sympathize properly if you’ve never
studied it. It is casting a cloud over my whole life. I’m such a dunce
at it, Matthew.”
“Well now, I dunno,” said Matthew soothingly. “I guess you’re all right
at anything. Mr. Phillips told me last week in Blair’s store at Carmody
that you was the smartest scholar in school and was making rapid
progress. ‘Rapid progress’ was his very words. There’s them as runs
down Teddy Phillips and says he ain’t much of a teacher; but I guess
he’s all right.”
Matthew would have thought any one who praised Anne was “all right.”
“I’m sure I’d get on better with geometry if only he wouldn’t change
the letters,” complained Anne. “I learn the proposition off by heart,
and then he draws it on the blackboard and puts different letters from
what are in the book and I get all mixed up. I don’t think a teacher
should take such a mean advantage, do you? We’re studying agriculture
now and I’ve found out at last what makes the roads red. It’s a great
comfort. I wonder how Marilla and Mrs. Lynde are enjoying themselves.
Mrs. Lynde says Canada is going to the dogs the way things are being
run at Ottawa, and that it’s an awful warning to the electors. She says
if women were allowed to vote we would soon see a blessed change. What
way do you vote, Matthew?”
“Conservative,” said Matthew promptly. To vote Conservative was part of
Matthew’s religion.
“Then I’m Conservative too,” said Anne decidedly. “I’m glad, because
Gil— because some of the boys in school are Grits. I guess Mr. Phillips
is a Grit too, because Prissy Andrews’ father is one, and Ruby Gillis
says that when a man is courting he always has to agree with the girl’s
mother in religion and her father in politics. Is that true, Matthew?”
“Well now, I dunno,” said Matthew.
“Did you ever go courting, Matthew?”
“Well now, no, I dunno’s I ever did,” said Matthew, who had certainly
never thought of such a thing in his whole existence.
Anne reflected with her chin in her hands.
“It must be rather interesting, don’t you think, Matthew? Ruby Gillis
says when she grows up she’s going to have ever so many beaus on the
string and have them all crazy about her; but I think that would be too
exciting. I’d rather have just one in his right mind. But Ruby Gillis
knows a great deal about such matters because she has so many big
sisters, and Mrs. Lynde says the Gillis girls have gone off like hot
cakes. Mr. Phillips goes up to see Prissy Andrews nearly every evening.
He says it is to help her with her lessons, but Miranda Sloane is
studying for Queen’s, too, and I should think she needed help a lot
more than Prissy because she’s ever so much stupider, but he never goes
to help her in the evenings at all. There are a great many things in
this world that I can’t understand very well, Matthew.”
“Well now, I dunno as I comprehend them all myself,” acknowledged
Matthew.
“Well, I suppose I must finish up my lessons. I won’t allow myself to
open that new book Jane lent me until I’m through. But it’s a terrible
temptation, Matthew. Even when I turn my back on it I can see it there
just as plain. Jane said she cried herself sick over it. I love a book
that makes me cry. But I think I’ll carry that book into the
sitting-room and lock it in the jam closet and give you the key. And
you must _not_ give it to me, Matthew, until my lessons are done, not
even if I implore you on my bended knees. It’s all very well to say
resist temptation, but it’s ever so much easier to resist it if you
can’t get the key. And then shall I run down the cellar and get some
russets, Matthew? Wouldn’t you like some russets?”
“Well now, I dunno but what I would,” said Matthew, who never ate
russets but knew Anne’s weakness for them.
Just as Anne emerged triumphantly from the cellar with her plateful of
russets came the sound of flying footsteps on the icy board walk
outside and the next moment the kitchen door was flung open and in
rushed Diana Barry, white-faced and breathless, with a shawl wrapped
hastily around her head. Anne promptly let go of her candle and plate
in her surprise, and plate, candle, and apples crashed together down
the cellar ladder and were found at the bottom embedded in melted
grease, the next day, by Marilla, who gathered them up and thanked
mercy the house hadn’t been set on fire.
“Whatever is the matter, Diana?” cried Anne. “Has your mother relented
at last?”
“Oh, Anne, do come quick,” implored Diana nervously. “Minnie May is
awful sick—she’s got croup, Young Mary Joe says—and father and mother
are away to town and there’s nobody to go for the doctor. Minnie May is
awful bad and Young Mary Joe doesn’t know what to do—and oh, Anne, I’m
so scared!”
Matthew, without a word, reached out for cap and coat, slipped past
Diana and away into the darkness of the yard.
“He’s gone to harness the sorrel mare to go to Carmody for the doctor,”
said Anne, who was hurrying on hood and jacket. “I know it as well as
if he’d said so. Matthew and I are such kindred spirits I can read his
thoughts without words at all.”
“I don’t believe he’ll find the doctor at Carmody,” sobbed Diana. “I
know that Doctor Blair went to town and I guess Doctor Spencer would go
too, Young Mary Joe never saw anybody with croup and Mrs. Lynde is
away. Oh, Anne!”
“Don’t cry, Di,” said Anne cheerily. “I know exactly what to do for
croup. You forget that Mrs. Hammond had twins three times. When you
look after three pairs of twins you naturally get a lot of experience.
They all had croup regularly. Just wait till I get the ipecac
bottle—you mayn’t have any at your house. Come on now.”
The two little girls hastened out hand in hand and hurried through
Lovers’ Lane and across the crusted field beyond, for the snow was too
deep to go by the shorter wood way. Anne, although sincerely sorry for
Minnie May, was far from being insensible to the romance of the
situation and to the sweetness of once more sharing that romance with a
kindred spirit.
The night was clear and frosty, all ebony of shadow and silver of snowy
slope; big stars were shining over the silent fields; here and there
the dark pointed firs stood up with snow powdering their branches and
the wind whistling through them. Anne thought it was truly delightful
to go skimming through all this mystery and loveliness with your bosom
friend who had been so long estranged.
Minnie May, aged three, was really very sick. She lay on the kitchen
sofa, feverish and restless, while her hoarse breathing could be heard
all over the house. Young Mary Joe, a buxom, broad-faced French girl
from the Creek, whom Mrs. Barry had engaged to stay with the children
during her absence, was helpless and bewildered, quite incapable of
thinking what to do, or doing it if she thought of it.
Anne went to work with skill and promptness.
“Minnie May has croup all right; she’s pretty bad, but I’ve seen them
worse. First we must have lots of hot water. I declare, Diana, there
isn’t more than a cupful in the kettle! There, I’ve filled it up, and,
Mary Joe, you may put some wood in the stove. I don’t want to hurt your
feelings, but it seems to me you might have thought of this before if
you’d any imagination. Now, I’ll undress Minnie May and put her to bed,
and you try to find some soft flannel cloths, Diana. I’m going to give
her a dose of ipecac first of all.”
Minnie May did not take kindly to the ipecac, but Anne had not brought
up three pairs of twins for nothing. Down that ipecac went, not only
once, but many times during the long, anxious night when the two little
girls worked patiently over the suffering Minnie May, and Young Mary
Joe, honestly anxious to do all she could, kept on a roaring fire and
heated more water than would have been needed for a hospital of croupy
babies.
It was three o’clock when Matthew came with the doctor, for he had been
obliged to go all the way to Spencervale for one. But the pressing need
for assistance was past. Minnie May was much better and was sleeping
soundly.
“I was awfully near giving up in despair,” explained Anne. “She got
worse and worse until she was sicker than ever the Hammond twins were,
even the last pair. I actually thought she was going to choke to death.
I gave her every drop of ipecac in that bottle, and when the last dose
went down I said to myself—not to Diana or Young Mary Joe, because I
didn’t want to worry them any more than they were worried, but I had to
say it to myself just to relieve my feelings—‘This is the last
lingering hope and I fear ’tis a vain one.’ But in about three minutes
she coughed up the phlegm and began to get better right away. You must
just imagine my relief, doctor, because I can’t express it in words.
You know there are some things that cannot be expressed in words.”
“Yes, I know,” nodded the doctor. He looked at Anne as if he were
thinking some things about her that couldn’t be expressed in words.
Later on, however, he expressed them to Mr. and Mrs. Barry.
“That little red-headed girl they have over at Cuthbert’s is as smart
as they make ’em. I tell you she saved that baby’s life, for it would
have been too late by the time I got here. She seems to have a skill
and presence of mind perfectly wonderful in a child of her age. I never
saw anything like the eyes of her when she was explaining the case out
to me.”
Anne had gone home in the wonderful, white-frosted winter morning,
heavy-eyed from loss of sleep, but still talking unweariedly to Matthew
as they crossed the long white field and walked under the glittering
fairy arch of the Lovers’ Lane maples.
“Oh, Matthew, isn’t it a wonderful morning? The world looks like
something God had just imagined for His own pleasure, doesn’t it? Those
trees look as if I could blow them away with a breath—pouf! I’m so glad
I live in a world where there are white frosts, aren’t you? And I’m so
glad Mrs. Hammond had three pairs of twins after all. If she hadn’t I
mightn’t have known what to do for Minnie May. I’m real sorry I was
ever cross with Mrs. Hammond for having twins. But, oh, Matthew, I’m so
sleepy. I can’t go to school. I just know I couldn’t keep my eyes open
and I’d be so stupid. But I hate to stay home for Gil— some of the
others will get head of the class, and it’s so hard to get up
again—although of course the harder it is the more satisfaction you
have when you do get up, haven’t you?”
“Well now, I guess you’ll manage all right,” said Matthew, looking at
Anne’s white little face and the dark shadows under her eyes. “You just
go right to bed and have a good sleep. I’ll do all the chores.”
Anne accordingly went to bed and slept so long and soundly that it was
well on in the white and rosy winter afternoon when she awoke and
descended to the kitchen where Marilla, who had arrived home in the
meantime, was sitting knitting.
“Oh, did you see the Premier?” exclaimed Anne at once. “What did he
look like, Marilla?”
“Well, he never got to be Premier on account of his looks,” said
Marilla. “Such a nose as that man had! But he can speak. I was proud of
being a Conservative. Rachel Lynde, of course, being a Liberal, had no
use for him. Your dinner is in the oven, Anne; and you can get yourself
some blue plum preserve out of the pantry. I guess you’re hungry.
Matthew has been telling me about last night. I must say it was
fortunate you knew what to do. I wouldn’t have had any idea myself, for
I never saw a case of croup. There now, never mind talking till you’ve
had your dinner. I can tell by the look of you that you’re just full up
with speeches, but they’ll keep.”
Marilla had something to tell Anne, but she did not tell it just then,
for she knew if she did Anne’s consequent excitement would lift her
clear out of the region of such material matters as appetite or dinner.
Not until Anne had finished her saucer of blue plums did Marilla say:
“Mrs. Barry was here this afternoon, Anne. She wanted to see you, but I
wouldn’t wake you up. She says you saved Minnie May’s life, and she is
very sorry she acted as she did in that affair of the currant wine. She
says she knows now you didn’t mean to set Diana drunk, and she hopes
you’ll forgive her and be good friends with Diana again. You’re to go
over this evening if you like, for Diana can’t stir outside the door on
account of a bad cold she caught last night. Now, Anne Shirley, for
pity’s sake don’t fly clean up into the air.”
The warning seemed not unnecessary, so uplifted and aerial was Anne’s
expression and attitude as she sprang to her feet, her face irradiated
with the flame of her spirit.
“Oh, Marilla, can I go right now—without washing my dishes? I’ll wash
them when I come back, but I cannot tie myself down to anything so
unromantic as dish-washing at this thrilling moment.”
“Yes, yes, run along,” said Marilla indulgently. “Anne Shirley—are you
crazy? Come back this instant and put something on you. I might as well
call to the wind. She’s gone without a cap or wrap. Look at her tearing
through the orchard with her hair streaming. It’ll be a mercy if she
doesn’t catch her death of cold.”
Anne came dancing home in the purple winter twilight across the snowy
places. Afar in the southwest was the great shimmering, pearl-like
sparkle of an evening star in a sky that was pale golden and ethereal
rose over gleaming white spaces and dark glens of spruce. The tinkles
of sleigh-bells among the snowy hills came like elfin chimes through
the frosty air, but their music was not sweeter than the song in Anne’s
heart and on her lips.
“You see before you a perfectly happy person, Marilla,” she announced.
“I’m perfectly happy—yes, in spite of my red hair. Just at present I
have a soul above red hair. Mrs. Barry kissed me and cried and said she
was so sorry and she could never repay me. I felt fearfully
embarrassed, Marilla, but I just said as politely as I could, ‘I have
no hard feelings for you, Mrs. Barry. I assure you once for all that I
did not mean to intoxicate Diana and henceforth I shall cover the past
with the mantle of oblivion.’ That was a pretty dignified way of
speaking, wasn’t it, Marilla? I felt that I was heaping coals of fire
on Mrs. Barry’s head. And Diana and I had a lovely afternoon. Diana
showed me a new fancy crochet stitch her aunt over at Carmody taught
her. Not a soul in Avonlea knows it but us, and we pledged a solemn vow
never to reveal it to any one else. Diana gave me a beautiful card with
a wreath of roses on it and a verse of poetry:
“‘If you love me as I love you
Nothing but death can part us two.’
And that is true, Marilla. We’re going to ask Mr. Phillips to let us
sit together in school again, and Gertie Pye can go with Minnie
Andrews. We had an elegant tea. Mrs. Barry had the very best china set
out, Marilla, just as if I was real company. I can’t tell you what a
thrill it gave me. Nobody ever used their very best china on my account
before. And we had fruit-cake and pound-cake and doughnuts and two
kinds of preserves, Marilla. And Mrs. Barry asked me if I took tea and
said, ‘Pa, why don’t you pass the biscuits to Anne?’ It must be lovely
to be grown up, Marilla, when just being treated as if you were is so
nice.”
“I don’t know about that,” said Marilla with a brief sigh.
“Well, anyway, when I am grown up,” said Anne decidedly, “I’m always
going to talk to little girls as if they were, too, and I’ll never
laugh when they use big words. I know from sorrowful experience how
that hurts one’s feelings. After tea Diana and I made taffy. The taffy
wasn’t very good, I suppose because neither Diana nor I had ever made
any before. Diana left me to stir it while she buttered the plates and
I forgot and let it burn; and then when we set it out on the platform
to cool the cat walked over one plate and that had to be thrown away.
But the making of it was splendid fun. Then when I came home Mrs. Barry
asked me to come over as often as I could and Diana stood at the window
and threw kisses to me all the way down to Lovers’ Lane. I assure you,
Marilla, that I feel like praying to-night and I’m going to think out a
special brand-new prayer in honour of the occasion.”