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chapter viii.anne's bringing-up is begun for reasons best known to herself, marilladid not tell anne that she was to stay at green gables until the next afternoon. during the forenoon she kept the child busywith various tasks and watched over her with a keen eye while she did them. by noon she had concluded that anne wassmart and obedient, willing to work and quick to learn; her most seriousshortcoming seemed to be a tendency to fall into daydreams in the middle of a task and forget all about it until such time as shewas sharply recalled to earth by a
reprimand or a catastrophe. when anne had finished washing the dinnerdishes she suddenly confronted marilla with the air and expression of one desperatelydetermined to learn the worst. her thin little body trembled from head tofoot; her face flushed and her eyes dilated until they were almost black; she claspedher hands tightly and said in an imploring voice: "oh, please, miss cuthbert, won't you tellme if you are going to send me away or not? i've tried to be patient all the morning,but i really feel that i cannot bear not knowing any longer.
it's a dreadful feeling.please tell me." "you haven't scalded the dishcloth in cleanhot water as i told you to do," said marilla immovably. "just go and do it before you ask any morequestions, anne." anne went and attended to the dishcloth.then she returned to marilla and fastened imploring eyes of the latter's face. "well," said marilla, unable to find anyexcuse for deferring her explanation longer, "i suppose i might as well tellyou. matthew and i have decided to keep you--that is, if you will try to be a good
little girl and show yourself grateful.why, child, whatever is the matter?" "i'm crying," said anne in a tone ofbewilderment. "i can't think why.i'm glad as glad can be. oh, glad doesn't seem the right word atall. i was glad about the white way and thecherry blossoms--but this! oh, it's something more than glad. i'm so happy.i'll try to be so good. it will be uphill work, i expect, for mrs.thomas often told me i was desperately wicked.
however, i'll do my very best.but can you tell me why i'm crying?" "i suppose it's because you're all excitedand worked up," said marilla disapprovingly. "sit down on that chair and try to calmyourself. i'm afraid you both cry and laugh far tooeasily. yes, you can stay here and we will try todo right by you. you must go to school; but it's only afortnight till vacation so it isn't worth while for you to start before it opensagain in september." "what am i to call you?" asked anne.
"shall i always say miss cuthbert?can i call you aunt marilla?" "no; you'll call me just plain marilla.i'm not used to being called miss cuthbert and it would make me nervous." "it sounds awfully disrespectful to justsay marilla," protested anne. "i guess there'll be nothing disrespectfulin it if you're careful to speak respectfully. everybody, young and old, in avonlea callsme marilla except the minister. he says miss cuthbert--when he thinks ofit." "i'd love to call you aunt marilla," saidanne wistfully.
"i've never had an aunt or any relation atall--not even a grandmother. it would make me feel as if i reallybelonged to you. can't i call you aunt marilla?""no. i'm not your aunt and i don't believe incalling people names that don't belong to them.""but we could imagine you were my aunt." "i couldn't," said marilla grimly. "do you never imagine things different fromwhat they really are?" asked anne wide- eyed."no." "oh!"
anne drew a long breath."oh, miss--marilla, how much you miss!" "i don't believe in imagining thingsdifferent from what they really are," retorted marilla. "when the lord puts us in certaincircumstances he doesn't mean for us to imagine them away.and that reminds me. go into the sitting room, anne--be sureyour feet are clean and don't let any flies in--and bring me out the illustrated cardthat's on the mantelpiece. the lord's prayer is on it and you'lldevote your spare time this afternoon to learning it off by heart.there's to be no more of such praying as i
heard last night." "i suppose i was very awkward," said anneapologetically, "but then, you see, i'd never had any practice. you couldn't really expect a person to prayvery well the first time she tried, could you? i thought out a splendid prayer after iwent to bed, just as i promised you i would.it was nearly as long as a minister's and so poetical. but would you believe it?i couldn't remember one word when i woke up
this morning.and i'm afraid i'll never be able to think out another one as good. somehow, things never are so good whenthey're thought out a second time. have you ever noticed that?""here is something for you to notice, anne. when i tell you to do a thing i want you toobey me at once and not stand stock-still and discourse about it.just you go and do as i bid you." anne promptly departed for the sitting-roomacross the hall; she failed to return; after waiting ten minutes marilla laid downher knitting and marched after her with a grim expression.
she found anne standing motionless before apicture hanging on the wall between the two windows, with her eyes astar with dreams. the white and green light strained throughapple trees and clustering vines outside fell over the rapt little figure with ahalf-unearthly radiance. "anne, whatever are you thinking of?"demanded marilla sharply. anne came back to earth with a start. "that," she said, pointing to the picture--a rather vivid chromo entitled, "christ blessing little children"--"and i was justimagining i was one of them--that i was the little girl in the blue dress, standing off
by herself in the corner as if she didn'tbelong to anybody, like me. she looks lonely and sad, don't you think?i guess she hadn't any father or mother of her own. but she wanted to be blessed, too, so shejust crept shyly up on the outside of the crowd, hoping nobody would notice her--except him. i'm sure i know just how she felt. her heart must have beat and her hands musthave got cold, like mine did when i asked you if i could stay.she was afraid he mightn't notice her. but it's likely he did, don't you think?
i've been trying to imagine it all out--heredging a little nearer all the time until she was quite close to him; and then hewould look at her and put his hand on her hair and oh, such a thrill of joy as wouldrun over her! but i wish the artist hadn't painted him sosorrowful looking. all his pictures are like that, if you'venoticed. but i don't believe he could really havelooked so sad or the children would have been afraid of him." "anne," said marilla, wondering why she hadnot broken into this speech long before, "you shouldn't talk that way.it's irreverent--positively irreverent."
anne's eyes marveled. "why, i felt just as reverent as could be.i'm sure i didn't mean to be irreverent." "well i don't suppose you did--but itdoesn't sound right to talk so familiarly about such things. and another thing, anne, when i send youafter something you're to bring it at once and not fall into mooning and imaginingbefore pictures. remember that. take that card and come right to thekitchen. now, sit down in the corner and learn thatprayer off by heart."
anne set the card up against the jugful ofapple blossoms she had brought in to decorate the dinner-table--marilla had eyedthat decoration askance, but had said nothing--propped her chin on her hands, and fell to studying it intently for severalsilent minutes. "i like this," she announced at length."it's beautiful. i've heard it before--i heard thesuperintendent of the asylum sunday school say it over once.but i didn't like it then. he had such a cracked voice and he prayedit so mournfully. i really felt sure he thought praying was adisagreeable duty.
this isn't poetry, but it makes me feeljust the same way poetry does. 'our father who art in heaven hallowed bethy name.' that is just like a line of music. oh, i'm so glad you thought of making melearn this, miss--marilla." "well, learn it and hold your tongue," saidmarilla shortly. anne tipped the vase of apple blossoms nearenough to bestow a soft kiss on a pink- cupped bud, and then studied diligently forsome moments longer. "marilla," she demanded presently, "do youthink that i shall ever have a bosom friend in avonlea?""a--a what kind of friend?"
"a bosom friend--an intimate friend, youknow--a really kindred spirit to whom i can confide my inmost soul.i've dreamed of meeting her all my life. i never really supposed i would, but somany of my loveliest dreams have come true all at once that perhaps this one will,too. do you think it's possible?" "diana barry lives over at orchard slopeand she's about your age. she's a very nice little girl, and perhapsshe will be a playmate for you when she comes home. she's visiting her aunt over at carmodyjust now.
you'll have to be careful how you behaveyourself, though. mrs. barry is a very particular woman. she won't let diana play with any littlegirl who isn't nice and good." anne looked at marilla through the appleblossoms, her eyes aglow with interest. "what is diana like? her hair isn't red, is it?oh, i hope not. it's bad enough to have red hair myself,but i positively couldn't endure it in a bosom friend." "diana is a very pretty little girl.she has black eyes and hair and rosy
cheeks.and she is good and smart, which is better than being pretty." marilla was as fond of morals as theduchess in wonderland, and was firmly convinced that one should be tacked on toevery remark made to a child who was being brought up. but anne waved the moral inconsequentlyaside and seized only on the delightful possibilities before it."oh, i'm so glad she's pretty. next to being beautiful oneself--and that'simpossible in my case--it would be best to have a beautiful bosom friend.
when i lived with mrs. thomas she had abookcase in her sitting room with glass doors. there weren't any books in it; mrs. thomaskept her best china and her preserves there--when she had any preserves to keep.one of the doors was broken. mr. thomas smashed it one night when he wasslightly intoxicated. but the other was whole and i used topretend that my reflection in it was another little girl who lived in it. i called her katie maurice, and we werevery intimate. i used to talk to her by the hour,especially on sunday, and tell her
everything. katie was the comfort and consolation of mylife. we used to pretend that the bookcase wasenchanted and that if i only knew the spell i could open the door and step right intothe room where katie maurice lived, instead of into mrs. thomas' shelves of preservesand china. and then katie maurice would have taken meby the hand and led me out into a wonderful place, all flowers and sunshine andfairies, and we would have lived there happy for ever after. when i went to live with mrs. hammond itjust broke my heart to leave katie maurice.
she felt it dreadfully, too, i know shedid, for she was crying when she kissed me good-bye through the bookcase door. there was no bookcase at mrs. hammond's.but just up the river a little way from the house there was a long green little valley,and the loveliest echo lived there. it echoed back every word you said, even ifyou didn't talk a bit loud. so i imagined that it was a little girlcalled violetta and we were great friends and i loved her almost as well as i lovedkatie maurice--not quite, but almost, you know. the night before i went to the asylum isaid good-bye to violetta, and oh, her
good-bye came back to me in such sad, sadtones. i had become so attached to her that ihadn't the heart to imagine a bosom friend at the asylum, even if there had been anyscope for imagination there." "i think it's just as well there wasn't,"said marilla drily. "i don't approve of such goings-on.you seem to half believe your own imaginations. it will be well for you to have a real livefriend to put such nonsense out of your head. but don't let mrs. barry hear you talkingabout your katie maurices and your
violettas or she'll think you tellstories." "oh, i won't. i couldn't talk of them to everybody--theirmemories are too sacred for that. but i thought i'd like to have you knowabout them. oh, look, here's a big bee just tumbled outof an apple blossom. just think what a lovely place to live--inan apple blossom! fancy going to sleep in it when the windwas rocking it. if i wasn't a human girl i think i'd liketo be a bee and live among the flowers." "yesterday you wanted to be a sea gull,"sniffed marilla.
"i think you are very fickle minded.i told you to learn that prayer and not talk. but it seems impossible for you to stoptalking if you've got anybody that will listen to you.so go up to your room and learn it." "oh, i know it pretty nearly all now--allbut just the last line." "well, never mind, do as i tell you. go to your room and finish learning itwell, and stay there until i call you down to help me get tea.""can i take the apple blossoms with me for company?" pleaded anne.
"no; you don't want your room cluttered upwith flowers. you should have left them on the tree inthe first place." "i did feel a little that way, too," saidanne. "i kind of felt i shouldn't shorten theirlovely lives by picking them--i wouldn't want to be picked if i were an appleblossom. but the temptation was irresistible. what do you do when you meet with anirresistible temptation?" "anne, did you hear me tell you to go toyour room?" anne sighed, retreated to the east gable,and sat down in a chair by the window.
"there--i know this prayer.i learned that last sentence coming upstairs. now i'm going to imagine things into thisroom so that they'll always stay imagined. the floor is covered with a white velvetcarpet with pink roses all over it and there are pink silk curtains at thewindows. the walls are hung with gold and silverbrocade tapestry. the furniture is mahogany.i never saw any mahogany, but it does sound so luxurious. this is a couch all heaped with gorgeoussilken cushions, pink and blue and crimson
and gold, and i am reclining gracefully onit. i can see my reflection in that splendidbig mirror hanging on the wall. i am tall and regal, clad in a gown oftrailing white lace, with a pearl cross on my breast and pearls in my hair. my hair is of midnight darkness and my skinis a clear ivory pallor. my name is the lady cordelia fitzgerald.no, it isn't--i can't make that seem real." she danced up to the little looking-glassand peered into it. her pointed freckled face and solemn grayeyes peered back at her. "you're only anne of green gables," shesaid earnestly, "and i see you, just as you
are looking now, whenever i try to imaginei'm the lady cordelia. but it's a million times nicer to be anneof green gables than anne of nowhere in particular, isn't it?" she bent forward, kissed her reflectionaffectionately, and betook herself to the open window."dear snow queen, good afternoon. and good afternoon dear birches down in thehollow. and good afternoon, dear gray house up onthe hill. i wonder if diana is to be my bosom friend. i hope she will, and i shall love her verymuch.
but i must never quite forget katie mauriceand violetta. they would feel so hurt if i did and i'dhate to hurt anybody's feelings, even a little bookcase girl's or a little echogirl's. i must be careful to remember them and sendthem a kiss every day." anne blew a couple of airy kisses from herfingertips past the cherry blossoms and then, with her chin in her hands, driftedluxuriously out on a sea of daydreams.