Anne's House of Dreams by Lucy Maud Montgomery (free ebooks for android .txt) đ
- Author: Lucy Maud Montgomery
- Performer: 0553213180
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âComparatively calm, Mistress Blythe, comparatively calm. She says, says she, `Well, Providence sends seasons of humiliation to a country, same as to individuals. You Grits have been cold and hungry for many a year. Make haste to get warmed and fed, for you wonât be in long.â `Well, now Cornelia,â I says, `mebbe Providence thinks Canada needs a real long spell of humiliation.â Ah, Susan, have YOU heard the news? The Liberals are in.â
Susan had just come in from the kitchen, attended by the odor of delectable dishes which always seemed to hover around her.
âNow, are they?â she said, with beautiful unconcern. âWell, I never could see but that my bread rose just as light when Grits were in as when they were not. And if any party, Mrs. Doctor, dear, will make it rain before the week is out, and save our kitchen garden from entire ruination, that is the party Susan will vote for. In the meantime, will you just step out and give me your opinion on the meat for dinner? I am fearing that it is very tough, and I think that we had better change our butcher as well as our government.â
One evening, a week later, Anne walked down to the Point, to see if she could get some fresh fish from Captain Jim, leaving Little Jem for the first time. It was quite a tragedy. Suppose he cried? Suppose Susan did not know just exactly what to do for him? Susan was calm and serene.
âI have had as much experience with him as you, Mrs. Doctor, dear, have I not?â
âYes, with himâbut not with other babies. Why, I looked after three pairs of twins, when I was a child, Susan. When they cried, I gave them peppermint or castor oil quite coolly. Itâs quite curious now to recall how lightly I took all those babies and their woes.â
âOh, well, if Little Jem cries, I will just clap a hot water bag on his little stomach,â said Susan.
âNot too hot, you know,â said Anne anxiously. Oh, was it really wise to go?
âDo not you fret, Mrs. Doctor, dear. Susan is not the woman to burn a wee man. Bless him, he has no notion of crying.â
Anne tore herself away finally and enjoyed her walk to the Point after all, through the long shadows of the sun-setting. Captain Jim was not in the living room of the lighthouse, but another man wasâa handsome, middle-aged man, with a strong, clean-shaven chin, who was unknown to Anne. Nevertheless, when she sat down, he began to talk to her with all the assurance of an old acquaintance. There was nothing amiss in what he said or the way he said it, but Anne rather resented such a cool taking-for-granted in a complete stranger. Her replies were frosty, and as few as decency required. Nothing daunted, her companion talked on for several minutes, then excused himself and went away. Anne could have sworn there was a twinkle in his eye and it annoyed her. Who was the creature? There was something vaguely familiar about him but she was certain she had never seen him before.
âCaptain Jim, who was that who just went out?â she asked, as Captain Jim came in.
âMarshall Elliott,â answered the captain.
âMarshall Elliott!â cried Anne. âOh, Captain Jimâit wasnâtâ yes, it WAS his voiceâoh, Captain Jim, I didnât know himâand I was quite insulting to him! WHY didnât he tell me? He must have seen I didnât know him.â
âHe wouldnât say a word about itâheâd just enjoy the joke. Donât worry over snubbing himâheâll think it fun. Yes, Marshallâs shaved off his beard at last and cut his hair. His party is in, you know. I didnât know him myself first time I saw him. He was up in Carter Flaggâs store at the Glen the night after election day, along with a crowd of others, waiting for the news. About twelve the âphone came throughâthe Liberals were in. Marshall just got up and walked outâhe didnât cheer or shoutâhe left the others to do that, and they nearly lifted the roof off Carterâs store, I reckon. Of course, all the Tories were over in Raymond Russellâs store. Not much cheering THERE. Marshall went straight down the street to the side door of Augustus Palmerâs barber shop. Augustus was in bed asleep, but Marhall hammered on the door until he got up and come down, wanting to know what all the racket was about.
âCome into your shop and do the best job you ever did in your life, Gus,â said Marshall. `The Liberals are in and youâre going to barber a good Grit before the sun rises.â
âGus was mad as hopsâpartly because heâd been dragged out of bed, but more because heâs a Tory. He vowed he wouldnât shave any man after twelve at night.
â`Youâll do what I want you to do, sonny,â said Marshall, `or Iâll jest turn you over my knee and give you one of those spankings your mother forgot.â
âHeâd have done it, too, and Gus knew it, for Marshall is as strong as an ox and Gus is only a midget of a man. So he gave in and towed Marshall in to the shop and went to work. `Now,â says he, `Iâll barber you up, but if you say one word to me about the Grits getting in while Iâm doing it Iâll cut your throat with this razor,â says he. You wouldnât have thought mild little Gus could be so bloodthirsty, would you? Shows what party politics will do for a man. Marshall kept quiet and got his hair and beard disposed of and went home. When his old housekeeper heard him come upstairs she peeked out of her bedroom door to see whether âtwas him or the hired boy. And when she saw a strange man striding down the hall with a candle in his hand she screamed blue murder and fainted dead away. They had to send for the doctor before they could bring her to, and it was several days before she could look at Marshall without shaking all over.â
Captain Jim had no fish. He seldom went out in his boat that summer, and his long tramping expeditions were over. He spent a great deal of his time sitting by his seaward window, looking out over the gulf, with his swiftly-whitening head leaning on his hand. He sat there tonight for many silent minutes, keeping some tryst with the past which Anne would not disturb. Presently he pointed to the iris of the West:
âThatâs beautiful, isnât, it, Mistress Blythe? But I wish you could have seen the sunrise this morning. It was a wonderful thingâwonderful. Iâve seen all kinds of sunrises come over that gulf. Iâve been all over the world, Mistress Blythe, and take it all in all, Iâve never seen a finer sight than a summer sunrise over the gulf. A man canât pick his time for dying, Mistress Blytheâjest got to go when the Great Captain gives His sailing orders. But if I could Iâd go out when the morning comes across that water. Iâve watched it many a time and thought what a thing it would be to pass out through that great white glory to whatever was waiting beyant, on a sea that ainât mapped out on any airthly chart. I think, Mistress Blythe, that Iâd find lost Margaret there.â
Captain Jim had often talked to Anne of lost Margaret since he had told her the old story. His love for her trembled in every toneâthat love that had never grown faint or forgetful.
âAnyway, I hope when my time comes Iâll go quick and easy. I donât think Iâm a coward, Mistress BlytheâIâve looked an ugly death in the face more than once without blenching. But the thought of a lingering death does give me a queer, sick feeling of horror.â
âDonât talk about leaving us, dear, DEAR Captain, Jim,â pleaded Anne, in a choked voice, patting the old brown hand, once so strong, but now grown very feeble. âWhat would we do without you?â
Captain Jim smiled beautifully.
âOh, youâd get along nicelyânicelyâbut you wouldnât forget the old man altogether, Mistress Blytheâno, I donât think youâll ever quite forget him. The race of Joseph always remembers one another. But itâll be a memory that wonât hurtâI like to think that my memory wonât hurt my friendsâitâll always be kind of pleasant to them, I hope and believe. It wonât be very long now before lost Margaret calls me, for the last time. Iâll be all ready to answer. I jest spoke of this because thereâs a little favor I want to ask you. Hereâs this poor old Matey of mineââCaptain Jim reached out a hand and poked the big, warm, velvety, golden ball on the sofa. The First Mate uncoiled himself like a spring with a nice, throaty, comfortable sound, half purr, half meow, stretched his paws in air, turned over and coiled himself up again. âHEâll miss me when I start on the Vâyage. I canât bear to think of leaving the poor critter to starve, like he was left before. If anything happens to me will you give Matey a bite and a corner, Mistress Blythe?â
âIndeed I will.â
âThen that is all I had on my mind. Your Little Jem is to have the few curious things I picked upâIâve seen to that. And now I donât like to see tears in those pretty eyes, Mistress Blythe. Iâll mebbe hang on for quite a spell yet. I heard you reading a piece of poetry one day last winterâone of Tennysonâs pieces. Iâd sorter like to hear it again, if you could recite it for me.â
Softly and clearly, while the seawind blew in on them, Anne repeated the beautiful lines of Tennysonâs wonderful swan songâ âCrossing the Bar.â The old captain kept time gently with his sinewy hand.
âYes, yes, Mistress Blythe,â he said, when she had finished, âthatâs it, thatâs it. He wasnât a sailor, you tell meâI dunno how he could have put an old sailorâs feelings into words like that, if he wasnât one. He didnât want any `sadness oâ farewellsâ and neither do I, Mistress Blytheâfor all will be well with me and mine beyant the bar.â
âAny news from Green Gables, Anne?â
âNothing very especial,â replied Anne, folding up Marillaâs letter. âJake Donnell has been there shingling the roof. He is a full-fledged carpenter now, so it seems he has had his own way in regard to the choice of a life-work. You remember his mother wanted him to be a college professor. I shall never forget the day she came to the school and rated me for failing to call him St. Clair.â
âDoes anyone ever call him that now?â
âEvidently not. It seems that he has completely lived it down. Even his mother has succumbed. I always thought that a boy with Jakeâs chin and mouth would get his own way in the end. Diana writes me that Dora has a beau. Just think of itâthat child!â
âDora is seventeen,â said Gilbert. âCharlie Sloane and I were both mad about you when you were seventeen, Anne.â
âReally, Gilbert, we must be getting on in years,â said Anne, with a half-rueful smile, âwhen children who were six when we thought ourselves grown up are old enough now to have beaux. Doraâs is Ralph AndrewsâJaneâs brother. I remember him as a little, round, fat, white-headed fellow who was always at the foot of his class. But I understand he is quite a fine-looking young man now.â
âDora will probably marry young. Sheâs of the same type as Charlotta the Fourthâsheâll never miss her first chance for fear she might not get another.â
âWell; if
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