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Anne of the Island
Lucy Maud Montgomery
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Anne of the Island
Lucy Maud Montgomery
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New adventures lie ahead as Anne Shirley packs her bags, waves good-bye to childhood, and heads for Redmond College. With old friend Prissy Grant waiting in the bustling city of Kingsport and frivolous new pal Philippa Gordon at her side, Anne tucks her memories of rural Avonlea away and discovers life on her own terms, filled with surprises...including a marriage proposal from the worst fellow imaginable, the sale of her very first story, and a tragedy that teaches her a painful lesson. But tears turn to laughter when Anne and her friends move into an old cottage and an ornery black cat steals her heart. Little does Anne know that handsome Gilbert Blythe wants to win her heart, too. Suddenly Anne must decide if she's ready for love...
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Sujet
LiteratureSous-sujet
ClassicsChapter I
The Shadow of Change
âHarvest is ended and summer is gone,â quoted Anne Shirley, gazing across the shorn fields dreamily. She and Diana Barry had been picking apples in the Green Gables orchard, but were now resting from their labors in a sunny corner, where airy fleets of thistledown drifted by on the wings of a wind that was still summer-sweet with the incense of ferns in the Haunted Wood.
But everything in the landscape around them spoke of autumn. The sea was roaring hollowly in the distance, the fields were bare and sere, scarfed with golden rod, the brook valley below Green Gables overflowed with asters of ethereal purple, and the Lake of Shining Waters was blueâblueâblue; not the changeful blue of spring, nor the pale azure of summer, but a clear, steadfast, serene blue, as if the water were past all moods and tenses of emotion and had settled down to a tranquility unbroken by fickle dreams.
âIt has been a nice summer,â said Diana, twisting the new ring on her left hand with a smile. âAnd Miss Lavendarâs wedding seemed to come as a sort of crown to it. I suppose Mr. and Mrs. Irving are on the Pacific coast now.â
âIt seems to me they have been gone long enough to go around the world,â sighed Anne.
âI canât believe it is only a week since they were married. Everything has changed. Miss Lavendar and Mr. and Mrs. Allan goneâhow lonely the manse looks with the shutters all closed! I went past it last night, and it made me feel as if everybody in it had died.â
âWeâll never get another minister as nice as Mr. Allan,â said Diana, with gloomy conviction. âI suppose weâll have all kinds of supplies this winter, and half the Sundays no preaching at all. And you and Gilbert goneâit will be awfully dull.â
âFred will be here,â insinuated Anne slyly.
âWhen is Mrs. Lynde going to move up?â asked Diana, as if she had not heard Anneâs remark.
âTomorrow. Iâm glad sheâs comingâbut it will be another change. Marilla and I cleared everything out of the spare room yesterday. Do you know, I hated to do it? Of course, it was sillyâbut it did seem as if we were committing sacrilege. That old spare room has always seemed like a shrine to me. When I was a child I thought it the most wonderful apartment in the world. You remember what a consuming desire I had to sleep in a spare room bedâbut not the Green Gables spare room. Oh, no, never there! It would have been too terribleâI couldnât have slept a wink from awe. I never WALKED through that room when Marilla sent me in on an errandâno, indeed, I tiptoed through it and held my breath, as if I were in church, and felt relieved when I got out of it. The pictures of George Whitefield and the Duke of Wellington hung there, one on each side of the mirror, and frowned so sternly at me all the time I was in, especially if I dared peep in the mirror, which was the only one in the house that didnât twist my face a little. I always wondered how Marilla dared houseclean that room. And now itâs not only cleaned but stripped bare. George Whitefield and the Duke have been relegated to the upstairs hall. âSo passes the glory of this world,ââ concluded Anne, with a laugh in which there was a little note of regret. It is never pleasant to have our old shrines desecrated, even when we have outgrown them.
âIâll be so lonesome when you go,â moaned Diana for the hundredth time. âAnd to think you go next week!â
âBut weâre together still,â said Anne cheerily. âWe mustnât let next week rob us of this weekâs joy. I hate the thought of going myselfâhome and I are such good friends. Talk of being lonesome! Itâs I who should groan. YOUâLL be here with any number of your old friendsâAND Fred! While I shall be alone among strangers, not knowing a soul!â
âEXCEPT GilbertâAND Charlie Sloane,â said Diana, imitating Anneâs italics and slyness.
âCharlie Sloane will be a great comfort, of course,â agreed Anne sarcastically; whereupon both those irresponsible damsels laughed. Diana knew exactly what Anne thought of Charlie Sloane; but, despite sundry confidential talks, she did not know just what Anne thought of Gilbert Blythe. To be sure, Anne herself did not know that.
âThe boys may be boarding at the other end of Kingsport, for all I know,â Anne went on. âI am glad Iâm going to Redmond, and I am sure I shall like it after a while. But for the first few weeks I know I wonât. I shanât even have the comfort of looking forward to the weekend visit home, as I had when I went to Queenâs. Christmas will seem like a thousand years away.â
âEverything is changingâor going to change,â said Diana sadly. âI have a feeling that things will never be the same again, Anne.â
âWe have come to a parting of the ways, I suppose,â said Anne thoughtfully. âWe had to come to it. Do you think, Diana, that being grown-up is really as nice as we used to imagine it would be when we were children?â
âI donât knowâthere are SOME nice things about it,â answered Diana, again caressing her ring with that little smile which always had the effect of making Anne feel suddenly left out and inexperienced. âBut there are so many puzzling things, too. Sometimes I feel as if being grown-up just frightened meâand then I would give anything to be a little girl again.â
âI suppose weâll get used to being grownup in time,â said Anne cheerfully. âThere wonât be so many unexpected things about it by and byâthough, after all, I fancy itâs the unexpected things that give spice to life. Weâre eighteen, Diana. In two more years weâll be twenty. When I was ten I thought twenty was a green old age. In no time youâll be a staid, middle-aged matron, and I shall be nice, old maid Aunt Anne, coming to visit you on vacations. Youâll always keep a corner for me, wonât you, Di darling? Not the spare room, of courseâold maids canât aspire to spare rooms, and I shall be as âumble as Uriah Heep, and quite content with a little over-the-porch or off-the-parlor cubby hole.â
âWhat nonsense you do talk, Anne,â laughed Diana. âYouâll marry somebody splendid and handsome and richâand no spare room in Avonlea will be half gorgeous enough for youâand youâll turn up your nose at all the friends of your youth.â
âThat would be a pity; my nose is quite nice, but I fear turning it up would spoil it,â said Anne, patting that shapely organ. âI havenât so many good features that I could afford to spoil those I have; so, even if I should marry the King of the Cannibal Islands, I promise you I wonât turn up my nose at you, Diana.â
With another gay laugh the girls separated, Diana to return to Orchard Slope, Anne to walk to the Post Office. She found a letter awaiting her there, and when Gilbert Blythe overtook her on the bridge over the Lake of Shining Waters she was sparkling with the excitement of it.
âPriscilla Grant is going to Redmond, too,â she exclaimed. âIsnât that splendid? I hoped she would, but she didnât think her father would consent. He has, however, and weâre to board together. I feel that I can face an army with bannersâor all the professors of Redmond in one fell phalanxâwith a chum like Priscilla by my side.â
âI think weâll like Kingsport,â said Gilbert. âItâs a nice old burg, they tell me, and has the finest natural park in the world. Iâve heard that the scenery in it is magnificent.â
âI wonder if it will beâcan beâany more beautiful than this,â murmured Anne, looking around her with the loving, enraptured eyes of those to whom âhomeâ must always be the loveliest spot in the world, no matter what fairer lands may lie under alien stars.
They were leaning on the bridge of the old pond, drinking deep of the enchantment of the dusk, just at the spot where Anne had climbed from her sinking Dory on the day Elaine floated down to Camelot. The fine, empurpling dye of sunset still stained the western skies, but the moon was rising and the water lay like a great, silver dream in her light. Remembrance wove a sweet and subtle spell over the two young creatures.
âYou are very quiet, Anne,â said Gilbert at last.
âIâm afraid to speak or move for fear all this wonderful beauty will vanish just like a broken silence,â breathed Anne.
Gilbert suddenly laid his hand over the slender white one lying on the rail of the bridge. His hazel eyes deepened into darkness, his still boyish lips opened to say something of the dream and hope that thrilled his soul. But Anne snatched her hand away and turned quickly. The spell of the dusk was broken for her.
âI must go home,â she exclaimed, with a rather overdone carelessness. âMarilla had a headache this afternoon, and Iâm sure the twins will be in some dreadful mischief by this time. I really shouldnât have stayed away so long.â
She chattered ceaselessly and inconsequently until they reached the Green Gables lane. Poor Gilbert hardly had a chance to get a word in edgewise. Anne felt rather relieved when they parted. There had been a new, secret self-consciousness in her heart with regard to Gilbert, ever since that fleeting moment of revelation in the garden of Echo Lodge. Something alien had intruded into the old, perfect, school-day comradeshipâsomething that threatened to mar it.
âI never felt glad to see Gilbert go before,â she thought, half-resentfully, half-sorrowfully, as she walked alone up the lane. âOur friendship will be spoiled if he goes on with this nonsense. It mustnât be spoiledâI wonât let it. Oh, WHY canât boys be just sensible!â
Anne had an uneasy doubt that it was not strictly âsensibleâ that she should still feel on her hand the warm pressure of Gilbertâs, as distinctly as she had felt it for the swift second his had rested there; and still less sensible that the sensation was far from being an unpleasant oneâvery different from that which had attended a similar demonstration on Charlie Sloaneâs part, when she had been sitting out a dance with him at a White Sands party three nights before. Anne shivered over the disagreeable recollection. But all problems connected with infatuated swains vanished from her mind when she entered the homely, unsentimental atmosphere of the Green Gables kitchen where an eight-year-old boy was crying grievously on the sofa.
âWhat is the matter, Davy?â asked Anne, taking him up in her arms. âWhere are Marilla and Dora?â
âMarillaâs putting Dora to bed,â sobbed Davy, âand Iâm crying âcause Dora fell down the outside cellar steps, heels over head, and scraped all the skin off her nose, andââ
âOh, well, donât cry about it, dear. Of course, you are sorry for her, but crying wonât help her any. Sheâll be all right tomorrow. Crying never helps any one, Davy-boy, andââ
âI ainât crying âcause Dora fell down cellar,â said Davy, cutting short Anneâs wellmeant preachment with increasing bitterness. âIâm crying, cause I wasnât there to see her fall. Iâm always missing some fun or other, seems to me.â
âOh, Davy!â Anne choked back an unholy shriek of laughter. âWould you call it fun to see poor little Dora fall down the steps and get hurt?â
âShe wasnât MUCH hurt,â said Davy, defiantly. ââCourse, if sheâd been killed Iâd have been real sorry, Anne. But the Keiths ainât so easy killed. Theyâre like the Blewetts, I guess. Herb Blewett fell off the hayloft last Wednesday, and rolled right down through the turnip chute into the box stall, where they had a fearful wild, cross horse, and rolled right under his heels. And still he got out alive, with only three bones broke. Mrs. Lynde says there are some folks you canât kill with a meat-axe. Is Mrs. Lynde coming here tomorrow, Anne?â
âYes, Davy, and I hope youâll be always very nice and good to her.â
âIâll be nice and good. But will she ever put me to bed at nights, Anne?â
âPerhaps. Why?â
ââCause,â said Davy very decidedly, âif she does I wonât say my prayers before her like I do before you, Anne.â
âWhy not?â
ââCause I donât think it would be nice to talk to God before strangers, Anne. Dora can say hers to Mrs. Lynde if she likes, but I wonât. Iâll wait till sheâs gone and then say âem. Wonât that be all right, Anne?â
âYes, if you are sure you wonât forget to say them, Davy-boy.â
âOh, I wonât forget, you bet. I think saying my prayers is great fun. But it wonât be as good fun saying them alone as saying them to you. I wish youâd stay home, Anne. I donât see what you want to go away and leave us for.â
âI donât exactly WANT to, Davy, but I feel I ought to go.â
âIf you donât want to go you neednât. Youâre grown up. When Iâm grown up Iâm not going to do one single thing I donât want to do, Anne.â
âAll your life, Davy, youâll find yourself doing things you donât want to do.â
âI wonât,â said Davy flatly. âCatch me! I have to do things I donât want to now âcause you and Marillaâll send me to bed if I donât. But when I grow up you canât do that, and thereâll be nobody to tell me not to do things. Wonât I have the time! Say, Anne, Milty Boulter says his mother says youâre going to college to see if you can catch a man. Are you, Anne? I want to know.â
For a second Anne burned with resentment. Then she laughed, reminding herself that Mrs. Boulterâs crude vulgarity of thought and speech could not harm her.
âNo, Davy, Iâm not. Iâm going to study and grow and learn about many things.â
âWhat things?â
ââShoes and ships and sealing wax
And cabbages and kings,ââ
quoted Anne.
âBut if you DID want to catch a man how would you go about it? I want to know,â persisted Davy, for whom the subject evidently possessed a certain fascination.
âYouâd better ask Mrs. Boulter,â said Anne thoughtlessly. âI think itâs likely she knows more about the process than I do.â
âI will, the next time I see her,â said Davy gravely.
âDavy! If you do!â cried Anne, realizing her mistake.
âBut you just told me to,â protest...