Lucy Maud Montgomery - The Complete Novels of Lucy Maud Montgomery - 20 Titles in One Volume - Including Anne of Green Gables Series, Emily Starr Trilogy, The Blue Castle, The Story Girl & Pat of Silver Bush Series

“I wonder if I’ll ever have such a happy fortnight again,” thought little Elizabeth, as she drove away from Green Gables. The road to the station was just as beautiful as it had been two weeks before, but half the time little Elizabeth couldn’t see it for tears.

“I couldn’t have believed I’d miss a child so much,” said Mrs. Lynde.

When little Elizabeth went, Katherine Brooke and her dog came for the rest of the summer. Katherine had resigned from the staff of the High School at the close of the year and meant to go to Redmond in the fall to take a secretarial course at Redmond University. Anne had advised this.

“I know you’d like it and you’ve never liked teaching,” said the latter, as they sat one evening in a ferny corner of a clover field and watched the glories of a sunset sky.

“Life owes me something more than it has paid me and I’m going out to collect it,” said Katherine decidedly. “I feel so much younger than I did this time last year,” she added with a laugh.

“I’m sure it’s the best thing for you to do, but I hate to think of Summerside and the High without you. What will the tower room be like next year without our evenings of confab and argument, and our hours of foolishness, when we turned everybody and everything into a joke?”

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“Windy Poplars,

“Spook’s Lane,

“September 8th.

“Dearest:

“The summer is over … the summer in which I have seen you only that weekend in May. And I am back at Windy Poplars for my third and last year in Summerside High. Katherine and I had a delightful time together at Green Gables and I’m going to miss her dreadfully this year. The new Junior teacher is a jolly little personage, chubby and rosy and friendly as a puppy … but somehow, there’s nothing more to her than that. She has sparkling shallow blue eyes with no thought behind them. I like her … I’ll always like her … neither more nor less … there’s nothing to discover in her. There was so much to discover in Katherine, when you once got past her guard.

“There is no change at Windy Poplars … yes there is. The old red cow has gone to her long home, so Rebecca Dew sadly informed me when I came down to supper Monday night. The widows have decided not to bother with another one but to get milk and cream from Mr. Cherry. This means that little Elizabeth will come no more to the garden gate for her new milk. But Mrs. Campbell seems to have grown reconciled to her coming over here when she wants to, so that does not make so much difference now.

“And another change is brewing. Aunt Kate told me, much to my sorrow, that they have decided to give Dusty Miller away as soon as they can find a suitable home for him. When I protested, she said they were really driven to it for peace’ sake. Rebecca Dew has been constantly complaining about him all summer and there seems to be no other way of satisfying her. Poor Dusty Miller … and he is such a nice, prowly, purry darling!

“Tomorrow, being Saturday, I’m going to look after Mrs. Raymond’s twins while she goes to Charlottetown to the funeral of some relative. Mrs. Raymond is a widow who came to our town last winter. Rebecca Dew and the Windy Poplars widows … really, Summerside is a great place for widows … think her a ‘little too grand’ for Summerside, but she was really a wonderful help to Katherine and me in our Dramatic Club activities. One good turn deserves another.

“Gerald and Geraldine are eight and are a pair of angelic-looking youngsters, but Rebecca Dew ‘pulled a mouth,’ to use one of her own expressions, when I told her what I was going to do.

“‘But I love children, Rebecca.’

“‘Children, yes, but them’s holy terrors, Miss Shirley. Mrs. Raymond doesn’t believe in punishing children no matter what they do. She says she’s determined they’ll have a “natural” life. They take people in by that saintly look of theirs, but I’ve heard what her neighbors have to say of them. The minister’s wife called one afternoon … well, Mrs. Raymond was sweet as sugar pie to her, but when she was leaving a shower of Spanish onions came flying down the stairs and one of them knocked her hat off. “Children always behave so abominably when you ‘specially want them to be good,” was all Mrs. Raymond said … kinder as if she was rather proud of them being so unmanageable. They’re from the States, you know’ … as if that explained everything. Rebecca has about as much use for ‘Yankees’ as Mrs. Lynde has.”

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Saturday forenoon Anne betook herself to the pretty, old-fashioned cottage on a street that straggled out into the country, where Mrs. Raymond and her famous twins lived. Mrs. Raymond was all ready to depart … rather gayly dressed for a funeral, perhaps … especially with regard to the beflowered hat perched on top of the smooth brown waves of hair that flowed around her head … but looking very beautiful. The eight-year-old twins, who had inherited her beauty, were sitting on the stairs, their delicate faces wreathed with a quite cherubic expression. They had complexions of pink and white, large China-blue eyes and aureoles of fine, fluffy, pale yellow hair.

They smiled with engaging sweetness when their mother introduced them to Anne and told them that dear Miss Shirley had been so kind as to come and take care of them while Mother was away at dear Aunty Ella’s funeral, and of course they would be good and not give her one teeny-weeny bit of trouble, wouldn’t they, darlings?

The darlings nodded gravely and contrived, though it hadn’t seemed possible, to look more angelic than ever.

Mrs. Raymond took Anne down the walk to the gate with her.

“They’re all I’ve got … now,” she said pathetically. “Perhaps I may have spoiled them a little … I know people say I have … people always know so much better how you ought to bring up your children than you know yourself, haven’t you noticed, Miss Shirley? But I think loving is better than spanking any day, don’t you, Miss Shirley? I’m sure you will have no trouble with them. Children always know whom they can play on and whom they can’t, don’t you think? That poor old Miss Prouty up the street … I had her to stay with them one day, but the poor darlings couldn’t bear her. So of course they teased her a good bit … you know what children are. She has revenged herself by telling the most ridiculous tales about them all over town. But they’ll just love you and I know they’ll be angels. Of course, they have high spirits … but children should have, don’t you think? It’s so pitiful to see children with a cowed appearance, isn’t it? I like them to be natural, don’t you? Too good children don’t seem natural, do they? Don’t let them sail their boats in the bathtub or go wading in the pond, will you? I’m so afraid of them catching cold … their father died of pneumonia.”

Mrs. Raymond’s large blue eyes looked as if they were going to overflow, but she gallantly blinked the tears away.

“Don’t worry if they quarrel a little — children always do quarrel, don’t you think? But if any outsider attacks them … my dear!! They really just worship each other, you know. I could have taken one of them to the funeral, but they simply wouldn’t hear of it. They’ve never been separated a day in their lives. And I couldn’t look after twins at a funeral, could I now?”

“Don’t worry, Mrs. Raymond,” said Anne kindly. “I’m sure Gerald and Geraldine and I will have a beautiful day together. I love children.”