CHAPTER XII
A Solemn Vow and Promise
It was not until the next Friday that Marilla heard thestory of the flower-wreathed hat. She came home fromMrs. Lynde's and called Anne to account."Anne, Mrs. Rachel says you went to church last Sundaywith your hat rigged out ridiculous with roses andbuttercups. What on earth put you up to such a caper?A pretty-looking object you must have been!"
"Oh. I know pink and yellow aren't becoming to me," began Anne.
"Becoming fiddlesticks! It was putting flowers on yourhat at all, no matter what color they were, that wasridiculous. You are the most aggravating child!"
"I don't see why it's any more ridiculous to wear flowerson your hat than on your dress," protested Anne. "Lots oflittle girls there had bouquets pinned on their dresses.What's the difference?"
Marilla was not to be drawn from the safe concrete intodubious paths of the abstract.
"Don't answer me back like that, Anne. It was very sillyof you to do such a thing. Never let me catch you at such atrick again. Mrs. Rachel says she thought she would sinkthrough the floor when she come in all rigged out likethat. She couldn't get near enough to tell you to takethem off till it was too late. She says people talked aboutit something dreadful. Of course they would think I had nobetter sense than to let you go decked out like that."
"Oh, I'm so sorry," said Anne, tears welling into her eyes."I never thought you'd mind. The roses and buttercupswere so sweet and pretty I thought they'd look lovelyon my hat. Lots of the little girls had artificial flowerson their hats. I'm afraid I'm going to be a dreadful trialto you. Maybe you'd better send me back to the asylum.That would be terrible; I don't think I could endure it;most likely I would go into consumption; I'm so thin as it is,you see. But that would be better than being a trial to you."
"Nonsense," said Marilla, vexed at herself for havingmade the child cry. "I don't want to send you back to theasylum, I'm sure. All I want is that you should behave likeother little girls and not make yourself ridiculous. Don'tcry any more. I've got some news for you. Diana Barry camehome this afternoon. I'm going up to see if I can borrow askirt pattern from Mrs. Barry, and if you like you cancome with me and get acquainted with Diana."
Anne rose to her feet, with clasped hands, the tears stillglistening on her cheeks; the dish towel she had beenhemming slipped unheeded to the floor.
"Oh, Marilla, I'm frightened--now that it has come I'mactually frightened. What if she shouldn't like me! Itwould be the most tragical disappointment of my life."
"Now, don't get into a fluster. And I do wish you wouldn'tuse such long words. It sounds so funny in a little girl.I guess Diana'll like you well enough. It's her motheryou've got to reckon with. If she doesn't like you it won'tmatter how much Diana does. If she has heard about youroutburst to Mrs. Lynde and going to church with buttercupsround your hat I don't know what she'll think of you. Youmust be polite and well behaved, and don't make any of yourstartling speeches. For pity's sake, if the child isn'tactually trembling!"
Anne was trembling. Her face was pale and tense.
"Oh, Marilla, you'd be excited, too, if you were going tomeet a little girl you hoped to be your bosom friend andwhose mother mightn't like you," she said as she hastenedto get her hat.
They went over to Orchard Slope by the short cut acrossthe brook and up the firry hill grove. Mrs. Barry cameto the kitchen door in answer to Marilla's knock. Shewas a tall black-eyed, black-haired woman, with a veryresolute mouth. She had the reputation of being verystrict with her children.
"How do you do, Marilla?" she said cordially. "Come in.And this is the little girl you have adopted, I suppose?"
"Yes, this is Anne Shirley," said Marilla.
"Spelled with an E," gasped Anne, who, tremulous andexcited as she was, was determined there should be nomisunderstanding on that important point.
Mrs. Barry, not hearing or not comprehending, merelyshook hands and said kindly:
"How are you?"
"I am well in body although considerable rumpled up inspirit, thank you ma'am," said Anne gravely. Then asideto Marilla in an audible whisper, "There wasn't anythingstartling in that, was there, Marilla?"
Diana was sitting on the sofa, reading a book which shedropped when the callers entered. She was a very prettylittle girl, with her mother's black eyes and hair, androsy cheeks, and the merry expression which was herinheritance from her father.
"This is my little girl Diana," said Mrs. Barry. "Diana,you might take Anne out into the garden and show heryour flowers. It will be better for you than straining youreyes over that book. She reads entirely too much--" thisto Marilla as the little girls went out--"and I can't preventher, for her father aids and abets her. She's always poringover a book. I'm glad she has the prospect of a playmate--perhaps it will take her more out-of-doors."
Outside in the garden, which was full of mellow sunsetlight streaming through the dark old firs to the west of it,stood Anne and Diana, gazing bashfully at each other overa clump of gorgeous tiger lilies.
The Barry garden was a bowery wilderness of flowerswhich would have delighted Anne's heart at any time lessfraught with destiny. It was encircled by huge old willowsand tall firs, beneath which flourished flowers that lovedthe shade. Prim, right-angled paths neatly bordered withclamshells, intersected it like moist red ribbons and in thebeds between old-fashioned flowers ran riot. There wererosy bleeding-hearts and great splendid crimson peonies;white, fragrant narcissi and thorny, sweet Scotch roses;pink and blue and white columbines and lilac-tinted BouncingBets; clumps of southernwood and ribbon grass and mint;purple Adam-and-Eve, daffodils, and masses of sweet cloverwhite with its delicate, fragrant, feathery sprays;scarlet lightning that shot its fiery lances over prim whitemusk-flowers; a garden it was where sunshine lingered andbees hummed, and winds, beguiled into loitering, purredand rustled.
"Oh, Diana," said Anne at last, clasping her hands andspeaking almost in a whisper, "oh, do you think you canlike me a little--enough to be my bosom friend?"
Diana laughed. Diana always laughed before she spoke.
"Why, I guess so," she said frankly. "I'm awfully glad you'vecome to live at Green Gables. It will be jolly to have somebodyto play with. There isn't any other girl who lives near enoughto play with, and I've no sisters big enough."
"Will you swear to be my friend forever and ever?" demandedAnne eagerly.
Diana looked shocked.
"Why it's dreadfully wicked to swear," she said rebukingly.
"Oh no, not my kind of swearing. There are two kinds, you know."
"I never heard of but one kind," said Diana doubtfully.
"There really is another. Oh, it isn't wicked at all. Itjust means vowing and promising solemnly."
"Well, I don't mind doing that," agreed Diana, relieved."How do you do it?"
"We must join hands--so," said Anne gravely. "It oughtto be over running water. We'll just imagine this path isrunning water. I'll repeat the oath first. I solemnly swearto be faithful to my bosom friend, Diana Barry, as long as thesun and moon shall endure. Now you say it and put my name in."
Diana repeated the "oath" with a laugh fore and aft. Thenshe said:
"You're a queer girl, Anne. I heard before that you werequeer. But I believe I'm going to like you real well."
When Marilla and Anne went home Diana went with them asfor as the log bridge. The two little girls walked withtheir arms about each other. At the brook they parted withmany promises to spend the next afternoon together.
"Well, did you find Diana a kindred spirit?" asked Marillaas they went up through the garden of Green Gables.
"Oh yes," sighed Anne, blissfully unconscious of anysarcasm on Marilla's part. "Oh Marilla, I'm the happiestgirl on Prince Edward Island this very moment. I assureyou I'll say my prayers with a right good-will tonight.Diana and I are going to build a playhouse in Mr. WilliamBell's birch grove tomorrow. Can I have those brokenpieces of china that are out in the woodshed? Diana'sbirthday is in February and mine is in March. Don't youthink that is a very strange coincidence? Diana isgoing to lend me a book to read. She says it's perfectlysplendid and tremendously exciting. She's going to show mea place back in the woods where rice lilies grow. Don'tyou think Diana has got very soulful eyes? I wish I hadsoulful eyes. Diana is going to teach me to sing a songcalled `Nelly in the Hazel Dell.' She's going to give mea picture to put up in my room; it's a perfectly beautifulpicture, she says--a lovely lady in a pale blue silk dress.A sewing-machine agent gave it to her. I wish I had somethingto give Diana. I'm an inch taller than Diana, but she is everso much fatter; she says she'd like to be thin because it's somuch more graceful, but I'm afraid she only said it to soothe myfeelings. We're going to the shore some day to gather shells.We have agreed to call the spring down by the log bridge theDryad's Bubble. Isn't that a perfectly elegant name? I read astory once about a spring called that. A dryad is sort of agrown-up fairy, I think."
"Well, all I hope is you won't talk Diana to death," saidMarilla. "But remember this in all your planning, Anne.You're not going to play all the time nor most of it. You'llhave your work to do and it'll have to be done first."
Anne's cup of happiness was full, and Matthew caused itto overflow. He had just got home from a trip to the storeat Carmody, and he sheepishly produced a small parcelfrom his pocket and handed it to Anne, with a deprecatorylook at Marilla.
"I heard you say you liked chocolate sweeties, so I gotyou some," he said.
"Humph," sniffed Marilla. "It'll ruin her teeth and stomach.There, there, child, don't look so dismal. You can eatthose, since Matthew has gone and got them. He'd betterhave brought you peppermints. They're wholesomer. Don'tsicken yourself eating all them at once now."
"Oh, no, indeed, I won't," said Anne eagerly. "I'll justeat one tonight, Marilla. And I can give Diana half ofthem, can't I? The other half will taste twice as sweet tome if I give some to her. It's delightful to think I havesomething to give her."
"I will say it for the child," said Marilla when Anne hadgone to her gable, "she isn't stingy. I'm glad, for of allfaults I detest stinginess in a child. Dear me, it's onlythree weeks since she came, and it seems as if she'd beenhere always. I can't imagine the place without her. Now,don't be looking I told-you-so, Matthew. That's bad enoughin a woman, but it isn't to be endured in a man. I'mperfectly willing to own up that I'm glad I consented to keepthe child and that I'm getting fond of her, but don't yourub it in, Matthew Cuthbert."
Next chapter: Chapter XIII -- The Delights of Anticipation
