章节正文
uncomfortably driven into a corner for his precise meaning.
"I suppose--we could hardly be expected to keep her."
"I should say not. What good would she be to us?"
"We might be some good to her," said Matthew suddenly and
unexpectedly.
"Matthew Cuthbert, I believe that child has bewitched you!
I can see as plain as plain that you want to keep her."
"Well now, she's a real interesting little thing," persisted
Matthew. "You should have heard her talk coming from the
station."
"Oh, she can talk fast enough. I saw that at once. It's
nothing in her favour, either. I don't like children who
have so much to say. I don't want an orphan girl and if I
did she isn't the style I'd pick out. There's something I
don't understand about her. No, she's got to be despatched
straight-way back to where she came from."
"I could hire a French boy to help me," said Matthew, "and
she'd be company for you."
"I'm not suffering for company," said Marilla shortly. "And
I'm not going to keep her."
"Well now, it's just as you say, of course, Marilla," said
Matthew rising and putting his pipe away. "I'm going to bed."
To bed went Matthew. And to bed, when she had put her
dishes away, went Marilla, frowning most resolutely. And
up-stairs, in the east gable, a lonely, heart-hungry,
friendless child cried herself to sleep.
CHAPTER IV
Morning at Green Gables
It was broad daylight when Anne awoke and sat up in bed,
staring confusedly at the window through which a flood of
cheery sunshine was pouring and outside of which something
white and feathery waved across glimpses of blue sky.
For a moment she could not remember where she was. First
came a delightfulthrill, as something very pleasant; then a
horrible remembrance. This was Green Gables and they didn't
want her because she wasn't a boy!
But it was morning and, yes, it was a cherry-tree in full
bloom outside of her window. With a bound she was out of
bed and across the floor. She pushed up the sash--it went
up stiffly and creakily, as if it hadn't been opened for a
long time, which was the case; and it stuck so tight that
nothing was needed to hold it up.
Anne dropped on her knees and gazed out into the June
morning, her eyes glistening with delight. Oh, wasn't it
beautiful? Wasn't it a lovely place? Suppose she wasn't
really going to stay here! She would imagine she was.
There was scope for imagination here.
A huge cherry-tree grew outside, so close that its boughs
tapped against the house, and it was so thick-set with
blossoms that hardly a leaf was to be seen. On both sides
of the house was a big orchard, one of apple-trees and one
of cherry-trees, also showered over with blossoms; and their
grass was all sprinkled with dandelions. In the garden below
were lilac-trees purple with flowers, and their dizzily
sweet fragrance drifted up to the window on the morning
wind.
Below the garden a green field lush with clover sloped down
to the hollow where the brook ran and where scores of white
birches grew, upspringing airily out of an undergrowth
suggestive of delightful possibilities in ferns and mosses
and woodsy things generally. Beyond it was a hill, green
and feathery with spruce and fir; there was a gap in it
where the gray gable end of the little house she had seen
from the other side of the Lake of Shining Waters was visible.
Off to the left were the big barns and beyond them, away
down over green, low-sloping fields, was a sparkling blue
glimpse of sea.
Anne's beauty-loving eyes lingered on it all, taking everything
greedily in. She had looked on so many unlovely places in her life,
poor child; but this was as lovely as anything she had ever dreamed.
She knelt there, lost to everything but the loveliness
around her, until she was startled by a hand on her
shoulder. Marilla had come in unheard by the small dreamer.
"It's time you were dressed," she said curtly.
Marilla really did not know how to talk to the child, and
her uncomfortableignorance made her crisp and curt when she
did not mean to be.
Anne stood up and drew a long breath.
"Oh, isn't it wonderful?" she said, waving her hand
comprehensively at the good world outside.
"It's a big tree," said Marilla, "and it blooms great, but
the fruit don't amount to much never--small and wormy."
"Oh, I don't mean just the tree; of course it's lovely--yes,
it's RADIANTLY lovely--it blooms as if it meant it--but I
meant everything, the garden and the orchard and the brook
and the woods, the whole big dear world. Don't you feel as
if you just loved the world on a morning like this? And I
can hear the brook laughing all the way up here. Have you
ever noticed what cheerful things brooks are? They're
always laughing. Even in winter-time I've heard them under
the ice. I'm so glad there's a brook near Green Gables.
Perhaps you think it doesn't make any difference to me when
you're not going to keep me, but it does. I shall always
like to remember that there is a brook at Green Gables even
if I never see it again. If there wasn't a brook I'd be
HAUNTED by the uncomfortable feeling that there ought to be
one. I'm not in the depths of despair this morning. I
never can be in the morning. Isn't it a splendid thing that
there are mornings? But I feel very sad. I've just been
imagining that it was really me you wanted after all and
that I was to stay here for ever and ever. It was a great
comfort while it lasted. But the worst of imagining things
is that the time comes when you have to stop and that hurts."
"You'd better get dressed and come down-stairs and never
mind your imaginings," said Marilla as soon as she could get
a word in edgewise. "Breakfast is waiting. Wash your face
and comb your hair. Leave the window up and turn your bedclothes
back over the foot of the bed. Be as smart as you can."
Anne could evidently be smart so some purpose for she was
down-stairs in ten minutes' time, with her clothes neatly
on, her hair brushed and braided, her face washed, and a
comfortable consciousness pervading her soul that she had
fulfilled all Marilla's requirements. As a matter of fact,
however, she had forgotten to turn back the bedclothes.
"I'm pretty hungry this morning," she announced as she
slipped into the chair Marilla placed for her. "The world
doesn't seem such a howling wilderness as it did last night.
I'm so glad it's a sunshiny morning. But I like rainy
mornings real well, too. All sorts of mornings are
interesting, don't you think? You don't know what's going
to happen through the day, and there's so much scope for
imagination. But I'm glad it's not rainy today because
it's easier to be cheerful and bear up under affliction on a
sunshiny day. I feel that I have a good deal to bear up
under. It's all very well to read about sorrows and imagine
yourself living through them heroically, but it's not so
nice when you really come to have them, is it?"
"For pity's sake hold your tongue," said Marilla. "You talk
entirely too much for a little girl."
Thereupon Anne held her tongue so obediently and thoroughly
that her continued silence made Marilla rather nervous, as
if in the presence of something not exactly natural.
Matthew also held his tongue,--but this was natural,--so
that the meal was a very silent one.
As it progressed Anne became more and more abstracted,
eating mechanically, with her big eyes fixed unswervingly
and unseeingly on the sky outside the window. This made
Marilla more nervous than ever; she had an uncomfortable
feeling that while this odd child's body might be there at
the table her spirit was far away in some remote airy
cloudland, borne aloft on the wings of imagination. Who
would want such a child about the place?
Yet Matthew wished to keep her, of all unaccountable things!
Marilla felt that he wanted it just as much this morning as
he had the night before, and that he would go on wanting it.
That was Matthew's way--take a whim into his head and cling
to it with the most amazing silent persistency--a
persistency ten times more potent and effectual in its very
silence than if he had talked it out.
When the meal was ended Anne came out of her reverie and
offered to wash the dishes.
"Can you wash dishes right?" asked Marilla distrustfully.
"Pretty well. I'm better at looking after children, though.
I've had so much experience at that. It's such a pity you
haven't any here for me to look after."
"I don't feel as if I wanted any more children to look after
than I've got at present. YOU'RE problem enough in all
conscience. What's to be done with you I don't know.
Matthew is a most ridiculous man."
"I think he's lovely," said Anne reproachfully. "He is so
very sympathetic. He didn't mind how much I talked--he
seemed to like it. I felt that he was a kindred spirit as
soon as ever I saw him."
"You're both queer enough, if that's what you mean by
kindred spirits," said Marilla with a sniff. "Yes, you may
wash the dishes. Take plenty of hot water, and be sure you
dry them well. I've got enough to attend to this morning
for I'll have to drive over to White Sands in the afternoon
and see Mrs. Spencer. You'll come with me and we'll settle
what's to be done with you. After you've finished the
dishes go up-stairs and make your bed."
Anne washed the dishes deftly enough, as Marilla who kept a
sharp eye on the process, discerned. Later on she made her
bed less successfully, for she had never learned the art of
wrestling with a feather tick. But is was done somehow and
smoothed down; and then Marilla, to get rid of her, told her
she might go out-of-doors and amuse herself until dinner time.
Anne flew to the door, face alight, eyes glowing. On the
very threshold she stopped short, wheeled about, came back
and sat down by the table, light and glow as effectually
blotted out as if some one had clapped an extinguisher on her.
"What's the matter now?" demanded Marilla.
"I don't dare go out," said Anne, in the tone of a martyr
relinquishing all earthly joys. "If I can't stay here there
is no use in my loving Green Gables. And if I go out there
and get acquainted with all those trees and flowers and the
orchard and the brook I'll not be able to help loving it.
It's hard enough now, so I won't make it any harder. I want
to go out so much--everything seems to be calling to me,
`Anne, Anne, come out to us. Anne, Anne, we want a
playmate'--but it's better not. There is no use in loving
things if you have to be torn from them, is there? And it's
so hard to keep from loving things, isn't it? That was why
I was so glad when I thought I was going to live here. I
thought I'd have so many things to love and nothing to
hinder me. But that brief dream is over. I am resigned to
my fate now, so I don't think I'll go out for fear I'll get
unresigned again. What is the name of that geranium on the
window-sill, please?"
"That's the apple-scented geranium."
"Oh, I don't mean that sort of a name. I mean just a name
"I suppose--we could hardly be expected to keep her."
"I should say not. What good would she be to us?"
"We might be some good to her," said Matthew suddenly and
unexpectedly.
"Matthew Cuthbert, I believe that child has bewitched you!
I can see as plain as plain that you want to keep her."
"Well now, she's a real interesting little thing," persisted
Matthew. "You should have heard her talk coming from the
station."
"Oh, she can talk fast enough. I saw that at once. It's
nothing in her favour, either. I don't like children who
have so much to say. I don't want an orphan girl and if I
did she isn't the style I'd pick out. There's something I
don't understand about her. No, she's got to be despatched
straight-way back to where she came from."
"I could hire a French boy to help me," said Matthew, "and
she'd be company for you."
"I'm not suffering for company," said Marilla shortly. "And
I'm not going to keep her."
"Well now, it's just as you say, of course, Marilla," said
Matthew rising and putting his pipe away. "I'm going to bed."
To bed went Matthew. And to bed, when she had put her
dishes away, went Marilla, frowning most resolutely. And
up-stairs, in the east gable, a lonely, heart-hungry,
friendless child cried herself to sleep.
CHAPTER IV
Morning at Green Gables
It was broad daylight when Anne awoke and sat up in bed,
staring confusedly at the window through which a flood of
cheery sunshine was pouring and outside of which something
white and feathery waved across glimpses of blue sky.
For a moment she could not remember where she was. First
came a delightfulthrill, as something very pleasant; then a
horrible remembrance. This was Green Gables and they didn't
want her because she wasn't a boy!
But it was morning and, yes, it was a cherry-tree in full
bloom outside of her window. With a bound she was out of
bed and across the floor. She pushed up the sash--it went
up stiffly and creakily, as if it hadn't been opened for a
long time, which was the case; and it stuck so tight that
nothing was needed to hold it up.
Anne dropped on her knees and gazed out into the June
morning, her eyes glistening with delight. Oh, wasn't it
beautiful? Wasn't it a lovely place? Suppose she wasn't
really going to stay here! She would imagine she was.
There was scope for imagination here.
A huge cherry-tree grew outside, so close that its boughs
tapped against the house, and it was so thick-set with
blossoms that hardly a leaf was to be seen. On both sides
of the house was a big orchard, one of apple-trees and one
of cherry-trees, also showered over with blossoms; and their
grass was all sprinkled with dandelions. In the garden below
were lilac-trees purple with flowers, and their dizzily
sweet fragrance drifted up to the window on the morning
wind.
Below the garden a green field lush with clover sloped down
to the hollow where the brook ran and where scores of white
birches grew, upspringing airily out of an undergrowth
suggestive of delightful possibilities in ferns and mosses
and woodsy things generally. Beyond it was a hill, green
and feathery with spruce and fir; there was a gap in it
where the gray gable end of the little house she had seen
from the other side of the Lake of Shining Waters was visible.
Off to the left were the big barns and beyond them, away
down over green, low-sloping fields, was a sparkling blue
glimpse of sea.
Anne's beauty-loving eyes lingered on it all, taking everything
greedily in. She had looked on so many unlovely places in her life,
poor child; but this was as lovely as anything she had ever dreamed.
She knelt there, lost to everything but the loveliness
around her, until she was startled by a hand on her
shoulder. Marilla had come in unheard by the small dreamer.
"It's time you were dressed," she said curtly.
Marilla really did not know how to talk to the child, and
her uncomfortableignorance made her crisp and curt when she
did not mean to be.
Anne stood up and drew a long breath.
"Oh, isn't it wonderful?" she said, waving her hand
comprehensively at the good world outside.
"It's a big tree," said Marilla, "and it blooms great, but
the fruit don't amount to much never--small and wormy."
"Oh, I don't mean just the tree; of course it's lovely--yes,
it's RADIANTLY lovely--it blooms as if it meant it--but I
meant everything, the garden and the orchard and the brook
and the woods, the whole big dear world. Don't you feel as
if you just loved the world on a morning like this? And I
can hear the brook laughing all the way up here. Have you
ever noticed what cheerful things brooks are? They're
always laughing. Even in winter-time I've heard them under
the ice. I'm so glad there's a brook near Green Gables.
Perhaps you think it doesn't make any difference to me when
you're not going to keep me, but it does. I shall always
like to remember that there is a brook at Green Gables even
if I never see it again. If there wasn't a brook I'd be
HAUNTED by the uncomfortable feeling that there ought to be
one. I'm not in the depths of despair this morning. I
never can be in the morning. Isn't it a splendid thing that
there are mornings? But I feel very sad. I've just been
imagining that it was really me you wanted after all and
that I was to stay here for ever and ever. It was a great
comfort while it lasted. But the worst of imagining things
is that the time comes when you have to stop and that hurts."
"You'd better get dressed and come down-stairs and never
mind your imaginings," said Marilla as soon as she could get
a word in edgewise. "Breakfast is waiting. Wash your face
and comb your hair. Leave the window up and turn your bedclothes
back over the foot of the bed. Be as smart as you can."
Anne could evidently be smart so some purpose for she was
down-stairs in ten minutes' time, with her clothes neatly
on, her hair brushed and braided, her face washed, and a
comfortable consciousness pervading her soul that she had
fulfilled all Marilla's requirements. As a matter of fact,
however, she had forgotten to turn back the bedclothes.
"I'm pretty hungry this morning," she announced as she
slipped into the chair Marilla placed for her. "The world
doesn't seem such a howling wilderness as it did last night.
I'm so glad it's a sunshiny morning. But I like rainy
mornings real well, too. All sorts of mornings are
interesting, don't you think? You don't know what's going
to happen through the day, and there's so much scope for
imagination. But I'm glad it's not rainy today because
it's easier to be cheerful and bear up under affliction on a
sunshiny day. I feel that I have a good deal to bear up
under. It's all very well to read about sorrows and imagine
yourself living through them heroically, but it's not so
nice when you really come to have them, is it?"
"For pity's sake hold your tongue," said Marilla. "You talk
entirely too much for a little girl."
Thereupon Anne held her tongue so obediently and thoroughly
that her continued silence made Marilla rather nervous, as
if in the presence of something not exactly natural.
Matthew also held his tongue,--but this was natural,--so
that the meal was a very silent one.
As it progressed Anne became more and more abstracted,
eating mechanically, with her big eyes fixed unswervingly
and unseeingly on the sky outside the window. This made
Marilla more nervous than ever; she had an uncomfortable
feeling that while this odd child's body might be there at
the table her spirit was far away in some remote airy
cloudland, borne aloft on the wings of imagination. Who
would want such a child about the place?
Yet Matthew wished to keep her, of all unaccountable things!
Marilla felt that he wanted it just as much this morning as
he had the night before, and that he would go on wanting it.
That was Matthew's way--take a whim into his head and cling
to it with the most amazing silent persistency--a
persistency ten times more potent and effectual in its very
silence than if he had talked it out.
When the meal was ended Anne came out of her reverie and
offered to wash the dishes.
"Can you wash dishes right?" asked Marilla distrustfully.
"Pretty well. I'm better at looking after children, though.
I've had so much experience at that. It's such a pity you
haven't any here for me to look after."
"I don't feel as if I wanted any more children to look after
than I've got at present. YOU'RE problem enough in all
conscience. What's to be done with you I don't know.
Matthew is a most ridiculous man."
"I think he's lovely," said Anne reproachfully. "He is so
very sympathetic. He didn't mind how much I talked--he
seemed to like it. I felt that he was a kindred spirit as
soon as ever I saw him."
"You're both queer enough, if that's what you mean by
kindred spirits," said Marilla with a sniff. "Yes, you may
wash the dishes. Take plenty of hot water, and be sure you
dry them well. I've got enough to attend to this morning
for I'll have to drive over to White Sands in the afternoon
and see Mrs. Spencer. You'll come with me and we'll settle
what's to be done with you. After you've finished the
dishes go up-stairs and make your bed."
Anne washed the dishes deftly enough, as Marilla who kept a
sharp eye on the process, discerned. Later on she made her
bed less successfully, for she had never learned the art of
wrestling with a feather tick. But is was done somehow and
smoothed down; and then Marilla, to get rid of her, told her
she might go out-of-doors and amuse herself until dinner time.
Anne flew to the door, face alight, eyes glowing. On the
very threshold she stopped short, wheeled about, came back
and sat down by the table, light and glow as effectually
blotted out as if some one had clapped an extinguisher on her.
"What's the matter now?" demanded Marilla.
"I don't dare go out," said Anne, in the tone of a martyr
relinquishing all earthly joys. "If I can't stay here there
is no use in my loving Green Gables. And if I go out there
and get acquainted with all those trees and flowers and the
orchard and the brook I'll not be able to help loving it.
It's hard enough now, so I won't make it any harder. I want
to go out so much--everything seems to be calling to me,
`Anne, Anne, come out to us. Anne, Anne, we want a
playmate'--but it's better not. There is no use in loving
things if you have to be torn from them, is there? And it's
so hard to keep from loving things, isn't it? That was why
I was so glad when I thought I was going to live here. I
thought I'd have so many things to love and nothing to
hinder me. But that brief dream is over. I am resigned to
my fate now, so I don't think I'll go out for fear I'll get
unresigned again. What is the name of that geranium on the
window-sill, please?"
"That's the apple-scented geranium."
"Oh, I don't mean that sort of a name. I mean just a name
- driven [´driv(ə)n]
drive 的过去分词 (初中英语单词) - suffering [´sʌfəriŋ] n.痛苦；灾害 (初中英语单词)
- shortly [´ʃɔ:tli] ad.立刻，马上；不久 (初中英语单词)
- lonely [´ləunli] a.孤独的；无人烟的 (初中英语单词)
- daylight [´deilait] n.日光；黎明 (初中英语单词)
- sunshine [´sʌnʃain] n.日光，阳光 (初中英语单词)
- delightful [di´laitful] a.讨人喜欢的 (初中英语单词)
- thrill [θril] v.震惊；激动；刺激 (初中英语单词)
- imagination [i,mædʒi´neiʃən] n.想象(力) (初中英语单词)
- orchard [´ɔ:tʃəd] n.果园 (初中英语单词)
- purple [´pə:pl] n.紫色 a.紫(红)的 (初中英语单词)
- ignorance [´ignərəns] n.无知，愚昧 (初中英语单词)
- amount [ə´maunt] n.总数；数量 v.合计 (初中英语单词)
- cheerful [´tʃiəful] a.快乐的；高兴的 (初中英语单词)
- despair [di´speə] vi.&n.绝望 (初中英语单词)
- waiting [´weitiŋ] n.等候；伺候 (初中英语单词)
- evidently [´evidəntli] ad.明显地 (初中英语单词)
- wilderness [´wildənis] n.荒地，荒野 (初中英语单词)
- nervous [´nə:vəs] a.神经的；神经过敏的 (初中英语单词)
- remote [ri´məut] a.遥远的；偏僻的 (初中英语单词)
- amazing [ə´meiziŋ] a.惊人的；惊奇的 (初中英语单词)
- sympathetic [,simpə´θetik] a.同情的，有同情心的 (初中英语单词)
- feather [´feðə] n.羽毛 (初中英语单词)
- alight [ə´lait] a.燃着的 vi.下；降落 (初中英语单词)
- orphan [´ɔ:fən] n.&a.孤儿 vt.使成孤儿 (高中英语单词)
- remembrance [ri´membrəns] n.记忆(力)；回忆 (高中英语单词)
- stiffly [´stifli] ad.硬；顽固地 (高中英语单词)
- fragrance [´freigrəns] n.芬芳，芳香 (高中英语单词)
- clover [´kləuvə] n.三叶草 (高中英语单词)
- spruce [spru:s] n.云杉木 a.&v.整洁 (高中英语单词)
- uncomfortable [ʌn´kʌmftəbəl] a.不舒服的，不自在的 (高中英语单词)
- consciousness [´kɔnʃəsnis] n.意识；觉悟；知觉 (高中英语单词)
- ridiculous [ri´dikjuləs] a.荒谬的；可笑的 (高中英语单词)
- kindred [´kindrid] n.亲属关系；同源关系 (高中英语单词)
- successfully [sək´sesfəli] ad.成功地 (高中英语单词)
- learned [´lə:nid] a.有学问的，博学的 (高中英语单词)
- threshold [´θreʃhəuld] n.门槛；入门；开端 (高中英语单词)
- earthly [´ə:θli] a.地球的；世俗的 (高中英语单词)
- loving [´lʌviŋ] a.爱的，有爱情的 (高中英语单词)
- precise [pri´sais] a.精确的；清楚的 (英语四级单词)
- potent [´pəutənt] a.有(势)力的；烈性的 (英语四级单词)
- resolutely [´rezəlju:tli] ad.坚决地；果断地 (英语六级单词)
- taking [´teikiŋ] a.迷人的 n.捕获物 (英语六级单词)
- affliction [ə´flikʃən] n.痛苦，苦恼；折磨 (英语六级单词)
- mechanically [mi´kænikəli] ad.机械地；无意识地 (英语六级单词)
- wanting [´wɔntiŋ, wɑ:n-] a.短缺的；不足的 (英语六级单词)
- spencer [´spensə] n.(羊毛)短上衣 (英语六级单词)
- deftly [´deftli] ad.灵巧地，敏捷地 (英语六级单词)
- calling [´kɔ:liŋ] n.点名；职业；欲望 (英语六级单词)
- geranium [dʒə´reiniəm] n.天竺葵 (英语六级单词)
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章节正文
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