Anne's House of Dreams Part 9

"I ENVY Anne," said Leslie suddenly and fiercely, "and I'd envy her even if she had died! She was a mother for one beautiful day. I'd gladly give my life for THAT!"

"I wouldn't talk like that, Leslie, dearie," said Miss Cornelia deprecatingly. She was afraid that the dignified Miss Cuthbert would think Leslie quite terrible.

Anne's convalescence was long, and made bitter for her by many things. The bloom and sunshine of the Four Winds world grated harshly on her; and yet, when the rain fell heavily, she pictured it beating so mercilessly down on that little grave across the harbor; and when the wind blew around the eaves she heard sad voices in it she had never heard before.

Kindly callers hurt her, too, with the well-meant plat.i.tudes with which they strove to cover the nakedness of bereavement. A letter from Phil Blake was an added sting. Phil had heard of the baby's birth, but not of its death, and she wrote Anne a congratulatory letter of sweet mirth which hurt her horribly.

"I would have laughed over it so happily if I had my baby," she sobbed to Marilla. "But when I haven't it just seems like wanton cruelty--though I know Phil wouldn't hurt me for the world. Oh, Marilla, I don't see how I can EVER be happy again--EVERYTHING will hurt me all the rest of my life."

"Time will help you," said Marilla, who was racked with sympathy but could never learn to express it in other than age-worn formulas.

"It doesn't seem FAIR," said Anne rebelliously. "Babies are born and live where they are not wanted--where they will be neglected-- where they will have no chance. I would have loved my baby so--and cared for it so tenderly--and tried to give her every chance for good. And yet I wasn't allowed to keep her."

"It was G.o.d's will, Anne," said Marilla, helpless before the riddle of the universe--the WHY of undeserved pain. "And little Joy is better off."

"I can't believe THAT," cried Anne bitterly. Then, seeing that Marilla looked shocked, she added pa.s.sionately, "Why should she be born at all--why should any one be born at all--if she's better off dead? I DON'T believe it is better for a child to die at birth than to live its life out--and love and be loved--and enjoy and suffer--and do its work--and develop a character that would give it a personality in eternity. And how do you know it was G.o.d's will? Perhaps it was just a thwarting of His purpose by the Power of Evil. We can't be expected to be resigned to THAT."

"Oh, Anne, don't talk so," said Marilla, genuinely alarmed lest Anne were drifting into deep and dangerous waters. "We can't understand--but we must have faith--we MUST believe that all is for the best. I know you find it hard to think so, just now. But try to be brave--for Gilbert's sake. He's so worried about you. You aren't getting strong as fast as you should."

"Oh, I know I've been very selfish," sighed Anne. "I love Gilbert more than ever--and I want to live for his sake. But it seems as if part of me was buried over there in that little harbor graveyard-- and it hurts so much that I'm afraid of life."

"It won't hurt so much always, Anne."

"The thought that it may stop hurting sometimes hurts me worse than all else, Marilla."

"Yes, I know, I've felt that too, about other things. But we all love you, Anne. Captain Jim has been up every day to ask for you--and Mrs. Moore haunts the place--and Miss Bryant spends most of her time, I think, cooking up nice things for you. Susan doesn't like it very well. She thinks she can cook as well as Miss Bryant."

"Dear Susan! Oh, everybody has been so dear and good and lovely to me, Marilla. I'm not ungrateful--and perhaps--when this horrible ache grows a little less--I'll find that I can go on living."

CHAPTER 20.

LOST MARGARET.

Anne found that she could go on living; the day came when she even smiled again over one of Miss Cornelia's speeches. But there was something in the smile that had never been in Anne's smile before and would never be absent from it again.

On the first day she was able to go for a drive Gilbert took her down to Four Winds Point, and left her there while he rowed over the channel to see a patient at the fishing village. A rollicking wind was scudding across the harbor and the dunes, whipping the water into white-caps and washing the sandsh.o.r.e with long lines of silvery breakers.

"I'm real proud to see you here again, Mistress Blythe," said Captain Jim. "Sit down--sit down. I'm afeared it's mighty dusty here today--but there's no need of looking at dust when you can look at such scenery, is there?"

"I don't mind the dust," said Anne, "but Gilbert says I must keep in the open air. I think I'll go and sit on the rocks down there."

"Would you like company or would you rather be alone?"

"If by company you mean yours I'd much rather have it than be alone," said Anne, smiling. Then she sighed. She had never before minded being alone. Now she dreaded it. When she was alone now she felt so dreadfully alone.

"Here's a nice little spot where the wind can't get at you," said Captain Jim, when they reached the rocks. "I often sit here. It's a great place jest to sit and dream."

"Oh--dreams," sighed Anne. "I can't dream now, Captain Jim--I'm done with dreams."

"Oh, no, you're not, Mistress Blythe--oh, no, you're not," said Captain Jim meditatively. "I know how you feel jest now--but if you keep on living you'll get glad again, and the first thing you know you'll be dreaming again--thank the good Lord for it! If it wasn't for our dreams they might as well bury us. How'd we stand living if it wasn't for our dream of immortality? And that's a dream that's BOUND to come true, Mistress Blythe. You'll see your little Joyce again some day."

"But she won't be my baby," said Anne, with trembling lips. "Oh, she may be, as Longfellow says, `a fair maiden clothed with celestial grace'--but she'll be a stranger to me."

"G.o.d will manage better'n THAT, I believe," said Captain Jim.

They were both silent for a little time. Then Captain Jim said very softly: "Mistress Blythe, may I tell you about lost Margaret?"

"Of course," said Anne gently. She did not know who "lost Margaret" was, but she felt that she was going to hear the romance of Captain Jim's life.

"I've often wanted to tell you about her," Captain Jim went on.

"Do you know why, Mistress Blythe? It's because I want somebody to remember and think of her sometime after I'm gone. I can't bear that her name should be forgotten by all living souls. And now n.o.body remembers lost Margaret but me."

Then Captain Jim told the story--an old, old forgotten story, for it was over fifty years since Margaret had fallen asleep one day in her father's dory and drifted--or so it was supposed, for nothing was ever certainly known as to her fate--out of the channel, beyond the bar, to perish in the black thundersquall which had come up so suddenly that long-ago summer afternoon. But to Captain Jim those fifty years were but as yesterday when it is past.

"I walked the sh.o.r.e for months after that," he said sadly, "looking to find her dear, sweet little body; but the sea never give her back to me. But I'll find her sometime, Mistress Blythe--I'll find her sometime . She's waiting for me. I wish I could tell you jest how she looked, but I can't. I've seen a fine, silvery mist hanging over the bar at sunrise that seemed like her--and then again I've seen a white birch in the woods back yander that made me think of her. She had pale, brown hair and a little white, sweet face, and long slender fingers like yours, Mistress Blythe, only browner, for she was a sh.o.r.e girl. Sometimes I wake up in the night and hear the sea calling to me in the old way, and it seems as if lost Margaret called in it. And when there's a storm and the waves are sobbing and moaning I hear her lamenting among them. And when they laugh on a gay day it's HER laugh--lost Margaret's sweet, roguish, little laugh. The sea took her from me, but some day I'll find her. Mistress Blythe. It can't keep us apart forever."

"I am glad you have told me about her," said Anne. "I have often wondered why you had lived all your life alone."

"I couldn't ever care for anyone else. Lost Margaret took my heart with her--out there," said the old lover, who had been faithful for fifty years to his drowned sweetheart. "You won't mind if I talk a good deal about her, will you, Mistress Blythe? It's a pleasure to me--for all the pain went out of her memory years ago and jest left its blessing. I know you'll never forget her, Mistress Blythe. And if the years, as I hope, bring other little folks to your home, I want you to promise me that you'll tell THEM the story of lost Margaret, so that her name won't be forgotten among humankind."

CHAPTER 21.

BARRIERS SWEPT AWAY.

"Anne," said Leslie, breaking abruptly a short silence, "you don't know how GOOD it is to be sitting here with you again--working-- and talking--and being silent together."

They were sitting among the blue-eyed gra.s.ses on the bank of the brook in Anne's garden. The water sparkled and crooned past them; the birches threw dappled shadows over them; roses bloomed along the walks. The sun was beginning to be low, and the air was full of woven music. There was one music of the wind in the firs behind the house, and another of the waves on the bar, and still another from the distant bell of the church near which the wee, white lady slept. Anne loved that bell, though it brought sorrowful thoughts now.

She looked curiously at Leslie, who had thrown down her sewing and spoken with a lack of restraint that was very unusual with her.

"On that horrible night when you were so ill," Leslie went on, "I kept thinking that perhaps we'd have no more talks and walks and WORKS together. And I realised just what your friendship had come to mean to me--just what YOU meant--and just what a hateful little beast I had been."

"Leslie! Leslie! I never allow anyone to call my friends names."

"It's true. That's exactly what I am--a hateful little beast. There's something I've GOT to tell you, Anne. I suppose it will make you despise me, but I MUST confess it. Anne, there have been times this past winter and spring when I have HATED you."

"I KNEW it," said Anne calmly.

"You KNEW it?"

"Yes, I saw it in your eyes."

" And yet you went on liking me and being my friend."

"Well, it was only now and then you hated me, Leslie. Between times you loved me, I think."

"I certainly did. But that other horrid feeling was always there, spoiling it, back in my heart. I kept it down--sometimes I forgot it-- but sometimes it would surge up and take possession of me. I hated you because I ENVIED you--oh, I was sick with envy of you at times. You had a dear little home--and love--and happiness--and glad dreams--everything I wanted--and never had--and never could have. Oh, never could have! THAT was what stung. I wouldn't have envied you, if I had had any HOPE that life would ever be different for me. But I hadn't--I hadn't--and it didn't seem FAIR. It made me rebellious--and it hurt me--and so I hated you at times. Oh, I was so ashamed of it--I'm dying of shame now--but I couldn't conquer it.

That night, when I was afraid you mightn't live--I thought I was going to be punished for my wickedness--and I loved you so then. Anne, Anne, I never had anything to love since my mother died, except d.i.c.k's old dog--and it's so dreadful to have nothing to love--life is so EMPTY--and there's NOTHING worse than emptiness-- and I might have loved you so much--and that horrible thing had spoiled it--"

Leslie was trembling and growing almost incoherent with the violence of her emotion.

"Don't, Leslie," implored Anne, "oh, don't. I understand-- don't talk of it any more."

"I must--I must. When I knew you were going to live I vowed that I would tell you as soon as you were well--that I wouldn't go on accepting your friendship and companionship without telling you how unworthy I was of it. And I've been so afraid--it would turn you against me."

"You needn't fear that, Leslie."

"Oh, I'm so glad--so glad, Anne." Leslie clasped her brown, work-hardened hands tightly together to still their shaking. "But I want to tell you everything, now I've begun. You don't remember the first time I saw you, I suppose--it wasn't that night on the sh.o.r.e--"

"No, it was the night Gilbert and I came home. You were driving your geese down the hill. I should think I DO remember it! I thought you were so beautiful--I longed for weeks after to find out who you were."

"I knew who YOU were, although I had never seen either of you before. I had heard of the new doctor and his bride who were coming to live in Miss Russell's little house. I--I hated you that very moment, Anne."

"I felt the resentment in your eyes--then I doubted--I thought I must be mistaken--because WHY should it be?"

"It was because you looked so happy. Oh, you'll agree with me now that I AM a hateful beast--to hate another woman just because she was happy,--and when her happiness didn't take anything from me! That was why I never went to see you. I knew quite well I ought to go--even our simple Four Winds customs demanded that. But I couldn't. I used to watch you from my window--I could see you and your husband strolling about your garden in the evening--or you running down the poplar lane to meet him. And it hurt me. And yet in another way I wanted to go over. I felt that, if I were not so miserable, I could have liked you and found in you what I've never had in my life--an intimate, REAL friend of my own age. And then you remember that night at the sh.o.r.e? You were afraid I would think you crazy. You must have thought I was."

"No, but I couldn't understand you, Leslie. One moment you drew me to you--the next you pushed me back."

"I was very unhappy that evening. I had had a hard day. d.i.c.k had been very--very hard to manage that day. Generally he is quite good-natured and easily controlled, you know, Anne. But some days he is very different. I was so heartsick--I ran away to the sh.o.r.e as soon as he went to sleep. It was my only refuge. I sat there thinking of how my poor father had ended his life, and wondering if I wouldn't be driven to it some day. Oh, my heart was full of black thoughts! And then you came dancing along the cove like a glad, light-hearted child. I--I hated you more then than I've ever done since. And yet I craved your friendship. The one feeling swayed me one moment; the other feeling the next. When I got home that night I cried for shame of what you must think of me. But it's always been just the same when I came over here. Sometimes I'd be happy and enjoy my visit. And at other times that hideous feeling would mar it all. There were times when everything about you and your house hurt me. You had so many dear little things I couldn't have. Do you know--it's ridiculous-- but I had an especial spite at those china dogs of yours. There were times when I wanted to catch up Gog and Magog and bang their pert black noses together! Oh, you smile, Anne--but it was never funny to me. I would come here and see you and Gilbert with your books and your flowers, and your household goods, and your little family jokes--and your love for each other showing in every look and word, even when you didn't know it--and I would go home to--you know what I went home to! Oh, Anne, I don't believe I'm jealous and envious by nature. When I was a girl I lacked many things my schoolmates had, but I never cared--I never disliked them for it. But I seem to have grown so hateful--"

"Leslie, dearest, stop blaming yourself. You are NOT hateful or jealous or envious. The life you have to live has warped you a little, perhaps-but it would have ruined a nature less fine and n.o.ble than yours. I'm letting you tell me all this because I believe it's better for you to talk it out and rid your soul of it. But don't blame yourself any more."

"Well, I won't. I just wanted you to know me as I am. That time you told me of your darling hope for the spring was the worst of all, Anne. I shall never forgive myself for the way I behaved then. I repented it with tears. And I DID put many a tender and loving thought of you into the little dress I made. But I might have known that anything I made could only be a shroud in the end."

"Now, Leslie, that IS bitter and morbid--put such thoughts away.

I was so glad when you brought the little dress; and since I had to lose little Joyce I like to think that the dress she wore was the one you made for her when you let yourself love me."

"Anne, do you know, I believe I shall always love you after this. I don't think I'll ever feel that dreadful way about you again. Talking it all out seems to have done away with it, somehow. It's very strange --and I thought it so real and bitter. It's like opening the door of a dark room to show some hideous creature you've believed to be there--and when the light streams in your monster turns out to have been just a shadow, vanishing when the light comes. It will never come between us again."

"No, we are real friends now, Leslie, and I am very glad."

"I hope you won't misunderstand me if I say something else. Anne, I was grieved to the core of my heart when you lost your baby; and if I could have saved her for you by cutting off one of my hands I would have done it. But your sorrow has brought us closer together. Your perfect happiness isn't a barrier any longer. Oh, don't misunderstand, dearest--I'm NOT glad that your happiness isn't perfect any longer--I can say that sincerely; but since it isn't, there isn't such a gulf between us."

"I DO understand that, too, Leslie. Now, we'll just shut up the past and forget what was unpleasant in it. It's all going to be different. We're both of the race of Joseph now. I think you've been wonderful --wonderful. And, Leslie, I can't help believing that life has something good and beautiful for you yet."

Leslie shook her head.

"No," she said dully. "There isn't any hope. d.i.c.k will never be better--and even if his memory were to come back--oh, Anne, it would be worse, even worse, than it is now. This is something you can't understand, you happy bride. Anne, did Miss Cornelia ever tell you how I came to marry d.i.c.k?"

"Yes."

"I'm glad--I wanted you to know--but I couldn't bring myself to talk of it if you hadn't known. Anne, it seems to me that ever since I was twelve years old life has been bitter. Before that I had a happy childhood. We were very poor--but we didn't mind. Father was so splendid--so clever and loving and sympathetic. We were chums as far back as I can remember. And mother was so sweet. She was very, very beautiful. I look like her, but I am not so beautiful as she was."

"Miss Cornelia says you are far more beautiful."

"She is mistaken--or prejudiced. I think my figure IS better-- mother was slight and bent by hard work--but she had the face of an angel. I used just to look up at her in worship. We all worshipped her,--father and Kenneth and I."

Anne remembered that Miss Cornelia had given her a very different impression of Leslie's mother. But had not love the truer vision? Still, it WAS selfish of Rose West to make her daughter marry d.i.c.k Moore.

"Kenneth was my brother," went on Leslie. "Oh, I can't tell you how I loved him. And he was cruelly killed. Do you know how?"

"Yes."

"Anne, I saw his little face as the wheel went over him. He fell on his back. Anne--Anne--I can see it now. I shall always see it. Anne, all I ask of heaven is that that recollection shall be blotted out of my memory. O my G.o.d!"

"Leslie, don't speak of it. I know the story--don't go into details that only harrow your soul up unavailingly. It WILL be blotted out."

After a moment's struggle, Leslie regained a measure of self- control.

"Then father's health got worse and he grew despondent--his mind became unbalanced--you've heard all that, too?"

"Yes."

"After that I had just mother to live for. But I was very ambitious. I meant to teach and earn my way through college. I meant to climb to the very top--oh, I won't talk of that either. It's no use. You know what happened. I couldn't see my dear little heart-broken mother, who had been such a slave all her life, turned out of her home. Of course, I could have earned enough for us to live on. But mother COULDN'T leave her home. She had come there as a bride--and she had loved father so--and all her memories were there. Even yet, Anne, when I think that I made her last year happy I'm not sorry for what I did. As for d.i.c.k--I didn't hate him when I married him--I just felt for him the indifferent, friendly feeling I had for most of my schoolmates. I knew he drank some--but I had never heard the story of the girl down at the fishing cove. If I had, I COULDN'T have married him, even for mother's sake. Afterwards--I DID hate him--but mother never knew. She died--and then I was alone. I was only seventeen and I was alone. d.i.c.k had gone off in the Four Sisters. I hoped he wouldn't be home very much more. The sea had always been in his blood. I had no other hope. Well, Captain Jim brought him home, as you know--and that's all there is to say. You know me now, Anne--the worst of me--the barriers are all down. And you still want to be my friend?"

Anne looked up through the birches, at the white paper-lantern of a half moon drifting downwards to the gulf of sunset. Her face was very sweet.

"I am your friend and you are mine, for always," she said. "Such a friend as I never had before. I have had many dear and beloved friends--but there is a something in you, Leslie, that I never found in anyone else. You have more to offer me in that rich nature of yours, and I have more to give you than I had in my careless girlhood. We are both women--and friends forever."

They clasped hands and smiled at each other through the tears that filled the gray eyes and the blue.

CHAPTER 22.