|
"I'll
settle Miss Anne when she comes home," said Marilla grimly, as she
shaved up kindlings with a carving knife and with more vim than was strictly
necessary. Matthew had come in and was waiting patiently for his tea in
his corner. "She's gadding
off somewhere with Diana, writing stories or practicing dialogues or some
such tomfoolery, and never thinking once about the time or her duties. She's
just got to be pulled up short and sudden on this sort of thing. I don't
care if Mrs. Allan does say she's the brightest and sweetest child she ever
knew. She may be bright and
sweet enough, but her head is full of nonsense and there's never any knowing
what shape it'll break out in next. Just
as soon as she grows out of one freak she takes up with another.
But there! Here I am
saying the very thing I was so riled with Rachel Lynde for saying at the Aid
today. I was real glad when Mrs. Allan spoke up for Anne, for if she hadn't
I know I'd have said something too sharp to Rachel before everybody. Anne's
got plenty of faults, goodness knows, and far be it from me to deny it.
But I'm bringing her up and not Rachel Lynde, who'd pick faults in
the Angel Gabriel himself if he lived in Avonlea. Just the same, Anne has no
business to leave the house like this when I told her she was to stay home
this afternoon and look after things. I must say, with all her faults, I
never found her disobedient or untrustworthy before and I'm real sorry to
find her so now."
"Well
now, I dunno," said Matthew, who, being patient and wise and, above
all, hungry, had deemed it best to let Marilla talk her wrath out
unhindered, having learned by experience that she got through with whatever
work was on hand much quicker if not delayed by untimely argument.
"Perhaps you're judging her too hasty, Marilla.
Don't call her untrustworthy until you're sure she has disobeyed you.
Mebbe it can all be explained--Anne's a great hand at
explaining."
"She's
not here when I told her to stay," retorted Marilla.
"I reckon she'll find it hard to explain THAT to my
satisfaction. Of course I knew you'd take her part, Matthew.
But I'm bringing her up, not you."
It
was dark when supper was ready, and still no sign of Anne, coming hurriedly
over the log bridge or up Lover's Lane, breathless and repentant with a
sense of neglected duties. Marilla washed and put away the dishes grimly.
Then, wanting a candle to light her way down the cellar, she went up
to the east gable for the one that generally stood on Anne's table. Lighting
it, she turned around to see Anne herself lying on the bed, face downward
among the pillows.
"Mercy
on us," said astonished Marilla, "have you been asleep,
Anne?"
"No,"
was the muffled reply.
"Are
you sick then?" demanded Marilla anxiously, going over to the bed.
Anne
cowered deeper into her pillows as if desirous of hiding herself forever
from mortal eyes.
"No.
But please, Marilla, go away and don't look at me.
I'm in the depths of despair and I don't care who gets head in class
or writes the best composition or sings in the Sunday-school choir any more.
Little things like that are of no importance now because I don't
suppose I'll ever be able to go anywhere again. My career is closed. Please, Marilla, go away and don't look at me."
"Did
anyone ever hear the like?" the mystified Marilla wanted to know.
"Anne Shirley, whatever is the matter with you?
What have you done? Get right up this minute and tell me.
This minute, I say. There
now, what is it?"
Anne
had slid to the floor in despairing obedience.
"Look
at my hair, Marilla," she whispered.
Accordingly,
Marilla lifted her candle and looked scrutinizingly at Anne's hair, flowing
in heavy masses down her back. It
certainly had a very strange appearance.
"Anne
Shirley, what have you done to your hair?
Why, it's GREEN!"
Green
it might be called, if it were any earthly color--a queer, dull, bronzy
green, with streaks here and there of the original red to heighten the
ghastly effect. Never in all
her life had Marilla seen anything so grotesque as Anne's hair at that
moment.
"Yes,
it's green," moaned Anne. "I
thought nothing could be as bad as red hair.
But now I know it's ten times worse to have green hair.
Oh, Marilla, you little know how utterly wretched I am."
"I
little know how you got into this fix, but I mean to find out," said
Marilla. "Come right down
to the kitchen--it's too cold up here--and tell me just what you've done.
I've been expecting something queer for some time.
You haven't got into any scrape for over two months, and I was sure
another one was due. Now, then,
what did you do to your hair?"
"I
dyed it."
"Dyed
it! Dyed your hair!
Anne Shirley, didn't you know it was a wicked thing to do?"
"Yes,
I knew it was a little wicked," admitted Anne.
"But I thought it was worth while to be a little wicked to get
rid of red hair. I counted the
cost, Marilla. Besides, I meant
to be extra good in other ways to make up for it."
"Well,"
said Marilla sarcastically, "if I'd decided it was worth while to dye
my hair I'd have dyed it a decent color at least.
I wouldn't have dyed it green."
"But
I didn't mean to dye it green, Marilla," protested Anne dejectedly.
"If I was wicked I meant to be wicked to some purpose.
He said it would turn my hair a beautiful raven black--he positively
assured me that it would. How could I doubt his word, Marilla? I know what it feels like to have your word doubted.
And Mrs. Allan says we should never suspect anyone of not telling us
the truth unless we have proof that they're not. I have proof now--green
hair is proof enough for anybody. But
I hadn't then and I believed every word he said IMPLICITLY."
"Who
said? Who are you talking
about?"
"The
peddler that was here this afternoon. I
bought the dye from him."
"Anne
Shirley, how often have I told you never to let one of those Italians in the
house! I don't believe in
encouraging them to come around at all."
"Oh,
I didn't let him in the house. I
remembered what you told me, and I went out, carefully shut the door, and
looked at his things on the step. Besides,
he wasn't an Italian--he was a German Jew.
He had a big box full of very interesting things and he told me he
was working hard to make enough money to bring his wife and children out
from Germany. He spoke so
feelingly about them that it touched my heart.
I wanted to buy something from him to help him in such a worthy
object. Then all at once I saw
the bottle of hair dye. The
peddler said it was warranted to dye any hair a beautiful raven black and
wouldn't wash off. In a trice I
saw myself with beautiful raven-black hair and the temptation was
irresistible. But the price of
the bottle was seventy-five cents and I had only fifty cents left out of my
chicken money. I think the
peddler had a very kind heart, for he said that, seeing it was me, he'd sell
it for fifty cents and that was just giving it away.
So I bought it, and as soon as he had gone I came up here and applied
it with an old hairbrush as the directions said.
I used up the whole bottle, and oh, Marilla, when I saw the dreadful
color it turned my hair I repented of being wicked, I can tell you.
And I've been repenting ever since."
"Well,
I hope you'll repent to good purpose," said Marilla severely, "and
that you've got your eyes opened to where your vanity has led you, Anne.
Goodness knows what's to be done.
I suppose the first thing is to give your hair a good washing and see
if that will do any good."
Accordingly,
Anne washed her hair, scrubbing it vigorously with soap and water, but for
all the difference it made she might as well have been scouring its original
red. The peddler had certainly
spoken the truth when he declared that the dye wouldn't wash off, however
his veracity might be impeached in other respects.
"Oh,
Marilla, what shall I do?" questioned Anne in tears. "I can never
live this down. People have pretty well forgotten my other mistakes--the
liniment cake and setting Diana drunk and flying into a temper with Mrs.
Lynde. But they'll never forget
this. They will think I am not respectable.
Oh, Marilla, `what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to
deceive.' That is poetry, but it is true.
And oh, how Josie Pye will laugh!
Marilla, I CANNOT face Josie Pye.
I am the unhappiest girl in Prince Edward Island."
Anne's
unhappiness continued for a week. During
that time she went nowhere and shampooed her hair every day.
Diana alone of outsiders knew the fatal secret, but she promised
solemnly never to tell, and it may be stated here and now that she kept her
word. At the end of the week
Marilla said decidedly:
"It's
no use, Anne. That is fast dye if ever there was any. Your hair must be cut
off; there is no other way. You
can't go out with it looking like that."
Anne's
lips quivered, but she realized the bitter truth of Marilla's remarks.
With a dismal sigh she went for the scissors.
"Please
cut it off at once, Marilla, and have it over.
Oh, I feel that my heart is broken.
This is such an unromantic affliction.
The girls in books lose their hair in fevers or sell it to get money
for some good deed, and I'm sure I wouldn't mind losing my hair in some such
fashion half so much. But there
is nothing comforting in having your hair cut off because you've dyed it a
dreadful color, is there? I'm
going to weep all the time you're cutting it off, if it won't interfere.
It seems such a tragic thing."
Anne
wept then, but later on, when she went upstairs and looked in the glass, she
was calm with despair. Marilla had done her work thoroughly and it had been
necessary to shingle the hair as closely as possible.
The result was not becoming, to state the case as mildly as may be.
Anne promptly turned her glass to the wall.
"I'll
never, never look at myself again until my hair grows," she exclaimed
passionately.
Then
she suddenly righted the glass.
"Yes,
I will, too. I'd do penance for being wicked that way. I'll look at myself
every time I come to my room and see how ugly I am.
And I won't try to imagine it away, either. I never thought I was vain about my hair, of all things, but
now I know I was, in spite of its being red, because it was so long and
thick and curly. I expect
something will happen to my nose next."
Anne's
clipped head made a sensation in school on the following Monday, but to her
relief nobody guessed the real reason for it, not even Josie Pye, who,
however, did not fail to inform Anne that she looked like a perfect
scarecrow.
"I
didn't say anything when Josie said that to me," Anne confided that
evening to Marilla, who was lying on the sofa after one of her headaches,
"because I thought it was part of my punishment and I ought to bear it
patiently. It's hard to be told
you look like a scarecrow and I wanted to say something back.
But I didn't. I just swept her one scornful look and then I forgave
her. It makes you feel very virtuous when you forgive people, doesn't it?
I mean to devote all my energies to being good after this and I shall
never try to be beautiful again. Of
course it's better to be good. I
know it is, but it's sometimes so hard to believe a thing even when you know
it. I do really want to be
good, Marilla, like you and Mrs. Allan and Miss Stacy, and grow up to be a
credit to you. Diana says when
my hair begins to grow to tie a black velvet ribbon around my head with a
bow at one side. She says she
thinks it will be very becoming. I
will call it a snood--that sounds so romantic.
But am I talking too much, Marilla?
Does it hurt your head?"
"My
head is better now. It was
terrible bad this afternoon, though. These
headaches of mine are getting worse and worse. I'll have to see a doctor
about them. As for your
chatter, I don't know that I mind it--I've got so used to it."
Which
was Marilla's way of saying that she liked to hear it.
|
Table of Contents
