quarrel … well, hardly ever … "
"They are among the most admirable children I have ever seen, Miss Baker."
"She snoops and pries … "
"I have caught her at it myself, Miss Baker."
"She's always getting offended and heartbroken over something but never offended enough to up and leave. She just sits around looking lonely and neglected until poor Mrs. Dr. is almost distracted. Nothing suits her. If a window is open she complains of draughts. If they are all shut she says she does like a little fresh air once in a while. She cannot bear onions … she cannot even bear the smell of them. She says they make her sick. So Mrs. Dr. says we must not use any. Now," said Susan grandly, "it may be a common taste to like onions, Miss Dew dear, but we all plead guilty to it at Ingleside."
"I am very partial to onions myself," admitted Rebecca Dew.
"She cannot bear cats. She says cats give her the creeps. It does not make any difference whether she sees them or not. Just to know there is one about the place is enough for her. So that poor Shrimp hardly dare show his face in the house. I have never altogether liked cats myself, Miss Dew, but I maintain they have a right to wave their own tails. And it is, 'Susan, never forget that I cannot eat eggs, please,' or 'Susan, how often must I tell you I cannot eat cold toast?' or 'Susan, some people may be able to drink stewed tea but I am not in that fortunate class.' Stewed tea, Miss Dew! As if I ever offered anyone stewed tea!"
"Nobody could ever suppose it of you, Miss Baker."
"If there is a question that should not be asked she will ask it. She is jealous because the doctor tells things to his wife before he tells them to her … and she is always trying to pick news out of him about his patients. Nothing aggravates him so much, Miss Dew. A doctor must know how to hold his tongue, as you are well aware. And her tantrums about fire! 'Susan Baker,' she says to me, 'I hope you never light a fire with coal-oil. Or leave oily rags lying around, Susan. They have been known to cause spontaneous combustion in less than an hour. How would you like to stand and watch this house burn down, Susan, knowing it was your fault?' Well, Miss Dew dear, I had my laugh on her over that. It was that very night she set her curtains on fire and the yells of her are ringing in my ears yet. And just when the poor doctor had got to sleep after having been up for two nights! What infuriates me most, Miss Dew, is that before she goes anywhere she goes into my pantry and counts the eggs. It takes all my philosophy to refrain from saying, 'Why not count the spoons, too?' Of course the children hate her. Mrs. Dr. is just about worn out keeping them from showing it. She actually slapped Nan one day when the doctor and Mrs. Dr. were both away … slapped her … just because Nan called her 'Mrs Mefusaleh' … having heard that imp of a Ken Ford saying it."
"I'd have slapped her," said Rebecca Dew viciously.
"I told her if she ever did the like again I would slap her. 'An occasional spanking we do have at Ingleside,' I told her, 'but slapping never, so put that in pickle.' She was sulky and offended for a week but at least she has never dared to lay a finger on one of them since. She loves it when their parents punish them, though. 'If I was your mother,' she says to Little Jem one evening. 'Oh ho, you won't ever be anybody's mother,' said the poor child … driven to it, Miss Dew, absolutely driven to it. The doctor sent him to bed without his supper, but who would you suppose, Miss Dew, saw that some was smuggled up to him later on?"
"Ah, now, who?" chortled Rebecca Dew, entering into the spirit of the tale.
"It would have broken your heart, Miss Dew, to hear the prayer he put up afterwards … all off his own bat, 'O God, please forgive me for being impertinent to Aunt Mary Maria. And O God, please help me to be always very polite to Aunt Mary Maria.' It brought the tears into my eyes, the poor lamb. I do not hold with irreverence or impertinence from youth to age, Miss Dew dear, but I must admit that when Bertie Shakespeare Drew threw a spitball at her one day … it just missed her nose by an inch, Miss Dew … I waylaid him at the gate on his way home and gave him a bag of doughnuts. Of course I did not tell him why. He was tickled over it … for doughnuts do not grow on trees, Miss Dew, and Mrs. Second Skimmings never makes them. Nan and Di … I would not breathe this to a soul but you, Miss Dew … the doctor and his wife never dream of it or they would put a stop to it … Nan and Di have named their old china doll with the split head after Aunt Mary Maria and whenever she scolds them they go out and drown her … the doll I mean … in the rainwater hogshead. Many's the jolly drowning we have had, I can assure you. But you could not believe what that woman did the other night, Miss Dew."
"I'd believe anything of her, Miss Baker."
"She would not eat a bite of supper because her feelings had been hurt over something, but she went into the pantry before she went to bed and ate up a lunch I had left for the poor doctor … every crumb, Miss Dew dear. I hope you will not think me an infidel, Miss Dew, but I cannot understand why the Good Lord does not get tired of some people."
"You must not allow yourself to lose your sense of humour, Miss Baker," said Rebecca Dew firmly.
"Oh, I am very well aware that there is a comical side to a toad under a harrow, Miss Dew. But the question is, does the toad see it? I am sorry to have bothered you with all this, Miss Dew dear, but it has been a great relief. I cannot say these things to Mrs. Dr. and I have been feeling lately that if I did not find an outlet I would burst."
"How well I know that feeling, Miss Baker."
"And now, Miss Dew dear," said Susan, getting up briskly, "what do you say to a cup of tea before bed? And a cold chicken leg, Miss Dew?"
"I have never denied," said Rebecca Dew, taking her well-baked feet out of the oven, "that while we should not forget the Higher Things of Life good food is a pleasant thing in moderation."
CHAPTER XII.
Gilbert had his two weeks' snipe shooting in Nova Scotia … not even Anne could persuade him to take a month … and November closed in on Ingleside. The dark hills, with the darker spruces marching over them, looked grim on early falling nights, but Ingleside bloomed with firelight and laughter, though the winds come in from the Atlantic singing of mournful things.
"Why isn't the wind happy, Mummy?" asked Walter one night.
"Because it is remembering all the sorrow of the world since time began," answered Anne.
"It is moaning just because there is so much dampness in the air," sniffed Aunt Mary Maria, "and my back is killing me."
But some days even the wind blew cheerfully through the silvery grey maple wood and some days there was no wind at all, only mellow Indian summer sunshine and the quiet shadows of the bare trees all over the lawn and frosty stillness at sunset.
"Look at that white evening star over the lombardy in the corner," said Anne. "Whenever I see anything like that I am minded to be just glad I am alive."
"You do say such funny things, Annie. Stars are quite common in P. E. Island," said Aunt Mary Maria … and thought: "Stars indeed! As if no one ever saw a star before! Didn't Annie know of the terrible waste that was going on in the kitchen every day? Didn't she know of the reckless way Susan Baker threw eggs about and used lard where dripping would do quite as well? Or didn't she care? Poor Gilbert! No wonder he had to keep his nose to the grindstone!"
November went out in greys and browns: but by morning the snow had woven its old white spell and Jem shouted with delight as he rushed down to breakfast.
"Oh,
