Book: Rilla of Ingleside

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"Miss Oliver dear," interrupted Susan, desperately determined to save
Gertrude from herself, if human power could do it, "you are all tired
out and unstrung--and no wonder, teaching those obstreperous youngsters
all day and coming home to bad war news. But just you go upstairs and
lie down and I will bring you up a cup of hot tea and a bite of toast
and very soon you will not want to slam doors or swear."

"Susan, you're a good soul--a very pearl of Susans! But, Susan, it
would be such a relief--to say just one soft, low, little tiny d---"

"I will bring you a hot-water bottle for the soles of your feet, also,"
interposed Susan resolutely, "and it would not be any relief to say that
word you are thinking of, Miss Oliver, and that you may tie to."

"Well, I'll try the hot-water bottle first," said Miss Oliver, repenting
herself on teasing Susan and vanishing upstairs, to Susan's intense
relief. Susan shook her head ominously as she filled the hot-water
bottle. The war was certainly relaxing the standards of behaviour
woefully. Here was Miss Oliver admittedly on the point of profanity.

"We must draw the blood from her brain," said Susan, "and if this bottle
is not effective I will see what can be done with a mustard plaster."

Gertrude rallied and carried on. Lord Kitchener went to Greece, whereat
Susan foretold that Constantine would soon experience a change of heart.
Lloyd George began to heckle the Allies regarding equipment and guns and
Susan said you would hear more of Lloyd George yet. The gallant Anzacs
withdrew from Gallipoli and Susan approved the step, with reservations.
The siege of Kut-El-Amara began and Susan pored over maps of Mesopotamia
and abused the Turks. Henry Ford started for Europe and Susan flayed him
with sarcasm. Sir John French was superseded by Sir Douglas Haig and
Susan dubiously opined that it was poor policy to swap horses crossing a
stream, "though, to be sure, Haig was a good name and French had a
foreign sound, say what you might." Not a move on the great chess-board
of king or bishop or pawn escaped Susan, who had once read only Glen St.
Mary notes. "There was a time," she said sorrowfully, "when I did not
care what happened outside of P.E. Island, and now a king cannot have a
toothache in Russia or China but it worries me. It may be broadening to
the mind, as the doctor said, but it is very painful to the feelings."

When Christmas came again Susan did not set any vacant places at the
festive board. Two empty chairs were too much even for Susan who had
thought in September that there would not be one.

"This is the first Christmas that Walter was not home," Rilla wrote in
her diary that night. "Jem used to be away for Christmases up in
Avonlea, but Walter never was. I had letters from Ken and him today.
They are still in England but expect to be in the trenches very soon.
And then--but I suppose we'll be able to endure it somehow. To me, the
strangest of all the strange things since 1914 is how we have all
learned to accept things we never thought we could--to go on with life
as a matter of course. I know that Jem and Jerry are in the trenches--
that Ken and Walter will be soon--that if one of them does not come
back my heart will break--yet I go on and work and plan--yes, and even
enjoy life by times. There are moments when we have real fun because,
just for the moment, we don't think about things and then--we remember
--and the remembering is worse than thinking of it all the time would
have been.

"Today was dark and cloudy and tonight is wild enough, as Gertrude says,
to please any novelist in search of suitable matter for a murder or
elopement. The raindrops streaming over the panes look like tears
running down a face, and the wind is shrieking through the maple grove.

"This hasn't been a nice Christmas Day in any way. Nan had toothache and
Susan had red eyes, and assumed a weird and gruesome flippancy of manner
to deceive us into thinking she hadn't; and Jims had a bad cold all day
and I'm afraid of croup. He has had croup twice since October. The first
time I was nearly frightened to death, for father and mother were both
away--father always is away, it seems to me, when any of this household
gets sick. But Susan was cool as a fish and knew just what to do, and by
morning Jims was all right. That child is a cross between a duck and an
imp. He's a year and four months old, trots about everywhere, and says
quite a few words. He has the cutest little way of calling me
"Willa-will." It always brings back that dreadful, ridiculous,
delightful night when Ken came to say good-bye, and I was so furious and
happy. Jims is pink and white and big-eyed and curly-haired and every
now and then I discover a new dimple in him. I can never quite believe
he is really the same creature as that scrawny, yellow, ugly little
changeling I brought home in the soup tureen. Nobody has ever heard a
word from Jim Anderson. If he never comes back I shall keep Jims always.
Everybody here worships and spoils him--or would spoil him if Morgan
and I didn't stand remorselessly in the way. Susan says Jims is the
cleverest child she ever saw and can recognize Old Nick when he sees him
--this because Jims threw poor Doc out of an upstairs window one day.
Doc turned into Mr. Hyde on his way down and landed in a currant bush,
spitting and swearing. I tried to console his inner cat with a saucer of
milk but he would have none of it, and remained Mr. Hyde the rest of the
day. Jims's latest exploit was to paint the cushion of the big arm-chair
in the sun parlour with molasses; and before anybody found it out Mrs.
Fred Clow came in on Red Cross business and sat down on it. Her new silk
dress was ruined and nobody could blame her for being vexed. But she
went into one of her tempers and said nasty things and gave me such
slams about 'spoiling' Jims that I nearly boiled over, too. But I kept
the lid on till she had waddled away and then I exploded.

"'The fat, clumsy, horrid old thing,' I said--and oh, what a
satisfaction it was to say it.

"'She has three sons at the front,' mother said rebukingly.

"'I suppose that covers all her shortcomings in manners,' I retorted.
But I was ashamed--for it is true that all her boys have gone and she
was very plucky and loyal about it too; and she is a perfect tower of
strength in the Red Cross. It's a little hard to remember all the
heroines. Just the same, it was her second new silk dress in one year
and that when everybody is--or should be--trying to 'save and serve.'

"I had to bring out my green velvet hat again lately and begin wearing
it. I hung on to my blue straw sailor as long as I could. How I hate the
green velvet hat! It is so elaborate and conspicuous. I don't see how I
could ever have liked it. But I vowed to wear it and wear it I will.

"Shirley and I went down to the station this morning to take Little Dog
Monday a bang-up Christmas dinner. Dog Monday waits and watches there
still, with just as much hope and confidence as ever. Sometimes he hangs
around the station house and talks to people and the rest of his time he
sits at his little kennel door and watches the track unwinkingly. We
never try to coax him home now: we know it is of no use. When Jem comes
back, Monday will come home with him; and if Jem--never comes back--
Monday will wait there for him as long as his dear dog heart goes on
beating.

"Fred Arnold was here last night. He was eighteen in November and is
going to enlist just as soon as his mother is over an operation she has
to have. He has been coming here very often lately and though I like him
so much it makes me uncomfortable, because I am afraid he is thinking
that perhaps I could care something for him. I can't tell him about Ken
--because, after all, what is there to tell? And yet I don't like to
behave coldly and distantly when he will be going away so soon. It is
very perplexing. I remember I used to think it would be such fun to have
dozens of beaux--and now I'm worried to death because two are too many.

"I am learning to cook. Susan is teaching me. I tried to learn long ago
--but no, let me be honest--Susan tried to teach me, which is a very
different thing. I never seemed to succeed with anything and I got
discouraged. But since the boys have gone away I wanted to be able to
make cake and things for them myself and so I started in again and this
time I'm getting on surprisingly well. Susan says it is all in the way I
hold my mouth and father says my subconscious mind is desirous of
learning now, and I dare say they're both right. Anyhow, I can make
dandy short-bread and fruitcake. I got ambitious last week and attempted
cream puffs, but made an awful failure of them. They came out of the
oven flat as flukes. I thought maybe the cream would fill them up again
and make them plump but it didn't. I think Susan was secretly pleased.
She is past mistress in the art of making cream puffs and it would break
her heart if anyone else here could make them as well. I wonder if Susan
tampered--but no, I won't suspect her of such a thing.

"Miranda Pryor spent an afternoon here a few days ago, helping me cut
out certain Red Cross garments known by the charming name of 'vermin
shirts.' Susan thinks that name is not quite decent, so I suggested she
call them 'cootie sarks,' which is old Highland Sandy's version of it.
But she shook her head and I heard her telling mother later that, in her
opinion, 'cooties' and 'sarks' were not proper subjects for young girls
to talk about. She was especially horrified when Jem wrote in his last
letter to mother, 'Tell Susan I had a fine cootie hunt this morning and
caught fifty-three!' Susan positively turned pea-green. 'Mrs. Dr. dear,'
she said, 'when I was young, if decent people were so unfortunate as to
get--those insects--they kept it a secret if possible. I do not want
to be narrow-minded, Mrs. Dr. dear, but I still think it is better not
to mention such things.'

"Miranda grew confidential over our vermin shirts and told me all her
troubles. She is desperately unhappy. She is engaged to Joe Milgrave and
Joe joined up in October and has been training in Charlottetown ever
since. Her father was furious when he joined and forbade Miranda ever to
have any dealing or communication with him again. Poor Joe expects to go
overseas any day and wants Miranda to marry him before he goes, which
shows that there have been 'communications' in spite of
Whiskers-on-the-moon. Miranda wants to marry him but cannot, and she
declares it will break her heart.

"'Why don't you run away and marry him?' I said. It didn't go against my
conscience in the least to give her such advice. Joe Milgrave is a
splendid fellow and Mr. Pryor fairly beamed on him until the war broke
out and I know Mr. Pryor would forgive Miranda very quickly, once it was
over and he wanted his housekeeper back. But Miranda shook her silvery
head dolefully.

"'Joe wants me to but I can't. Mother's last words to me, as she lay on
her dying-bed, were, "Never, never run away, Miranda," and I promised.'

"Miranda's mother died two years ago, and it seems, according to
Miranda, that her mother and father actually ran away to be married
themselves. To picture Whiskers-on-the-moon as the hero of an elopement
is beyond my power. But such was the case and Mrs. Pryor at least lived
to repent it. She had a hard life of it with Mr. Pryor, and she thought
it was a punishment on her for running away. So she made Miranda promise
she would never, for any reason whatever, do it.

"Of course, you cannot urge a girl to break a promise made to a dying
mother, so I did not see what Miranda could do unless she got Joe to
come to the house when her father was away and marry her there. But
Miranda said that couldn't be managed. Her father seemed to suspect she
might be up to something of the sort and he never went away for long at
a time, and, of course, Joe couldn't get leave of absence at an hour's
notice.

"'No, I shall just have to let Joe go, and he will be killed--I know he
will be killed--and my heart will break,' said Miranda, her tears
running down and copiously bedewing the vermin shirts!

"I am not writing like this for lack of any real sympathy with poor
Miranda. I've just got into the habit of giving things a comical twist
if I can, when I'm writing to Jem and Walter and Ken, to make them
laugh. I really felt sorry for Miranda who is as much in love with Joe
as a china-blue girl can be with anyone and who is dreadfully ashamed of
her father's pro-German sentiments. I think she understood that I did,
for she said she had wanted to tell me all about her worries because I
had grown so sympathetic this past year. I wonder if I have. I know I
used to be a selfish, thoughtless creature--how selfish and thoughtless
I am ashamed to remember now, so I can't be quite so bad as I was.

"I wish I could help Miranda. It would be very romantic to contrive a
war-wedding and I should dearly love to get the better of
Whiskers-on-the-moon. But at present the oracle has not spoken."



CHAPTER XVIII

A WAR-WEDDING

"I can tell you this Dr. dear," said Susan, pale with wrath, "that
Germany is getting to be perfectly ridiculous."

They were all in the big Ingleside kitchen. Susan was mixing biscuits
for supper. Mrs. Blythe was making shortbread for Jem, and Rilla was
compounding candy for Ken and Walter--it had once been "Walter and Ken"
in her thoughts but somehow, quite unconsciously, this had changed until
Ken's name came naturally first. Cousin Sophia was also there, knitting.
All the boys were going to be killed in the long run, so Cousin Sophia
felt in her bones, but they might better die with warm feet than cold
ones, so Cousin Sophia knitted faithfully and gloomily.

Into this peaceful scene erupted the doctor, wrathful and excited over
the burning of the Parliament Buildings in Ottawa. And Susan became
automatically quite as wrathful and excited.

"What will those Huns do next?" she demanded. "Coming over here and
burning our Parliament building! Did anyone ever hear of such an
outrage?"

"We don't know that the Germans are responsible for this," said the
doctor--much as if he felt quite sure they were. "Fires do start
without their agency sometimes. And Uncle Mark MacAllister's barn was
burnt last week. You can hardly accuse the Germans of that, Susan."

"Indeed, Dr. dear, I do not know." Susan nodded slowly and portentously.
"Whiskers-on-the-moon was there that very day. The fire broke out half
an hour after he was gone. So much is a fact--but I shall not accuse a
Presbyterian elder of burning anybody's barn until I have proof.
However, everybody knows, Dr. dear, that both Uncle Mark's boys have
enlisted, and that Uncle Mark himself makes speeches at all the
recruiting meetings. So no doubt Germany is anxious to get square with
him."

"I could never speak at a recruiting meeting," said Cousin Sophia
solemnly. "I could never reconcile it to my conscience to ask another
woman's son to go, to murder and be murdered."

"Could you not?" said Susan. "Well, Sophia Crawford, I felt as if I
could ask anyone to go when I read last night that there were no
children under eight years of age left alive in Poland. Think of that,
Sophia Crawford"--Susan shook a floury finger at Sophia--"not--one--
child--under--eight--years--of--age!"

"I suppose the Germans has et 'em all," sighed Cousin Sophia.

"Well, no-o-o," said Susan reluctantly, as if she hated to admit that
there was any crime the Huns couldn't be accused of. "The Germans have
not turned cannibal yet--as far as I know. They have died of starvation
and exposure, the poor little creatures. There is murdering for you,
Cousin Sophia Crawford. The thought of it poisons every bite and sup I
take."

"I see that Fred Carson of Lowbridge has been awarded a Distinguished
Conduct Medal," remarked the doctor, over his local paper.

"I heard that last week," said Susan. "He is a battalion runner and he
did something extra brave and daring. His letter, telling his folks
about it, came when his old Grandmother Carson was on her dying-bed. She
had only a few minutes more to live and the Episcopal minister, who was
there, asked her if she would not like him to pray. 'Oh yes, yes, you
can pray,' she said impatient-like--she was a Dean, Dr. dear, and the
Deans were always high-spirited--'you can pray, but for pity's sake
pray low and don't disturb me. I want to think over this splendid news
and I have not much time left to do it.' That was Almira Carson all
over. Fred was the apple of her eye. She was seventy-five years of age
and had not a grey hair in her head, they tell me."

"By the way, that reminds me--I found a grey hair this morning--my
very first," said Mrs. Blythe.

"I have noticed that grey hair for some time, Mrs. Dr. dear, but I did
not speak of it. Thought I to myself, 'She has enough to bear.' But now
that you have discovered it let me remind you that grey hairs are
honourable."

"I must be getting old, Gilbert." Mrs. Blythe laughed a trifle ruefully.
"People are beginning to tell me I look so young. They never tell you
that when you are young. But I shall not worry over my silver thread. I
never liked red hair. Gilbert, did I ever tell you of that time, years
ago at Green Gables, when I dyed my hair? Nobody but Marilla and I knew
about it."

"Was that the reason you came out once with your hair shingled to the
bone?"

"Yes. I bought a bottle of dye from a German Jew pedlar. I fondly
expected it would turn my hair black--and it turned it green. So it had
to be cut off."

"You had a narrow escape, Mrs. Dr. dear," exclaimed Susan. "Of course
you were too young then to know what a German was. It was a special
mercy of Providence that it was only green dye and not poison."

"It seems hundreds of years since those Green Gables days," sighed Mrs.
Blythe. "TThey belonged to another world altogether. Life has been cut
in two by the chasm of war. What is ahead I don't know--but it can't be
a bit like the past. I wonder if those of us who have lived half our
lives in the old world will ever feel wholly at home in the new."

"Have you noticed," asked Miss Oliver, glancing up from her book, "how
everything written before the war seems so far away now, too? One feels
as if one was reading something as ancient as the Iliad. This poem of
Wordsworth's--the Senior class have it in their entrance work--I've
been glancing over it. Its classic calm and repose and the beauty of the
lines seem to belong to another planet, and to have as little to do with
the present world-welter as the evening star."

"The only thing that I find much comfort in reading nowadays is the
Bible," remarked Susan, whisking her biscuits into the oven. "There are
so many passages in it that seem to me exactly descriptive of the Huns.
Old Highland Sandy declares that there is no doubt that the Kaiser is
the Anti-Christ spoken of in Revelations, but I do not go as far as
that. It would, in my humble opinion, Mrs. Dr. dear, be too great an
honour for him."

Early one morning, several days later, Miranda Pryor slipped up to
Ingleside, ostensibly to get some Red Cross sewing, but in reality to
talk over with sympathetic Rilla troubles that were past bearing alone.
She brought her dog with her--an over-fed, bandy-legged little animal
very dear to her heart because Joe Milgrave had given it to her when it
was a puppy. Mr. Pryor regarded all dogs with disfavour; but in those
days he had looked kindly upon Joe as a suitor for Miranda's hand and so
he had allowed her to keep the puppy. Miranda was so grateful that she
endeavoured to please her father by naming her dog after his political
idol, the great Liberal chieftain, Sir Wilfrid Laurier--though his
title was soon abbreviated to Wilfy. Sir Wilfrid grew and flourished and
waxed fat; but Miranda spoiled him absurdly and nobody else liked him.
Rilla especially hated him because of his detestable trick of lying flat
on his back and entreating you with waving paws to tickle his sleek
stomach. When she saw that Miranda's pale eyes bore unmistakable
testimony of her having cried all night, Rilla asked her to come up to
her room, knowing Miranda had a tale of woe to tell, but she ordered Sir
Wilfrid to remain below.

"Oh, can't he come, too?" said Miranda wistfully. "Poor Wilfy won't be
any bother--and I wiped his paws so carefully before I brought him in.
He is always so lonesome in a strange place without me--and very soon
he'll be--all--I'll have left--to remind me--of Joe."

Rilla yielded, and Sir Wilfrid, with his tail curled at a saucy angle
over his brindled back, trotted triumphantly up the stairs before them.

"Oh, Rilla," sobbed Miranda, when they had reached sanctuary. "I'm so
unhappy. I can't begin to tell you how unhappy I am. Truly, my heart is
breaking."

Rilla sat down on the lounge beside her. Sir Wilfrid squatted on his
haunches before them, with his impertinent pink tongue stuck out, and
listened. "What is the trouble, Miranda?"

"Joe is coming home tonight on his last leave. I had a letter from him
on Saturday--he sends my letters in care of Bob Crawford, you know,
because of father--and, oh, Rilla, he will only have four days--he has
to go away Friday morning--and I may never see him again."

"Does he still want you to marry him?" asked Rilla.

"Oh, yes. He implored me in his letter to run away and be married. But I
cannot do that, Rilla, not even for Joe. My only comfort is that I will
be able to see him for a little while tomorrow afternoon. Father has to
go to Charlottetown on business. At least we will have one good farewell
talk. But oh--afterwards--why, Rilla, I know father won't even let me
go to the station Friday morning to see Joe off."

"Why in the world don't you and Joe get married tomorrow afternoon at
home?" demanded Rilla.

Miranda swallowed a sob in such amazement that she almost choked.

"Why--why--that is impossible, Rilla."

"Why?" briefly demanded the organizer of the Junior Red Cross and the
transporter of babies in soup tureens.

"Why--why--we never thought of such a thing--Joe hasn't a license--I
have no dress--I couldn't be married in black--I--I--we--you--you--"
Miranda lost herself altogether and Sir Wilfrid, seeing that she was
in dire distress threw back his head and emitted a melancholy yelp.

Rilla Blythe thought hard and rapidly for a few minutes. Then she said,
"Miranda, if you will put yourself into my hands I'll have you married
to Joe before four o'clock tomorrow afternoon."

"Oh, you couldn't."

"I can and I will. But you'll have to do exactly as I tell you."

"Oh--I--don't think--oh, father will kill me--"

"Nonsense. He'll be very angry I suppose. But are you more afraid of
your father's anger than you are of Joe's never coming back to you?"

"No," said Miranda, with sudden firmness, "I'm not."

"Will you do as I tell you then?"

"Yes, I will."

"Then get Joe on the long-distance at once and tell him to bring out a
license and ring tonight."

"Oh, I couldn't," wailed the aghast Miranda, "it--it would be so--so
indelicate."

Rilla shut her little white teeth together with a snap. "Heaven grant me
patience," she said under her breath. "I'll do it then," she said aloud,
"and meanwhile, you go home and make what preparations you can. When I
'phone down to you to come up and help me sew come at once."

As soon as Miranda, pallid, scared, but desperately resolved, had gone,
Rilla flew to the telephone and put in a long-distance call for
Charlottetown. She got through with such surprising quickness that she
was convinced Providence approved of her undertaking, but it was a good
hour before she could get in touch with Joe Milgrave at his camp.
Meanwhile, she paced impatiently about, and prayed that when she did get
Joe there would be no listeners on the line to carry news to
Whiskers-on-the-moon.

"Is that you, Joe? Rilla Blythe is speaking--Rilla--Rilla--oh, never
mind. Listen to this. Before you come home tonight get a marriage
license--a marriage license--yes, a marriage license--and a
wedding-ring. Did you get that? And will you do it? Very well, be sure
you do it--it is your only chance."

Flushed with triumph--for her only fear was that she might not be able
to locate Joe in time--Rilla rang the Pryor ring. This time she had not
such good luck for she drew Whiskers-on-the-moon.

"Is that Miranda? Oh--Mr. Pryor! Well, Mr. Pryor, will you kindly ask
Miranda if she can come up this afternoon and help me with some sewing.
It is very important, or I would not trouble her. Oh--thank you."

Mr. Pryor had consented somewhat grumpily, but he had consented--he did
not want to offend Dr. Blythe, and he knew that if he refused to allow
Miranda to do any Red Cross work public opinion would make the Glen too
hot for comfort. Rilla went out to the kitchen, shut all the doors with
a mysterious expression which alarmed Susan, and then said solemnly,
"Susan can you make a wedding-cake this afternoon?"

"A wedding-cake!" Susan stared. Rilla had, without any warning, brought
her a war-baby once upon a time. Was she now, with equal suddenness,
going to produce a husband?

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