OOchartsis in the Web Scraping Software Industry

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Beyoncé has made history once again, becoming the first Black woman to top Billboard&#x27;s country music chart. The Grammy winner achieved the feat after her new single Texas Hold &#x27;Em reached No. 1 on the country airplay chart this week.

Beyoncé becomes first Black woman to top Billboard country music chart | CBC News

Blue-collar jobs have already been impacted heavily by robotics and automation, neither of which require artificial intelligence. Now, recent AI innovations like ChatGPT seem poised to make white-collar jobs vulnerable, which were previously considered safe from automation. But will stop at white-collar positions, or will it threaten blue-collar jobs, as well? AI Blue-Collar Jobs Most at Risk From AI Most of the jobs generative AI can eliminate are white-collar roles. However, a few blue-collar fields could also be affected. Jobs that a robot can perform are at an especially high risk of being eliminated with AI integrations. Retail Sales and retail employees are already experiencing the impact of AI and automation in the job market. Over the past several years, more stores have replaced traditional checkout counters with automated self-service kiosks. Additionally, many people have shifted to online shopping, reducing the number of customers visiting physical storefronts. Self-service checkout at brick-and-mortar grocery stores. Some small shops have no employees, only a few associates who come in to restock the shelves. accounts for 55% of all transactions Unfortunately for people working in retail, most customer-facing roles will likely disappear in the near future. Restocking will likely become the only task requiring employees. AI could completely take over most checkout and customer service tasks. Manufacturing Automation has long been a part of the manufacturing industry, but AI could advance automation to the point of eliminating most hands-on jobs. Combining robotics and AI enables manufacturers to automate their assembly processes. Shifting to an employee-free workplace lets manufacturers operate around the clock and significantly reduce payroll, insurance, and injury compensation expenses. Plus, AI and robotics can often deliver higher-quality products since they don’t encounter human error. There are clear financial benefits for a fully automated manufacturing environment. AI will likely take over most assembly line jobs with the help of robotics. Most blue-collar positions in manufacturing will be technician roles, such as robot repair. Agriculture and Food Processing Farming is often not the first thing that comes to mind when people think of AI and robotics. However, there is huge potential for AI-assisted automation in the agriculture industry. Blue-collar jobs like food packaging and crop harvesting are often repetitive manual labor. These tasks are relatively easy to automate, especially now that AI can accurately recognize ripe or bruised fruit. For example, apple orchards in America’s Northwestern states are to pick apples. Some are flying drones that pick them from the air, while others are large robotic arms on a rolling base that drive through orchards. The robots use AI computer vision to identify ripe fruit and pluck apples from the trees with a robotic arm. starting to use AI-powered robots Farmers can completely automate their harvesting process with enough of these robots, eliminating thousands of blue-collar manual labor jobs. The same applies to food processing and packaging tasks, such as cleaning freshly harvested food. AI computer vision enables robots to perform virtually all food processing tasks, even with delicate foods like pastries and fruit. Is AI Replacing Employees or Filling Empty Jobs? It may sound alarming that AI is threatening blue-collar as well as white-collar jobs. However, is AI actually displacing human employees? It’s easy to imagine businesses firing people and replacing them with AI, but that may not be the reality of the situation. Many industries face major labor shortages today, including manufacturing, retail, and agriculture. This hurts productivity and leads to higher rates of stress and injuries among understaffed teams. These shortages are only getting worse, too. For instance, the National Association of Manufacturers estimates that the manufacturing industry by 2030. Additionally, studies show that fully in-person jobs, such as in retail, and lower employee satisfaction. Businesses have a hard time finding and keeping workers in these sectors. will be short 2.1 million employees have higher quit rates There is no lack of open blue-collar jobs. The problem is finding enough people to fill those roles. Employers often turn to AI and automation when labor shortages continue for an extended period. In these cases, integrating AI can improve the employee experience by reducing the workload on understaffed teams. Adapting to AI in the Workforce Is it possible for AI and employees to coexist peacefully in the blue-collar job market? Some may be surprised to hear that AI can be a helpful addition to the workforce in several ways. It may not be replacing employees so much as shifting humans’ jobs. One of the most common challenges in today’s workforce is a lack of skilled labor, specifically in blue-collar roles. Jobs are available, but not enough people have the technical skills to fill them. For example, there is a , which analysts expect to worsen over the next decade. shortage of at least 70,000 skilled HVAC technicians AI can help employers adapt blue-collar roles to close the skills gap. For instance, it can speed training processes to help employees gain the necessary skills in less time. This benefits everyone since more advanced abilities result in higher pay for blue-collar workers. Similarly, AI is creating more opportunities for blue-collar workers to move into higher-level jobs. AI is eliminating low-skill manual labor tasks, but that includes many positions people don’t typically enjoy anyway. The skills gap presents a great opportunity to reskill and upskill manual labor employees so they can graduate to more fulfilling, engaging careers. It’s also worth considering that AI is only good at a narrow niche of tasks. Humans will always : creativity, originality, and the ability to learn. Countless blue-collar jobs require those skills. have the edge in three core areas For instance, auto technicians need creativity to find the best possible solution to vehicles’ mechanical problems. Robotics technicians rely on their ability to learn to help them keep up with advancing technology. Landscapers exercise originality every day to create unique outdoor spaces. AI can’t replicate these skills on a human level. Even with the help of robotics, there will always be blue-collar jobs that require people. While AI automates mundane manual labor, humans get to focus on creativity-centered tasks. The physical nature of blue-collar work also makes it much more resilient to automation than most white-collar jobs. These careers will be more secure as AI’s presence in the workplace grows. Timeline for the Shift to AI in the Job Market How rapidly will AI change the blue-collar job market? It has advanced rapidly over the past few years, but its impact on the workplace is developing a bit slower. Employers need time and money to invest in AI tools and learn how to use them. Therefore, the transition will happen gradually. The first stage in most fields will be integrating AI tools and assistants. This is already occurring in many white-collar jobs. For example, software developers to automate many tasks, like idea generation or debugging. AI may start helping with employee training or managerial processes like shift scheduling in blue-collar fields. now use machine learning This first stage will occur over the next three to five years. Meanwhile, manufacturing specifically will see an increase in physical automation. For example, AI will begin taking over quality control inspections with the help of computer vision. Most of these integrations will fill empty jobs rather than replace employees. The shift to AI will take longer in some blue-collar fields than in others. For instance, manual labor in agriculture is highly threatened by AI, but the technology still needs much more development. As of 2023, agricultural employees are in the United States. among the least exposed to AI Agriculture has very little advanced electronic equipment, so adding AI will take longer than in fields like manufacturing. Engineers must develop outdoor-ready robotics equipment as well as AI models suited for agriculture. It could take another five to 10 years before tasks like harvesting are viable for automation. On the other end of the spectrum, retail jobs could begin seeing a decline due to AI within the next few years. Automation is already rapidly phasing out tasks like employee-serviced checkout lanes. The technology to automate retail is already present in the workplace, so these blue-collar jobs will experience the impact of AI soonest. Working Alongside AI Successfully It’s natural to be concerned about AI eliminating valuable jobs. Most blue-collar careers are at much lower risk of automation than white-collar jobs. However, AI poses a significant threat to manufacturing, retail, and agriculture careers. Luckily, it will mainly fill empty positions in these industries rather than displacing employees. AI can be a valuable assistant in many situations by reducing workloads and stress.

Is There an AI Threat to Blue-Collar Jobs?

THE STORM BURSTS.

Mark Twain's Speeches by Mark Twain, is part of the HackerNoon Books Series. You can jump to any chapter in this book . THE SAVAGE CLUB DINNER here THE SAVAGE CLUB DINNER A portrait of Mr. Clemens, signed by all the members of the
          club attending the dinner, was presented to him, July 6, 1907,
          and in submitting the toast “The Health of Mark Twain” Mr. J.
          Scott Stokes recalled the fact that he had read parts of Doctor
          Clemens’s works to Harold Frederic during Frederic’s last
          illness. MR. CHAIRMAN AND FELLOW-SAVAGES,—I am very glad indeed to have that portrait. I think it is the best one that I have ever had, and there have been opportunities before to get a good photograph. I have sat to photographers twenty-two times to-day. Those sittings added to those that have preceded them since I have been in Europe—if we average at that rate—must have numbered one hundred to two hundred sittings. Out of all those there ought to be some good photographs. This is the best I have had, and I am glad to have your honored names on it. I did not know Harold Frederic personally, but I have heard a great deal about him, and nothing that was not pleasant and nothing except such things as lead a man to honor another man and to love him. I consider that it is a misfortune of mine that I have never had the luck to meet him, and if any book of mine read to him in his last hours made those hours easier for him and more comfortable, I am very glad and proud of that. I call to mind such a case many years ago of an English authoress, well known in her day, who wrote such beautiful child tales, touching and lovely in every possible way. In a little biographical sketch of her I found that her last hours were spent partly in reading a book of mine, until she was no longer able to read. That has always remained in my mind, and I have always cherished it as one of the good things of my life. I had read what she had written, and had loved her for what she had done. Stanley apparently carried a book of mine feloniously away to Africa, and I have not a doubt that it had a noble and uplifting influence there in the wilds of Africa—because on his previous journeys he never carried anything to read except Shakespeare and the Bible. I did not know of that circumstance. I did not know that he had carried a book of mine. I only noticed that when he came back he was a reformed man. I knew Stanley very well in those old days. Stanley was the first man who ever reported a lecture of mine, and that was in St. Louis. When I was down there the next time to give the same lecture I was told to give them something fresh, as they had read that in the papers. I met Stanley here when he came back from that first expedition of his which closed with the finding of Livingstone. You remember how he would break out at the meetings of the British Association, and find fault with what people said, because Stanley had notions of his own, and could not contain them. They had to come out or break him up—and so he would go round and address geographical societies. He was always on the warpath in those days, and people always had to have Stanley contradicting their geography for them and improving it. But he always came back and sat drinking beer with me in the hotel up to two in the morning, and he was then one of the most civilized human beings that ever was. I saw in a newspaper this evening a reference to an interview which appeared in one of the papers the other day, in which the interviewer said that I characterized Mr. Birrell’s speech the other day at the Pilgrims’ Club as “bully.” Now, if you will excuse me, I never use slang to an interviewer or anybody else. That distresses me. Whatever I said about Mr. Birrell’s speech was said in English, as good English as anybody uses. If I could not describe Mr. Birrell’s delightful speech without using slang I would not describe it at all. I would close my mouth and keep it closed, much as it would discomfort me. Now that comes of interviewing a man in the first person, which is an altogether wrong way to interview him. It is entirely wrong because none of you, I, or anybody else, could interview a man—could listen to a man talking any length of time and then go off and reproduce that talk in the first person. It can’t be done. What results is merely that the interviewer gives the substance of what is said and puts it in his own language and puts it in your mouth. It will always be either better language than you use or worse, and in my case it is always worse. I have a great respect for the English language. I am one of its supporters, its promoters, its elevators. I don’t degrade it. A slip of the tongue would be the most that you would get from me. I have always tried hard and faithfully to improve my English and never to degrade it. I always try to use the best English to describe what I think and what I feel, or what I don’t feel and what I don’t think. I am not one of those who in expressing opinions confine themselves to facts. I don’t know anything that mars good literature so completely as too much truth. Facts contain a deal of poetry, but you can’t use too many of them without damaging your literature. I love all literature, and as long as I am a doctor of literature—I have suggested to you for twenty years I have been diligently trying to improve my own literature, and now, by virtue of the University of Oxford, I mean to doctor everybody else’s. Now I think I ought to apologize for my clothes. At home I venture things that I am not permitted by my family to venture in foreign parts. I was instructed before I left home and ordered to refrain from white clothes in England. I meant to keep that command fair and clean, and I would have done it if I had been in the habit of obeying instructions, but I can’t invent a new process in life right away. I have not had white clothes on since I crossed the ocean until now. In these three or four weeks I have grown so tired of gray and black that you have earned my gratitude in permitting me to come as I have. I wear white clothes in the depth of winter in my home, but I don’t go out in the streets in them. I don’t go out to attract too much attention. I like to attract some, and always I would like to be dressed so that I may be more conspicuous than anybody else. If I had been an ancient Briton, I would not have contented myself with blue paint, but I would have bankrupted the rainbow. I so enjoy gay clothes in which women clothe themselves that it always grieves me when I go to the opera to see that, while women look like a flower-bed, the men are a few gray stumps among them in their black evening dress. These are two or three reasons why I wish to wear white clothes: When I find myself in assemblies like this, with everybody in black clothes, I know I possess something that is superior to everybody else’s. Clothes are never clean. You don’t know whether they are clean or not, because you can’t see. Here or anywhere you must scour your head every two or three days or it is full of grit. Your clothes must collect just as much dirt as your hair. If you wear white clothes you are clean, and your cleaning bill gets so heavy that you have to take care. I am proud to say that I can wear a white suit of clothes without a blemish for three days. If you need any further instruction in the matter of clothes I shall be glad to give it to you. I hope I have convinced some of you that it is just as well to wear white clothes as any other kind. I do not want to boast. I only want to make you understand that you are not clean. As to age, the fact that I am nearly seventy-two years old does not clearly indicate how old I am, because part of every day—it is with me as with you, you try to describe your age, and you cannot do it. Sometimes you are only fifteen; sometimes you are twenty-five. It is very seldom in a day that I am seventy-two years old. I am older now sometimes than I was when I used to rob orchards; a thing which I would not do to-day—if the orchards were watched. I am so glad to be here to-night. I am so glad to renew with the Savages that now ancient time when I first sat with a company of this club in London in 1872. That is a long time ago. But I did stay with the Savages a night in London long ago, and as I had come into a very strange land, and was with friends, as I could see, that has always remained in my mind as a peculiarly blessed evening, since it brought me into contact with men of my own kind and my own feelings. I am glad to be here, and to see you all again, because it is very likely that I shall not see you again. It is easier than I thought to come across the Atlantic. I have been received, as you know, in the most delightfully generous way in England ever since I came here. It keeps me choked up all the time. Everybody is so generous, and they do seem to give you such a hearty welcome. Nobody in the world can appreciate it higher than I do. It did not wait till I got to London, but when I came ashore at Tilbury the stevedores on the dock raised the first welcome—a good and hearty welcome from the men who do the heavy labor in the world, and save you and me having to do it. They are the men who with their hands build empires and make them prosper. It is because of them that the others are wealthy and can live in luxury. They received me with a “Hurrah!” that went to my heart. They are the men that build civilization, and without them no civilization can be built. So I came first to the authors and creators of civilization, and I blessedly end this happy meeting with the Savages who destroy it. About HackerNoon Book Series: We bring you the most important technical, scientific, and insightful public domain books. This book is part of the public domain. Mark Twain (2004). Mark Twain's Speeches. Urbana, Illinois: Project Gutenberg. Retrieved October 2022 https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/3188/pg3188-images.html This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at , located at . www.gutenberg.org https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html

THE SAVAGE CLUB DINNER

Mark Twain's Speeches by Mark Twain, is part of the HackerNoon Books Series. You can jump to any chapter in this book . SIXTY-SEVENTH BIRTHDAY here SIXTY-SEVENTH BIRTHDAY AT THE METROPOLITAN CLUB, NEW YORK, NOVEMBER 28, 1902

          Address at a dinner given in honor of Mr. Clemens by Colonel
          Harvey, President of Harper & Brothers. I think I ought to be allowed to talk as long as I want to, for the reason that I have cancelled all my winter’s engagements of every kind, for good and sufficient reasons, and am making no new engagements for this winter, and, therefore, this is the only chance I shall have to disembowel my skull for a year—close the mouth in that portrait for a year. I want to offer thanks and homage to the chairman for this innovation which he has introduced here, which is an improvement, as I consider it, on the old-fashioned style of conducting occasions like this. That was bad that was a bad, bad, bad arrangement. Under that old custom the chairman got up and made a speech, he introduced the prisoner at the bar, and covered him all over with compliments, nothing but compliments, not a thing but compliments, never a slur, and sat down and left that man to get up and talk without a text. You cannot talk on compliments; that is not a text. No modest person, and I was born one, can talk on compliments. A man gets up and is filled to the eyes with happy emotions, but his tongue is tied; he has nothing to say; he is in the condition of Doctor Rice’s friend who came home drunk and explained it to his wife, and his wife said to him, “John, when you have drunk all the whiskey you want, you ought to ask for sarsaparilla.” He said, “Yes, but when I have drunk all the whiskey I want I can’t say sarsaparilla.” And so I think it is much better to leave a man unmolested until the testimony and pleadings are all in. Otherwise he is dumb—he is at the sarsaparilla stage. Before I get to the higgledy-piggledy point, as Mr. Howells suggested I do, I want to thank you, gentlemen, for this very high honor you are doing me, and I am quite competent to estimate it at its value. I see around me captains of all the illustrious industries, most distinguished men; there are more than fifty here, and I believe I know thirty-nine of them well. I could probably borrow money from—from the others, anyway. It is a proud thing to me, indeed, to see such a distinguished company gather here on such an occasion as this, when there is no foreign prince to be feted—when you have come here not to do honor to hereditary privilege and ancient lineage, but to do reverence to mere moral excellence and elemental veracity-and, dear me, how old it seems to make me! I look around me and I see three or four persons I have known so many, many years. I have known Mr. Secretary Hay—John Hay, as the nation and the rest of his friends love to call him—I have known John Hay and Tom Reed and the Reverend Twichell close upon thirty-six years. Close upon thirty-six years I have known those venerable men. I have known Mr. Howells nearly thirty-four years, and I knew Chauncey Depew before he could walk straight, and before he learned to tell the truth. Twenty-seven years ago, I heard him make the most noble and eloquent and beautiful speech that has ever fallen from even his capable lips. Tom Reed said that my principal defect was inaccuracy of statement. Well, suppose that that is true. What’s the use of telling the truth all the time? I never tell the truth about Tom Reed—but that is his defect, truth; he speaks the truth always. Tom Reed has a good heart, and he has a good intellect, but he hasn’t any judgment. Why, when Tom Reed was invited to lecture to the Ladies’ Society for the Procreation or Procrastination, or something, of morals, I don’t know what it was—advancement, I suppose, of pure morals—he had the immortal indiscretion to begin by saying that some of us can’t be optimists, but by judiciously utilizing the opportunities that Providence puts in our way we can all be bigamists. You perceive his limitations. Anything he has in his mind he states, if he thinks it is true. Well, that was true, but that was no place to say it—so they fired him out. A lot of accounts have been settled here tonight for me; I have held grudges against some of these people, but they have all been wiped out by the very handsome compliments that have been paid me. Even Wayne MacVeagh—I have had a grudge against him many years. The first time I saw Wayne MacVeagh was at a private dinner-party at Charles A. Dana’s, and when I got there he was clattering along, and I tried to get a word in here and there; but you know what Wayne MacVeagh is when he is started, and I could not get in five words to his one—or one word to his five. I struggled along and struggled along, and—well, I wanted to tell and I was trying to tell a dream I had had the night before, and it was a remarkable dream, a dream worth people’s while to listen to, a dream recounting Sam Jones the revivalist’s reception in heaven. I was on a train, and was approaching the celestial way-station—I had a through ticket—and I noticed a man sitting alongside of me asleep, and he had his ticket in his hat. He was the remains of the Archbishop of Canterbury; I recognized him by his photograph. I had nothing against him, so I took his ticket and let him have mine. He didn’t object—he wasn’t in a condition to object—and presently when the train stopped at the heavenly station—well, I got off, and he went on by request—but there they all were, the angels, you know, millions of them, every one with a torch; they had arranged for a torch-light procession; they were expecting the Archbishop, and when I got off they started to raise a shout, but it didn’t materialize. I don’t know whether they were disappointed. I suppose they had a lot of superstitious ideas about the Archbishop and what he should look like, and I didn’t fill the bill, and I was trying to explain to Saint Peter, and was doing it in the German tongue, because I didn’t want to be too explicit. Well, I found it was no use, I couldn’t get along, for Wayne MacVeagh was occupying the whole place, and I said to Mr. Dana, “What is the matter with that man? Who is that man with the long tongue? What’s the trouble with him, that long, lank cadaver, old oil-derrick out of a job—who is that?” “Well, now,” Mr. Dana said, “you don’t want to meddle with him; you had better keep quiet; just keep quiet, because that’s a bad man. Talk! He was born to talk. Don’t let him get out with you; he’ll skin you.” I said, “I have been skinned, skinned, and skinned for years, there is nothing left.” He said, “Oh, you’ll find there is; that man is the very seed and inspiration of that proverb which says, ‘No matter how close you skin an onion, a clever man can always peel it again.’” Well, I reflected and I quieted down. That would never occur to Tom Reed. He’s got no discretion. Well, MacVeagh is just the same man; he hasn’t changed a bit in all those years; he has been peeling Mr. Mitchell lately. That’s the kind of man he is. Mr. Howells—that poem of his is admirable; that’s the way to treat a person. Howells has a peculiar gift for seeing the merits of people, and he has always exhibited them in my favor. Howells has never written anything about me that I couldn’t read six or seven times a day; he is always just and always fair; he has written more appreciatively of me than any one in this world, and published it in the North American Review. He did me the justice to say that my intentions—he italicized that—that my intentions were always good, that I wounded people’s conventions rather than their convictions. Now, I wouldn’t want anything handsomer than that said of me. I would rather wait, with anything harsh I might have to say, till the convictions become conventions. Bangs has traced me all the way down. He can’t find that honest man, but I will look for him in the looking-glass when I get home. It was intimated by the Colonel that it is New England that makes New York and builds up this country and makes it great, overlooking the fact that there’s a lot of people here who came from elsewhere, like John Hay from away out West, and Howells from Ohio, and St. Clair McKelway and me from Missouri, and we are doing what we can to build up New York a little-elevate it. Why, when I was living in that village of Hannibal, Missouri, on the banks of the Mississippi, and Hay up in the town of Warsaw, also on the banks of the Mississippi River it is an emotional bit of the Mississippi, and when it is low water you have to climb up to it on a ladder, and when it floods you have to hunt for it; with a deep-sea lead—but it is a great and beautiful country. In that old time it was a paradise for simplicity—it was a simple, simple life, cheap but comfortable, and full of sweetness, and there was nothing of this rage of modern civilization there at all. It was a delectable land. I went out there last June, and I met in that town of Hannibal a schoolmate of mine, John Briggs, whom I had not seen for more than fifty years. I tell you, that was a meeting! That pal whom I had known as a little boy long ago, and knew now as a stately man three or four inches over six feet and browned by exposure to many climes, he was back there to see that old place again. We spent a whole afternoon going about here and there and yonder, and hunting up the scenes and talking of the crimes which we had committed so long ago. It was a heartbreaking delight, full of pathos, laughter, and tears, all mixed together; and we called the roll of the boys and girls that we picnicked and sweethearted with so many years ago, and there were hardly half a dozen of them left; the rest were in their graves; and we went up there on the summit of that hill, a treasured place in my memory, the summit of Holiday’s Hill, and looked out again over that magnificent panorama of the Mississippi River, sweeping along league after league, a level green paradise on one side, and retreating capes and promontories as far as you could see on the other, fading away in the soft, rich lights of the remote distance. I recognized then that I was seeing now the most enchanting river view the planet could furnish. I never knew it when I was a boy; it took an educated eye that had travelled over the globe to know and appreciate it; and John said, “Can you point out the place where Bear Creek used to be before the railroad came?” I said, “Yes, it ran along yonder.” “And can you point out the swimming-hole?” “Yes, out there.” And he said, “Can you point out the place where we stole the skiff?” Well, I didn’t know which one he meant. Such a wilderness of events had intervened since that day, more than fifty years ago, it took me more than five minutes to call back that little incident, and then I did call it back; it was a white skiff, and we painted it red to allay suspicion. And the saddest, saddest man came along—a stranger he was—and he looked that red skiff over so pathetically, and he said: “Well, if it weren’t for the complexion I’d know whose skiff that was.” He said it in that pleading way, you know, that appeals for sympathy and suggestion; we were full of sympathy for him, but we weren’t in any condition to offer suggestions. I can see him yet as he turned away with that same sad look on his face and vanished out of history forever. I wonder what became of that man. I know what became of the skiff. Well, it was a beautiful life, a lovely life. There was no crime. Merely little things like pillaging orchards and watermelon-patches and breaking the Sabbath—we didn’t break the Sabbath often enough to signify—once a week perhaps. But we were good boys, good Presbyterian boys, all Presbyterian boys, and loyal and all that; anyway, we were good Presbyterian boys when the weather was doubtful; when it was fair, we did wander a little from the fold. Look at John Hay and me. There we were in obscurity, and look where we are now. Consider the ladder which he has climbed, the illustrious vocations he has served—and vocations is the right word; he has in all those vocations acquitted himself with high credit and honor to his country and to the mother that bore him. Scholar, soldier, diplomat, poet, historian—now, see where we are. He is Secretary of State and I am a gentleman. It could not happen in any other country. Our institutions give men the positions that of right belong to them through merit; all you men have won your places, not by heredities, and not by family influence or extraneous help, but only by the natural gifts God gave you at your birth, made effective by your own energies; this is the country to live in. Now, there is one invisible guest here. A part of me is present; the larger part, the better part, is yonder at her home; that is my wife, and she has a good many personal friends here, and I think it won’t distress any one of them to know that, although she is going to be confined to that bed for many months to come from that nervous prostration, there is not any danger and she is coming along very well—and I think it quite appropriate that I should speak of her. I knew her for the first time just in the same year that I first knew John Hay and Tom Reed and Mr. Twichell—thirty-six years ago—and she has been the best friend I have ever had, and that is saying a good deal; she has reared me—she and Twichell together—and what I am I owe to them. Twichell—why, it is such a pleasure to look upon Twichell’s face! For five-and-twenty years I was under the Rev. Mr. Twichell’s tuition, I was in his pastorate, occupying a pew in his church, and held him in due reverence. That man is full of all the graces that go to make a person companionable and beloved; and wherever Twichell goes to start a church the people flock there to buy the land; they find real estate goes up all around the spot, and the envious and the thoughtful always try to get Twichell to move to their neighborhood and start a church; and wherever you see him go you can go and buy land there with confidence, feeling sure that there will be a double price for you before very long. I am not saying this to flatter Mr. Twichell; it is the fact. Many and many a time I have attended the annual sale in his church, and bought up all the pews on a margin—and it would have been better for me spiritually and financially if I had stayed under his wing. I have tried to do good in this world, and it is marvellous in how many different ways I have done good, and it is comfortable to reflect—now, there’s Mr. Rogers—just out of the affection I bear that man many a time I have given him points in finance that he had never thought of—and if he could lay aside envy, prejudice, and superstition, and utilize those ideas in his business, it would make a difference in his bank account. Well, I like the poetry. I like all the speeches and the poetry, too. I liked Doctor Van Dyke’s poem. I wish I could return thanks in proper measure to you, gentlemen, who have spoken and violated your feelings to pay me compliments; some were merited and some you overlooked, it is true; and Colonel Harvey did slander every one of you, and put things into my mouth that I never said, never thought of at all. And now, my wife and I, out of our single heart, return you our deepest and most grateful thanks, and—yesterday was her birthday. About HackerNoon Book Series: We bring you the most important technical, scientific, and insightful public domain books. This book is part of the public domain. Mark Twain (2004). Mark Twain's Speeches. Urbana, Illinois: Project Gutenberg. Retrieved October 2022 https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/3188/pg3188-images.html This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at , located at . www.gutenberg.org https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html

SIXTY-SEVENTH BIRTHDAY

A Treatise on Domestic Economy; For the Use of Young Ladies at Home and at School by Catharine Esther Beecher, is part of the HackerNoon Books Series. You can jump to any chapter in this book . ON THE CULTIVATION OF FRUIT. here CHAPTER XXXVI. ON THE CULTIVATION OF FRUIT. By a little attention to this matter, a lady, with the help of her children, can obtain a rich abundance of all kinds of fruit. The writer has resided in families, where little boys, of eight, ten, and twelve years old, amused themselves, under the direction of their mother, in planting walnuts, chestnuts, and hazelnuts, for future time; as well as in planting and inoculating young fruit-trees, of all descriptions. A mother, who will take pains to inspire a love for such pursuits, in her children, and who will aid and superintend them, will save them from many temptations; and, at a trifling expense, secure to them and herself a rich reward, in the choicest fruits. The information given in this work, on this subject, may be relied on, as sanctioned by the most experienced nursery-men. The soil, for a nursery, should be rich, well dug, dressed with well-decayed manure, free from weeds, and protected from cold winds. Fruit seeds should be planted in the Autumn, an inch and a half or two inches deep, in ridges four or five feet apart, pressing the earth firmly over the seeds. While growing, they should be thinned out, leaving the best ones a foot and a half apart. The soil should be kept loose, soft, and free from weeds. They should be inoculated or ingrafted, when of the size of a pipe stem; and in a year after this, may be transplanted to their permanent stand. Peach trees sometimes bear in two years from budding, and in four years from planting, if well kept. In a year after transplanting, take pains to train the head aright. Straight, upright branches, produce , or twigs bearing only leaves. The side branches, which are angular or curved, yield the most fruit. For this reason, the limbs should be trained in curves, and perpendicular twigs should be cut off, if there be need of pruning. The last of June is the time for this. Grass should never be allowed to grow within four feet of a large tree, and the soil should be kept loose, to admit air to the roots. Trees in orchards should be twenty-five feet apart. The soil the top soil, has much to do with the health of trees. If it be what is called , the trees will deteriorate. Trees need to be manured, and to have the soil kept open and free from weeds. gourmands under hard-pan can be raised in any part of this Country. can be raised in the Middle States. For this purpose, in the Autumn, loosen the roots, on one side, and bend the tree down to the earth, on the other; then cover it with a mound of straw, earth, and boards; and early in the Spring raise it up, and cover the roots. grow well in any but a wet soil. They are propagated by cuttings. The old wood should be thinned in the Fall, and manure be put on. They can be trained into small trees. are propagated by layers and cuttings. They are best, when kept from suckers and trained like trees. One third of the old wood should be removed every Autumn. do best, when shaded during a part of the day. They are propagated by layers, slips, and suckers. There is one kind, which bears monthly. require a light soil and vegetable manure. They should be transplanted in April or September, and be set eight inches apart, in rows nine inches asunder, and in beds which are two feet wide, with narrow alleys between them. A part of these plants are . These have large flowers, with showy stamens and high black anthers. The have short stamens, a great number of pistils, and the flowers are every way less showy. In blossom-time, pull out all the non-bearers. Some think it best to leave one non-bearer to every twelve bearers; but others pull them all out. Many beds never produce any fruit, because all the plants in them are non-bearers. Weeds should be kept from the vines. When the vines are matted with young plants, the best way is to dig over the beds, in cross lines, so as to leave some of the plants standing in little squares, while the rest are turned under the soil. This should be done over a second time in the same year. Filberts Figs Currants Gooseberries Raspberries Strawberries non-bearers bearers To raise this fruit, manure the soil, and keep it soft, and free from weeds. A gravelly or sandy soil, and a south exposure, are best. Transplant the vines in the early Spring, or, better, in the Fall. Prune them, the first year, so as to have only two main branches, taking off all other shoots, as fast as they come. In November, cut off all of these two branches, except four eyes. The second year, in the Spring, loosen the earth around the roots, and allow only two branches to grow, and every month, take off all side shoots. When they are very strong, preserve only a part, and cut off the rest in the Fall. In November, cut off all the two main stems, except eight eyes. After the second year no more pruning is needed, except to reduce the side shoots, for the purpose of increasing the fruit. All the pruning of grapes, (except nipping side shoots,) must be done when the sap is not running, or they will bleed to death. Train them on poles, or lattices, to expose them to the air and sun. Cover tender vines in the Autumn. Grapes are propagated by cuttings, layers, and seeds. For cuttings, select, in the Autumn, well-ripened wood, of the former year, and take five joints for each. Bury them, till April; then soak them, for some hours, and set them out, , so that all the eyes but one shall be covered. Grapes. aslant To Preserve Fruit. Raspberries and Strawberries can be preserved, in perfect flavor, in the following manner. Take a pound of nice sifted sugar for each pound of fruit. Put them in alternate layers, of fruit and sugar, till the jar is entirely full, then cork it, and seal it air tight. Currants and Gooseberries may be perfectly preserved thus. Gather them, when dry, selecting only the solid ones. Take off the stalks, and put them in dry junk-bottles. Set them, , in a kettle of water, and slowly raise it to boiling heat, in order to drive the air out of the bottles. Then take out the bottles, cork them, and seal them air tight. Keep them in a dry place, where they will not freeze. The success of this method depends on excluding air and water. uncorked Apples, Grapes, and such like fruit can be preserved, by packing them, when dry and solid, in dry sand or sawdust, putting alternate layers of fruit and sawdust or sand. Some sawdust gives a bad flavor to the fruit. Modes of Preserving Fruit Trees. Heaps of ashes, or tanner's bark, around peach trees, prevent the attack of the worm. The , is a disease of peach trees, which is spread by the pollen of the blossom. When a tree begins to turn yellow, take it away, with all its roots, before it blossoms again, or it will infect other trees. Planting tansy around the roots of fruit trees, is a sure protection against worms, as it prevents the moth from depositing her egg. Equal quantities of salt and saltpetre, put around the trunk of a peach tree, half a pound to a tree, improves the size and flavor of the fruit. Apply this about the first of April, and if any trees have worms already in them, put on half the quantity, in addition, in June. To young trees, just set out, apply one ounce, in April, and another in June, close to the stem. Sandy soil is best for peaches. yellows Apple trees are preserved from insects, by a wash of strong ley to the body and limbs, which, if old, should be first scraped. Caterpillars should be removed, by cutting down their nests in a damp day. Boring a hole, in a tree infested with worms, and filling it with sulphur, will often drive them off immediately. The , or , in pear trees, can be stopped, by cutting off all the blighted branches. It is supposed, by some, to be owing to an excess of sap, which is remedied by diminishing the roots. fire-blight brûlure The , which destroys plums, and other stone fruit, can be checked only by gathering up all the fruit that falls, (which contains their eggs,) and destroying it. The can be checked, by applying a bandage around the body of the tree, and every evening smearing it with fresh tar. curculio canker-worm About HackerNoon Book Series: We bring you the most important technical, scientific, and insightful public domain books. This book is part of the public domain. Catharine Esther Beecher (2007). A Treatise on Domestic Economy; For the Use of Young Ladies at Home and at School. Urbana, Illinois: Project Gutenberg. Retrieved https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/21829/pg21829-images.html This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at , located at . www.gutenberg.org https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html

ON THE CULTIVATION OF FRUIT.

How Jesus fled from Capernaum, and the Galileans at first fell away from him;

I am not in the habit of seeing the Household Words regularly; but a friend

The Mysterious Stranger, and Other Stories by Mark Twain, is part of the HackerNoon Books Series. You can jump to any chapter in this book . Chapter I here Chapter I It was in 1590—winter. Austria was far away from the world, and asleep; it was still the Middle Ages in Austria, and promised to remain so forever. Some even set it away back centuries upon centuries and said that by the mental and spiritual clock it was still the Age of Belief in Austria. But they meant it as a compliment, not a slur, and it was so taken, and we were all proud of it. I remember it well, although I was only a boy; and I remember, too, the pleasure it gave me. Yes, Austria was far from the world, and asleep, and our village was in the middle of that sleep, being in the middle of Austria. It drowsed in peace in the deep privacy of a hilly and woodsy solitude where news from the world hardly ever came to disturb its dreams, and was infinitely content. At its front flowed the tranquil river, its surface painted with cloud-forms and the reflections of drifting arks and stone-boats; behind it rose the woody steeps to the base of the lofty precipice; from the top of the precipice frowned a vast castle, its long stretch of towers and bastions mailed in vines; beyond the river, a league to the left, was a tumbled expanse of forest-clothed hills cloven by winding gorges where the sun never penetrated; and to the right a precipice overlooked the river, and between it and the hills just spoken of lay a far-reaching plain dotted with little homesteads nested among orchards and shade trees. The whole region for leagues around was the hereditary property of a prince, whose servants kept the castle always in perfect condition for occupancy, but neither he nor his family came there oftener than once in five years. When they came it was as if the lord of the world had arrived, and had brought all the glories of its kingdoms along; and when they went they left a calm behind which was like the deep sleep which follows an orgy. Eseldorf was a paradise for us boys. We were not overmuch pestered with schooling. Mainly we were trained to be good Christians; to revere the Virgin, the Church, and the saints above everything. Beyond these matters we were not required to know much; and, in fact, not allowed to. Knowledge was not good for the common people, and could make them discontented with the lot which God had appointed for them, and God would not endure discontentment with His plans. We had two priests. One of them, Father Adolf, was a very zealous and strenuous priest, much considered. There may have been better priests, in some ways, than Father Adolf, but there was never one in our commune who was held in more solemn and awful respect. This was because he had absolutely no fear of the Devil. He was the only Christian I have ever known of whom that could be truly said. People stood in deep dread of him on that account; for they thought that there must be something supernatural about him, else he could not be so bold and so confident. All men speak in bitter disapproval of the Devil, but they do it reverently, not flippantly; but Father Adolf's way was very different; he called him by every name he could lay his tongue to, and it made everyone shudder that heard him; and often he would even speak of him scornfully and scoffingly; then the people crossed themselves and went quickly out of his presence, fearing that something fearful might happen. Father Adolf had actually met Satan face to face more than once, and defied him. This was known to be so. Father Adolf said it himself. He never made any secret of it, but spoke it right out. And that he was speaking true there was proof in at least one instance, for on that occasion he quarreled with the enemy, and intrepidly threw his bottle at him; and there, upon the wall of his study, was the ruddy splotch where it struck and broke. But it was Father Peter, the other priest, that we all loved best and were sorriest for. Some people charged him with talking around in conversation that God was all goodness and would find a way to save all his poor human children. It was a horrible thing to say, but there was never any absolute proof that Father Peter said it; and it was out of character for him to say it, too, for he was always good and gentle and truthful. He wasn't charged with saying it in the pulpit, where all the congregation could hear and testify, but only outside, in talk; and it is easy for enemies to manufacture that. Father Peter had an enemy and a very powerful one, the astrologer who lived in a tumbled old tower up the valley, and put in his nights studying the stars. Every one knew he could foretell wars and famines, though that was not so hard, for there was always a war, and generally a famine somewhere. But he could also read any man's life through the stars in a big book he had, and find lost property, and every one in the village except Father Peter stood in awe of him. Even Father Adolf, who had defied the Devil, had a wholesome respect for the astrologer when he came through our village wearing his tall, pointed hat and his long, flowing robe with stars on it, carrying his big book, and a staff which was known to have magic power. The bishop himself sometimes listened to the astrologer, it was said, for, besides studying the stars and prophesying, the astrologer made a great show of piety, which would impress the bishop, of course. But Father Peter took no stock in the astrologer. He denounced him openly as a charlatan—a fraud with no valuable knowledge of any kind, or powers beyond those of an ordinary and rather inferior human being, which naturally made the astrologer hate Father Peter and wish to ruin him. It was the astrologer, as we all believed, who originated the story about Father Peter's shocking remark and carried it to the bishop. It was said that Father Peter had made the remark to his niece, Marget, though Marget denied it and implored the bishop to believe her and spare her old uncle from poverty and disgrace. But the bishop wouldn't listen. He suspended Father Peter indefinitely, though he wouldn't go so far as to excommunicate him on the evidence of only one witness; and now Father Peter had been out a couple of years, and our other priest, Father Adolf, had his flock. Those had been hard years for the old priest and Marget. They had been favorites, but of course that changed when they came under the shadow of the bishop's frown. Many of their friends fell away entirely, and the rest became cool and distant. Marget was a lovely girl of eighteen when the trouble came, and she had the best head in the village, and the most in it. She taught the harp, and earned all her clothes and pocket money by her own industry. But her scholars fell off one by one now; she was forgotten when there were dances and parties among the youth of the village; the young fellows stopped coming to the house, all except Wilhelm Meidling—and he could have been spared; she and her uncle were sad and forlorn in their neglect and disgrace, and the sunshine was gone out of their lives. Matters went worse and worse, all through the two years. Clothes were wearing out, bread was harder and harder to get. And now, at last, the very end was come. Solomon Isaacs had lent all the money he was willing to put on the house, and gave notice that to-morrow he would foreclose. About HackerNoon Book Series: We bring you the most important technical, scientific, and insightful public domain books. This book is part of the public domain. Mark Twain (2008). The Mysterious Stranger, and Other Stories. Urbana, Illinois: Project Gutenberg. Retrieved October 2022 https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/3186/pg3186-images.html This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at , located at . www.gutenberg.org https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html

It was in 1590—winter

Ali Pacha by Alexandre Dumas, is part of the HackerNoon Books Series. You can jump to any chapter in this book here . Chapter VI CHAPTER VI Ali had long cherished a violent passion for Zobeide, the wife of his son Veli Pacha: Having vainly attempted to gratify it after his son’s departure, and being indignantly repulsed, he had recourse to drugs, and the unhappy Zobeide remained in ignorance of her misfortune until she found she was pregnant. Then, half-avowals from her women, compelled to obey the pacha from fear of death, mixed with confused memories of her own, revealed the whole terrible truth. Not knowing in her despair which way to turn, she wrote to Ali, entreating him to visit the harem. As head of the family, he had a right to enter, being supposed responsible for the conduct of his sons’ families, no-law-giver having hitherto contemplated the possibility of so disgraceful a crime. When he appeared, Zobeide flung herself at his feet, speechless with grief. Ali acknowledged his guilt, pleaded the violence of his passion, wept with his victim, and entreating her to control herself and keep silence, promised that all should be made right. Neither the prayers nor tears of Zobeide could induce him to give up the intention of effacing the traces of his first crime by a second even more horrible. But the story was already whispered abroad, and Pacho Bey learnt all its details from the spies he kept in Janina. Delighted at the prospect of avenging himself on the father, he hastened with his news to the son. Veli Pacha, furious, vowed vengeance, and demanded Pacho Bey’s help, which was readily promised. But Ali had been warned, and was not a man to be taken unawares. Pacho Bey, whom Veli had just promoted to the office of sword-bearer, was attacked in broad daylight by six emissaries sent from Janina. He obtained timely help, however, and five of the assassins, taken red-handed, were at once hung without ceremony in the market-place. The sixth was the messenger whose arrival with the news had caused such dismay at Ali’s banquet. As Ali reflected how the storm he had raised could best be laid, he was informed that the ruler of the marriage feast sent by Moustai, Pacha of Scodra, to receive the young bride who should reign in his harem, had just arrived in the plain of Janina. He was Yussuf Bey of the Delres, an old enemy of Ali’s, and had encamped with his escort of eight hundred warriors at the foot of Tomoros of Dodona. Dreading some treachery, he absolutely refused all entreaties to enter the town, and Ali seeing that it was useless to insist, and that his adversary for the present was safe, at once sent his grand-daughter, the Princess of Aulis, out to him. This matter disposed of, Ali was able to attend to his hideous family tragedy. He began by effecting the disappearance of the women whom he had been compelled to make his accomplices; they were simply sewn up in sacks by gipsies and thrown into the lake. This done, he himself led the executioners into a subterranean part of the castle, where they were beheaded by black mutes as a reward for their obedience. He then sent a doctor to Zobeide; who succeeded in causing a miscarriage, and who, his work done, was seized and strangled by the black mutes who had just beheaded the gipsies. Having thus got rid of all who could bear witness to his crime, he wrote to Veli that he might now send for his wife and two of his children, hitherto detained as hostages, and that the innocence of Zobeide would confound a calumniator who had dared to assail him with such injurious suspicions. When this letter arrived, Pacho Bey, distrusting equally the treachery of the father and the weakness of the son, and content with having sown the seeds of dissension in his enemy’s family, had sufficient wisdom to seek safety in flight. Ali, furious, vowed, on hearing this, that his vengeance should overtake him even at the ends of the earth. Meanwhile he fell back on Yussuf Bey of the Debres, whose escape when lately at Janina still rankled in his mind. As Yussuf was dangerous both from character and influence, Ali feared to attack him openly, and sought to assassinate him. This was not precisely easy; for, exposed to a thousand dangers of this kind, the nobles of that day were on their guard. Steel and poison were used up, and another way had to be sought. Ali found it. One of the many adventurers with whom Janina was filled penetrated to the pacha’s presence, and offered to sell the secret of a powder whereof three grains would suffice to kill a man with a terrible explosion—explosive powder, in short. Ali heard with delight, but replied that he must see it in action before purchasing. In the dungeons of the castle by the lake, a poor monk of the order of St. Basil was slowly dying, for having boldly refused a sacrilegious simony proposed to him by Ali. He was a fit subject for the experiment, and was successfully blown to pieces, to the great satisfaction of Ali, who concluded his bargain, and hastened to make use of it. He prepared a false firman, which, according to custom, was enclosed and sealed in a cylindrical case, and sent to Yussuf Bey by a Greek, wholly ignorant of the real object of his mission. Opening it without suspicion, Yussuf had his arm blown off, and died in consequence, but found time to despatch a message to Moustai Pacha of Scodra, informing him of the catastrophe, and warning him to keep good guard. Yussuf’s letter was received by Moustai just as a similar infernal machine was placed in his hands under cover to his young wife. The packet was seized, and a careful examination disclosed its nature. The mother of Moustai, a jealous and cruel woman, accused her daughter-in-law of complicity, and the unfortunate Ayesha, though shortly to become a mother, expired in agony from the effects of poison, only guilty of being the innocent instrument of her grandfather’s treachery. Fortune having frustrated Ali’s schemes concerning Moustai Pacha, offered him as consolation a chance of invading the territory of Parga, the only place in Epirus which had hitherto escaped his rule, and which he greedily coveted. Agia, a small Christian town on the coast, had rebelled against him and allied itself to Parga. It provided an excuse for hostilities, and Ali’s troops, under his son Mouktar, first seized Agia, where they only found a few old men to massacre, and then marched on Parga, where the rebels had taken refuge. After a few skirmishes, Mouktar entered the town, and though the Parganiotes fought bravely, they must inevitably have surrendered had they been left to themselves. But they had sought protection from the French, who had garrisoned the citadel, and the French grenadiers descending rapidly from the height, charged the Turks with so much fury that they fled in all directions, leaving on the field four “bimbashis,” or captains of a thousand, and a considerable number of killed and wounded. The pacha’s fleet succeeded no better than his army. Issuing from the Gulf of Ambracia, it was intended to attack Parga from the sea, joining in the massacre, and cutting off all hope of escape from that side, Ali meaning to spare neither the garrison nor any male inhabitants over twelve years of age. But a few shots fired from a small fort dispersed the ships, and a barque manned by sailors from Paxos pursued them, a shot from which killed Ali’s admiral on his quarter-deck. He was a Greek of Galaxidi, Athanasius Macrys by name. Filled with anxiety, Ali awaited news at Prevesa, where a courier, sent off at the beginning of the action, had brought him oranges gathered in the orchards of Parga. Ali gave him a purse of gold, and publicly proclaimed his success. His joy was redoubled when a second messenger presented two heads of French soldiers, and announced that his troops were in possession of the lower part of Parga. Without further delay he ordered his attendants to mount, entered his carriage, and started triumphantly on the Roman road to Nicopolis. He sent messengers to his generals, ordering them to spare the women and children of Parga, intended for his harem, and above all to take strict charge of the plunder. He was approaching the arena of Nicopolis when a third Tartar messenger informed him of the defeat of his army. Ali changed countenance, and could scarcely articulate the order to return to Prevesa. Once in his palace, he gave way to such fury that all around him trembled, demanding frequently if it could be true that his troops were beaten. “May your misfortune be upon us!” his attendants answered, prostrating themselves. All at once, looking out on the calm blue sea which lay before his windows, he perceived his fleet doubling Cape Pancrator and re-entering the Ambracian Gulf under full sail; it anchored close by the palace, and on hailing the leading ship a speaking trumpet announced to Ali the death of his admiral, Athanasius Macrys. “But Parga, Parga!” cried Ali. “May Allah grant the pacha long life! The Parganiotes have escaped the sword of His Highness.” “It is the will of Allah!” murmured the pacha; whose head sank upon his breast in dejection. Arms having failed, Ali, as usual, took refuge in plots and treachery, but this time, instead of corrupting his enemies with gold, he sought to weaken them by division. About HackerNoon Book Series: We bring you the most important technical, scientific, and insightful public domain books. This book is part of the public domain. Alexandre Dumas (2006). Ali Pacha. Urbana, Illinois: Project Gutenberg. Retrieved https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/2753/pg2753-images.html This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org , located at https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html .

Ali had long cherished a violent passion for Zobeide

Emily of New Moon by L. M. Montgomery, is part of the HackerNoon Books Series. You can jump to any chapter in this book here . A Daughter of Eve CHAPTER XIII. A Daughter of Eve NEW MOON was noted for its apples and on that first autumn of Emily’s life there both the “old” and the “new” orchards bore a bumper crop. In the new were the titled and pedigreed apples; and in the old the seedlings, unknown to catalogues, that yet had a flavour wildly sweet and all their own. There was no taboo on any apple and Emily was free to eat all she wanted of each and every kind,—the only prohibition being that she must not take any to bed with her. Aunt Elizabeth, very properly, did not want her bed messed up with apple seeds; and Aunt Laura had a horror of any one eating apples in the dark lest they might eat an apple worm into the bargain. Emily, therefore, should have been able fully to satisfy her appetite for apples at home; but there is a certain odd kink in human nature by reason of which the flavour of the apples belonging to somebody else is always vastly superior to our own—as the crafty serpent of Eden very well knew. Emily, like most people, possessed this kink, and consequently thought that nowhere were there such delicious apples as those belonging to Lofty John. He was in the habit of keeping a long row of apples on one of the beams in his workshop and it was understood that she and Ilse might help themselves freely whenever they visited that charming, dusty, shaving-carpeted spot. Three varieties of Lofty John’s apples were their especial favourites—the “scabby apples,” that looked as if they had leprosy but were of unsurpassed deliciousness under their queerly blotched skins; the “little red apples,” scarcely bigger than a crab, deep crimson all over and glossy as satin, that had such a sweet, nutty flavour; and the big green “sweet apples” that children usually thought the best of all. Emily considered that day wasted whose low descending sun had not beheld her munching one of Lofty John’s big green sweets. In the back of her mind Emily knew quite well that she should not be going to Lofty John’s at all. To be sure, she had never been forbidden to go—simply because it had never occurred to her aunts that an inmate of New Moon could so forget the beloved old family feud between the houses of Murray and Sullivan belonging to two generations back. It was an inheritance that any proper Murray would live up to as a matter of course. But when Emily was off with that wild little Ishmaelite of an Ilse, traditions lost their power under the allurement of Lofty John’s “reds” and “scabs.” She wandered rather lonesomely into his workshop one September evening at twilight. She had been alone since she came from school; her aunts and Cousin Jimmy had gone to Shrewsbury, promising to be back by sunset. Ilse was away also, her father, prodded thereto by Mrs. Simms, having taken her to Charlottetown to get her a winter coat. Emily liked being alone very well at first. She felt quite important over being in charge of New Moon. She ate the supper Aunt Laura had left on the cook-house dresser for her and she went into the dairy and skimmed six lovely big pans of milk. She had no business at all to do this but she had always hankered to do it and this was too good a chance to be missed. She did it beautifully and nobody ever knew—each aunt supposing the other had done it—and so she was never scolded for it. This does not point any particular moral, of course; in a proper yarn Emily should either have been found out and punished for disobedience or been driven by an uneasy conscience to confess; but I am sorry—or ought to be—to have to state that Emily’s conscience never worried her about the matter at all. Still, she was doomed to suffer enough that night from an entirely different cause, to balance all her little peccadillos. By the time the cream was skimmed and poured into the big stone crock and well stirred—Emily didn’t forget , either—it was after sunset and still nobody had come home. Emily didn’t like the idea of going alone into the big, dusky, echoing house; so she hied her to Lofty John’s shop, which she found unoccupied, though the plane halted midway on a board indicated that Lofty John had been working there quite recently and would probably return. Emily sat down on a round section of a huge log and looked around to see what she could get to eat. There was a row of “reds” and “scabs” clean across the side of the shop but no “sweet” among them; and Emily felt that what she needed just then was a “sweet” and nothing else. that Then she spied one—a huge one—the biggest “sweet” Emily had ever seen, all by itself on one of the steps of the stair leading up to the loft. She climbed up, possessed herself of it and ate it out of hand. She was gnawing happily at the core when Lofty John came in. He nodded to her with a seemingly careless glance around. “Just been in to get my supper,” he said. “The wife’s away so I had to get it myself.” He fell to planing in silence. Emily sat on the stairs, counting the seeds of the big “sweet”—you told your fortunes by the seeds—listening to the Wind Woman whistling elfishly through a knot hole in the loft, and composing a “Deskripshun of Lofty John’s Carpenter Shop By Lantern Light,” to be written later on a letter-bill. She was lost in a mental hunt for an accurate phrase to picture the absurd elongated shadow of Lofty John’s nose on the opposite wall when Lofty John whirled about, so suddenly that the shadow of his nose shot upward like a huge spear to the ceiling, and demanded in a startled voice, “What’s become av that big sweet apple that was on that stair?” “Why—I—I et it,” stammered Emily. Lofty John dropped his plane, threw up his hands, and looked at Emily with a horrified face. “The saints preserve us, child! Ye never et that apple—don’t tell me ye’ve gone and et apple!” that “Yes, I did,” said Emily uncomfortably. “I didn’t think it was any harm—I—” “Harm! Listen to her, will you? That apple was poisoned for the rats! They’ve been plaguing me life out here and I had me mind made up to finish their fun. And now you’ve et the apple—it would kill a dozen av ye in a brace of shakes.” Lofty John saw a white face and a gingham apron flash through the workshop and out into the dark. Emily’s first wild impulse was to get home at once—before she dropped dead. She tore across the field through the bush and the garden and dashed into the house. It was still silent and dark—nobody was home yet. Emily gave a bitter little shriek of despair—when they came they would find her stiff and cold, black in the face likely, everything in this dear world ended for her forever, all because she had eaten an apple which she thought she was perfectly welcome to eat. It wasn’t fair—she didn’t want to die. But she must. She only hoped desperately that some one would come before she was dead. It would be so terrible to die there all alone in that great, big, empty New Moon. She dared not try to go anywhere for help. It was too dark now and she would likely drop dead on the way. To die out there—alone—in the dark—oh, that would be too dreadful. It did not occur to her that anything could be done for her; she thought if you once swallowed poison that was the end of you. With hands shaking in panic she got a candle lighted. It wasn’t quite so bad then—you face things in the light. And Emily, pale, terrified, alone, was already deciding that this must be faced bravely. She must not shame the Starrs and the Murrays. She clenched her cold hands and tried to stop trembling. How long would it be before she died, she wondered. Lofty John had said the apple would kill her in a “brace of shakes.” What did that mean? How long was a brace of shakes? Would it hurt her to die? She had a vague idea that poison did hurt you awfully. Oh; and just a little while ago she had been so happy! She had thought she was going to live for years and write great poems and be famous like Mrs. Hemans. She had had a fight with Ilse the night before and hadn’t made it up yet—never could make it up now. And Ilse would feel so terribly. She must write her a note and forgive her. Was there time for that much? Oh, how cold her hands were! Perhaps that meant she was dying already. She had heard or read that your hands turned cold when you were dying. She wondered if her face was turning black. She grasped her candle and hurried up the stairs to the spare-room. There was a looking-glass there—the only one in the house hung low enough for her to see her reflection if she tipped the bottom of it back. Ordinarily Emily would have been frightened to death at the mere thought of going into that spare-room by dim, flickering candlelight. But the one great terror had swallowed up all lesser ones. She looked at her reflection, amid the sleek, black flow of her hair, in the upward-striking light on the dark background of the shadowy room. Oh, she was pale as the dead already. Yes, that was a dying face—there could be no doubt of it. could Something rose up in Emily and took possession of her—some inheritance from the good old stock behind her. She ceased to tremble—she accepted her fate—with bitter regret, but calmly. “I don’t want to die but since I have to I’ll die as becomes a Murray,” she said. She had read a similar sentence in a book and it came pat to the moment. And now she must hurry. That letter to Ilse must be written. Emily went to Aunt Elizabeth’s room first, to assure herself that her right-hand top bureau drawer was quite tidy; then she flitted up the garret stairs to her dormer corner. The great place was full of lurking, pouncing shadows that crowded about the little island of faint candlelight, but they had no terrors for Emily now. “And to think I was feeling so bad to-day because my petticoat was bunchy,” she thought, as she got one of her dear letter-bills—the last she would ever write on. There was no need to write to Father—she would see him soon—but Ilse must have her letter—dear, loving, jolly, hot-tempered Ilse, who, just the day before had shrieked insulting epithets after her and who would be haunted by remorse all her life for it. “Dearest Ilse,” wrote Emily, her hand shaking a little but her lips firmly set. “I am going to die. I have been poisoned by an apple Lofty John had put for rats. I will never see you again, but I am writing this to tell you I love you and you are not to feel bad because you called me a skunk and a bloodthirsty mink yesterday. I forgive you, so do not worry over it. And I am sorry I told you that you were beneath contemt because I didn’t mean a word of it. I leave you all my share of the broken dishes in our playhouse and please tell Teddy good-bye for me. He will never be able to teach me how to put worms on a fish-hook now. I promised him I would learn because I did not want him to think I was a coward but I am glad I did not for I know what the worm feels like now. I do not feel sick yet but I dont know what the simptoms of poisoning are and Lofty John said there was enough to kill a dozen of me so I cant have long to live. If Aunt Elizabeth is willing you can have my necklace of Venetian beads. It is the only valuble possession I have. Don’t let anybody do anything to Lofty John because he did not mean to poison me and it was all my own fault for being so greedy. Perhaps people will think he did it on purpose because I am a Protestant but I feel sure he did not and please tell him not to be hawnted by remorse. I think I feel a pain in my stomach now so I guess that the end draws ni. Fare well and remember her who died so young. “Your own devoted, “ .” Emily As Emily folded up her letter-bill she heard the sound of wheels in the yard below. A moment later Elizabeth and Laura Murray were confronted in the kitchen by a tragic-faced little creature, grasping a guttering candle in one hand and a red letter-bill in the other. “Emily, what is the matter?” cried Aunt Laura. “I’m dying,” said Emily solemnly. “I et an apple Lofty John had poisoned for rats. I have only a few minutes to live, Aunt Laura.” Laura Murray dropped down on the black bench with her hand at her heart. Elizabeth turned as pale as Emily herself. “Emily, is this some play-acting of yours?” she demanded sternly. “No,” cried Emily, quite indignantly. “It’s the truth. Do you suppose a dying person would be play-acting? And oh, Aunt Elizabeth, please will you give this letter to Ilse—and please forgive me for being naughty—though I wasn’t always naughty when you thought I was—and don’t let any one see me after I’m dead if I turn black—especially Rhoda Stuart.” By this time Aunt Elizabeth was herself again. “How long ago is it since you ate that apple, Emily?” “About an hour.” “If you’d eaten a poisoned apple an hour ago you’d be dead or sick by now—” “Oh,” cried Emily transformed in a second. A wild, sweet hope sprang up in her heart—was there a chance for her after all? Then she added despairingly, “But I felt another pain in my stomach just as I came downstairs.” “Laura,” said Aunt Elizabeth, “take this child out to the cook-house and give her a good dose of mustard and water at once. It will do no harm and do some good, if there’s anything in this yarn of hers. I’m going down to the doctor’s—he may be back—but I’ll see Lofty John on the way.” may Aunt Elizabeth went out—and Aunt Elizabeth went out very quickly—if it had been any one else it might have been said she ran. As for Emily—well, Aunt Laura gave her that emetic in short order and two minutes later Emily had no doubt at all that she was dying then and there—and the sooner the better. When Aunt Elizabeth returned Emily was lying on the sofa in the kitchen, as white as the pillow under her head, and as limp as a faded lily. “Wasn’t the doctor home?” cried Aunt Laura desperately. “I don’t know—there’s no need of the doctor. I didn’t think there was from the first. It was just one of Lofty John’s jokes. He thought he’d give Emily a fright—just for fun— idea of fun. March you off to bed, Miss Emily. You deserve all you’ve got for going over there to Lofty John’s at all and I don’t pity you a particle. I haven’t had such a turn for years.” his “I have a pain in my stomach,” wailed Emily, in whom fright and mustard-and-water combined had temporarily extinguished all spirit. did “Any one who eats apples from dawn to dark must expect a few pains in her stomach. You won’t have any more to-night, I reckon—the mustard will remedy that. Take your candle and go.” “Well,” said Emily, getting unsteadily to her feet, “I that dod-gasted Lofty John.” hate “Emily!” said both aunts together. “He it,” said Emily vindictively. deserves “Oh, Emily—that dreadful word you used!” Aunt Laura seemed curiously upset about something. “Why, what’s the matter with dod-gasted?” said Emily, quite mystified. “Cousin Jimmy uses it often, when things vex him. He used it to-day—he said that dod-gasted heifer had broken out of the graveyard pasture again.” “Emily,” said Aunt Elizabeth, with the air of one impaling herself on the easiest horn of a dilemma, “your Cousin Jimmy is a man—and men sometimes use expressions, in the heat of anger, that are not proper for little girls.” “But what the matter with dod-gasted?” persisted Emily. “It isn’t a swear word, is it? And if it isn’t, why can’t I use it?” is “It isn’t a—a ladylike word,” said Aunt Laura. “Well, then, I won’t use it any more,” said Emily resignedly, “but Lofty John dod-gasted.” is Aunt Laura laughed so much after Emily had gone upstairs that Aunt Elizabeth told her a woman of her age should have more sense. “Elizabeth, you it was funny,” protested Laura. know Emily being safely out of sight, Elizabeth permitted herself a somewhat grim smile. “I told Lofty John a few plain truths—he’ll not go telling children they’re poisoned again in a hurry. I left him fairly dancing with rage.” Worn out, Emily fell asleep as soon as she was in bed; but an hour later she awakened. Aunt Elizabeth had not yet come to bed so the blind was still up and Emily saw a dear, friendly star winking down at her. Far away the sea moaned alluringly. Oh, it was nice just to be alone and to be alive. Life tasted good to her again—“tasted like more,” as Cousin Jimmy said. She could have a chance to write more letter-bills, and poetry—Emily already saw a yard of verses entitled “Thoughts of One Doomed to Sudden Death”—and play with Ilse and Teddy—scour the barns with Saucy Sal, watch Aunt Laura skim cream in the dairy and help cousin Jimmy garden,—read books in Emily’s Bower and trot along the To-day Road—but visit Lofty John’s workshop. She determined that she would never have anything to do with Lofty John again after his diabolical cruelty. She felt so indignant with him for frightening her—after they had been such good friends, too—that she could not go to sleep until she had composed an account of her death by poison, of Lofty John being tried for her murder and condemned to death, and of his being hanged on a gibbet as lofty as himself, Emily being present at the dreadful scene, in spite of the fact that she was dead by his act. When she had finally cut him down and buried him with obloquy—the tears streaming down her face out of sympathy for Mrs. Lofty John—she forgave him. Very likely he was not dod-gasted after all. not She wrote it all down on a letter-bill in the garret the next day. About HackerNoon Book Series: We bring you the most important technical, scientific, and insightful public domain books. This book is part of the public domain. L. M. Montgomery (2020). Emily of New Moon. Urbana, Illinois: Project Gutenberg. Retrieved https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/61236/pg61236-images.html This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org , located at https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html.

A Daughter of Eve

The Book of Yesterday

The Story Girl by L. M. Montgomery, is part of the HackerNoon Books Series. You can jump to any chapter in this book here . THE SHADOW FEARED OF MAN CHAPTER XXIX. THE SHADOW FEARED OF MAN We were all up early the next morning, dressing by candlelight. But early as it was we found the Story Girl in the kitchen when we went down, sitting on Rachel Ward’s blue chest and looking important. “What do you think?” she exclaimed. “Peter has the measles! He was dreadfully sick all night, and Uncle Roger had to go for the doctor. He was quite light-headed, and didn’t know any one. Of course he’s far too sick to be taken home, so his mother has come up to wait on him, and I’m to live over here until he is better.” This was mingled bitter and sweet. We were sorry to hear that Peter had the measles; but it would be jolly to have the Story Girl living with us all the time. What orgies of story telling we should have! “I suppose we’ll all have the measles now,” grumbled Felicity. “And October is such an inconvenient time for measles—there’s so much to do.” “I don’t believe any time is very convenient to have the measles,” Cecily said. “Oh, perhaps we won’t have them,” said the Story Girl cheerfully. “Peter caught them at Markdale, the last time he was home, his mother says.” “I don’t want to catch the measles from Peter,” said Felicity decidedly. “Fancy catching them from a hired boy!” “Oh, Felicity, don’t call Peter a hired boy when he’s sick,” protested Cecily. During the next two days we were very busy—too busy to tell tales or listen to them. Only in the frosty dusk did we have time to wander afar in realms of gold with the Story Girl. She had recently been digging into a couple of old volumes of classic myths and northland folklore which she had found in Aunt Olivia’s attic; and for us, god and goddess, laughing nymph and mocking satyr, norn and valkyrie, elf and troll, and “green folk” generally, were real creatures once again, inhabiting the orchards and woods and meadows around us, until it seemed as if the Golden Age had returned to earth. Then, on the third day, the Story Girl came to us with a very white face. She had been over to Uncle Roger’s yard to hear the latest bulletin from the sick room. Hitherto they had been of a non-committal nature; but now it was only too evident that she had bad news. “Peter is very, very sick,” she said miserably. “He has caught cold someway—and the measles have struck in—and—and—” the Story Girl wrung her brown hands together—“the doctor is afraid he—he—won’t get better.” We all stood around, stricken, incredulous. “Do you mean,” said Felix, finding voice at length, “that Peter is going to die?” The Story Girl nodded miserably. “They’re afraid so.” Cecily sat down by her half filled basket and began to cry. Felicity said violently that she didn’t believe it. “I can’t pick another apple to-day and I ain’t going to try,” said Dan. None of us could. We went to the grown-ups and told them so; and the grown-ups, with unaccustomed understanding and sympathy, told us that we need not. Then we roamed about in our wretchedness and tried to comfort one another. We avoided the orchard; it was for us too full of happy memories to accord with our bitterness of soul. Instead, we resorted to the spruce wood, where the hush and the sombre shadows and the soft, melancholy sighing of the wind in the branches over us did not jar harshly on our new sorrow. We could not really believe that Peter was going to die—to DIE. Old people died. Grown-up people died. Even children of whom we had heard died. But that one of US—of our merry little band—should die was unbelievable. We could not believe it. And yet the possibility struck us in the face like a blow. We sat on the mossy stones under the dark old evergreens and gave ourselves up to wretchedness. We all, even Dan, cried, except the Story Girl. “I don’t see how you can be so unfeeling, Sara Stanley,” said Felicity reproachfully. “You’ve always been such friends with Peter—and made out you thought so much of him—and now you ain’t shedding a tear for him.” I looked at the Story Girl’s dry, piteous eyes, and suddenly remembered that I had never seen her cry. When she told us sad tales, in a voice laden with all the tears that had ever been shed, she had never shed one of her own. “I can’t cry,” she said drearily. “I wish I could. I’ve a dreadful feeling here—” she touched her slender throat—“and if I could cry I think it would make it better. But I can’t.” “Maybe Peter will get better after all,” said Dan, swallowing a sob. “I’ve heard of lots of people who went and got better after the doctor said they were going to die.” “While there’s life there’s hope, you know,” said Felix. “We shouldn’t cross bridges till we come to them.” “Those are only proverbs,” said the Story Girl bitterly. “Proverbs are all very fine when there’s nothing to worry you, but when you’re in real trouble they’re not a bit of help.” “Oh, I wish I’d never said Peter wasn’t fit to associate with,” moaned Felicity. “If he ever gets better I’ll never say such a thing again—I’ll never THINK it. He’s just a lovely boy and twice as smart as lots that aren’t hired out.” “He was always so polite and good-natured and obliging,” sighed Cecily. “He was just a real gentleman,” said the Story Girl. “There ain’t many fellows as fair and square as Peter,” said Dan. “And such a worker,” said Felix. “Uncle Roger says he never had a boy he could depend on like Peter,” I said. “It’s too late to be saying all these nice things about him now,” said the Story Girl. “He won’t ever know how much we thought of him. It’s too late.” “If he gets better I’ll tell him,” said Cecily resolutely. “I wish I hadn’t boxed his ears that day he tried to kiss me,” went on Felicity, who was evidently raking her conscience for past offences in regard to Peter. “Of course I couldn’t be expected to let a hir—to let a boy kiss me. But I needn’t have been so cross about it. I might have been more dignified. And I told him I just hated him. That wasn’t true, but I s’pose he’ll die thinking it is. Oh, dear me, what makes people say things they’ve got to be so sorry for afterwards?” “I suppose if Peter d-d-dies he’ll go to heaven anyhow,” sobbed Cecily. “He’s been real good all this summer, but he isn’t a church member.” “He’s a Presbyterian, you know,” said Felicity reassuringly. Her tone expressed her conviction that that would carry Peter through if anything would. “We’re none of us church members. But of course Peter couldn’t be sent to the bad place. That would be ridiculous. What would they do with him there, when he’s so good and polite and honest and kind?” “Oh, I think he’ll be all right, too,” sighed Cecily, “but you know he never did go to church and Sunday School before this summer.” “Well, his father run away, and his mother was too busy earning a living to bring him up right,” argued Felicity. “Don’t you suppose that anybody, even God, would make allowances for that?” “Of course Peter will go to heaven,” said the Story Girl. “He’s not grown up enough to go anywhere else. Children always go to heaven. But I don’t want him to go there or anywhere else. I want him to stay right here. I know heaven must be a splendid place, but I’m sure Peter would rather be here, having fun with us.” “Sara Stanley,” rebuked Felicity. “I should think you wouldn’t say such things at such a solemn time. You’re such a queer girl.” “Wouldn’t you rather be here yourself than in heaven?” said the Story Girl bluntly. “Wouldn’t you now, Felicity King? Tell the truth, ‘cross your heart.” But Felicity took refuge from this inconvenient question in tears. “If we could only DO something to help Peter!” I said desperately. “It seems dreadful not to be able to do a single thing.” “There’s one thing we can do,” said Cecily gently. “We can pray for him.” “So we can,” I agreed. “I’m going to pray like sixty,” said Felix energetically. “We’ll have to be awful good, you know,” warned Cecily. “There’s no use praying if you’re not good.” “That will be easy,” sighed Felicity. “I don’t feel a bit like being bad. If anything happens to Peter I feel sure I’ll never be naughty again. I won’t have the heart.” We did, indeed, pray most sincerely for Peter’s recovery. We did not, as in the case of Paddy, “tack it on after more important things,” but put it in the very forefront of our petitions. Even skeptical Dan prayed, his skepticism falling away from him like a discarded garment in this valley of the shadow, which sifts out hearts and tries souls, until we all, grown-up or children, realize our weakness, and, finding that our own puny strength is as a reed shaken in the wind, creep back humbly to the God we have vainly dreamed we could do without. Peter was no better the next day. Aunt Olivia reported that his mother was broken-hearted. We did not again ask to be released from work. Instead, we went at it with feverish zeal. If we worked hard there was less time for grief and grievious thoughts. We picked apples and dragged them to the granary doggedly. In the afternoon Aunt Janet brought us a lunch of apple turnovers; but we could not eat them. Peter, as Felicity reminded us with a burst of tears, had been so fond of apple turnovers. And, oh, how good we were! How angelically and unnaturally good! Never was there such a band of kind, sweet-tempered, unselfish children in any orchard. Even Felicity and Dan, for once in their lives, got through the day without any exchange of left-handed compliments. Cecily confided to me that she never meant to put her hair up in curlers on Saturday nights again, because it was pretending. She was so anxious to repent of something, sweet girl, and this was all she could think of. During the afternoon Judy Pineau brought up a tear-blotted note from Sara Ray. Sara had not been allowed to visit the hill farm since Peter had developed measles. She was an unhappy little exile, and could only relieve her anguish of soul by daily letters to Cecily, which the faithful and obliging Judy Pineau brought up for her. These epistles were as gushingly underlined as if Sara had been a correspondent of early Victorian days. Cecily did not write back, because Mrs. Ray had decreed that no letters must be taken down from the hill farm lest they carry infection. Cecily had offered to bake every epistle thoroughly in the oven before sending it; but Mrs. Ray was inexorable, and Cecily had to content herself by sending long verbal messages with Judy Pineau. “My OWN DEAREST Cecily,” ran Sara’s letter. “I have just heard the sad news about POOR DEAR PETER. I can’t describe MY FEELINGS. They are DREADFUL. I have been crying ALL THE AFTERNOON. I wish I could FLY to you, but ma will not let me. She is afraid I will catch the measles, but I would rather have the measles A DOZEN TIMES OVER than be sepparated from you all like this. But I have felt, ever since the Judgment Sunday that I MUST OBEY MA BETTER than I used to do. If ANYTHING HAPPENS to Peter and you are let see him BEFORE IT HAPPENS give him MY LOVE and tell him HOW SORRY I AM, and that I hope we will ALL meet in A BETTER WORLD Everything in school is about the same. The master is awful cross by spells. Jimmy Frewen walked home with Nellie Bowan last night from prayer-meeting and HER ONLY FOURTEEN. Don’t you think it horrid BEGINNING SO YOUNG? YOU AND ME would NEVER do anything like that till we were GROWN UP, would we? Willy Fraser looks SO LONESOME in school these days. I must stop for ma says I waste FAR TOO MUCH TIME writing letters. Tell Judy ALL THE NEWS for me. “Your OWN TRUE FRIEND, “SARA RAY. “P.S. Oh I DO hope Peter will get better. Ma is going to get me a new brown dress for the winter. “S. R.” When evening came we went to our seats under the whispering, sighing fir trees. It was a beautiful night—clear, windless, frosty. Some one galloped down the road on horseback, lustily singing a comic song. How dared he? We felt that it was an insult to our wretchedness. If Peter were going to—going to—well, if anything happened to Peter, we felt so miserably sure that the music of life would be stilled for us for ever. How could any one in the world be happy when we were so unhappy? Presently Aunt Olivia came down the long twilight arcade. Her bright hair was uncovered and she looked slim and queen-like in her light dress. We thought Aunt Olivia very pretty then. Looking back from a mature standpoint I realize that she must have been an unusually beautiful woman; and she looked her prettiest as she stood under the swaying boughs in the last faint light of the autumn dusk and smiled down at our woebegone faces. “Dear, sorrowful little people, I bring you glad tidings of great joy,” she said. “The doctor has just been here, and he finds Peter much better, and thinks he will pull through after all.” We gazed up at her in silence for a few moments. When we had heard the news of Paddy’s recovery we had been noisy and jubilant; but we were very quiet now. We had been too near something dark and terrible and menacing; and though it was thus suddenly removed the chill and shadow of it were about us still. Presently the Story Girl, who had been standing up, leaning against a tall fir, slipped down to the ground in a huddled fashion and broke into a very passion of weeping. I had never heard any one cry so, with dreadful, rending sobs. I was used to hearing girls cry. It was as much Sara Ray’s normal state as any other, and even Felicity and Cecily availed themselves occasionally of the privilege of sex. But I had never heard any girl cry like this. It gave me the same unpleasant sensation which I had felt one time when I had seen my father cry. “Oh, don’t, Sara, don’t,” I said gently, patting her convulsed shoulder. “You ARE a queer girl,” said Felicity—more tolerantly than usual however—“you never cried a speck when you thought Peter was going to die—and now when he is going to get better you cry like that.” “Sara, child, come with me,” said Aunt Olivia, bending over her. The Story Girl got up and went away, with Aunt Olivia’s arms around her. The sound of her crying died away under the firs, and with it seemed to go the dread and grief that had been our portion for hours. In the reaction our spirits rose with a bound. “Oh, ain’t it great that Peter’s going to be all right?” said Dan, springing up. “I never was so glad of anything in my whole life,” declared Felicity in shameless rapture. “Can’t we send word somehow to Sara Ray to-night?” asked Cecily, the ever-thoughtful. “She’s feeling so bad—and she’ll have to feel that way till to-morrow if we can’t.” “Let’s all go down to the Ray gate and holler to Judy Pineau till she comes out,” suggested Felix. Accordingly, we went and “hollered,” with a right good will. We were much taken aback to find that Mrs. Ray came to the gate instead of Judy, and rather sourly demanded what we were yelling about. When she heard our news, however, she had the decency to say she was glad, and to promise she would convey the good tidings to Sara—“who is already in bed, where all children of her age should be,” added Mrs. Ray severely. WE had no intention of going to bed for a good two hours yet. Instead, after devoutly thanking goodness that our grown-ups, in spite of some imperfections, were not of the Mrs. Ray type, we betook ourselves to the granary, lighted a huge lantern which Dan had made out of a turnip, and proceeded to devour all the apples we might have eaten through the day but had not. We were a blithe little crew, sitting there in the light of our goblin lantern. We had in very truth been given beauty for ashes and the oil of joy for mourning. Life was as a red rose once more. “I’m going to make a big batch of patty-pans, first thing in the morning,” said Felicity jubilantly. “Isn’t it queer? Last night I felt just like praying, and tonight I feel just like cooking.” “We mustn’t forget to thank God for making Peter better,” said Cecily, as we finally went to the house. “Do you s’pose Peter wouldn’t have got better anyway?” said Dan. “Oh, Dan, what makes you ask such questions?” exclaimed Cecily in real distress. “I dunno,” said Dan. “They just kind of come into my head, like. But of course I mean to thank God when I say my prayers to-night. That’s only decent.” About HackerNoon Book Series: We bring you the most important technical, scientific, and insightful public domain books. This book is part of the public domain. L. M. Montgomery (2004). The Story Girl. Urbana, Illinois: Project Gutenberg. Retrieved https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/5342/pg5342-images.html This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org , located at https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html .

THE SHADOW FEARED OF MAN

The Story Girl by L. M. Montgomery, is part of the HackerNoon Books Series. You can jump to any chapter in this book here . PETER GOES TO CHURCH CHAPTER V. PETER GOES TO CHURCH There was no Sunday School the next afternoon, as superintendent and teachers wished to attend a communion service at Markdale. The Carlisle service was in the evening, and at sunset we were waiting at Uncle Alec’s front door for Peter and the Story Girl. None of the grown-ups were going to church. Aunt Olivia had a sick headache and Uncle Roger stayed home with her. Aunt Janet and Uncle Alec had gone to the Markdale service and had not yet returned. Felicity and Cecily were wearing their new summer muslins for the first time—and were acutely conscious of the fact. Felicity, her pink and white face shadowed by her drooping, forget-me-not-wreathed, leghorn hat, was as beautiful as usual; but Cecily, having tortured her hair with curl papers all night, had a rampant bush of curls all about her head which quite destroyed the sweet, nun-like expression of her little features. Cecily cherished a grudge against fate because she had not been given naturally curly hair as had the other two girls. But she attained the desire of her heart on Sundays at least, and was quite well satisfied. It was impossible to convince her that the satin smooth lustre of her week-day tresses was much more becoming to her. Presently Peter and the Story Girl appeared, and we were all more or less relieved to see that Peter looked quite respectable, despite the indisputable patch on his trousers. His face was rosy, his thick black curls were smoothly combed, and his tie was neatly bowed; but it was his legs which we scrutinized most anxiously. At first glance they seemed well enough; but closer inspection revealed something not altogether customary. “What is the matter with your stockings, Peter?” asked Dan bluntly. “Oh, I hadn’t a pair without holes in the legs,” answered Peter easily, “because ma hadn’t time to darn them this week. So I put on two pairs. The holes don’t come in the same places, and you’d never notice them unless you looked right close.” “Have you got a cent for collection?” demanded Felicity. “I’ve got a Yankee cent. I s’pose it will do, won’t it?” Felicity shook her head vehemently. “Oh, no, no. It may be all right to pass a Yankee cent on a store keeper or an egg peddler, but it would never do for church.” “I’ll have to go without any, then,” said Peter. “I haven’t another cent. I only get fifty cents a week and I give it all to ma last night.” But Peter must have a cent. Felicity would have given him one herself—and she was none too lavish of her coppers—rather than have him go without one. Dan, however, lent him one, on the distinct understanding that it was to be repaid the next week. Uncle Roger wandered by at this moment and, beholding Peter, said, “‘Is Saul also among the prophets?’ What can have induced you to turn church-goer, Peter, when all Olivia’s gentle persuasions were of no avail? The old, old argument I suppose—‘beauty draws us with a single hair.’” Uncle Roger looked quizzically at Felicity. We did not know what his quotations meant, but we understood he thought Peter was going to church because of Felicity. Felicity tossed her head. “It isn’t my fault that he’s going to church,” she said snappishly. “It’s the Story Girl’s doings.” Uncle Roger sat down on the doorstep, and gave himself over to one of the silent, inward paroxysms of laughter we all found so very aggravating. He shook his big, blond head, shut his eyes, and murmured, “Not her fault! Oh, Felicity, Felicity, you’ll be the death of your dear Uncle yet if you don’t watch out.” Felicity started off indignantly, and we followed, picking up Sara Ray at the foot of the hill. The Carlisle church was a very old-fashioned one, with a square, ivy-hung tower. It was shaded by tall elms, and the graveyard surrounded it completely, many of the graves being directly under its windows. We always took the corner path through it, passing the King plot where our kindred of four generations slept in a green solitude of wavering light and shadow. There was Great-grandfather King’s flat tombstone of rough Island sandstone, so overgrown with ivy that we could hardly read its lengthy inscription, recording his whole history in brief, and finishing with eight lines of original verse composed by his widow. I do not think that poetry was Great-grandmother King’s strong point. When Felix read it, on our first Sunday in Carlisle, he remarked dubiously that it LOOKED like poetry but didn’t SOUND like it. There, too, slept the Emily whose faithful spirit was supposed to haunt the orchard; but Edith who had kissed the poet lay not with her kindred. She had died in a far, foreign land, and the murmur of an alien sea sounded about her grave. White marble tablets, ornamented with weeping willow trees, marked where Grandfather and Grandmother King were buried, and a single shaft of red Scotch granite stood between the graves of Aunt Felicity and Uncle Felix. The Story Girl lingered to lay a bunch of wild violets, misty blue and faintly sweet, on her mother’s grave; and then she read aloud the verse on the stone. “‘They were lovely and pleasant in their lives and in their death they were not divided.’” The tones of her voice brought out the poignant and immortal beauty and pathos of that wonderful old lament. The girls wiped their eyes; and we boys felt as if we might have done so, too, had nobody been looking. What better epitaph could any one wish than to have it said that he was lovely and pleasant in his life? When I heard the Story Girl read it I made a secret compact with myself that I would try to deserve such an epitaph. “I wish I had a family plot,” said Peter, rather wistfully. “I haven’t ANYTHING you fellows have. The Craigs are just buried anywhere they happen to die.” “I’d like to be buried here when I die,” said Felix. “But I hope it won’t be for a good while yet,” he added in a livelier tone, as we moved onward to the church. The interior of the church was as old-fashioned as its exterior. It was furnished with square box pews; the pulpit was a “wine-glass” one, and was reached by a steep, narrow flight of steps. Uncle Alec’s pew was at the top of the church, quite near the pulpit. Peter’s appearance did not attract as much attention as we had fondly expected. Indeed, nobody seemed to notice him at all. The lamps were not yet lighted and the church was filled with a soft twilight and hush. Outside, the sky was purple and gold and silvery green, with a delicate tangle of rosy cloud above the elms. “Isn’t it awful nice and holy in here?” whispered Peter reverently. “I didn’t know church was like this. It’s nice.” Felicity frowned at him, and the Story Girl touched her with her slippered foot to remind him that he must not talk in church. Peter stiffened up and sat at attention during the service. Nobody could have behaved better. But when the sermon was over and the collection was being taken up, he made the sensation which his entrance had not produced. Elder Frewen, a tall, pale man, with long, sandy side-whiskers, appeared at the door of our pew with the collection plate. We knew Elder Frewen quite well and liked him; he was Aunt Janet’s cousin and often visited her. The contrast between his week-day jollity and the unearthly solemnity of his countenance on Sundays always struck us as very funny. It seemed so to strike Peter; for as Peter dropped his cent into the plate he laughed aloud! Everybody looked at our pew. I have always wondered why Felicity did not die of mortification on the spot. The Story Girl turned white, and Cecily turned red. As for that poor, unlucky Peter, the shame of his countenance was pitiful to behold. He never lifted his head for the remainder of the service; and he followed us down the aisle and across the graveyard like a beaten dog. None of us uttered a word until we reached the road, lying in the white moonshine of the May night. Then Felicity broke the tense silence by remarking to the Story Girl, “I told you so!” The Story Girl made no response. Peter sidled up to her. “I’m awful sorry,” he said contritely. “I never meant to laugh. It just happened before I could stop myself. It was this way—” “Don’t you ever speak to me again,” said the Story Girl, in a tone of cold concentrated fury. “Go and be a Methodist, or a Mohammedan, or ANYTHING! I don’t care what you are! You have HUMILIATED me!” She marched off with Sara Ray, and Peter dropped back to us with a frightened face. “What is it I’ve done to her?” he whispered. “What does that big word mean?” “Oh, never mind,” I said crossly—for I felt that Peter HAD disgraced us—“She’s just mad—and no wonder. Whatever made you act so crazy, Peter?” “Well, I didn’t mean to. And I wanted to laugh twice before that and DIDN’T. It was the Story Girl’s stories made me want to laugh, so I don’t think it’s fair for her to be mad at me. She hadn’t ought to tell me stories about people if she don’t want me to laugh when I see them. When I looked at Samuel Ward I thought of him getting up in meeting one night, and praying that he might be guided in his upsetting and downrising. I remembered the way she took him off, and I wanted to laugh. And then I looked at the pulpit and thought of the story she told about the old Scotch minister who was too fat to get in at the door of it, and had to h’ist himself by his two hands over it, and then whispered to the other minister so that everybody heard him. “‘This pulpit door was made for speerits’—and I wanted to laugh. And then Mr. Frewen come—and I thought of her story about his sidewhiskers—how when his first wife died of information of the lungs he went courting Celia Ward, and Celia told him she wouldn’t marry him unless he shaved them whiskers off. And he wouldn’t, just to be stubborn. And one day one of them caught fire, when he was burning brush, and burned off, and every one thought he’d HAVE to shave the other off then. But he didn’t and just went round with one whisker till the burned one grew out. And then Celia gave in and took him, because she saw there wasn’t no hope of HIM ever giving in. I just remembered that story, and I thought I could see him, taking up the cents so solemn, with one long whisker; and the laugh just laughed itself before I could help it.” We all exploded with laughter on the spot, much to the horror of Mrs. Abraham Ward, who was just driving past, and who came up the next day and told Aunt Janet we had “acted scandalous” on the road home from church. We felt ashamed ourselves, because we knew people should conduct themselves decently and in order on Sunday farings-forth. But, as with Peter, it “had laughed itself.” Even Felicity laughed. Felicity was not nearly so angry with Peter as might have been expected. She even walked beside him and let him carry her Bible. They talked quite confidentially. Perhaps she forgave him the more easily, because he had justified her in her predictions, and thus afforded her a decided triumph over the Story Girl. “I’m going to keep on going to church,” Peter told her. “I like it. Sermons are more int’resting than I thought, and I like the singing. I wish I could make up my mind whether to be a Presbyterian or a Methodist. I s’pose I might ask the ministers about it.” “Oh, no, no, don’t do that,” said Felicity in alarm. “Ministers wouldn’t want to be bothered with such questions.” “Why not? What are ministers for if they ain’t to tell people how to get to heaven?” “Oh, well, it’s all right for grown-ups to ask them things, of course. But it isn’t respectful for little boys—especially hired boys.” “I don’t see why. But anyhow, I s’pose it wouldn’t be much use, because if he was a Presbyterian minister he’d say I ought to be a Presbyterian, and if he was a Methodist he’d tell me to be one, too. Look here, Felicity, what IS the difference between them?” “I—I don’t know,” said Felicity reluctantly. “I s’pose children can’t understand such things. There must be a great deal of difference, of course, if we only knew what it was. Anyhow, I am a Presbyterian, and I’m glad of it.” We walked on in silence for a time, thinking our own young thoughts. Presently they were scattered by an abrupt and startling question from Peter. “What does God look like?” he said. It appeared that none of us had any idea. “The Story Girl would prob’ly know,” said Cecily. “I wish I knew,” said Peter gravely. “I wish I could see a picture of God. It would make Him seem lots more real.” “I’ve often wondered myself what he looks like,” said Felicity in a burst of confidence. Even in Felicity, so it would seem, there were depths of thought unplumbed. “I’ve seen pictures of Jesus,” said Felix meditatively. “He looks just like a man, only better and kinder. But now that I come to think of it, I’ve never seen a picture of God.” “Well, if there isn’t one in Toronto it isn’t likely there’s one anywhere,” said Peter disappointedly. “I saw a picture of the devil once,” he added. “It was in a book my Aunt Jane had. She got it for a prize in school. My Aunt Jane was clever.” “It couldn’t have been a very good book if there was such a picture in it,” said Felicity. “It was a real good book. My Aunt Jane wouldn’t have a book that wasn’t good,” retorted Peter sulkily. He refused to discuss the subject further, somewhat to our disappointment. For we had never seen a picture of the person referred to, and we were rather curious regarding it. “We’ll ask Peter to describe it sometime when he’s in a better humour,” whispered Felix. Sara Ray having turned in at her own gate, I ran ahead to join the Story Girl, and we walked up the hill together. She had recovered her calmness of mind, but she made no reference to Peter. When we reached our lane and passed under Grandfather King’s big willow the fragrance of the orchard struck us in the face like a wave. We could see the long rows of trees, a white gladness in the moonshine. It seemed to us that there was in the orchard something different from other orchards that we had known. We were too young to analyze the vague sensation. In later years we were to understand that it was because the orchard blossomed not only apple blossoms but all the love, faith, joy, pure happiness and pure sorrow of those who had made it and walked there. “The orchard doesn’t seem the same place by moonlight at all,” said the Story Girl dreamily. “It’s lovely, but it’s different. When I was very small I used to believe the fairies danced in it on moonlight nights. I would like to believe it now but I can’t.” “Why not?” “Oh, it’s so hard to believe things you know are not true. It was Uncle Edward who told me there were no such things as fairies. I was just seven. He is a minister, so of course I knew he spoke the truth. It was his duty to tell me, and I do not blame him, but I have never felt quite the same to Uncle Edward since.” Ah, do we ever “feel quite the same” towards people who destroy our illusions? Shall I ever be able to forgive the brutal creature who first told me there was no such person as Santa Claus? He was a boy, three years older than myself; and he may now, for aught I know, be a most useful and respectable member of society, beloved by his kind. But I know what he must ever seem to me! We waited at Uncle Alec’s door for the others to come up. Peter was by way of skulking shamefacedly past into the shadows; but the Story Girl’s brief, bitter anger had vanished. “Wait for me, Peter,” she called. She went over to him and held out her hand. “I forgive you,” she said graciously. Felix and I felt that it would really be worth while to offend her, just to be forgiven in such an adorable voice. Peter eagerly grasped her hand. “I tell you what, Story Girl, I’m awfully sorry I laughed in church, but you needn’t be afraid I ever will again. No, sir! And I’m going to church and Sunday School regular, and I’ll say my prayers every night. I want to be like the rest of you. And look here! I’ve thought of the way my Aunt Jane used to give medicine to a cat. You mix the powder in lard, and spread it on his paws and his sides and he’ll lick it off, ‘cause a cat can’t stand being messy. If Paddy isn’t any better to-morrow, we’ll do that.” They went away together hand in hand, children-wise, up the lane of spruces crossed with bars of moonlight. And there was peace over all that fresh and flowery land, and peace in our little hearts. About HackerNoon Book Series: We bring you the most important technical, scientific, and insightful public domain books. This book is part of the public domain. L. M. Montgomery (2004). The Story Girl. Urbana, Illinois: Project Gutenberg. Retrieved https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/5342/pg5342-images.html This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org , located at https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html .

PETER GOES TO CHURCH

Kilmeny of the Orchard by L. M. Montgomery, is part of the HackerNoon Books Series. You can jump to any chapter in this book here . THE STORY OF KILMENY CHAPTER VI. THE STORY OF KILMENY Wednesday evening Eric went to the orchard again; and again he was disappointed. He went home, determined to solve the mystery by open inquiry. Fortune favoured him, for he found Mrs. Williamson alone, sitting by the west window of her kitchen and knitting at a long gray sock. She hummed softly to herself as she knitted, and Timothy slept blackly at her feet. She looked at Eric with quiet affection in her large, candid eyes. She had liked Mr. West. But Eric had found his way into the inner chamber of her heart, by reason that his eyes were so like those of the little son she had buried in the Lindsay churchyard many years before. “Mrs. Williamson,” said Eric, with an affectation of carelessness, “I chanced on an old deserted orchard back behind the woods over there last week, a charming bit of wilderness. Do you know whose it is?” “I suppose it must be the old Connors orchard,” answered Mrs. Williamson after a moment’s reflection. “I had forgotten all about it. It must be all of thirty years since Mr. and Mrs. Connors moved away. Their house and barns were burned down and they sold the land to Thomas Gordon and went to live in town. They’re both dead now. Mr. Connors used to be very proud of his orchard. There weren’t many orchards in Lindsay then, though almost everybody has one now.” “There was a young girl in it, playing on a violin,” said Eric, annoyed to find that it cost him an effort to speak of her, and that the blood mounted to his face as he did so. “She ran away in great alarm as soon as she saw me, although I do not think I did or said anything to frighten or vex her. I have no idea who she was. Do you know?” Mrs. Williamson did not make an immediate reply. She laid down her knitting and gazed out of the window as if pondering seriously some question in her own mind. Finally she said, with an intonation of keen interest in her voice, “I suppose it must have been Kilmeny Gordon, Master.” “Kilmeny Gordon? Do you mean the niece of Thomas Gordon of whom your husband spoke?” “Yes.” “I can hardly believe that the girl I saw can be a member of Thomas Gordon’s family.” “Well, if it wasn’t Kilmeny Gordon I don’t know who it could have been. There is no other house near that orchard and I’ve heard she plays the violin. If it was Kilmeny you’ve seen what very few people in Lindsay have ever seen, Master. And those few have never seen her close by. I have never laid eyes on her myself. It’s no wonder she ran away, poor girl. She isn’t used to seeing strangers.” “I’m rather glad if that was the sole reason of her flight,” said Eric. “I admit I didn’t like to see any girl so frightened of me as she appeared to be. She was as white as paper, and so terrified that she never uttered a word, but fled like a deer to cover.” “Well, she couldn’t have spoken a word in any case,” said Mrs. Williamson quietly. “Kilmeny Gordon is dumb.” Eric sat in dismayed silence for a moment. That beautiful creature afflicted in such a fashion—why, it was horrible! Mingled with his dismay was a strange pang of personal regret and disappointment. “It couldn’t have been Kilmeny Gordon, then,” he protested at last, remembering. “The girl I saw played on the violin exquisitely. I never heard anything like it. It is impossible that a deaf mute could play like that.” “Oh, she isn’t deaf, Master,” responded Mrs. Williamson, looking at Eric keenly through her spectacles. She picked up her knitting and fell to work again. “That is the strange part of it, if anything about her can be stranger than another. She can hear as well as anybody and understands everything that is said to her. But she can’t speak a word and never could, at least, so they say. The truth is, nobody knows much about her. Janet and Thomas never speak of her, and Neil won’t either. He has been well questioned, too, you can depend on that; but he won’t ever say a word about Kilmeny and he gets mad if folks persist.” “Why isn’t she to be spoken of?” queried Eric impatiently. “What is the mystery about her?” “It’s a sad story, Master. I suppose the Gordons look on her existence as a sort of disgrace. For my own part, I think it’s terrible, the way she’s been brought up. But the Gordons are very strange people, Mr. Marshall. I kind of reproved father for saying so, you remember, but it is true. They have very strange ways. And you’ve really seen Kilmeny? What does she look like? I’ve heard that she was handsome. Is it true?” “I thought her very beautiful,” said Eric rather curtly. “But HOW has she been brought up, Mrs. Williamson? And why?” “Well, I might as well tell you the whole story, Master. Kilmeny is the niece of Thomas and Janet Gordon. Her mother was Margaret Gordon, their younger sister. Old James Gordon came out from Scotland. Janet and Thomas were born in the Old Country and were small children when they came here. They were never very sociable folks, but still they used to visit out some then, and people used to go there. They were kind and honest people, even if they were a little peculiar. “Mrs. Gordon died a few years after they came out, and four years later James Gordon went home to Scotland and brought a new wife back with him. She was a great deal younger than he was and a very pretty woman, as my mother often told me. She was friendly and gay and liked social life. The Gordon place was a very different sort of place after she came there, and even Janet and Thomas got thawed out and softened down a good bit. They were real fond of their stepmother, I’ve heard. Then, six years after she was married, the second Mrs. Gordon died too. She died when Margaret was born. They say James Gordon almost broke his heart over it. “Janet brought Margaret up. She and Thomas just worshipped the child and so did their father. I knew Margaret Gordon well once. We were just the same age and we set together in school. We were always good friends until she turned against all the world. “She was a strange girl in some ways even then, but I always liked her, though a great many people didn’t. She had some bitter enemies, but she had some devoted friends too. That was her way. She made folks either hate or love her. Those who did love her would have gone through fire and water for her. “When she grew up she was very pretty—tall and splendid, like a queen, with great thick braids of black hair and red, red cheeks and lips. Everybody who saw her looked at her a second time. She was a little vain of her beauty, I think, Master. And she was proud, oh, she was very proud. She liked to be first in everything, and she couldn’t bear not to show to good advantage. She was dreadful determined, too. You couldn’t budge her an inch, Master, when she once had made up her mind on any point. But she was warm-hearted and generous. She could sing like an angel and she was very clever. She could learn anything with just one look at it and she was terrible fond of reading. “When I’m talking about her like this it all comes back to me, just what she was like and how she looked and spoke and acted, and little ways she had of moving her hands and head. I declare it almost seems as if she was right here in this room instead of being over there in the churchyard. I wish you’d light the lamp, Master. I feel kind of nervous.” Eric rose and lighted the lamp, rather wondering at Mrs. Williamson’s unusual exhibition of nerves. She was generally so calm and composed. “Thank you, Master. That’s better. I won’t be fancying now that Margaret Gordon’s here listening to what I’m saying. I had the feeling so strong a moment ago. “I suppose you think I’m a long while getting to Kilmeny, but I’m coming to that. I didn’t mean to talk so much about Margaret, but somehow my thoughts got taken up with her. “Well, Margaret passed the Board and went to Queen’s Academy and got a teacher’s license. She passed pretty well up when she came out, but Janet told me she cried all night after the pass list came out because there were some ahead of her. “She went to teach school over at Radnor. It was there she met a man named Ronald Fraser. Margaret had never had a beau before. She could have had any young man in Lindsay if she had wanted him, but she wouldn’t look at one of them. They said it was because she thought nobody was good enough for her, but that wasn’t the way of it at all, Master. I knew, because Margaret and I used to talk of those matters, as girls do. She didn’t believe in going with anybody unless it was somebody she thought everything of. And there was nobody in Lindsay she cared that much for. “This Ronald Fraser was a stranger from Nova Scotia and nobody knew much about him. He was a widower, although he was only a young man. He had set up store-keeping in Radnor and was doing well. He was real handsome and had taking ways women like. It was said that all the Radnor girls were in love with him, but I don’t think his worst enemy could have said he flirted with them. He never took any notice of them; but the very first time he saw Margaret Gordon he fell in love with her and she with him. “They came over to church in Lindsay together the next Sunday and everybody said it would be a match. Margaret looked lovely that day, so gentle and womanly. She had been used to hold her head pretty high, but that day she held it drooping a little and her black eyes cast down. Ronald Fraser was very tall and fair, with blue eyes. They made as handsome a couple as I ever saw. “But old James Gordon and Thomas and Janet didn’t much approve of him. I saw that plain enough one time I was there and he brought Margaret home from Radnor Friday night. I guess they wouldn’t have liked anybody, though, who come after Margaret. They thought nobody was good enough for her. “But Margaret coaxed them all round in time. She could do pretty near anything with them, they were so fond and proud of her. Her father held out the longest, but finally he give in and consented for her to marry Ronald Fraser. “They had a big wedding, too—all the neighbours were asked. Margaret always liked to make a display. I was her bridesmaid, Master. I helped her dress and nothing would please her; she wanted to look that nice for Ronald’s sake. She was a handsome bride; dressed in white, with red roses in her hair and at her breast. She wouldn’t wear white flowers; she said they looked too much like funeral flowers. She looked like a picture. I can see her this minute, as plain as plain, just as she was that night, blushing and turning pale by turns, and looking at Ronald with her eyes of love. If ever a girl loved a man with all her heart Margaret Gordon did. It almost made me feel frightened. She gave him the worship it isn’t right to give anybody but God, Master, and I think that is always punished. “They went to live at Radnor and for a little while everything went well. Margaret had a nice house, and was gay and happy. She dressed beautiful and entertained a good deal. Then—well, Ronald Fraser’s first wife turned up looking for him! She wasn’t dead after all. “Oh, there was terrible scandal, Master. The talk and gossip was something dreadful. Every one you met had a different story, and it was hard to get at the truth. Some said Ronald Fraser had known all the time that his wife wasn’t dead, and had deceived Margaret. But I don’t think he did. He swore he didn’t. They hadn’t been very happy together, it seems. Her mother made trouble between them. Then she went to visit her mother in Montreal, and died in the hospital there, so the word came to Ronald. Perhaps he believed it a little too readily, but that he DID believe it I never had a doubt. Her story was that it was another woman of the same name. When she found out Ronald thought her dead she and her mother agreed to let him think so. But when she heard he had got married again she thought she’d better let him know the truth. “It all sounded like a queer story and I suppose you couldn’t blame people for not believing it too readily. But I’ve always felt it was true. Margaret didn’t think so, though. She believed that Ronald Fraser had deceived her, knowing all the time that he couldn’t make her his lawful wife. She turned against him and hated him just as much as she had loved him before. “Ronald Fraser went away with his real wife, and in less than a year word came of his death. They said he just died of a broken heart, nothing more nor less. “Margaret came home to her father’s house. From the day that she went over its threshold, she never came out until she was carried out in her coffin three years ago. Not a soul outside of her own family ever saw her again. I went to see her, but Janet told me she wouldn’t see me. It was foolish of Margaret to act so. She hadn’t done anything real wrong; and everybody was sorry for her and would have helped her all they could. But I reckon pity cut her as deep as blame could have done, and deeper, because you see, Master, she was so proud she couldn’t bear it. “They say her father was hard on her, too; and that was unjust if it was true. Janet and Thomas felt the disgrace, too. The people that had been in the habit of going to the Gordon place soon stopped going, for they could see they were not welcome. “Old James Gordon died that winter. He never held his head up again after the scandal. He had been an elder in the church, but he handed in his resignation right away and nobody could persuade him to withdraw it. “Kilmeny was born in the spring, but nobody ever saw her, except the minister who baptized her. She was never taken to church or sent to school. Of course, I suppose there wouldn’t have been any use in her going to school when she couldn’t speak, and it’s likely Margaret taught her all she could be taught herself. But it was dreadful that she was never taken to church, or let go among the children and young folks. And it was a real shame that nothing was ever done to find out why she couldn’t talk, or if she could be cured. “Margaret Gordon died three years ago, and everybody in Lindsay went to the funeral. But they didn’t see her. The coffin lid was screwed down. And they didn’t see Kilmeny either. I would have loved to see HER for Margaret’s sake, but I didn’t want to see poor Margaret. I had never seen her since the night she was a bride, for I had left Lindsay on a visit just after that, and what I came home the scandal had just broken out. I remembered Margaret in all her pride and beauty, and I couldn’t have borne to look at her dead face and see the awful changes I knew must be there. “It was thought perhaps Janet and Thomas would take Kilmeny out after her mother was gone, but they never did, so I suppose they must have agreed with Margaret about the way she had been brought up. I’ve often felt sorry for the poor girl, and I don’t think her people did right by her, even if she was mysteriously afflicted. She must have had a very sad, lonely life. “That is the story, Master, and I’ve been a long time telling it, as I dare say you think. But the past just seemed to be living again for me as I talked. If you don’t want to be pestered with questions about Kilmeny Gordon, Master, you’d better not let on you’ve seen her.” Eric was not likely to. He had heard all he wanted to know and more. “So this girl is at the core of a tragedy,” he reflected, as he went to his room. “And she is dumb! The pity of it! Kilmeny! The name suits her. She is as lovely and innocent as the heroine of the old ballad. ‘And oh, Kilmeny was fair to see.’ But the next line is certainly not so appropriate, for her eyes were anything but ‘still and steadfast’—after she had seen me, at all events.” He tried to put her out of his thoughts, but he could not. The memory of her beautiful face drew him with a power he could not resist. The next evening he went again to the orchard. About HackerNoon Book Series: We bring you the most important technical, scientific, and insightful public domain books. This book is part of the public domain. L. M. Montgomery (2004). Kilmeny of the Orchard. Urbana, Illinois: Project Gutenberg. Retrieved https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/5341/pg5341-images.html This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org , located at https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html.

THE STORY OF KILMENY

Kilmeny of the Orchard by L. M. Montgomery, is part of the HackerNoon Books Series. You can jump to any chapter in this book here . A PHANTOM OF DELIGHT CHAPTER V. A PHANTOM OF DELIGHT Shortly before sunset that evening Eric went for a walk. When he did not go to the shore he liked to indulge in long tramps through the Lindsay fields and woods, in the mellowness of “the sweet ‘o the year.” Most of the Lindsay houses were built along the main road, which ran parallel to the shore, or about the stores at “The Corner.” The farms ran back from them into solitudes of woods and pasture lands. Eric struck southwest from the Williamson homestead, in a direction he had not hitherto explored, and walked briskly along, enjoying the witchery of the season all about him in earth and air and sky. He felt it and loved it and yielded to it, as anyone of clean life and sane pulses must do. The spruce wood in which he presently found himself was smitten through with arrows of ruby light from the setting sun. He went through it, walking up a long, purple aisle where the wood-floor was brown and elastic under his feet, and came out beyond it on a scene which surprised him. No house was in sight, but he found himself looking into an orchard; an old orchard, evidently long neglected and forsaken. But an orchard dies hard; and this one, which must have been a very delightful spot once, was delightful still, none the less so for the air of gentle melancholy which seemed to pervade it, the melancholy which invests all places that have once been the scenes of joy and pleasure and young life, and are so no longer, places where hearts have throbbed, and pulses thrilled, and eyes brightened, and merry voices echoed. The ghosts of these things seem to linger in their old haunts through many empty years. The orchard was large and long, enclosed in a tumbledown old fence of longers bleached to a silvery gray in the suns of many lost summers. At regular intervals along the fence were tall, gnarled fir trees, and an evening wind, sweeter than that which blew over the beds of spice from Lebanon, was singing in their tops, an earth-old song with power to carry the soul back to the dawn of time. Eastward, a thick fir wood grew, beginning with tiny treelets just feathering from the grass, and grading up therefrom to the tall veterans of the mid-grove, unbrokenly and evenly, giving the effect of a solid, sloping green wall, so beautifully compact that it looked as if it had been clipped into its velvet surface by art. Most of the orchard was grown over lushly with grass; but at the end where Eric stood there was a square, treeless place which had evidently once served as a homestead garden. Old paths were still visible, bordered by stones and large pebbles. There were two clumps of lilac trees; one blossoming in royal purple, the other in white. Between them was a bed ablow with the starry spikes of June lilies. Their penetrating, haunting fragrance distilled on the dewy air in every soft puff of wind. Along the fence rosebushes grew, but it was as yet too early in the season for roses. Beyond was the orchard proper, three long rows of trees with green avenues between, each tree standing in a wonderful blow of pink and white. The charm of the place took sudden possession of Eric as nothing had ever done before. He was not given to romantic fancies; but the orchard laid hold of him subtly and drew him to itself, and he was never to be quite his own man again. He went into it over one of the broken panels of fence, and so, unknowing, went forward to meet all that life held for him. He walked the length of the orchard’s middle avenue between long, sinuous boughs picked out with delicate, rose-hearted bloom. When he reached its southern boundary he flung himself down in a grassy corner of the fence where another lilac bush grew, with ferns and wild blue violets at its roots. From where he now was he got a glimpse of a house about a quarter of a mile away, its gray gable peering out from a dark spruce wood. It seemed a dull, gloomy, remote place, and he did not know who lived there. He had a wide outlook to the west, over far hazy fields and misty blue intervales. The sun had just set, and the whole world of green meadows beyond swam in golden light. Across a long valley brimmed with shadow were uplands of sunset, and great sky lakes of saffron and rose where a soul might lose itself in colour. The air was very fragrant with the baptism of the dew, and the odours of a bed of wild mint upon which he had trampled. Robins were whistling, clear and sweet and sudden, in the woods all about him. “This is a veritable ‘haunt of ancient peace,’” quoted Eric, looking around with delighted eyes. “I could fall asleep here, dream dreams and see visions. What a sky! Could anything be diviner than that fine crystal eastern blue, and those frail white clouds that look like woven lace? What a dizzying, intoxicating fragrance lilacs have! I wonder if perfume could set a man drunk. Those apple trees now—why, what is that?” Eric started up and listened. Across the mellow stillness, mingled with the croon of the wind in the trees and the flute-like calls of the robins, came a strain of delicious music, so beautiful and fantastic that Eric held his breath in astonishment and delight. Was he dreaming? No, it was real music, the music of a violin played by some hand inspired with the very spirit of harmony. He had never heard anything like it; and, somehow, he felt quite sure that nothing exactly like it ever had been heard before; he believed that that wonderful music was coming straight from the soul of the unseen violinist, and translating itself into those most airy and delicate and exquisite sounds for the first time; the very soul of music, with all sense and earthliness refined away. It was an elusive, haunting melody, strangely suited to the time and place; it had in it the sigh of the wind in the woods, the eerie whispering of the grasses at dewfall, the white thoughts of the June lilies, the rejoicing of the apple blossoms; all the soul of all the old laughter and song and tears and gladness and sobs the orchard had ever known in the lost years; and besides all this, there was in it a pitiful, plaintive cry as of some imprisoned thing calling for freedom and utterance. At first Eric listened as a man spellbound, mutely and motionlessly, lost in wonderment. Then a very natural curiosity overcame him. Who in Lindsay could play a violin like that? And who was playing so here, in this deserted old orchard, of all places in the world? He rose and walked up the long white avenue, going as slowly and silently as possible, for he did not wish to interrupt the player. When he reached the open space of the garden he stopped short in new amazement and was again tempted into thinking he must certainly be dreaming. Under the big branching white lilac tree was an old, sagging, wooden bench; and on this bench a girl was sitting, playing on an old brown violin. Her eyes were on the faraway horizon and she did not see Eric. For a few moments he stood there and looked at her. The pictures she made photographed itself on his vision to the finest detail, never to be blotted from his book of remembrance. To his latest day Eric Marshall will be able to recall vividly that scene as he saw it then—the velvet darkness of the spruce woods, the overarching sky of soft brilliance, the swaying lilac blossoms, and amid it all the girl on the old bench with the violin under her chin. He had, in his twenty-four years of life, met hundreds of pretty women, scores of handsome women, a scant half dozen of really beautiful women. But he knew at once, beyond all possibility of question or doubt, that he had never seen or imagined anything so exquisite as this girl of the orchard. Her loveliness was so perfect that his breath almost went from him in his first delight of it. Her face was oval, marked in every cameo-like line and feature with that expression of absolute, flawless purity, found in the angels and Madonnas of old paintings, a purity that held in it no faintest strain of earthliness. Her head was bare, and her thick, jet-black hair was parted above her forehead and hung in two heavy lustrous braids over her shoulders. Her eyes were of such a blue as Eric had never seen in eyes before, the tint of the sea in the still, calm light that follows after a fine sunset; they were as luminous as the stars that came out over Lindsay Harbour in the afterglow, and were fringed about with very long, soot-black lashes, and arched over by most delicately pencilled dark eyebrows. Her skin was as fine and purely tinted as the heart of a white rose. The collarless dress of pale blue print she wore revealed her smooth, slender throat; her sleeves were rolled up above her elbows and the hand which guided the bow of her violin was perhaps the most beautiful thing about her, perfect in shape and texture, firm and white, with rosy-nailed taper fingers. One long, drooping plume of lilac blossom lightly touched her hair and cast a wavering shadow over the flower-like face beneath it. There was something very child-like about her, and yet at least eighteen sweet years must have gone to the making of her. She seemed to be playing half unconsciously, as if her thoughts were far away in some fair dreamland of the skies. But presently she looked away from “the bourne of sunset,” and her lovely eyes fell on Eric, standing motionless before her in the shadow of the apple tree. The sudden change that swept over her was startling. She sprang to her feet, the music breaking in mid-strain and the bow slipping from her hand to the grass. Every hint of colour fled from her face and she trembled like one of the wind-stirred June lilies. “I beg your pardon,” said Eric hastily. “I am sorry that I have alarmed you. But your music was so beautiful that I did not remember you were not aware of my presence here. Please forgive me.” He stopped in dismay, for he suddenly realized that the expression on the girl’s face was one of terror—not merely the startled alarm of a shy, childlike creature who had thought herself alone, but absolute terror. It was betrayed in her blanched and quivering lips and in the widely distended blue eyes that stared back into his with the expression of some trapped wild thing. It hurt him that any woman should look at him in such a fashion, at him who had always held womanhood in such reverence. “Don’t look so frightened,” he said gently, thinking only of calming her fear, and speaking as he would to a child. “I will not hurt you. You are safe, quite safe.” In his eagerness to reassure her he took an unconscious step forward. Instantly she turned, and, without a sound, fled across the orchard, through a gap in the northern fence and along what seemed to be a lane bordering the fir wood beyond and arched over with wild cherry trees misty white in the gathering gloom. Before Eric could recover his wits she had vanished from his sight among the firs. He stooped and picked up the violin bow, feeling slightly foolish and very much annoyed. “Well, this is a most mysterious thing,” he said, somewhat impatiently. “Am I bewitched? Who was she? WHAT was she? Can it be possible that she is a Lindsay girl? And why in the name of all that’s provoking should she be so frightened at the mere sight of me? I have never thought I was a particularly hideous person, but certainly this adventure has not increased my vanity to any perceptible extent. Perhaps I have wandered into an enchanted orchard, and been outwardly transformed into an ogre. Now that I have come to think of it, there is something quite uncanny about the place. Anything might happen here. It is no common orchard for the production of marketable apples, that is plain to be seen. No, it’s a most unwholesome locality; and the sooner I make my escape from it the better.” He glanced about it with a whimsical smile. The light was fading rapidly and the orchard was full of soft, creeping shadows and silences. It seemed to wink sleepy eyes of impish enjoyment at his perplexity. He laid the violin bow down on the old bench. “Well, there is no use in my following her, and I have no right to do so even if it were of use. But I certainly wish she hadn’t fled in such evident terror. Eyes like hers were never meant to express anything but tenderness and trust. Why—why—WHY was she so frightened? And who—who—WHO—can she be?” All the way home, over fields and pastures that were beginning to be moonlight silvered he pondered the mystery. “Let me see,” he reflected. “Mr. Williamson was describing the Lindsay girls for my benefit the other evening. If I remember rightly he said that there were four handsome ones in the district. What were their names? Florrie Woods, Melissa Foster—no, Melissa Palmer—Emma Scott, and Jennie May Ferguson. Can she be one of them? No, it is a flagrant waste of time and gray matter supposing it. That girl couldn’t be a Florrie or a Melissa or an Emma, while Jennie May is completely out of the question. Well, there is some bewitchment in the affair. Of that I’m convinced. So I’d better forget all about it.” But Eric found that it was impossible to forget all about it. The more he tried to forget, the more keenly and insistently he remembered. The girl’s exquisite face haunted him and the mystery of her tantalized him. True, he knew that, in all likelihood, he might easily solve the problem by asking the Williamsons about her. But somehow, to his own surprise, he found that he shrank from doing this. He felt that it was impossible to ask Robert Williamson and probably have the girl’s name overflowed in a stream of petty gossip concerning her and all her antecedents and collaterals to the third and fourth generation. If he had to ask any one it should be Mrs. Williamson; but he meant to find out the secret for himself if it were at all possible. He had planned to go to the harbour the next evening. One of the lobstermen had promised to take him out cod-fishing. But instead he wandered southwest over the fields again. He found the orchard easily—he had half expected NOT to find it. It was still the same fragrant, grassy, wind-haunted spot. But it had no occupant and the violin bow was gone from the old bench. “Perhaps she tiptoed back here for it by the light o’ the moon,” thought Eric, pleasing his fancy by the vision of a lithe, girlish figure stealing with a beating heart through mingled shadow and moonshine. “I wonder if she will possibly come this evening, or if I have frightened her away for ever. I’ll hide me behind this spruce copse and wait.” Eric waited until dark, but no music sounded through the orchard and no one came to it. The keenness of his disappointment surprised him, nay more, it vexed him. What nonsense to be so worked up because a little girl he had seen for five minutes failed to appear! Where was his common sense, his “gumption,” as old Robert Williamson would have said? Naturally a man liked to look at a pretty face. But was that any reason why he should feel as if life were flat, stale, and unprofitable simply because he could not look at it? He called himself a fool and went home in a petulant mood. Arriving there, he plunged fiercely into solving algebraical equations and working out geometry exercises, determined to put out of his head forthwith all vain imaginings of an enchanted orchard, white in the moonshine, with lilts of elfin music echoing down its long arcades. The next day was Sunday and Eric went to church twice. The Williamson pew was one of the side ones at the top of the church and its occupants practically faced the congregation. Eric looked at every girl and woman in the audience, but he saw nothing of the face which, setting will power and common sense flatly at defiance, haunted his memory like a star. Thomas Gordon was there, sitting alone in his long, empty pew near the top of the building; and Neil Gordon sang in the choir which occupied the front pew of the gallery. He had a powerful and melodious, though untrained voice, which dominated the singing and took the colour out of the weaker, more commonplace tones of the other singers. He was well-dressed in a suit of dark blue serge, with a white collar and tie. But Eric idly thought it did not become him so well as the working clothes in which he had first seen him. He was too obviously dressed up, and he looked coarser and more out of harmony with his surroundings. For two days Eric refused to let himself think of the orchard. Monday evening he went cod-fishing, and Tuesday evening he went up to play checkers with Alexander Tracy. Alexander won all the games so easily that he never had any respect for Eric Marshall again. “Played like a feller whose thoughts were wool gathering,” he complained to his wife. “He’ll never make a checker player—never in this world.” About HackerNoon Book Series: We bring you the most important technical, scientific, and insightful public domain books. This book is part of the public domain. L. M. Montgomery (2004). Kilmeny of the Orchard. Urbana, Illinois: Project Gutenberg. Retrieved https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/5341/pg5341-images.html This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org , located at https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html.

A PHANTOM OF DELIGHT

THE CONSCIENCE CASE OF DAVID BELL

Further Chronicles of Avonlea by L. M. Montgomery, is part of the HackerNoon Books Series. You can jump to any chapter in this book here . SARA'S WAY IX. SARA'S WAY The warm June sunshine was coming down through the trees, white with the virginal bloom of apple-blossoms, and through the shining panes, making a tremulous mosaic upon Mrs. Eben Andrews' spotless kitchen floor. Through the open door, a wind, fragrant from long wanderings over orchards and clover meadows, drifted in, and, from the window, Mrs. Eben and her guest could look down over a long, misty valley sloping to a sparkling sea. Mrs. Jonas Andrews was spending the afternoon with her sister-in-law. She was a big, sonsy woman, with full-blown peony cheeks and large, dreamy, brown eyes. When she had been a slim, pink-and-white girl those eyes had been very romantic. Now they were so out of keeping with the rest of her appearance as to be ludicrous. Mrs. Eben, sitting at the other end of the small tea-table that was drawn up against the window, was a thin little woman, with a very sharp nose and light, faded blue eyes. She looked like a woman whose opinions were always very decided and warranted to wear. "How does Sara like teaching at Newbridge?" asked Mrs. Jonas, helping herself a second time to Mrs. Eben's matchless black fruit cake, and thereby bestowing a subtle compliment which Mrs. Eben did not fail to appreciate. "Well, I guess she likes it pretty well—better than down at White Sands, anyway," answered Mrs. Eben. "Yes, I may say it suits her. Of course it's a long walk there and back. I think it would have been wiser for her to keep on boarding at Morrison's, as she did all winter, but Sara is bound to be home all she can. And I must say the walk seems to agree with her." "I was down to see Jonas' aunt at Newbridge last night," said Mrs. Jonas, "and she said she'd heard that Sara had made up her mind to take Lige Baxter at last, and that they were to be married in the fall. She asked me if it was true. I said I didn't know, but I hoped to mercy it was. Now, is it, Louisa?" "Not a word of it," said Mrs. Eben sorrowfully. "Sara hasn't any more notion of taking Lige than ever she had. I'm sure it's not MY fault. I've talked and argued till I'm tired. I declare to you, Amelia, I am terribly disappointed. I'd set my heart on Sara's marrying Lige—and now to think she won't!" "She is a very foolish girl," said Mrs. Jonas, judicially. "If Lige Baxter isn't good enough for her, who is?" "And he's so well off," said Mrs. Eben, "and does such a good business, and is well spoken of by every one. And that lovely new house of his at Newbridge, with bay windows and hardwood floors! I've dreamed and dreamed of seeing Sara there as mistress." "Maybe you'll see her there yet," said Mrs. Jonas, who always took a hopeful view of everything, even of Sara's contrariness. But she felt discouraged, too. Well, she had done her best. If Lige Baxter's broth was spoiled it was not for lack of cooks. Every Andrews in Avonlea had been trying for two years to bring about a match between him and Sara, and Mrs. Jonas had borne her part valiantly. Mrs. Eben's despondent reply was cut short by the appearance of Sara herself. The girl stood for a moment in the doorway and looked with a faintly amused air at her aunts. She knew quite well that they had been discussing her, for Mrs. Jonas, who carried her conscience in her face, looked guilty, and Mrs. Eben had not been able wholly to banish her aggrieved expression. Sara put away her books, kissed Mrs. Jonas' rosy cheek, and sat down at the table. Mrs. Eben brought her some fresh tea, some hot rolls, and a little jelly-pot of the apricot preserves Sara liked, and she cut some more fruit cake for her in moist plummy slices. She might be out of patience with Sara's "contrariness," but she spoiled and petted her for all that, for the girl was the very core of her childless heart. Sara Andrews was not, strictly speaking, pretty; but there was that about her which made people look at her twice. She was very dark, with a rich, dusky sort of darkness, her deep eyes were velvety brown, and her lips and cheeks were crimson. She ate her rolls and preserves with a healthy appetite, sharpened by her long walk from Newbridge, and told amusing little stories of her day's work that made the two older women shake with laughter, and exchange shy glances of pride over her cleverness. When tea was over she poured the remaining contents of the cream jug into a saucer. "I must feed my pussy," she said as she left the room. "That girl beats me," said Mrs. Eben with a sigh of perplexity. "You know that black cat we've had for two years? Eben and I have always made a lot of him, but Sara seemed to have a dislike to him. Never a peaceful nap under the stove could he have when Sara was home—out he must go. Well, a little spell ago he got his leg broke accidentally and we thought he'd have to be killed. But Sara wouldn't hear of it. She got splints and set his leg just as knacky, and bandaged it up, and she has tended him like a sick baby ever since. He's just about well now, and he lives in clover, that cat does. It's just her way. There's them sick chickens she's been doctoring for a week, giving them pills and things! "And she thinks more of that wretched-looking calf that got poisoned with paris green than of all the other stock on the place." As the summer wore away, Mrs. Eben tried to reconcile herself to the destruction of her air castles. But she scolded Sara considerably. "Sara, why don't you like Lige? I'm sure he is a model young man." "I don't like model young men," answered Sara impatiently. "And I really think I hate Lige Baxter. He has always been held up to me as such a paragon. I'm tired of hearing about all his perfections. I know them all off by heart. He doesn't drink, he doesn't smoke, he doesn't steal, he doesn't tell fibs, he never loses his temper, he doesn't swear, and he goes to church regularly. Such a faultless creature as that would certainly get on my nerves. No, no, you'll have to pick out another mistress for your new house at the Bridge, Aunt Louisa." When the apple trees, that had been pink and white in June, were russet and bronze in October, Mrs. Eben had a quilting. The quilt was of the "Rising Star" pattern, which was considered in Avonlea to be very handsome. Mrs. Eben had intended it for part of Sara's "setting out," and, while she sewed the red-and-white diamonds together, she had regaled her fancy by imagining she saw it spread out on the spare-room bed of the house at Newbridge, with herself laying her bonnet and shawl on it when she went to see Sara. Those bright visions had faded with the apple blossoms, and Mrs. Eben hardly had the heart to finish the quilt at all. The quilting came off on Saturday afternoon, when Sara could be home from school. All Mrs. Eben's particular friends were ranged around the quilt, and tongues and fingers flew. Sara flitted about, helping her aunt with the supper preparations. She was in the room, getting the custard dishes out of the cupboard, when Mrs. George Pye arrived. Mrs. George had a genius for being late. She was later than usual to-day, and she looked excited. Every woman around the "Rising Star" felt that Mrs. George had some news worth listening to, and there was an expectant silence while she pulled out her chair and settled herself at the quilt. She was a tall, thin woman with a long pale face and liquid green eyes. As she looked around the circle she had the air of a cat daintily licking its chops over some titbit. "I suppose," she said, "that you have heard the news?" She knew perfectly well that they had not. Every other woman at the frame stopped quilting. Mrs. Eben came to the door with a pan of puffy, smoking-hot soda biscuits in her hand. Sara stopped counting the custard dishes, and turned her ripely-colored face over her shoulder. Even the black cat, at her feet, ceased preening his fur. Mrs. George felt that the undivided attention of her audience was hers. "Baxter Brothers have failed," she said, her green eyes shooting out flashes of light. "Failed DISGRACEFULLY!" She paused for a moment; but, since her hearers were as yet speechless from surprise, she went on. "George came home from Newbridge, just before I left, with the news. You could have knocked me down with a feather. I should have thought that firm was as steady as the Rock of Gibraltar! But they're ruined—absolutely ruined. Louisa, dear, can you find me a good needle?" "Louisa, dear," had set her biscuits down with a sharp thud, reckless of results. A sharp, metallic tinkle sounded at the closet where Sara had struck the edge of her tray against a shelf. The sound seemed to loosen the paralyzed tongues, and everybody began talking and exclaiming at once. Clear and shrill above the confusion rose Mrs. George Pye's voice. "Yes, indeed, you may well say so. It IS disgraceful. And to think how everybody trusted them! George will lose considerable by the crash, and so will a good many folks. Everything will have to go—Peter Baxter's farm and Lige's grand new house. Mrs. Peter won't carry her head so high after this, I'll be bound. George saw Lige at the Bridge, and he said he looked dreadful cut up and ashamed." "Who, or what's to blame for the failure?" asked Mrs. Rachel Lynde sharply. She did not like Mrs. George Pye. "There are a dozen different stories on the go," was the reply. "As far as George could make out, Peter Baxter has been speculating with other folks' money, and this is the result. Everybody always suspected that Peter was crooked; but you'd have thought that Lige would have kept him straight. HE had always such a reputation for saintliness." "I don't suppose Lige knew anything about it," said Mrs. Rachel indignantly. "Well, he'd ought to, then. If he isn't a knave he's a fool," said Mrs. Harmon Andrews, who had formerly been among his warmest partisans. "He should have kept watch on Peter and found out how the business was being run. Well, Sara, you were the level-headest of us all—I'll admit that now. A nice mess it would be if you were married or engaged to Lige, and him left without a cent—even if he can clear his character!" "There is a good deal of talk about Peter, and swindling, and a lawsuit," said Mrs. George Pye, quilting industriously. "Most of the Newbridge folks think it's all Peter's fault, and that Lige isn't to blame. But you can't tell. I dare say Lige is as deep in the mire as Peter. He was always a little too good to be wholesome, I thought." There was a clink of glass at the cupboard, as Sara set the tray down. She came forward and stood behind Mrs. Rachel Lynde's chair, resting her shapely hands on that lady's broad shoulders. Her face was very pale, but her flashing eyes sought and faced defiantly Mrs. George Pye's cat-like orbs. Her voice quivered with passion and contempt. "You'll all have a fling at Lige Baxter, now that he's down. You couldn't say enough in his praise, once. I'll not stand by and hear it hinted that Lige Baxter is a swindler. You all know perfectly well that Lige is as honest as the day, if he IS so unfortunate as to have an unprincipled brother. You, Mrs. Pye, know it better than any one, yet you come here and run him down the minute he's in trouble. If there's another word said here against Lige Baxter I'll leave the room and the house till you're gone, every one of you." She flashed a glance around the quilt that cowed the gossips. Even Mrs. George Pye's eyes flickered and waned and quailed. Nothing more was said until Sara had picked up her glasses and marched from the room. Even then they dared not speak above a whisper. Mrs. Pye, alone, smarting from the snub, ventured to ejaculate, "Pity save us!" as Sara slammed the door. For the next fortnight gossip and rumor held high carnival in Avonlea and Newbridge, and Mrs. Eben grew to dread the sight of a visitor. "They're bound to talk about the Baxter failure and criticize Lige," she deplored to Mrs. Jonas. "And it riles Sara up so terrible. She used to declare that she hated Lige, and now she won't listen to a word against him. Not that I say any, myself. I'm sorry for him, and I believe he's done his best. But I can't stop other people from talking." One evening Harmon Andrews came in with a fresh budget of news. "The Baxter business is pretty near wound up at last," he said, as he lighted his pipe. "Peter has got his lawsuits settled and has hushed up the talk about swindling, somehow. Trust him for slipping out of a scrape clean and clever. He don't seem to worry any, but Lige looks like a walking skeleton. Some folks pity him, but I say he should have kept the run of things better and not have trusted everything to Peter. I hear he's going out West in the Spring, to take up land in Alberta and try his hand at farming. Best thing he can do, I guess. Folks hereabouts have had enough of the Baxter breed. Newbridge will be well rid of them." Sara, who had been sitting in the dark corner by the stove, suddenly stood up, letting the black cat slip from her lap to the floor. Mrs. Eben glanced at her apprehensively, for she was afraid the girl was going to break out in a tirade against the complacent Harmon. But Sara only walked fiercely out of the kitchen, with a sound as if she were struggling for breath. In the hall she snatched a scarf from the wall, flung open the front door, and rushed down the lane in the chill, pure air of the autumn twilight. Her heart was throbbing with the pity she always felt for bruised and baited creatures. On and on she went heedlessly, intent only on walking away her pain, over gray, brooding fields and winding slopes, and along the skirts of ruinous, dusky pine woods, curtained with fine spun purple gloom. Her dress brushed against the brittle grasses and sere ferns, and the moist night wind, loosed from wild places far away, blew her hair about her face. At last she came to a little rustic gate, leading into a shadowy wood-lane. The gate was bound with willow withes, and, as Sara fumbled vainly at them with her chilled hands, a man's firm step came up behind her, and Lige Baxter's hand closed over her's. "Oh, Lige!" she said, with something like a sob. He opened the gate and drew her through. She left her hand in his, as they walked through the lane where lissome boughs of young saplings flicked against their heads, and the air was wildly sweet with the woodsy odors. "It's a long while since I've seen you, Lige," Sara said at last. Lige looked wistfully down at her through the gloom. "Yes, it seems very long to me, Sara. But I didn't think you'd care to see me, after what you said last spring. And you know things have been going against me. People have said hard things. I've been unfortunate, Sara, and may be too easy-going, but I've been honest. Don't believe folks if they tell you I wasn't." "Indeed, I never did—not for a minute!" fired Sara. "I'm glad of that. I'm going away, later on. I felt bad enough when you refused to marry me, Sara; but it's well that you didn't. I'm man enough to be thankful my troubles don't fall on you." Sara stopped and turned to him. Beyond them the lane opened into a field and a clear lake of crocus sky cast a dim light into the shadow where they stood. Above it was a new moon, like a gleaming silver scimitar. Sara saw it was over her left shoulder, and she saw Lige's face above her, tender and troubled. "Lige," she said softly, "do you love me still?" "You know I do," said Lige sadly. That was all Sara wanted. With a quick movement she nestled into his arms, and laid her warm, tear-wet cheek against his cold one. When the amazing rumor that Sara was going to marry Lige Baxter, and go out West with him, circulated through the Andrews clan, hands were lifted and heads were shaken. Mrs. Jonas puffed and panted up the hill to learn if it were true. She found Mrs. Eben stitching for dear life on an "Irish Chain" quilt, while Sara was sewing the diamonds on another "Rising Star" with a martyr-like expression on her face. Sara hated patchwork above everything else, but Mrs. Eben was mistress up to a certain point. "You'll have to make that quilt, Sara Andrews. If you're going to live out on those prairies, you'll need piles of quilts, and you shall have them if I sew my fingers to the bone. But you'll have to help make them." And Sara had to. When Mrs. Jonas came, Mrs. Eben sent Sara off to the post-office to get her out of the way. "I suppose it's true, this time?" said Mrs. Jonas. "Yes, indeed," said Mrs. Eben briskly. "Sara is set on it. There is no use trying to move her—you know that—so I've just concluded to make the best of it. I'm no turn-coat. Lige Baxter is Lige Baxter still, neither more nor less. I've always said he's a fine young man, and I say so still. After all, he and Sara won't be any poorer than Eben and I were when we started out." Mrs. Jonas heaved a sigh of relief. "I'm real glad you take that view of it, Louisa. I'm not displeased, either, although Mrs. Harmon would take my head off if she heard me say so. I always liked Lige. But I must say I'm amazed, too, after the way Sara used to rail at him." "Well, we might have expected it," said Mrs. Eben sagely. "It was always Sara's way. When any creature got sick or unfortunate she seemed to take it right into her heart. So you may say Lige Baxter's failure was a success after all About HackerNoon Book Series: We bring you the most important technical, scientific, and insightful public domain books. This book is part of the public domain. L. M. Montgomery (2004). Further Chronicles of Avonlea. Urbana, Illinois: Project Gutenberg. Retrieved https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/5340/pg5340-images.html This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org , located at https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html .

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