Anne of Green Gables
CHAPTER XXXIII
The Hotel Concert
"Put on your white organdy, by all means, Anne," advised Diana decidedly.
They were together in the east gable chamber; outside it was only twilight—a
lovely yellowish-green twilight with a clear-blue cloudless sky. A big round
moon, slowly deepening from her pallid luster into burnished silver, hung over
the Haunted Wood; the air was full of sweet summer sounds—sleepy birds
twittering, freakish breezes, faraway voices and laughter. But in Anne's room
the blind was drawn and the lamp lighted, for an important toilet was being
made.
The east gable was a very different place from what it had been on that night
four years before, when Anne had felt its bareness penetrate to the marrow of
her spirit with its inhospitable chill. Changes had crept in, Marilla conniving
at them resignedly, until it was as sweet and dainty a nest as a young girl
could desire.
The velvet carpet with the pink roses and the pink silk curtains of Anne's
early visions had certainly never materialized; but her dreams had kept pace
with her growth, and it is not probable she lamented them. The floor was covered
with a pretty matting, and the curtains that softened the high window and
fluttered in the vagrant breezes were of pale-green art muslin. The walls, hung
not with gold and silver brocade tapestry, but with a dainty apple-blossom
paper, were adorned with a few good pictures given Anne by Mrs. Allan. Miss
Stacy's photograph occupied the place of honor, and Anne made a sentimental
point of keeping fresh flowers on the bracket under it. Tonight a spike of white
lilies faintly perfumed the room like the dream of a fragrance. There was no
"mahogany furniture," but there was a white-painted bookcase filled with books,
a cushioned wicker rocker, a toilet table befrilled with white muslin, a quaint,
gilt-framed mirror with chubby pink Cupids and purple grapes painted over its
arched top, that used to hang in the spare room, and a low white bed.
Anne was dressing for a concert at the White Sands Hotel. The guests had got
it up in aid of the Charlottetown hospital, and had hunted out all the available
amateur talent in the surrounding districts to help it along. Bertha Sampson and
Pearl Clay of the White Sands Baptist choir had been asked to sing a duet;
Milton Clark of Newbridge was to give a violin solo; Winnie Adella Blair of
Carmody was to sing a Scotch ballad; and Laura Spencer of Spencervale and Anne
Shirley of Avonlea were to recite.
As Anne would have said at one time, it was "an epoch in her life," and she
was deliciously athrill with the excitement of it. Matthew was in the seventh
heaven of gratified pride over the honor conferred on his Anne and Marilla was
not far behind, although she would have died rather than admit it, and said she
didn't think it was very proper for a lot of young folks to be gadding over to
the hotel without any responsible person with them.
Anne and Diana were to drive over with Jane Andrews and her brother Billy in
their double-seated buggy; and several other Avonlea girls and boys were going
too. There was a party of visitors expected out from town, and after the concert
a supper was to be given to the performers.
"Do you really think the organdy will be best?" queried Anne anxiously.
"I don't think it's as pretty as my blue-flowered muslin—and it
certainly isn't so fashionable."
"But it suits you ever so much better," said Diana. "It's so soft
and frilly and clinging. The muslin is stiff, and makes you look too
dressed up. But the organdy seems as if it grew on you."
Anne sighed and yielded. Diana was beginning to have a reputation for notable
taste in dressing, and her advice on such subjects was much sought after. She
was looking very pretty herself on this particular night in a dress of the
lovely wild-rose pink, from which Anne was forever debarred; but she was not to
take any part in the concert, so her appearance was of minor importance. All her
pains were bestowed upon Anne, who, she vowed, must, for the credit of Avonlea,
be dressed and combed and adorned to the Queen's taste.
"Pull out that frill a little more—so; here, let me tie your sash; now for
your slippers. I'm going to braid your hair in two thick braids, and tie them
halfway up with big white bows—no, don't pull out a single curl over your
forehead—just have the soft part. There is no way you do your hair suits you so
well, Anne, and Mrs. Allan says you look like a Madonna when you part it so. I
shall fasten this little white house rose just behind your ear. There was just
one on my bush, and I saved it for you."
"Shall I put my pearl beads on?" asked Anne. "Matthew brought me a string
from town last week, and I know he'd like to see them on me."
Diana pursed up her lips, put her black head on one side critically, and
finally pronounced in favor of the beads, which were thereupon tied around
Anne's slim milk-white throat.
"There's something so stylish about you, Anne," said Diana, with unenvious
admiration. "You hold your head with such an air. I suppose it's your figure. I
am just a dumpling. I've always been afraid of it, and now I know it is so.
Well, I suppose I shall just have to resign myself to it."
"But you have such dimples," said Anne, smiling affectionately into the
pretty, vivacious face so near her own. "Lovely dimples, like little dents in
cream. I have given up all hope of dimples. My dimple-dream will never come
true; but so many of my dreams have that I mustn't complain. Am I all ready
now?"
"All ready," assured Diana, as Marilla appeared in the doorway, a gaunt
figure with grayer hair than of yore and no fewer angles, but with a much softer
face. "Come right in and look at our elocutionist, Marilla. Doesn't she look
lovely?"
Marilla emitted a sound between a sniff and a grunt.
"She looks neat and proper. I like that way of fixing her hair. But I expect
she'll ruin that dress driving over there in the dust and dew with it, and it
looks most too thin for these damp nights. Organdy's the most unserviceable
stuff in the world anyhow, and I told Matthew so when he got it. But there is no
use in saying anything to Matthew nowadays. Time was when he would take my
advice, but now he just buys things for Anne regardless, and the clerks at
Carmody know they can palm anything off on him. Just let them tell him a thing
is pretty and fashionable, and Matthew plunks his money down for it. Mind you
keep your skirt clear of the wheel, Anne, and put your warm jacket on."
Then Marilla stalked downstairs, thinking proudly how sweet Anne looked, with
that
"One moonbeam from the forehead to the crown"
and regretting that she could not go to the concert herself to hear her girl
recite.
"I wonder if it IS too damp for my dress," said Anne anxiously.
"Not a bit of it," said Diana, pulling up the window blind. "It's a perfect
night, and there won't be any dew. Look at the moonlight."
"I'm so glad my window looks east into the sunrising," said Anne, going over
to Diana. "It's so splendid to see the morning coming up over those long hills
and glowing through those sharp fir tops. It's new every morning, and I feel as
if I washed my very soul in that bath of earliest sunshine. Oh, Diana, I love
this little room so dearly. I don't know how I'll get along without it when I go
to town next month."
"Don't speak of your going away tonight," begged Diana. "I don't want to
think of it, it makes me so miserable, and I do want to have a good time this
evening. What are you going to recite, Anne? And are you nervous?"
"Not a bit. I've recited so often in public I don't mind at all now. I've
decided to give 'The Maiden's Vow.' It's so pathetic. Laura Spencer is going to
give a comic recitation, but I'd rather make people cry than laugh."
"What will you recite if they encore you?"
"They won't dream of encoring me," scoffed Anne, who was not without her own
secret hopes that they would, and already visioned herself telling Matthew all
about it at the next morning's breakfast table. "There are Billy and Jane now—I
hear the wheels. Come on."
Billy Andrews insisted that Anne should ride on the front seat with him, so
she unwillingly climbed up. She would have much preferred to sit back with the
girls, where she could have laughed and chattered to her heart's content. There
was not much of either laughter or chatter in Billy. He was a big, fat, stolid
youth of twenty, with a round, expressionless face, and a painful lack of
conversational gifts. But he admired Anne immensely, and was puffed up with
pride over the prospect of driving to White Sands with that slim, upright figure
beside him.
Anne, by dint of talking over her shoulder to the girls and occasionally
passing a sop of civility to Billy—who grinned and chuckled and never could
think of any reply until it was too late—contrived to enjoy the drive in spite
of all. It was a night for enjoyment. The road was full of buggies, all bound
for the hotel, and laughter, silver clear, echoed and reechoed along it. When
they reached the hotel it was a blaze of light from top to bottom. They were met
by the ladies of the concert committee, one of whom took Anne off to the
performers' dressing room which was filled with the members of a Charlottetown
Symphony Club, among whom Anne felt suddenly shy and frightened and countrified.
Her dress, which, in the east gable, had seemed so dainty and pretty, now seemed
simple and plain—too simple and plain, she thought, among all the silks and
laces that glistened and rustled around her. What were her pearl beads compared
to the diamonds of the big, handsome lady near her? And how poor her one wee
white rose must look beside all the hothouse flowers the others wore! Anne laid
her hat and jacket away, and shrank miserably into a corner. She wished herself
back in the white room at Green Gables.
It was still worse on the platform of the big concert hall of the hotel,
where she presently found herself. The electric lights dazzled her eyes, the
perfume and hum bewildered her. She wished she were sitting down in the audience
with Diana and Jane, who seemed to be having a splendid time away at the back.
She was wedged in between a stout lady in pink silk and a tall, scornful-looking
girl in a white-lace dress. The stout lady occasionally turned her head squarely
around and surveyed Anne through her eyeglasses until Anne, acutely sensitive of
being so scrutinized, felt that she must scream aloud; and the white-lace girl
kept talking audibly to her next neighbor about the "country bumpkins" and
"rustic belles" in the audience, languidly anticipating "such fun" from the
displays of local talent on the program. Anne believed that she would hate that
white-lace girl to the end of life.
Unfortunately for Anne, a professional elocutionist was staying at the hotel
and had consented to recite. She was a lithe, dark-eyed woman in a wonderful
gown of shimmering gray stuff like woven moonbeams, with gems on her neck and in
her dark hair. She had a marvelously flexible voice and wonderful power of
expression; the audience went wild over her selection. Anne, forgetting all
about herself and her troubles for the time, listened with rapt and shining
eyes; but when the recitation ended she suddenly put her hands over her face.
She could never get up and recite after that—never. Had she ever thought she
could recite? Oh, if she were only back at Green Gables!
At this unpropitious moment her name was called. Somehow Anne—who did not
notice the rather guilty little start of surprise the white-lace girl gave, and
would not have understood the subtle compliment implied therein if she had—got
on her feet, and moved dizzily out to the front. She was so pale that Diana and
Jane, down in the audience, clasped each other's hands in nervous sympathy.
Anne was the victim of an overwhelming attack of stage fright. Often as she
had recited in public, she had never before faced such an audience as this, and
the sight of it paralyzed her energies completely. Everything was so strange, so
brilliant, so bewildering—the rows of ladies in evening dress, the critical
faces, the whole atmosphere of wealth and culture about her. Very different this
from the plain benches at the Debating Club, filled with the homely, sympathetic
faces of friends and neighbors. These people, she thought, would be merciless
critics. Perhaps, like the white-lace girl, they anticipated amusement from her
"rustic" efforts. She felt hopelessly, helplessly ashamed and miserable. Her
knees trembled, her heart fluttered, a horrible faintness came over her; not a
word could she utter, and the next moment she would have fled from the platform
despite the humiliation which, she felt, must ever after be her portion if she
did so.
But suddenly, as her dilated, frightened eyes gazed out over the audience,
she saw Gilbert Blythe away at the back of the room, bending forward with a
smile on his face—a smile which seemed to Anne at once triumphant and taunting.
In reality it was nothing of the kind. Gilbert was merely smiling with
appreciation of the whole affair in general and of the effect produced by Anne's
slender white form and spiritual face against a background of palms in
particular. Josie Pye, whom he had driven over, sat beside him, and her face
certainly was both triumphant and taunting. But Anne did not see Josie, and
would not have cared if she had. She drew a long breath and flung her head up
proudly, courage and determination tingling over her like an electric shock. She
WOULD NOT fail before Gilbert Blythe—he should never be able to laugh at her,
never, never! Her fright and nervousness vanished; and she began her recitation,
her clear, sweet voice reaching to the farthest corner of the room without a
tremor or a break. Self-possession was fully restored to her, and in the
reaction from that horrible moment of powerlessness she recited as she had never
done before. When she finished there were bursts of honest applause. Anne,
stepping back to her seat, blushing with shyness and delight, found her hand
vigorously clasped and shaken by the stout lady in pink silk.
"My dear, you did splendidly," she puffed. "I've been crying like a baby,
actually I have. There, they're encoring you—they're bound to have you back!"
"Oh, I can't go," said Anne confusedly. "But yet—I must, or Matthew will be
disappointed. He said they would encore me."
"Then don't disappoint Matthew," said the pink lady, laughing.
Smiling, blushing, limpid eyed, Anne tripped back and gave a quaint, funny
little selection that captivated her audience still further. The rest of the
evening was quite a little triumph for her.
When the concert was over, the stout, pink lady—who was the wife of an
American millionaire—took her under her wing, and introduced her to everybody;
and everybody was very nice to her. The professional elocutionist, Mrs. Evans,
came and chatted with her, telling her that she had a charming voice and
"interpreted" her selections beautifully. Even the white-lace girl paid her a
languid little compliment. They had supper in the big, beautifully decorated
dining room; Diana and Jane were invited to partake of this, also, since they
had come with Anne, but Billy was nowhere to be found, having decamped in mortal
fear of some such invitation. He was in waiting for them, with the team,
however, when it was all over, and the three girls came merrily out into the
calm, white moonshine radiance. Anne breathed deeply, and looked into the clear
sky beyond the dark boughs of the firs.
Oh, it was good to be out again in the purity and silence of the night! How
great and still and wonderful everything was, with the murmur of the sea
sounding through it and the darkling cliffs beyond like grim giants guarding
enchanted coasts.
"Hasn't it been a perfectly splendid time?" sighed Jane, as they drove away.
"I just wish I was a rich American and could spend my summer at a hotel and wear
jewels and low-necked dresses and have ice cream and chicken salad every blessed
day. I'm sure it would be ever so much more fun than teaching school. Anne, your
recitation was simply great, although I thought at first you were never going to
begin. I think it was better than Mrs. Evans's."
"Oh, no, don't say things like that, Jane," said Anne quickly, "because it
sounds silly. It couldn't be better than Mrs. Evans's, you know, for she is a
professional, and I'm only a schoolgirl, with a little knack of reciting. I'm
quite satisfied if the people just liked mine pretty well."
"I've a compliment for you, Anne," said Diana. "At least I think it must be a
compliment because of the tone he said it in. Part of it was anyhow. There was
an American sitting behind Jane and me—such a romantic-looking man, with
coal-black hair and eyes. Josie Pye says he is a distinguished artist, and that
her mother's cousin in Boston is married to a man that used to go to school with
him. Well, we heard him say—didn't we, Jane?—'Who is that girl on the platform
with the splendid Titian hair? She has a face I should like to paint.' There
now, Anne. But what does Titian hair mean?"
"Being interpreted it means plain red, I guess," laughed Anne. "Titian was a
very famous artist who liked to paint red-haired women."
"DID you see all the diamonds those ladies wore?" sighed Jane. "They were
simply dazzling. Wouldn't you just love to be rich, girls?"
"We ARE rich," said Anne staunchly. "Why, we have sixteen years to our
credit, and we're happy as queens, and we've all got imaginations, more or less.
Look at that sea, girls—all silver and shadow and vision of things not seen. We
couldn't enjoy its loveliness any more if we had millions of dollars and ropes
of diamonds. You wouldn't change into any of those women if you could. Would you
want to be that white-lace girl and wear a sour look all your life, as if you'd
been born turning up your nose at the world? Or the pink lady, kind and nice as
she is, so stout and short that you'd really no figure at all? Or even Mrs.
Evans, with that sad, sad look in her eyes? She must have been dreadfully
unhappy sometime to have such a look. You KNOW you wouldn't, Jane Andrews!"
"I DON'T know—exactly," said Jane unconvinced. "I think diamonds would
comfort a person for a good deal."
"Well, I don't want to be anyone but myself, even if I go uncomforted by
diamonds all my life," declared Anne. "I'm quite content to be Anne of Green
Gables, with my string of pearl beads. I know Matthew gave me as much love with
them as ever went with Madame the Pink Lady's jewels."