Chapter XXXVIII

April 23rd, Patty's Place, Spofford Avenue

The Ochre Notebook

It's a good thing we are in the midst of boxing up our little nest, I doubt I would have found the Ochre Notebooks if I hadn't been elbow deep in tissue and cashmere. There they were, tucked inside an old fuchsia cloak – I cannot believe I ever wore such a colour! It's nearly as gruesome as what I'm about to tell you now, and you must bear it, dear old Ochre. Because if I don't pour myself into you I will certainly pour forth – like hot oil upon the barbarians – over none other than Anne herself!

Ugh, is there anything worse than when those we dare to worship do things that disappoint us? But what does Anne mean by refusing Royal Gardner! How could she? Really, how could she! I cannot believe it of her, nor possibly understand. Anne maintains she was neither flirting with him, nor encouraging him, nor after his money. So, what on earth has she been doing with the poor boy for two years?

There's not the least use in asking her. She will only keep saying she needs someone who belongs in her life. Is there a man alive – or in a book for that matter – more romantic than Roy? Or an earthly reason why the handsomest, cleverest, richest fellow in all Kingsport doesn't belong in her life?

What a lost and mangled thing Anne looks. Worse than my dusty pink flowerpot hat! Fancy me wearing such an eyesore – that is heading straight for the bonfire. Perhaps I shall give it to Anne out of spite. She said her refusal of Roy had spoiled everything backwards, and I believe she's right. I swear the goose has less sense now than when she first came to Redmond! Well, I learned have all my lessons. The only one that didn't stick is how to comfort a person without making them feel worse. Anne just will not be consoled. She won't even vent the tiniest bit. Though I don't know why, I feel better already!

Ugh, there's someone at the door. And the girls are in the orchard and Anne is in a funk. I suppose it's up to me to shoo them away!

Later...

Of all people! Gilbert Blythe was on the porch steps wanting to see Anne.

"Hold on, won't you," I said to him, "Anne may need a moment, Mr. Gardner has only now proposed!"

I didn't dare invite Gil in. Honestly, he'll see her on the Island in a few days' time, what could be so important? I suppose I could have asked, but I was so fed up with Anne, and Roy, and the hideous apparel that so my called friends let me wear in public! I left Gilbert with his mouth as wide as his eyes (even then he managed to look rather gorgeous) and trudged upstairs to ask Queen Anne if she was 'at home' to visitors, only to witness the definitive exhibition of utter muddle-headedness. When I think of how she used to laugh at me!

"Tell him I'm not here! No, tell him I'll be down in a moment! No, Phil, ask if he could call back in an hour. No, I don't want to see him. No, don't tell him that! Oh, why is he here, hasn't he a train to catch? I imagine this has something to do with Christine –"

"Now that you mention it, honey," I said, "he did ask if we'd heard talk at the Reception –"

"He's come to tell me he's engaged. Of course, he has. So thoughtful, so honourable, so utterly Gilbert Blythe!"

On she went. I was about to call a doctor. I already suspected Anne was out of her senses for refusing Roy, but after seeing that performance I knew she was. I don't even think she'd stopped babbling when I left the room. And to top off, after going to the bother of trudging down those stairs again, I discovered Gil had left without so much as a goodbye!

…

April 24th, Patty's Place, Spofford Avenue

The Ochre Notebook

Poor old Anne. She walks about the house like there was a coat hanger stuck in her blouse – and still refuses to be comforted. Whenever we hold out our arms to her it's as though we offered her last season's gloves – of which I have several.

"Don't, please don't," she says to us, "it hurts to be held, hurts as much as if I was bruised all over."

How I'd love to give her a kick, then she'd remember what a real bruise felt like. It never seems to occur to her how much it hurts us to see her look so blue. We have two tiny days left to us, we girls of Patty's Place, and Anne is like a cold shower on a wedding breakfast. Ugh, I never cared a straw for the weather before. Now I want to know how it is that in 1887 no one can tell me with any certainty if it will rain on my wedding day!

Anne hasn't even told me if she wants her maid-of-honour gown to be made up in lemon or lilac, and I can't ask her because she'll only think of Roy again. Well, the man can't be that upset. I saw his sister, Dorothy, at Backshalls this morning and she says that Roy is still planning his tour of Italy. He is hardly incapacitated with grief, whereas Anne hasn't left the house at all. My opinion of her at this moment is lower than cats!

I couldn't help myself, I invited Dorothy to Patty's Place for tea this afternoon. I know very well what Anne will say, which is why I won't tell her. In fact, I'll be sure to have us girls building up the bonfire when Dorothy is due. That pile is getting to be six foot high! We are going to spend our last evening together, sitting round a crackling blaze, feeding our faces with sugar and stodge and getting dangerously merry. What a pity I never managed to get Gil inside, he could have shifted those depressing chairs of Prissy and Stella's out to the orchard.

Which reminds me. I must remember to write to that mannie. I have a terrible suspicion that when I saw him last, I might not have made it exactly clear that Roy's proposal was refused.

Ugh, I am still in shock at having to write those words!

…

25th April, Patty's Place, Spofford Avenue

The Ochre Notebook

So this is goodbye! Goodbye Ochre Notebook!

Stella is insisting we all take something to the bonfire that we want to let go of forever. Prissy is finally getting rid of those letters from the Grafton farmer – which is a boon for me because I need an extra hatbox. Stella is burning letters too. The ones she wrote to that ghost from Mornington. As for Anne, she isn't quite ready or willing to let go of Roy's letters, though not for any sentimental reason. After Dorothy's visit something of the old Anne (or at least one of the old Annes) returned, and she said she would hold onto Mr. Gardner's correspondence for a while in case he wanted them when he publishes his memoirs. Little wretch! Her vast array of mementos however, the heart shaped cards, dried flowers and little poems are off to feed the fire. We loaded them into the old knotted crate that Rusty refused to die in, and Anne made such a ruckus I thought she was going to insist on keeping that too.

"Stop!" she screeched, "Not that one!" and ran over to Priss to retrieve a card with stars upon it.

"What's so special about that?" we asked her.

"To remind me of my room, of course. My little blue room with its little starry ceiling."

We all looked at each other wondering who would be the first to speak. Anne has been terribly prickly of late and none of us much relished being glared at. But even by her dreamy standards, this was rather worrying.

"Anne, dearie," Jimsie ventured – good old Jimsie, how I'll miss that duck – "there aren't any stars on your ceiling."

Then we all got that green-eyed glare. Though I wonder if Anne didn't pity us poor unimaginative clods even more than we pitied her!

No one was sorry for me, however.

"A single notebook!" Stella sniffed. "Is that really all you've got?"

"Well excuse me if I'm not in the habit of writing to dead people," I replied. "It must be an Island tradition."

"Anyone waiting on a letter from you would be dead from the shock of receiving it!" Anne teased.

"You have at least a dozen of these books," Priss said to me – and Priss would know, my belongings have been choking up her room for a year. "Why is this the only one to go?"

"Because you won't let me burn my hideous flower pot hat!" I said.

I didn't tell them the real reason: that I could hardly be expected to give up my Ochre-ish self forever. Well, I'm only becoming a minister's wife. I'm not becoming a saint!

…

30th June, 1887 ~ Green Gables, Avonlea

Dear Diary,

It appears I have taken to sitting in graveyards. Perhaps because it's the one place left in all the world where people never change. How strange to think I met the marvel that was Miss Gordon in such a spot. What a Phil-o-the-wisp she was then! So dazzlingly clever, divinely beautiful ~ if not angelically good.

And now? Well Diary, now she is Mrs. Blake. And her husband is an angel. The two of them just fit together. Not in that cloying way, like a spout to a kettle, so that one without the other makes them both quite useless. No, they are so much more than that. Like the branches of a tree! Wonderful enough in their own right, but together, able to build and to bear so much more. Their wedding was a joy to me, but what I loved most was seeing how dearly Phil loves her Reverend Jo. I thought it was the bridegroom who was supposed to be sick with nerves awaiting his bride's arrival. Instead Phil had me peek up the aisle twice, then run back to tell her if Jo was still there!

"I've always been the worst sort of witch," she said, looking the very opposite in her filmy white veil, "and it got me adored all my life. But being adored isn't half so wonderful as being understood. Jo got me straight away. And today... Oh honey, today I finally get him."

"You mean you belong together?" I laughed, hoping she would finally see that Roy and I really didn't.

"I do admit you're not half as glum as you usually are when you turn down a thoroughly sensible proposal," she said, and twitted me on the nose with her cake fork. "Now I must make nice with Mother's side. The bell at the Patterson St Chapel wants replacing and the Byrnes will agree to anything today. You must also do a favour for your dear little Phil. When you kiss me goodbye remind me I've got an important letter to write."

I never did kiss Phil goodbye. I was wandering among the headstones of St Columba's when Reverend and Mrs Blake drove away to the 'land of Evangeline'. That evening I found myself at another, kneeling on the grassy plot where my mother and father lie. It was Mrs. Gordon's lady's maid, Cora, who drove me there. Of all one hundred and eighty guests at the banquet, hers was the only company I sought. I revealed to her a quiet wish to slip away to the cemetery, and she surprised me by saying she'd been wanting to do the same.

A little miracle occurred in that overgrown, forgotten spot, for there on the Shirleys' pale headstone was a posy of mayflowers.

"Miss Philippa ~ Mrs. Blake rather, has one of us come here every week with some bit of cheer for your folks," Cora said, as she lay Phil's bridal bouquet on the grave of a young ship's carpenter.

The moment I saw those creamy white stars I knew they were meant for me. That to leave that place without them would be to leave without my heart. I asked Cora for a stem to replace them with, a pretty sprig of rosemary, then I left her and the carriage and began walking the streets of a hometown that never was my home.

Now I'm sitting in a graveyard again, warming my back against Matthew's stone. The leaves of his rose flutter against my neck as though someone is trying to get my attention. Perhaps that someone is making their way here now on beams of light from behind the clouds. A little angel wending her way ~ or his ~ to a neat, white cottage with two sturdy pines at the gate, and two sturdy souls inside who have yearned all these months to welcome this beloved child.

Oh dearest God above, I know I've thrown prayers up to you every minute this afternoon, but please, please I ask you again to keep Diana safe.

Keep them both safe.

Later...

Diary, Sarah Blythe was just here. Upon hearing the Wright baby is about to make an appearance she decided to visit her own mother on the way back from the Gillis'. I attempted to withdraw but she waved away the awkwardness, saying she would never want for Matthew to be deprived of my company on her account.

"I imagine he'll have missed you dearly when you were away," she said.

Mrs Blythe wasn't just talking of Matthew. The way she said dearly I knew she was thinking of her son, who left for Glen St Mary the day I arrived back home. She set down a spray of wildflowers that sang of an Avonlea roadside, and began fussing with the moss on her mother's stone.

"You never met her, did you Anne? Such a woman, she was. Strong, determined, with real a sense of mischief. She could always find something to laugh over, though she had her share of sorrows. I'll never forget the advice she gave me the day I was set to marry ~"

That last word hung in the air between us and there was no way for us to just wave it away. Mrs Blythe rocked to her feet and dusted off her skirts.

"There I am interrupting when I see you're writing. I hear tell there's a book in the works, I'll leave you be."

I wanted to run after her. I wanted to catch her in my arms and say, Mrs. Blythe, it's my fault Gilbert never comes home anymore.

I don't know how I know this, yet I know it all the same. But as soon as the words were formed in my mouth I forced myself to swallow them down. Because it's not my fault, how could it be? He let go of me a long time ago. So why I can't let go of him?

Do you know what I miss, Diary? The comfortable grudge I used to have. Oh, that I had it back. To wrap it around me, to nuzzle against it, and take great hateful sniffs! I try to summon that outraged feeling. Instead I just feel blue. The deepest, darkest midnight blue with not a star to be seen.

Because there were no stars, Anne Shirley. They were only cracks in the ceiling.

...