Anne Of Avonlea (Bedtime Story) Part 9

Chapter 9 Question of Colour That old nuisance of Rachel Lynde was here again today,

Pestering me for a subscription towards buying a carpet for the vestry room,

Said Mr.

Harrison wrathfully.

I detest that woman more than anybody I know.

She can put a whole sermon,

Text,

Comment and application into six words and throw it at you like a brick.

Anne who was perched on the edge of the veranda,

Enjoying the charm of a mild west wind blowing across a new ploughed field on a grey November twilight,

Piping a quaint little melody among the twisted firs below the garden,

Turned her dreamy face over her shoulder.

The trouble is you and Miss Lynde don't understand one another,

She explained.

That is always what is wrong when people don't like each other.

I didn't like Miss Lynde at first either,

But as soon as I came to understand her,

I learned to.

Miss Lynde may be an acquired taste with some folks,

But I didn't keep on eating bananas because I was told I'd learn to like them if I did,

Growled Mr.

Harrison.

And as for understanding her,

I understand that she's a confirmed busybody and I told her so.

Oh,

That must have hurt her feelings very much,

Said Anne reproachfully.

How could you say such a thing?

I said some dreadful things to Miss Lynde long ago,

But it was when I had lost my temper.

I couldn't say them deliberately.

It was the truth and I believe in telling the truth to everybody.

But you don't tell the whole truth,

Objected Anne.

You only tell the disagreeable part of the truth.

Now you have told me a dozen times that my hair was red,

But you had never once told me that I had a nice nose.

I dare say you know it without any telling,

Chuckled Mr.

Harrison.

I know I have red hair too,

Although it is much darker than it used to be,

So there is no need of telling me that either.

Well well,

I try and not to mention it again since you are so sensitive.

You must excuse me,

Anne.

I've got a habit of being outspoken and folks mustn't mind it.

But they can't help minding it and I don't think it is any help that it is your habit.

What would you think of a person who went about sticking pins and needles into people and saying,

Excuse me?

You mustn't mind me.

It is just a habit I've got.

You'd think he was crazy,

Wouldn't you?

And as for Miss Flint being a busybody,

Perhaps she is.

But did you tell her she had a very kind heart and always helped the poor and never said a word when Timothy Cotton stole a crock of butter out of her dairy and told his wife he'd bought it from her?

Miss Cotton cast it up to her the next time they met,

That it tasted of turnips,

And Miss Flint just said she was sorry it had turned out so poorly.

I suppose she has some good qualities,

Conceded Mr.

Harrison grudgingly.

Most folks have.

I have some myself,

Though you might never suspect it.

But anyhow,

I ain't going to give anything to that carpet.

Folks are everlastingly begging for money here,

It seems to me.

How is your project of painting the hall coming on?

Splendidly.

We had a meeting of the AVIS last Friday night and found that we had plenty of money subscribed to paint the hall and shingle the roof too.

Most people gave very liberally,

Mr.

Harrison.

Anne was a sweet-sought lass,

But she could instill some venom into innocent Daleks when occasion required.

What color are you going to have it?

We have decided on a very pretty green.

The roof will be dark red,

Of course.

Mr.

Roger Pye is going to get the paint in town today.

Who's got the job?

Mr.

Joshua Pye of Carmody.

He has nearly finished the shingling.

We had to give him the contract.

For every one of the Pyes,

And there are four families,

You know,

Said they wouldn't give a cent unless Joshua got it.

They had subscribed $12 between them,

And we thought that was too much to lose.

Although some people think we shouldn't have given in to the Pyes.

Miss Lynn says they try to run everything.

The main question is,

Will this Joshua do his work well?

If he does,

I don't see that it matters whether his name is Pye or Pudding.

He has the reputation of being a good workman,

Though they say he is a very peculiar man.

He hardly ever talks.

He is peculiar enough all right,

Then,

Said Mr.

Harrison dryly,

Or at least folks here will call him so.

I never was much of a talker till I came to Avonlea,

And then I had to begin in self-defense of Miss Lynn would have,

Said I was dumb,

And started the subscription to have me taught sign language.

You are not going yet,

Anne?

I must.

I have some sewing to do for Dora this evening.

Besides,

Davy is probably breaking Maria's heart with some new mid-chief by this time.

This morning the first thing he said was,

Where does the dog go,

Anne?

I want to know.

I told him it went around the other side of the world,

But after breakfast he declared it didn't,

That it went down the well.

Maria says she caught him hanging over the well box four times today,

Trying to reach down the dark.

He is a limp,

Declared Mr.

Harrison.

He came over here yesterday and pulled six feathers out of Ginger's tail before I could get in from the barn.

The poor bird has been moping ever since.

Those children must be a sight of trouble to you folks.

Everything that's worth having is some trouble,

Said Anne,

Secretly resolving to forgive Davy's next offense,

Whatever it might be,

Since he had avenged her on Ginger.

Mr.

Roger Pye brought the hull paint home that night,

And Mr.

Joshua Pye,

A surely deserter and man,

Began painting the next day.

He was not disturbed in his task.

The hull was situated on what was called the lower road.

In late autumn this road was always muddy and wet,

And people going to comedy traveled by the longer,

Upper road.

The hull was so closely surrounded by fir woods that it was invisible unless you were near it.

Mr.

Joshua Pye painted away in the solitude and independence that were so dear to his unsociable heart.

Friday afternoon he finished his job and went home to comedy.

Soon after his departure,

Mrs.

Rachel Lynde drove by,

Having braved the mud of the lower road out of curiosity to see what the hull looked like in its new coat of paint.

When she rounded the spruce curve she saw,

The side effect did Mrs.

Lynde oddly.

She dropped the reins,

Hollowed up her hands,

And said,

Gracious Providence!

She stared as if she could not believe her eyes.

Then she laughed,

Almost hysterically.

There must be some mistake.

There must.

I knew those Pyes would make a mess of things.

Mrs.

Lynde drove home,

Meeting several people on the road and stopping to tell them about the hull.

The news flew like wildfire.

Gilbert Blight,

Poring over the textbook at home,

Heard it from his father's hired boy at sunset and rushed breathlessly to Green Gables,

Joined on the way by Fred Wright.

They found Diana Barry,

Jane Andrews,

And Anne Shirley,

Their spare personified,

At the yard gate of Green Gables,

Under the big leafless willows.

It isn't true,

Shirley,

Anne,

Exclaimed Gilbert.

It is true,

Answered Anne,

Looking like the muse of tragedy.

Miss Lynde called on her way from comedy to tell me.

Oh,

It is simply dreadful.

What is the use of trying to improve anything?

What is dreadful?

Asked Oliver Sloane,

Arriving at this moment with a bad box he had brought from town for Marilla.

Haven't you heard?

Said Jane,

Wrathfully.

Well it is simply this.

Joshua Pye has gone and painted the hull blue,

Instead of green,

A deep brilliant blue,

The shade they use for painting carts and wheelbarrows.

And Miss Lynde says it is the most hideous color for a building,

Especially when combined with the red roof that she ever saw or imagined.

You could simply have knocked me down with a feather when I heard it.

It is heartbreaking,

After all the trouble we've had.

How on earth could such a mistake have happened?

Well Diana,

The blame of this unmerciful disaster was eventually narrowed down to the Pye's.

The improvers had decided to use Morton Harris paints,

And the Morton Harris paint cans were numbered according to a color card.

A purchaser chose his shade on the card and ordered by the accompanying number.

147 was the shade of green desired,

And when Mr.

Roger Pye sent word to the improvers by his son John Andrew that he was going to town and would get their paint for them,

The improvers told John Andrew to tell his father to get 147.

John Andrew always averred that he did so,

But Mr.

Roger Pye astoundingly declared that John Andrew told him 157,

And there the matter stands to this day.

That night there was a blank dismay in every Avallee house where an improver lived.

The gloom at Green Gables was so intense that it quenched even Davy.

Anne wept and would not be comforted.

I must cry even if I am almost seventeen,

Marilla.

She sobbed.

It is so mortifying,

And it sounds the dead knell of society,

While simply be laughed out of existence.

In life as in dreams,

However,

Things often go by contraries.

The Avallee people did not laugh.

They were too angry.

Their money had gone to paint the hall,

And consequently they felt themselves bitterly aggrieved by the mistake.

Public indignation centered on the Pyes.

Roger Pye and John Andrew had bungled the matter between them,

And as for Joshua Pye,

He must be a born fool not to suspect there was something wrong when he opened the cans and saw the color of the paint.

Joshua Pye,

When thus Anne adverted upon,

Retorted that the Avallee tasting colors was no business of his.

Whatever his private opinion might be,

He had been hired to paint the hall,

Not to talk about it,

And he meant to have his money for it.

The improvers paid him his money in bitterness of spirit,

After consulting Mr.

Peter Sloane,

Who was a magistrate.

You'll have to pay it,

Peter told him.

You can't hold him responsible for the mistake,

Since he claims he was never told what the color was supposed to be,

But just given the cans and told to go ahead.

But it is a burning shame,

And that hall certainly does look awful.

The luckless improvers expected that Avallee would be more prejudiced than ever against them,

But instead public sympathy veered around their favor.

People thought the eager,

Enthusiastic little band who had worked so hard for their object had been badly used.

Miss Lynn told them to keep on,

And show the Pyes that there really were people in the world who could do things without making a muddle of them.

Mr.

Major Spencer sent them word that he would clean out all the stumps along the road front of his farm,

And seed it down with grass at his own expense.

And Mrs.

Hiram Sloane called at the school one day and beckoned Anne mysteriously out into the porch to tell her if the Sassity wanted to make a geranium bed at the crossroads in the spring.

They didn't need to be afraid of her cow,

For she would see that the marauding animal was kept within safe hounds.

Even Mr.

Harrison chuckled,

If he chuckled at all in private,

And was all sympathy outwardly.

Never mind,

Anne.

Most paints fade uglier every year,

But that blue is as ugly as it can be to begin with,

So it's bound to fade prettier,

And the roof is shingled and painted all right.

Folks will be able to sit in the hall after this without being leaked on.

You have accomplished so much anyhow.

But Evan Lee's blue hull will be a byword in all the neighboring settlements from this time out,

Said Anne bitterly.

And it must be confessed that it was.