32 Anne Of Green Gables - Stephanie Poppins

Chapter 32: When Matthew and Marilla Cuthbert adopt an orphan from Nova Scotia, they assume the little boy that they receive into their home will be better than any hired help, and a good hand on the farm. Little do they realize, they are in for a greater surprise than any they have ever experienced in the quiet provincial town of Avonlea.

In this episode, Anne looks to the future as she receives her results.

Transcript

This is SD Hudson Magic.

I'm delighted to be able to read for you,

Anne of Green Gables.

This I consider to be my favourite story of all time.

And even though I am English,

And not Canadian,

I hope I will do this story justice.

Chapter 32 The past list is out.

With the end of June came the close of the term and the close of Miss Stacy's Ruling Avenue School.

Anne and Diana walked home that evening feeling very sober indeed.

Red eyes and damp handkerchiefs bore convincing testimony to the fact that Miss Stacy's farewell words must have been quite as touching as Mr Phillips's had been under similar circumstances three years before.

Diana looked back at the schoolhouse from the foot of the Spruce Hill and sighed deeply.

It does seem as if it were the end of everything,

Doesn't it?

She said dismally.

You oughtn't to feel half so bad as I do,

Said Anne,

Hunting vainly for a dry spot on her handkerchief.

You'll be back again next winter,

But I suppose I've left the dear old school forever,

If I have good luck that is.

You won't be a bit the same.

Miss Stacy won't be there,

Nor you,

Nor Jane,

Nor Ruby probably.

I shall have to sit alone,

For I couldn't bear to have another deskmate after you.

Oh,

We've had jolly times,

Haven't we,

Anne?

It's dreadful to think they're all over.

Two big tears rolled down Diana's nose.

If you would only stop crying,

I could,

Said Anne,

Imploringly.

Just as soon as I put away my hanky,

I see you brimming up,

And that starts me off again.

As Mrs Lynn says,

If you can't be cheerful,

Be as cheerful as you can.

After all,

I dare say I'll be back next year.

This is one of those times I know I'm not going to pass.

They're getting alarmingly frequent.

Why,

You came out splendidly in the exams Miss Stacy gave,

Said Diana.

Yes,

But those exams didn't make me nervous.

When I think of the real thing,

You can't imagine what a horrible,

Cold,

Fluttery feeling comes round my heart.

And then my number is thirteen,

And Josie said,

It's so unlucky.

I'm not suspicious,

And I know it can make no difference,

But I still wish it wasn't thirteen.

I do wish I was going in with you,

Said Diana.

Wouldn't we have a perfectly elegant time?

But I suppose you'll have to cram in the evenings.

No,

Miss Stacy's made us promise not to open a book at all in the evenings.

She said it would only tire and confuse us,

And we're to go out walking and not think at all about the exams,

And go to bed early.

It's good advice,

But I expect it'll be hard to follow.

Good advice is apt to be,

I think.

Prissy Andrews told me she sat up half the night every night of her entrance week and crammed for dear life,

And I had determined to sit up at least as long as she did.

It was so kind of you,

Aunt Josephine,

To ask me to stay at Beechwood while I'm in town.

You'll write to me while you're in,

Won't you?

Asked Diana.

I'll write Tuesday night and tell you how the first day goes,

Promised Anne.

I'll be haunting the post office until Wednesday,

Vowed Diana.

Anne went to town the following Monday,

And on Wednesday Diana haunted the post office as agreed,

And got her letter.

Dearest Diana,

Wrote Anne.

Here it is,

Tuesday night,

And I'm writing this in the library at Beechwood.

Last night I was horribly lonesome,

All alone in my room,

And wished so much you were with me.

I couldn't cram because I'd promised Miss Stacy not to,

But it was as hard to keep from opening my history as it used to be to keep from reading a story before my lessons were learned.

This morning Miss Stacy came for me,

And we went to the academy,

Calling for Jane and Ruby and Josie on our way.

Ruby asked me to feel her hands,

And they were as cold as ice.

Josie said I looked as if I hadn't slept a wink,

And she didn't believe I was strong enough to stand the grind of the teacher's course,

Even if I did get through.

There are times and seasons,

Even yet,

When I don't feel I've made any great headway in learning to like Josie Pye.

When we reached the academy there were scores of students there from all over the island.

The first person we saw was Moody Spurgeon sitting on the steps and muttering away to himself.

Jane asked him what on earth he was doing,

And he said he was repeating the multiplication table over and over to steady his nerves,

And for pity's sake not to interrupt him,

Because if he stopped for a moment he got frightened and forgot everything he ever knew.

But the multiplication table kept his facts firmly in their proper place.

When we were assigned to our rooms Miss Stacy had to leave us.

Jane and I sat together,

And Jane was so composed that I envied her.

No need of the multiplication table for good,

Steady,

Sensible Jane.

I wondered if I looked as I felt,

And if they could hear my heart thumping clear across the room.

Then a man came in and began distributing the English examination sheets.

My hands grew cold then and my head fairly walled around as I picked it up.

Just one awful moment,

Diana I felt exactly as I did four years ago when I asked Marilla if I might stay at Green Gables.

And then everything cleared up in my mind and my heart began beating again.

I forgot to say it had stopped altogether,

For I knew I could do something with that paper anyhow.

At noon we went home for dinner and then back again for history in the afternoon.

The history was a pretty hard paper and I got dreadfully mixed up in the dates.

Still,

I think I did fairly well today.

But oh Diana,

Tomorrow the geometry exam comes off and when I think of it,

It takes every bit of determination I possess to keep from opening my euclid.

If I thought the multiplication table would help me in any way,

I'd recite it from now till tomorrow morning.

I went down to see the other girls this evening.

On my way I met Moochie Spurgeon,

Wandering distractedly around.

He said he knew he'd failed in history and he was born to be a disappointment to his parents and he was going home on the morning train.

And it would be easier to be a carpenter than a minister anyhow.

I cheered him up and persuaded him to stay to the end because it would be unfair to Miss Stacy if he didn't.

Sometimes I'd wished I was born a boy,

But when I see Moochie Spurgeon I'm always glad I'm a girl and not his sister.

Ruby was in hysterics when I reached their boarding house.

She'd just discovered a fearful mistake she'd made in her English paper.

When she recovered we went uptown and had an ice cream.

How we wished you'd have been with us.

Oh Diana,

If only the geometry examination were over.

But there,

As Mrs.

Lynde would say,

The sun will go on rising and setting whether I fail in geometry or not.

That is true,

But not especially comforting.

I think I'd rather it didn't go on if I failed.

Yours devotedly,

Anne.

The geometry examination and all the others were over in due time.

Anne arrived home on Friday evening,

Rather tired but with an air of chase and triumph about her.

Diana was over at Green Gables when she arrived and they met as if they'd been parted for years.

You old darling,

It's perfectly splendid to see you back again.

It seems like an age since you went to town and.

.

.

Oh Anne,

How did you get along?

Pretty well,

I think.

In everything but the geometry.

I don't know whether I passed it or not and I have a creepy,

Crawly presentiment that I didn't.

Oh,

How good it is to be back.

Green Gables is the dearest,

Loveliest spot in the world.

How did the others do?

The girls say they didn't pass but I think they did pretty well.

Josie says the geometry was so easy a child of ten could do it.

Moody Spurgeon still thinks he failed in history and Charlie says he failed in algebra.

But we don't really know anything about it and won't know until the pass list is out.

That won't be for a fortnight.

Fancy living a fortnight in such suspense.

I wish I could go to sleep and never wake up until it's over.

Diana knew it would be useless to ask how Gilbert Blythe had fared.

So she merely said,

Oh,

You'll pass alright,

Don't worry.

I'd rather not pass at all than come out pretty well up on the list,

Flashed Anne,

By which she meant,

And Diana knew she meant,

The success would be incomplete and bitter if she did not come out ahead of Gilbert Blythe.

With this end in view,

Anne had strained every nerve during the examinations.

So had Gilbert.

They had met and passed each other on the street a dozen times without any sign of recognition and every time Anne held her head a little higher and wished a little more earnestly that she had made friends with Gilbert when he asked her and vowed a little more determinedly to surpass him in the examination.

She knew that all Avonlea Junior was wondering which would come out first.

Even she knew that Jimmy Glover and Ned Wright had a bet on the question and that Josie Pye had said there was no doubt in the world Gilbert would be first.

And she felt her humiliation would be unbearable if she failed.

But she had another and nobler motive for wishing to do well.

She wanted to pass high for the sake of Matthew and Marilla,

Especially Matthew.

Matthew had declared to her his conviction that she would beat the whole island.

That,

Anne felt,

Was something it would be foolish to hope for even in the wildest dreams.

But she did hope fervently she would be among the first ten at least so that she might see Matthew's kindly brown eyes gleam with pride in her achievement.

That,

She felt,

Would be a sweet reward indeed for her hard work and patient grubbing amongst unimaginative equations and conjunctions.

At the end of the fortnight,

Anne talked to Haunting,

The post office also,

In the distracted company of Jane,

Ruby and Josie,

Opening the Charlottetown dailies with shaking hands and cold,

Sink-away feelings,

As bad as any experience during the entrance week.

Charlie and Gilbert were not above doing this too,

But Moody Spurgeon stayed resolutely away.

I haven't got the grit to go there and look at a paper in cold blood,

He told Anne.

I'm just going to wait until everybody comes and tells me suddenly whether I've passed or not.

When three weeks had gone by without the past list appearing,

Anne began to feel she really couldn't stand the strain much longer.

Her appetite failed and her interest in avenue doings languished.

Mrs Lind wanted to know what else you could expect with a Tory Superintendent of Education at the Head of Affairs.

And Matthew,

Noting Anne's paleness and indifference and the lagging steps that bore her home from the post office every afternoon,

Began seriously to wonder if he hadn't better vote grit at the next election.

But one evening the news came.

Anne was sitting at her open window,

For the time forgetful of the woes of exams and the cares of the world,

As she drank in the beauty of the summer dusk,

Sweet scented with flower breasts from the garden below and sibilant and rustling from the stir of poplars.

The eastern sky above the firs was flushed faintly pink from the reflection of the west and Anne was wondering dreamily if the spirit of colour looked like that when she saw Diana come flying down through the firs,

Over the log bridge and up the slope with a fluttering newspaper in her hand.

Anne sprang to her feet,

Knowing at once what that paper contained.

The pass list was out.

Her head whirled and her heart beat until it hurt her.

She could not move a step.

It seemed an hour to her before Diana came rushing along the hall and burst into the room without even knocking.

Anne,

You've passed!

She cried.

Passed the very first!

You and Gilbert both,

You're ties,

But your name is first.

Oh,

I'm so proud!

Diana flung the paper on the table and herself on Anne's bed,

Utterly breathless and incapable of further speech.

Anne lighted the lamp,

Oversetting the match safe and using up half a dozen matches before her shaking hands could accomplish the task.

Then she snatched up the paper.

Yes,

She had passed.

There was her name at the very top of a list of 200.

That moment was worth living for.

You did just splendidly,

Anne,

Puffed Diana,

Recovering sufficiently to sit up and speak.

For Anne,

Starry-eyed and rapt,

Had not uttered a word.

Father brought the paper home from Bright River not ten minutes ago.

It came out on the afternoon train,

You know,

And won't be here till tomorrow by mail.

And when I saw the pass list,

I just rushed over like a wild thing.

You've passed,

Every one of you.

Meet at Moody's Spurgeon and all,

Though he's conditioned in history.

Jane and Ruby did pretty well,

They're halfway up,

And so did Charlie.

Josie just scraped through with three marks to spare,

But you'll see she'll put on as many airs as if she led.

Won't Miss Stacy be delighted?

Oh Anne,

What does it feel like to see your name at the head of a pass list like that?

If it were me,

I know I'd go crazy with joy.

I'm pretty near crazy as it is,

But you're as calm and cool as a spring evening.

I'm just dazzled inside,

Said Anne.

I want to say a hundred things,

And I can't find words to say them in.

I never dreamed of this.

Yes,

I did too,

Just once.

I let myself think once,

What if I should come out first?

Quakingly,

You know,

For it seemed so vain and presumptuous to think I could lead the island.

Excuse me a minute,

Diana.

I must rush right out to the field to tell Matthew.

Then we'll go up to the road and tell the good news to the others.

They hurried to the hay field below the barn where Matthew was coiling hay.

And as luck would have it,

Mrs Lind was talking to Marilla at the late fence.

Oh Matthew,

Exclaimed Anne,

I've passed,

And I'm first.

Or one of the first.

I'm not vain,

But I'm thankful.

Well now,

I always said it,

Said Matthew,

Gazing at the past list delightedly.

I knew you could beat them all easy.

You've done pretty well,

I must say,

Anne,

Said Marilla,

Trying to hide her extreme pride in Anne from Mrs Rachel's critical eye.

But that good soul said heartily,

I just guess she's done well,

And far be it for me to be backward in saying it.

You're a credit to your friends,

Anne,

That's what,

And we're all proud of you.

That night,

Anne,

Who had wound up the delightful evening with a serious little talk with Mrs Alan at the manse,

Knelt sweetly by her open window in a great sheen of moonshine and a moment of prayer,

Of gratitude and aspiration that came straight from her heart.

There was in it thankfulness for the past and reverent petition for the future.

And when she slept on her white pillow,

Her dreams were as fair and bright and beautiful as maidenhood might desire.

I hope you enjoyed this chapter.

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Reviews

Thank you. Every chapter has been stellar and this one particularly so. This is my second time through and I'm sure it won't be my last. I unde6 my sister is also listening.
You have no idea how much I look forward to listening every night. I've listened briefly to another version but after listening to you the other one just doesn't cut it. You do such a beautiful job and yes, you don't have to be Canadian to be stellar. ❤️