"To Laura, in memory of the olden time."
 
  CHAPTER 1
  IN THE GARRET OF GREEN GABLES
      

    "Thanks be,
           I'm done with geometry,
         learning or teaching it,"
              said Anne Shirley,
           a trifle vindictively,
         as she thumped
               a somewhat
                  battered volume of Euclid
                       into a big chest
                           of books,
           banged the lid in triumph,
         and sat down upon it,
           looking at Diana Wright
               across the Green Gables garret,
         with gray eyes
             that were
                  like a morning sky.

    The garret was a shadowy,
           suggestive,
         delightful place,
           as all garrets should be.

    Through the open window,
           by which Anne sat,
         blew the sweet,
           scented,
         sun-warm air
               of the August afternoon;
        outside,
           poplar boughs
              rustled and tossed
                   in the wind;
        beyond them were the woods,
           where Lover's Lane
              wound its enchanted path,
         and the old apple orchard
              which still
                  bore its rosy harvests munificently.

    And,
           over all,
         was a great mountain
              range of snowy clouds
                   in the blue southern sky.

    Through the other window
        was glimpsed a distant,
           white-capped,
         blue sea
          --the beautiful St. Lawrence Gulf,
           on which floats,
         like a jewel,
           Abegweit,
         whose softer,
           sweeter Indian name
            has long
                been forsaken
                       for the more prosaic
                           one of Prince Edward Island.

    Diana Wright,
           three years older than
             when we last saw her,
         had grown
              somewhat matronly
                   in the intervening time.

    But her eyes
        were as black and brilliant,
           her cheeks as rosy,
         and her dimples as enchanting,
           as in the long-ago days
             when she and Anne Shirley
                had vowed eternal friendship
                       in the garden
                     at Orchard Slope.

    In her arms
         she held a small,
           sleeping,
         black-curled creature,
           who for two happy years
            had been
                  known to the world
                       of Avonlea as
         "Small Anne Cordelia."

    Avonlea folks knew
         why Diana
            had called her Anne,
           of course,
         but Avonlea folks
            were puzzled by the Cordelia.

    There had never
        been a Cordelia
               in the Wright
              or Barry connections.

    Mrs. Harmon Andrews said
         she supposed Diana
            had found the name
                   in some trashy novel,
           and wondered
             that Fred
                hadn't more sense than
                      to allow it.

    But Diana and Anne
          smiled at each other.

    They knew
         how Small Anne Cordelia
            had come by her name.

    "You always
          hated geometry,"
              said Diana
                   with a retrospective smile.

    "I should think
        you'd be real glad
              to be through with teaching,
           anyhow."

    "Oh,
           I've always liked teaching,
         apart from geometry.

    These past three years
           in Summerside
          have been very pleasant ones.

    Mrs. Harmon Andrews told me
         when
             I came home
               that I
                wouldn't likely find
                       married life
                           as much better than
                          teaching as I expected.

    Evidently Mrs. Harmon
        is of Hamlet's opinion
         that it may be
             better to bear the ills
         that we
              have than fly
                   to others that
         we know not of."

    Anne's laugh,
           as blithe and irresistible
               as of yore,
         with an added
               note of sweetness and maturity,
           rang through the garret.

    Marilla in the kitchen below,
           compounding blue plum preserve,
         heard it and smiled;
        then sighed to think
             how seldom
                 that dear laugh
                    would echo
                           through Green Gables
                               in the years to come.

    Nothing in her life
        had ever
              given Marilla so much happiness
                   as the knowledge
         that Anne
            was going
                  to marry Gilbert Blythe;
        but every joy
            must bring
                   with it
                       its little shadow of sorrow.

    During the
           three Summerside years Anne
        had been
         home often
               for vacations and weekends;
        but,
           after this,
         a bi-annual visit would be
             as much as could be
                 hoped for.