Katherine, with a little smile that tried to be sarcastic but couldn’t quite succeed, left them in the parlor and played games with the twins in the kitchen all the evening. To her amazement she found she was enjoying it. And what fun it was to go down cellar with Davy and find that there were really such things as sweet apples still left in the world.
Katherine had never been in a country cellar before and had no idea what a delightful, spooky, shadowy place it could be by candlelight. Life already seemed warmer. For the first time it came home to Katherine that life might be beautiful, even for her.
Davy made enough noise to wake the Seven Sleepers, at an unearthly hour Christmas morning, ringing an old cowbell up and down the stairs. Marilla was horrified at his doing such a thing when there was a guest in the house, but Katherine came down laughing. Somehow, an odd camaraderie had sprung up between her and Davy. She told Anne candidly that she had no use for the impeccable Dora but that Davy was somehow tarred with her own brush.
They opened the parlor and distributed the gifts before breakfast because the twins, even Dora, couldn’t have eaten anything if they hadn’t. Katherine, who had not expected anything except, perhaps, a duty gift from Anne, found herself getting presents from every one. A gay, crocheted afghan from Mrs. Lynde … a sachet of orris root from Dora … a paper-knife from Davy … a basketful of tiny jars of jam and jelly from Marilla … even a little bronze chessy cat for a paper-weight from Gilbert.
And, tied under the tree, curled up on a bit of warm and woolly blanket, a dear little browneyed puppy, with alert, silken ears and an ingratiating tail. A card tied to his neck bore the legend, “From Anne, who dares, after all, to wish you a Merry Christmas.”
Katherine gathered his wriggling little body up in her arms and spoke shakily.
“Anne … he’s a darling! But Mrs. Dennis won’t let me keep him. I asked her if I might get a dog and she refused.”
“I’ve arranged it all with Mrs. Dennis. You’ll find she won’t object. And, anyway, Katherine, you’re not going to be there long. You must find a decent place to live, now that you’ve paid off what you thought were your obligations. Look at the lovely box of stationery Diana sent me. Isn’t it fascinating to look at the blank pages and wonder what will be written on them?”
Mrs. Lynde was thankful it was a white Christmas … there would be no fat graveyards when Christmas was white … but to Katherine it seemed a purple and crimson and golden Christmas. And the week that followed was just as beautiful. Katherine had often wondered bitterly just what it would be like to be happy and now she found out. She bloomed out in the most astonishing way. Anne found herself enjoying their companionship.
“To think I was afraid she would spoil my Christmas holiday!” she reflected in amazement.
“To think,” said Katherine to herself, “that I was on the verge of refusing to come here when Anne invited me!”
They went for long walks … through Lover’s Lane and the Haunted Wood, where the very silence seemed friendly … over hills where the light snow whirled in a winter dance of goblins … through old orchards full of violet shadows … through the glory of sunset woods. There were no birds to chirp or sing, no brooks to gurgle, no squirrels to gossip. But the wind made occasional music that had in quality what it lacked in quantity.
“One can always find something lovely to look at or listen to,” said Anne.
They talked of “cabbages and kings,” and hitched their wagons to stars, and came home with appetites that taxed even the Green Gables pantry. One day it stormed and they couldn’t go out. The east wind was beating around the eaves and the gray gulf was roaring. But even a storm at Green Gables had charms of its own. It was cozy to sit by the stove and dreamily watch the firelight flickering over the ceiling while you munched apples and candy. How jolly supper was with the storm wailing outside!
One night Gilbert took them to see Diana and her new baby daughter.
“I never held a baby in my life before,” said Katherine as they drove home. “For one thing, I didn’t want to, and for another I’d have been afraid of it going to pieces in my grasp. You can’t imagine how I felt … so big and clumsy with that tiny, exquisite thing in my arms. I know Mrs. Wright thought I was going to drop it every minute. I could see her striving heroically to conceal her terror. But it did something to me … the baby I mean … I haven’t decided just what.”
“Babies are such fascinating creatures,” said Anne dreamily. “They are what I heard somebody at Redmond call ‘terrific bundles of potentialities.’ Think of it, Katherine … Homer must have been a baby once … a baby with dimples and great eyes full of light … he couldn’t have been blind then, of course.”
“What a pity his mother didn’t know he was to be Homer,” said Katherine.
“But I think I’m glad Judas’ mother didn’t know he was to be Judas,” said Anne softly. “I hope she never did know.”
There was a concert in the hall one night, with a party at Abner Sloane’s after it, and Anne persuaded Katherine to go to both.
“I want you to give us a reading for our program, Katherine. I’ve heard you read beautifully.”
“I used to recite … I think I rather liked doing it. But the summer before last I recited at a shore concert which a party of summer resorters got up … and I heard them laughing at me afterwards.”
“How do you know they were laughing at you?”
“They must have been. There wasn’t anything else to laugh at.”
Anne hid a smile and persisted in asking for the reading.
“Give Genevra for an encore. I’m told you do that splendidly. Mrs. Stephen Pringle told me she never slept a wink the night after she heard you give it.”
“No; I’ve never liked Genevra. It’s in the reading, so I try occasionally to show the class how to read it. I really have no patience with Genevra. Why didn’t she scream when she found herself locked in? When they were hunting everywhere for her, surely somebody would have heard her.”
Katherine finally promised the reading but was dubious about the party. “I’ll go, of course. But nobody will ask me to dance and I’ll feel sarcastic and prejudiced and ashamed. I’m always miserable at parties … the few I’ve ever gone to. Nobody seems to think I can dance … and you know I can fairly well, Anne. I picked it up at Uncle Henry’s, because a poor bit of a maid they had wanted to learn, too, and she and I used to dance together in the kitchen at night to the music that went on in the parlor. I think I’d like it … with the right kind of partner.”
“You won’t be miserable at this party, Katherine. You won’t be outside looking in. There’s all the difference in the world, you know, between being inside looking out and outside looking in. You have such lovely hair, Katherine. Do you mind if I try a new way of doing it?”
Katherine shrugged.
“Oh, go ahead. I suppose my hair does look dreadful … but I’ve no time to be always primping. I haven’t a party dress. Will my green taffeta do?”
“It will have to do … though green is the one color above all others that you should never wear, my Katherine. But you’re going to wear a red, pintucked chiffon collar I’ve made for you. Yes, you are. You ought to have a red dress, Katherine.”
“I’ve always hated red. When I went to live with Uncle Henry, Aunt Gertrude always made me wear aprons of bright Turkey-red. The other children in school used to call out ‘Fire,’ when I came in with one of those aprons on. Anyway, I can’t be bothered with clothes.”
“Heaven grant me patience! Clothes are very important,” said Anne severely, as she braided and coiled. Then she looked at her work and saw that