A Queen's Girl

"I declare, my recitation has made you cry, Marilla,"
said Anne gaily stooping over Marilla's chair to drop a
butterfly kiss on that lady's cheek. "Now, I call that a
positive triumph."

"No, I wasn't crying over your piece," said Marilla, who
would have scorned to be betrayed into such weakness by
any poetry stuff. "I just couldn't help thinking of the
little girl you used to be, Anne. And I was wishing you could
have stayed a little girl, even with all your queer ways.
You've grown up now and you're going away; and you look
so tall and stylish and so--so--different altogether
in that dress--as if you didn't belong in Avonlea at all--
and I just got lonesome thinking it all over."

"Marilla!" Anne sat down on Marilla's gingham lap, took
Marilla's lined face between her hands, and looked gravely
and tenderly into Marilla's eyes. "I'm not a bit changed--
not really. I'm only just pruned down and branched out.
The real ME--back here--is just the same. It won't make a
bit of difference where I go or how much I change outwardly;
at heart I shall always be your little Anne, who will love
you and Matthew and dear Green Gables more and better every
day of her life."

Anne laid her fresh young cheek against Marilla's faded
one, and reached out a hand to pat Matthew's shoulder.
Marilla would have given much just then to have possessed
Anne's power of putting her feelings into words; but nature
and habit had willed it otherwise, and she could only put her
arms close about her girl and hold her tenderly to her heart,
wishing that she need never let her go.