Anne of Windy Poplars - L. M. Montgomery [93]
‘I come over to tell you I’m going to have you for my beau,’ she said, looking eloquently at him out of a pair of brown eyes that, even at seven, Ivy had learned had a devastating effect on most of the small boys of her acquaintance.
Gerald turned crimson. ‘I won’t be your beau,’ he said.
‘But you’ve got to be,’ said Ivy serenely.
‘But you’ve got to be,’ said Geraldine, wagging her head at him.
‘I won’t be!’ shouted Gerald furiously. ‘And don’t you give me any more of your lip, Ivy Trent.’
‘You have to be,’ said Ivy stubbornly.
‘You have to be,’ said Geraldine.
Ivy glared at here. ‘You just shut up, Geraldine Raymond!’
‘I guess I can talk in my own yard,’ said Geraldine.
‘Course she can,’ said Gerald. ‘And if you don’t shut up, Ivy Trent, I’ll just go over to your place and dig the eyes out of your doll.’
‘My mother would spank you if you did,’ cried Ivy.
‘Oh, she would, would she? Well, do you know what my mother would do to her if she did? She’d just sock her on the nose.’
‘Well, anyway, you’ve got to be my beau,’ said Ivy, returning calmly to the vital subject.
‘I’ll – I’ll duck your head in the rain-barrel!’ yelled the maddened Gerald. ‘I’ll rub your face in an ants’ nest! I’ll – I’ll tear them bows and sash off you!’ – triumphantly, for this at least was feasible.
‘Let’s do it!’ squealed Geraldine.
They pounced like furies on the unfortunate Ivy, who kicked and shrieked and tried to bite, but was no match for the two of them. Together they hauled her across the yard and into the woodshed, where her howls could not be heard.
‘Hurry,’ gasped Geraldine, ‘fore Miss Shirley comes out!’
No time was to be lost. Gerald held Ivy’s legs while Geraldine held her wrists with one hand and tore off her hair bow and shoulder bows and sash with the other.
‘Let’s paint her legs,’ shouted Gerald, his eyes falling on a couple of cans of paint left there by some workmen the previous week. ‘I’ll hold her, and you paint her.’
Ivy shrieked vainly in despair. Her stockings were pulled down, and in a few moments her legs were adorned with wide stripes of red and green paint. In the process a good deal of the paint got spattered over her embroidered dress and new boots. As a finishing touch they filled her curls with burrs.
She was a pitiful sight when they finally released her. The twins howled mirthfully as they looked at her. Long weeks of airs and condescensions from Ivy had been avenged.
‘Now you go home,’ said Gerald. ‘This’ll teach you to go round telling people they have to be your beaux.’
‘I’ll tell my mother,’ wept Ivy. ‘I’ll go straight home and tell my mother on you, you horrid, horrid, hateful, ugly boy!’
‘Don’t you call my brother ugly, you stuck-up thing!’ cried Geraldine. ‘You and your shoulder bows! Here, take them with you. We don’t want them cluttering up our woodshed.’
Ivy, pursued by the bows, which Geraldine pelted after her, ran sobbing out of the yard and down the street.
‘Quick! Let’s sneak up the back stairs to the bathroom and clean up ’fore Miss Shirley sees us,’ gasped Geraldine.
4
Mr Grand had talked himself out and bowed himself away. Anne stood for a moment on the doorstep, wondering uneasily where her charges were. Up the street and in at the gate came a wrathful lady, leading a forlorn and still sobbing atom of humanity by the hand.
‘Miss Shirley, where is Mrs Raymond?’ demanded Mrs Trent.
‘Mrs Raymond is –’
‘I insist on seeing Mrs Raymond. She shall see with her own eyes what her children have done to poor helpless, innocent Ivy. Look at her, Miss Shirley, just look at her!’
‘Oh, Mrs Trent, I’m so sorry! It is all my fault. Mrs Raymond is away, and I promised to look after them. But Mr Grand came –’
‘No, it isn’t your fault, Miss Shirley. I don’t blame you. No one can cope with those diabolical children. The whole street knows them. If Mrs Raymond isn’t here there is no point in my remaining. I shall take my poor child home. But Mrs Raymond shall hear of this; indeed she shall… Listen to that, Miss Shirley. Are they tearing each other limb from limb?’
‘That’ was a chorus