if Jane had also proposed to Nettie for him, or
if he had mustered enough spunk to ask the fateful question himself. All
the Andrews family seemed to share in his pride and pleasure, from
Mrs. Harmon in the pew to Jane in the choir. Jane had resigned from the
Avonlea school and intended to go West in the fall.

"Can't get a beau in Avonlea, that's what," said Mrs. Rachel Lynde
scornfully. "SAYS she thinks she'll have better health out West. I never
heard her health was poor before."

"Jane is a nice girl," Anne had said loyally. "She never tried to
attract attention, as some did."

"Oh, she never chased the boys, if that's what you mean," said Mrs.
Rachel. "But she'd like to be married, just as much as anybody, that's
what. What else would take her out West to some forsaken place whose
only recommendation is that men are plenty and women scarce? Don't you
tell me!"

But it was not at Jane, Anne gazed that day in dismay and surprise. It
was at Ruby Gillis, who sat beside her in the choir. What had happened
to Ruby? She was even handsomer than ever; but her blue eyes were
too bright and lustrous, and the color of her cheeks was hectically
brilliant; besides, she was very thin; the hands that held her hymn-book
were almost transparent in their delicacy.

"Is Ruby Gillis ill?" Anne asked of Mrs. Lynde, as they went home from
church.

"Ruby Gillis is dying of galloping consumption," said Mrs. Lynde
bluntly. "Everybody knows it except herself and her FAMILY. They won't
give in. If you ask THEM, she's perfectly well. She hasn't been able
to teach since she had that attack of congestion in the winter, but she
says she's going to teach again in the fall, and she's after the White
Sands school. She'll be in her grave, poor girl, when White Sands school
opens, that's what."

Anne listened in shocked silence. Ruby Gillis, her old school-chum,
dying? Could it be possible? Of late years they had grown apart; but the
old tie of school-girl intimacy was there, and made itself felt sharply
in the tug the news gave at Anne's heartstrings. Ruby, the brilliant,
the merry, the coquettish! It was impossible to associate the thought of
her with anything like death. She had greeted Anne with gay cordiality
after church, and urged her to come up the next evening.

"I'll be away Tuesday and Wednesday evenings," she had whispered
triumphantly. "There's a concert at Carmody and a party at White Sands.
Herb Spencer's going to take me. He'