huge, drooping pompadour,
big, rolling brown eyes, and a most extensive and bewildering smile. She
was dressed with exceeding smartness and wore several bangle bracelets
that glittered and rattled and tinkled with every movement of her hands.
Matthew was covered with confusion at finding her there at all; and
those bangles completely wrecked his wits at one fell swoop.

"What can I do for you this evening, Mr. Cuthbert?" Miss Lucilla Harris
inquired, briskly and ingratiatingly, tapping the counter with both
hands.

"Have you any--any--any--well now, say any garden rakes?" stammered
Matthew.

Miss Harris looked somewhat surprised, as well she might, to hear a man
inquiring for garden rakes in the middle of December.

"I believe we have one or two left over," she said, "but they're
upstairs in the lumber room. I'll go and see." During her absence
Matthew collected his scattered senses for another effort.

When Miss Harris returned with the rake and cheerfully inquired:
"Anything else tonight, Mr. Cuthbert?" Matthew took his courage in
both hands and replied: "Well now, since you suggest it, I might as
well--take--that is--look at--buy some--some hayseed."

Miss Harris had heard Matthew Cuthbert called odd. She now concluded
that he was entirely crazy.

"We only keep hayseed in the spring," she explained loftily. "We've none
on hand just now."

"Oh, certainly--certainly--just as you say," stammered unhappy
Matthew, seizing the rake and making for the door. At the threshold he
recollected that he had not paid for it and he turned miserably back.
While Miss Harris was counting out his change he rallied his powers for
a final desperate attempt.

"Well now--if it isn't too much trouble--I might as well--that is--I'd
like to look at--at--some sugar."

"White or brown?" queried Miss Harris patiently.

"Oh--well now--brown," said Matthew feebly.

"There's a barrel of it over there," said Miss Harris, shaking her
bangles at it. "It's the only kind we have."

"I'll--I'll take twenty pounds of it," said Matthew, with beads of
perspiration standing on his forehead.

Matthew had driven halfway home before he was his own man again. It had
been a gruesome experience, but it served him right, he thought, for
committing the heresy of going to a strange store. When he reached
home he hid the rake in the tool house, but the sugar he carried in to
Marilla.

"Brown sugar!" exclaimed Marilla. "Whatever possessed you to get