ALICE LAWSON: So, what are you going to recite, Anne?

ANNE: I've decided to give The Highwayman. It's very pathetic. Laura Spencer is giving a comic recitation, but I prefer to make people cry.

ALICE LAWSON: Are you nervous?

ANNE: A little bit, even though I've stood out in public so often. But I feel very well-prepared and that helps.

ALICE LAWSON: Well, this organdy will look elegant under the electric lights at the White Sands Hotel. Oh, mother tried to convince me to audition for a violin solo. Can you imagine? I mean, I haven't picked up a bow in three years. The Charlottetown hospital is a worthy cause and all, but I am not prepared to suffer humiliation for it.

ANNE: We're all amateurs. They may be very sorry they've asked any of us to do it when it's all over.

ALICE LAWSON: Oh, hardly the case with you, Anne. After standing first at Queens, you can do no wrong in this community.

ANNE: Someone ought to tell that to Marilla.

ALICE LAWSON: Well, Mr. Cuthbert is sure proud. He plunks down his money awful quick these days for anything I tell him is pretty and fashionable.

ANNE: Alice Lawson! You devil! Don't you go abusing Matthew's generosity to me. You do have good taste though. I'll see you at the concert.

GILBERT: Hello, Anne. Whoa. Can I offer you a ride home? You promised we were going to be friends. Remember?

ANNE: Well, alright. It is rather awkward with all these. It was good of you to stop.

GILBERT: Seems I'm developing quite a habit of getting you out of awkward situations.

ANNE: I thought a lot about what happened at the bridge, Gil. What I mean to say is, it was very rude of me to just run off like that. But I was very overwrought over learning my score--our score. I mean, I wasn't myself.

GILBERT: That's alright. Life's too short to hold grudges, anyway.

ANNE: It's valiant of you to say so. You'll go far with that kind of attitude.

GILBERT: You know what you're going to study at Queens, Anne?

ANNE: I intend on taking my teacher's license in one year instead of two, like Miss Stacy suggested.

GILBERT: Gee, I was imagining you would have a career on the stage. Well, I think you'd make a swell actress, especially as the Lily Maid. I hear you're giving The Highwayman at the White Sands recital.

ANNE: My life is an open book I see. Who told you that?

GILBERT: Well, I have a little confession to make. I was just at the Lawson's myself and Alice told me you were walking home.

ANNE: Oh.

GILBERT: I'm going to try to get you an encore while you're up there so make sure you have a second selection ready.

ANNE: No one is going to encore me.

GILBERT: Well, I would. Especially if I had the honor of escorting you to the concert.

ANNE: Uh, I don't know. I promised the Barry's I'd go with them, but--

GILBERT: I think you're old enough to make up your own mind, Anne.

ANNE: I've always been old enough to make up my own mind. Very well then, Gilbert. I'd be pleased to accept your invitation. Could you let me off at the corner, please. I'm going to take a shortcut and show Diana what I bought.

MARILLA: Well, say something, Matthew. She was holding his hand.

MATTHEW: She'd have to hold his hand if he was helping her out of the buggy.

MARILLA: What was she doing in that buggy?

MATTHEW: Nothing worth all this fussing.

MARILLA: She's just a child, Matthew. She doesn't know what she's doing.

ANNE: Hello everyone. Sorry I was late. I stopped over at Diana's and she just loves the material you chose, Matthew.

MARILLA: Anne Shirley, I've just been informed by a reliable source that you were seen at Avonlea crossroads in a buggy with a young man.

MATTHEW: Marilla!

ANNE: He only offered me a ride home. He was just being friendly.

MARILLA: Not according to Rachel Lynde.

ANNE: Rachel Lynde?

MARILLA: Yes. Rachel Lynde saw you.

MATTHEW: Marilla, she ain't done nothing wrong.

MARILLA: Matthew. Remember, in the beginning, I told you not to put your oar in.

MARILLA: I'm sorry I lost my temper, Anne.

ANNE: Marilla, please. I never meant anything to come of all this.

MARILLA: And nothing has, as yet. Anne, you've changed so much; grown so tall and so stylish. You don't belong in Avonlea anymore. I get lonely just thinking about it. You'll be going off into the world to make your way and you don't want to make any ties here that you might come to regret later.

ANNE: No matter where I go or how I change, I'll always be your Anne. Anne of Green Gables.

ANNE: I want you to give this to him.

DIANA: [reading from letter] "Dear Gilbert, I regret that I will be unable to attend the White Sands concert with you. Sincerely, Anne Shirley." Why won't you go with him?

ANNE: Plenty of reasons why I won't go. I only accepted in first place because he dared me.

DIANA: Well, I think you owe him an explanation.

MARILLA: I hope you don't ruin your dress driving there in the dust. It's far too thin for this damp weather. I'm sorry agreed to it.

ANNE: Thank you, Matthew.

MATTHEW: Well, there's no sense in saying anything to you, Matthew, but those pearls look absolutely ridiculous. I don't know where you get these silly ideas.

ANNE: Matthew is proud of the way I look.

DIANA: [from outside] Anne!

ANNE: They're here. Thank you, Marilla and Matthew. I mustn't keep them waiting.

MARILLA: Now, mind you keep your dress clear of the wheel.

MATTHEW: Good luck, Anne!

ANNE: I'll be watching for you both.

DIANA: Gilbert gave me this in return for your note. He's coming to watch you anyway. I didn't want Jane or Gabby Brothers to see me.

ANNE: [reading from letter] "...to your own opinion. It would have been easier if you told me in person, if you still consider me your friend. Sincerely, Gilbert Blythe." I won't be accused of being a coward, Diana. He doesn't understand. Tell him I'll speak to him the first minute I can steal away tonight.

DIANA: Calm down, Anne.

ANNE: I'm so ashamed. I can't go up on that stage. I can't. I'll be merciless if I fail.

DIANA: You've never failed at anything, Anne Shirley. Go on.

AMELIA EVANS: [reciting lines 76-88 of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's The Wreck of the Hesperus]

    Ho! ho! the breakers roared

At daybreak, on the bleak sea-beach,
    A fisherman stood aghast,
To see the form of a maiden fair,
    Lashed close to a drifting mast.

The salt sea was frozen on her breast,
    The salt tears in her eyes;
And he saw her hair, like the brown sea-weed
    On the billows fall and rise.

Such was the wreck of the Hesperus,
    In the midnight and the snow!
[God] save us all from a death like this,
    On the reef of Norman's Woe!

LADY IN YELLOW: Mrs. Evans has just completed a European tour.

LADY IN BLUE: Oh, she's a prodigious talent. I was moved beyond words.

MRS. SPENCER: On behalf of the Charlottetown hospital, I would like to offer our indebtedness to Mrs. Amelia Evans for gracing us with such a stirring performance in support of today's benefit. Thank you. And now, ladies and gentlemen, I would like to present one of Avonlea's most celebrated students, who achieved the highest standing in the recent entrance examinations to Queens Academy: Miss Anne Shirley.

LADY IN BLUE: It will be amusing to see what arises from the local amateur actors.

ANNE: [reciting lines 1-6, 25-30 and 85-90 from Alfred Noyes' The Highwayman]

The wind was a torrent of darkness among the gusty trees.
The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas.
The road was a ribbon of moonlight over the purple moor,
And the highwayman came riding--
    Riding--riding--
The highwayman came riding, up to the old inn-door.

"One kiss, my bonny sweetheart, I'm after a prize tonight,
But I shall [return] with the yellow gold before the morning light;
Yet, if they press me sharply, and harry me through the day,
Then look for me by moonlight,
    Watch for me by moonlight,
I'll come to thee by moonlight, though hell should bar the way."

Back, he spurred like a madman, shouting a curse to the sky,
With the white road smoking behind him and his rapier brandished high.
Blood-red were his spurs in the golden noon; wine-red was his velvet coat;
When they shot him down on the highway.
    Down like a dog on the highway,
And he lay in his blood on the highway, with the bunch of lace at his throat.

AUDIENCE: Encore! Encore!

LADY IN YELLOW: Dear, you were splendid. Go back. They're encoring you.

ANNE: I can't go back.

LADY IN YELLOW: Yes, you can.

MARILLA: Anne, I have to admit I was so proud.

MRS. BARRY: Your recitation was as magnificent as Mrs. Evans'...

MRS. BARRY: ...and she's a professional. DIANA: Well, I overheard that romantic-looking young man over there asking who the girl on the platform was with the lovely titian hair. MARILLA: Whatever that means.

JOSIE PYE: I saw you fawning over Anne Shirley. GILBERT: Well, you sure couldn't get up there and give a recital like that. JOSIE PYE: I could be up there on stage. GILBERT: Well, I'd like to see that sometime, Josie Pye.

ANNE: It's plain red; it's just a fancy way of saying it.

DIANA: Well, he thought you were wonderful anyway.

LADY IN YELLOW: You'll forgive me for stealing her away again, won't you? There are so many people waiting to meet our young Miss Shirley.

ANNE: Will you excuse me? I don't mean to be rude, but there is someone I absolutely must speak with. I'll return right away. I promise.

LADY IN YELLOW: Very well, dear. But hurry up, I have important people waiting.

ANNE: Gilbert! Gilbert!

DIANA: I'm sorry I didn't get a chance to talk to him, Anne. Blame me, if you want.

ANNE: It's alright, Diana. Some things just aren't meant to be.

DIANA: Did you see all those diamonds? I wish I were rich and I could spend my whole summer at a hotel eating icecream and chicken salad.

ANNE: You know something, Diana? We are rich. We have sixteen years to our credit, and we both have wonderful imaginations. We should be as happy as queens. Look at that! You couldn't enjoy it's loveliness anymore if you had ropes of diamonds.

DIANA: I don't know about that.

ANNE: I'm content with my string of pearls. Matthew gave them to me with as much love as ever went into any of those stuffy women's jewels. I am happy Diana, and nothing is going to hold me back.