Susan Baker , the gray and grim and faithful handmaiden of the Blythe family at Ingleside , never lost an opportunity of calling her `` Mrs. Marshall Elliott , '' with the most killing and pointed emphasis , as if to say `` You wanted to be Mrs. and Mrs. you shall be with a vengeance as far as I am concerned . '' Miss Cornelia was going up to Ingleside to see Dr. and Mrs. Blythe , who were just home from Europe . They had been away for three months , having left in February to attend a famous medical congress in London ; and certain things , which Miss Cornelia was anxious to discuss , had taken place in the Glen during their absence . For one thing , there was a new family in the manse . And such a family ! Miss Cornelia shook her head over them several times as she walked briskly along . Susan Baker and the Anne Shirley of other days saw her coming , as they sat on the big veranda at Ingleside , enjoying the charm of the cat 's light , the sweetness of sleepy robins whistling among the twilit maples , and the dance of a gusty group of daffodils blowing against the old , mellow , red brick wall of the lawn . Anne was sitting on the steps , her hands clasped over her knee , looking , in the kind dusk , as girlish as a mother of many has any right to be ; and the beautiful gray-green eyes , gazing down the harbour road , were as full of unquenchable sparkle and dream as ever . Behind her , in the hammock , Rilla Blythe was curled up , a fat , roly-poly little creature of six years , the youngest of the Ingleside children . She had curly red hair and hazel eyes that were now buttoned up after the funny , wrinkled fashion in which Rilla always went to sleep . Shirley , `` the little brown boy , '' as he was known in the family `` Who 's Who , '' was asleep in Susan 's arms . He was brown-haired , brown-eyed and brown-skinned , with very rosy cheeks , and he was Susan 's especial love . After his birth Anne had been very ill for a long time , and Susan `` mothered '' the baby with a passionate tenderness which none of the other children , dear as they were to her , had ever called out . Dr. Blythe had said that but for her he would never have lived . `` I gave him life just as much as you did , Mrs. Dr. dear , '' Susan was wont to say . `` He is just as much my baby as he is yours . '' And , indeed , it was always to Susan that Shirley ran , to be kissed for bumps , and rocked to sleep , and protected from well-deserved spankings . Susan had conscientiously spanked all the other Blythe children when she thought they needed it for their souls ' good , but she would not spank Shirley nor allow his mother to do it . Once , Dr. Blythe had spanked him and Susan had been stormily indignant . `` That man would spank an angel , Mrs. Dr. dear , that he would , '' she had declared bitterly ; and she would not make the poor doctor a pie for weeks .
She had taken Shirley XXXXX her to her brother 's home during his parents ' absence , while all the other children had gone to Avonlea , and she had three blessed months of him all to herself .
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