“Oh, let us keep calm,” implored Anne, who was the most excited of them all, “and try to think of some way of preventing him.”
“I don’t know how you’re going to prevent him,” exclaimed Jane bitterly. “Everybody knows what Judson Parker is. He’d do anything for money. He hasn’t a spark of public spirit or any sense of the beautiful.”
The prospect looked rather unpromising. Judson Parker and his sister were the only Parkers in Avonlea, so that no leverage could be exerted by family connections. Martha Parker was a lady of all too certain age who disapproved of young people in general and the Improvers in particular. Judson was a jovial, smooth-spoken man, so uniformly goodnatured and bland that it was surprising how few friends he had. Perhaps he had got the better in too many business transactions. . . which seldom makes for popularity. He was reputed to be very “sharp” and it was the general opinion that he “hadn’t much principle.”
“If Judson Parker has a chance to ‘turn an honest penny,’ as he says himself, he’ll never lose it,” declared Fred Wright.
“Is there nobody who has any influence over him?” asked Anne despairingly.
“He goes to see Louisa Spencer at White Sands,” suggested Carrie Sloane. “Perhaps she could coax him not to rent his fences.”
“Not she,” said Gilbert emphatically. “I know Louisa Spencer well. She doesn’t ‘believe’ in Village Improvement Societies, but she does believe in dollars and cents. She’d be more likely to urge Judson on than to dissuade him.”
“The only thing to do is to appoint a committee to wait on him and protest,” said Julia Bell, “and you must send girls, for he’d hardly be civil to boys . . . but I won’t go, so nobody need nominate me.”
“Better send Anne alone,” said Oliver Sloane. “She can talk Judson over if anybody can.”
Anne protested. She was willing to go and do the talking; but she must have others with her “for moral support.” Diana and Jane were therefore appointed to support her morally and the Improvers broke up, buzzing like angry bees with indignation. Anne was so worried that she didn’t sleep until nearly morning, and then she dreamed that the trustees had put a fence around the school and painted “Try Purple Pills” all over it.