enjoyment was spoiled.
I ll just step over to Green Gables after tea and find out from Marilla
where he s gone and why, the worthy woman finally concluded. He
doesn t generally go to town this time of year and he _never_ visits; if
he d run out of turnip seed he wouldn t dress up and take the buggy to
go for more; he wasn t driving fast enough to be going for a doctor.
Yet something must have happened since last night to start him off. I m
clean puzzled, that s what, and I won t know a minute s peace of mind or
conscience until I know what has taken Matthew Cuthbert out of Avonlea
today.
Accordingly after tea Mrs. Rachel set out; she had not far to go; the
big, rambling, orchard-embowered house where the Cuthberts lived was a
scant quarter of a mile up the road from Lynde s Hollow. To be sure, the
long lane made it a good deal further. Matthew Cuthbert s father, as
shy and silent as his son after him, had got as far away as he possibly
could from his fellow men without actually retreating into the woods
when he founded his homestead. Green Gables was built at the furthest
edge of his cleared land and there it was to this day, barely visible
from the main road along which all the other Avonlea houses were so
sociably situated. Mrs. Rachel Lynde did not call living in such a place
_living_ at all.
It s just _staying_, that s what, she said as she stepped along the
deep-rutted, grassy lane bordered with wild rose bushes. It s no wonder
Matthew and Marilla are both a little odd, living away back here by
themselves. Trees aren t much company, though dear knows if they were
there d be enough of them. I d ruther look at people. To be sure, they
seem contented enough; but then, I suppose, they re used to it. A body
can get used to anything, even to being hanged, as the Irishman said.
With this Mrs. Rachel stepped out of the lane into the backyard of
Green Gables. Very green and neat and precise was that yard, set about
on one side with great patriarchal willows and on the other with prim
Lombardies. Not a stray stick nor stone was to be seen, for Mrs. Rachel
would have seen it if there had been. Privately she was of the opinion
that Marilla Cuthbert swept that yard over as often as she swept her
house. One could have eaten a meal off the ground without overbrimming
the proverbial peck of dirt.
4