Mrs Rachel Lynde Is Surprised (Anne of Green Gables)

01CHAPTER I.

02Mrs.

03Rachel Lynde is Surprised.

04Mrs.

05Rachel Lynde lived just where the Avonlea main road dipped down into a little hollow, fringed with alders and ladies' ear-drops, and traversed by a brook that had its source away back in the woods of the old Cuthbert place.

06It was reputed to be an intricate, headlong brook in its earlier course through those woods, with dark secrets of pool and cascade.

07But by the time it reached Lynde's hollow it was a quiet, well-conducted little stream, for not even a brook could run past Mrs.

08Rachel Lynde's door without due regard for decency and decorum.

09It probably was conscious that Mrs.

10Rachel was sitting at her window, keeping a sharp eye on everything that passed, from brooks and children up, and that if she noticed anything odd or out of place, she would never rest until she had ferreted out the whys and wherefores thereof.

11There are plenty of people in Avonlea and out of it, who can attend closely to their neighbor's business by dint of neglecting their own.

12But Mrs.

13Rachel Lynde was one of those capable creatures who can manage their own concerns and those of other folks into the bargain.

14She was a notable housewife.

15Her work was always done and well done.

16She ran the sewing-circle, helped run the Sunday school, and was the strongest prop of the Church Aid Society and Foreign Missions Auxiliary.

17Yet with all this Mrs.

18Rachel found abundant time to sit for hours at her kitchen window, knitting cotton-warp quilts—she had knitted sixteen of them, as Avonlea housekeepers were wont to tell in odd voices—and keeping a sharp eye on the main road that crossed the hollow and wound up the steep red hill beyond.

19Since Avonlea occupied a little triangular peninsula jutting out into the Gulf of St.

20Lawrence with water on two sides of it, anybody who went out of it or into it had to pass over that hill road, and so run the unseen gauntlet of Mrs.

21Rachel's all-seeing eye.

22She was sitting there one afternoon in early June.

23The sun was coming in at the window, warm and bright.

24The orchard on the slope below the house was in a bridal flush of pinky-white bloom, hummed over by a myriad of bees.

25Thomas Lynde, a meek little man whom Avonlea people called Rachel Lynde's husband, was sowing his late turnip seed on the hill-field beyond the barn.

26And Matthew Cuthbert ought to have been sowing his on the big red brook-field away over by Green Gables.

27Mrs.

28Rachel knew that he ought, because she had heard him tell Peter Morrison the evening before in William J.

29Blair's store over at Carmody, that he meant to sow his turnip seed the next afternoon.

30Peter had asked him, of course, for Matthew Cuthbert had never been known to volunteer information about anything in his whole life.

31And yet here was Matthew Cuthbert, at half-past three on the afternoon of a busy day, placidly driving over the hollow and up the hill.

32Moreover, he wore a white collar and his best suit of clothes, which was plain proof that he was going out of Avonlea.

33And he had the buggy and the sorrel mare, which betokened that he was going a considerable distance.

34Now, where was Matthew Cuthbert going, and why was he going there?

35Had it been any other man in Avonlea, Mrs.

36Rachel, deftly putting this and that together, might have given a pretty good guess as to both questions.

37But Matthew so rarely went from home that it must be something pressing and unusual which was taking him.

38He was the shyest man alive and hated to have to go among strangers or to any place where he might have to talk.

39Matthew, dressed up with a white collar and driving in a buggy, was something that didn't happen often.

40Mrs.

41Rachel, ponder as she might, could make nothing of it, and her afternoon's enjoyment was spoiled.

42"'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.

43"'He doesn't generally go to town this time of year, and he never visits.

44If he'd run out of turnip seat he wouldn't dress up and take the buggy to go for more.

45He wasn't driving fast enough to be going for a doctor.

46Yet something must have happened since last night to start him off.

47I'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.

48Rachel set out.

49She had not far to go.

50The big, rambling, orchard-embowered house where the Cuthberts lived was a scant quarter of a mile up the road from Lynn's Hollow.

51To be sure, the long lane made it a good deal further.

52Matthew 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.

53Green 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.

54Mrs.

55Rachel Lynde did not call living in such a place, living at all.

56"'It's just staying, that's what,' she said, as she stepped along the deep-rutted, grassy lane bordered with wild rose-bushes.

57"'It's no wonder Matthew and Marilla are both a little odd, living away back here by themselves.

58Trees aren't much company, though dear knows if they were, there'd be enough of them.

59I'd rather look at people.

60To be sure.

61They seem contented enough, but then I suppose they're used to it.

62A body can get used to anything, even to being hanged, as the Irishman said.' With this Mrs.

63Rachel stepped out of the lane, into the back yard of Green Gables.

64Very green and neat and precise was that yard, set about on one side with great patriarchal willows, and the other with prim lombardies.

65Not a stray stick nor stone was to be seen, for Mrs.

66Rachel would have seen it if there had been.

67Privately she was of the opinion that Marilla Cuthbert swept that yard over as often as she swept her house.

68One could have eaten a meal off the ground without overbrimming the proverbial peck of dirt.

69Mrs.

70Rachel rapped smartly at the kitchen door, and stepped in when bidden to do so.

71The kitchen at Green Gables was a cheerful apartment.

72Or would have been cheerful, if it had not been so painfully clean as to give it something of the appearance of an unused parlour.

73Its windows looked east and west.

74Through the west one, looking out on the back yard, came a flood of mellow June sunlight.

75But the east one, whence you got a glimpse of the bloom, white cherry trees in the left orchard, and nodding slender birches down in the hollow by the brook, was greened over by a tangle of vines.

76Here sat Marilla Cuthbert, when she sat at all, always slightly distrustful of sunshine, which seemed to her too dancing and irresponsible a thing for a world which was meant to be taken seriously.

77And here she sat now, knitting, and the table behind her was laid for supper.

78Mrs.

79Rachel, before she had fairly closed the door, had taken mental note of everything that was on that table.

80There were three plates laid, so that Marilla must be expecting someone home with Matthew to tea.

81But the dishes were every-day dishes, and there was only crab-apple preserves and one kind of cake, so that the expected company could not be any particular company.

82Yet what of Matthew's white collar and the sorrel mare?

83Mrs.

84Rachel was getting fairly dizzy with this unusual mystery about quiet, unmysterious green gables.

85"'Good evening, Rachel,' Marilla said briskly.

86"'This is a real fine evening, isn't it?

87Won't you sit down?

88How are all your folks?' Something that, for lack of any other name, might be called friendship, existed and always had existed between Marilla Cuthbert and Mrs.

89Rachel, in spite of—or perhaps because of their dissimilarity.

90Marilla was a tall, thin woman, with angles and without curves.

91Her dark hair showed some grey streaks and was always twisted up in a hard little knot behind, with two wire hairpins stuck aggressively through it.

92She looked like a woman of narrow experience and rigid conscience—which she was.

93But there was a saving something about her mouth which, if it had been ever so slightly developed, might have been considered indicative of a sense of humour.

94"'We're all pretty well,' said Mrs.

95Rachel.

96"'I was kind of afraid you weren't, though, when I saw Matthew starting off to-day.

97I thought maybe he was going to the doctor's.' Marilla's lips twitched understandingly.

98She had expected Mrs.

99Rachel up.

100She had known that the sight of Matthew jaunting off so unaccountably would be too much for her neighbour's curiosity.

101"'Oh, no.

102I'm quite well, although I had a bad headache yesterday,' she said.

103"'Matthew went to Bright River.

104We're getting a little boy from an orphan asylum in Nova Scotia, and he's coming on the train to-night.' If Marilla had said that Matthew had gone to Bright River to meet a kangaroo from Australia, Mrs.

105Rachel could not have been more astonished.

106She was actually stricken dumb for five seconds.

107It was unsupposable that Marilla was making fun of her.

108But Mrs.

109Rachel was almost forced to suppose it." "'Are you in earnest, Marilla?' she demanded when voice returned to her.

110"'Yes, of course,' said Marilla, as if getting boys from orphan asylums in Nova Scotia were part of the usual spring work on any well-regulated Avonlea farm, instead of being an unheard-of innovation.

111Mrs.

112Rachel felt that she had received a severe mental jolt.

113She thought in exclamation points, "'A boy!

114Marilla and Matthew Cuthbert, of all people, adopting a boy!

115From an orphan asylum!' "'Well, the world was certainly turning upside down.

116She would be surprised at nothing after this.

117Nothing!' "'What on earth put such a notion into your head?' she demanded disapprovingly.

118This had been done without her advice being asked, and must perforce be disapproved.

119"'Well, we've been thinking about it for some time.

120All winter, in fact,' returned Marilla.

121"'Mrs.

122Alexander Spencer was up here one day before Christmas, and she said she was going to get a little girl from the asylum over in Hopeton in the spring.

123Her cousin lives there, and Mrs.

124Spencer has visited her and knows all about it.

125So Matthew and I have talked it over, off and on, ever since.

126We thought we'd get a boy.

127Matthew's getting up in years, you know.

128He's sixty, and he isn't so spry as he once was.

129His heart troubles him a good deal.

130And you know how desperate hard it's got to be to get hired help.

131There's never anybody to be had but those stupid, half-grown little French boys.

132And as soon as you do get one broke into your ways and taught something, he's up and off to the lobster canneries or the States.

133At first Matthew suggested getting a homeboy, but I said no, flat to that.

134"'They may be all right, I'm not saying they're not.

135But no London Street Arabs for me,' I said.

136"'Gid me a native-born at least.

137There'll be a risk, no matter who we get.

138But I'll feel easier in my mind and sleep sounder at nights if we get a born Canadian.' So in the end we decided to ask Mrs.

139Spencer to pick us out one when she went over to get her little girl.

140We heard last week she was going, so we sent her word by Richard Spencer's folks at Carmody to bring us a smart, likely boy of about ten or eleven.

141We decided that would be the best age—old enough to be of some use in doing chores right off, and young enough to be trained up proper.

142We mean to give him a good home and schooling.

143We had a telegram from Mrs.

144Alexander Spencer to-day—the mailman brought it from the station—saying they were coming on the 5.30 train to-night.

145So Matthew went to Bright River to meet him.

146Mrs.

147Spencer will drop him off there.

148Of course she goes on to White Sand Station herself." Mrs.

149Rachel prided herself on always speaking her mind.

150She proceeded to speak it now, having adjusted her mental attitude to this amazing piece of news.

151"'Well, Marilla, I'll just tell you plain that I think you're doing a mighty foolish thing—a risky thing, that's what.

152You don't know what you're getting.

153You're bringing a strange child into your house and home, and you don't know a single thing about him, nor what his disposition is like, nor what sort of parents he had, nor how he's likely to turn out.

154Why, it was only last week I read in the paper how a man and his wife up west of the island took a boy out of an orphan asylum, and he set fire to the house at night.

155Set it on purpose, Marilla, and nearly burnt them to a crisp in their beds.

156And I know another case where an adopted boy used to suck the eggs.

157They couldn't break him of it.

158If you had asked my advice in the matter—which you didn't do, Marilla—I'd have said, for mercy's sake, not to think of such a thing, that's what." This Job's comforting seemed neither to offend nor to alarm Marilla.

159She knitted steadily on.

160"'I don't deny there's something in what you say, Rachel.

161I've had some qualms myself.

162But Matthew was terrible set on it.

163I could see that, so I gave in.

164It's so seldom Matthew sets his mind on anything that when he does I always feel it's my duty to give in.

165And as for the risk—there's risks in pretty near everything a body does in this world.

166There's risks in people's having children of their own, if it comes to that.

167They don't always turn out well.

168And then Nova Scotia's right close to the island.

169It isn't as if we were getting him from England or the States.

170He can't be much different from ourselves.' "'Well, I hope it will turn out all right,' said Mrs.

171Rachel, in a tone that plainly indicated her painful doubts.

172"'Only don't say I didn't warn you if he burns green gables down or puts strychnine in the well.

173I heard of a case over in New Brunswick where an orphan asylum child did that, and the whole family died in fearful agonies.

174Only it was a girl in that instance.' "'Well, we're not getting a girl,' said Marilla, as if poisoning wells were a purely feminine accomplishment, and not to be dreaded in the case of a boy.

175"'I'd never dream of taking a girl to bring up.

176I wonder it Mrs.

177Alexander Spencer for doing it.

178But there, she wouldn't shrink from adopting a whole orphan asylum if she took it into her head.

179Mrs.

180Rachel would have liked to stay until Matthew came home with his imported orphan.

181But reflecting that it would be a good two hours at least before his arrival, she concluded to go up the road to Robert Bell's and tell the news.

182It would certainly make a sensation second to none, and Mrs.

183Rachel dearly loved to make a sensation.

184So she took herself away, somewhat to Marilla's relief, for the latter felt her doubts and fears reviving under the influence of Mrs.

185Rachel's pessimism.

186"'Well, of all things that ever were or will be,' ejaculated Mrs.

187Rachel, when she was safely out in the lane.

188"'It does really seem as if I must be dreaming.' "'Well, I'm sorry for that poor young one, and no mistake.

189Matthew and Marilla don't know anything about children, and they'll expect him to be wiser and steadier than his own grandfather, if so be's he's ever had a grandfather, which is doubtful.

190It seems uncanny to think of a child at Green Gables somehow.

191There's never been one there, for Matthew and Marilla were grown up when the new house was built.

192If they ever were children, which is hard to believe when one looks at them, I wouldn't be in that orphan's shoes for anything.

193My, but I pity him, that's what.' So said Mrs.

194Rachel to the wild rose-bushes out of the fullness of her heart.

195But if she could have seen the child who was waiting patiently at the Bright River Station at that very moment, her pity would have been still deeper and more profound.

196End of chapter 1