"Montgomery, Lucy Maud - Anne Of Green Gables" - читать интересную книгу автора (Montgomery Lucy Maud)

afternoon of a busy day, placidly driving over the hollow and up the hill;
moreover, he wore a white collar and his best suit of clothes, which was
plain proof that he was going out of Avonlea; and he had the buggy and
sorrel mare, which betokened that he was going a considerable distance.
Now, where was Matthew Cuthbert going and why was he going there?
Had it been any other man in Avonlea, Mrs. Rachel, deftly putting
this and that together, might have given a pretty good guess as to both
questions. But Matthew so rarely went from home that it must be something
pressing and unusual which was taking him; he was the shyest man alive and
hated to have to go among strangers or to any place where he might have to
talk. Matthew, dressed up with a white collar and driving in a buggy, was
something that didn't happen often. Mrs. Rachel, ponder as she might,
could make nothing of it and her afternoon's 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 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 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.
Mrs. Rachel rapped smartly at the kitchen door and stepped in when
bidden to do so. The kitchen at Green Gables was a cheerful apartment-or
would have been cheerful if it had not been so painfully clean as to give