“Not more so than usual,” said Marilla, with no thought of being sarcastic.
“Well then, do you think I am awake?”
“Anne, what nonsense has got into you? Who was that woman, I say?”
“Marilla, if I’m not crazy and not asleep she can’t be such stuff as dreams are made of . . . she must be real. Anyway, I’m sure I couldn’t have imagined such a bonnet. She says she is Mr. Harrison’s wife, Marilla.”
Marilla stared in her turn.
“His wife! Anne Shirley! Then what has he been passing himself off as an unmarried man for?”
“I don’t suppose he did, really,” said Anne, trying to be just. “He never said he wasn’t married. People simply took it for granted. Oh Marilla, what will Mrs. Lynde say to this?”
They found out what Mrs. Lynde had to say when she came up that evening. Mrs. Lynde wasn’t surprised! Mrs. Lynde had always expected something of the sort! Mrs. Lynde had always known there was something about Mr. Harrison!
“To think of his deserting his wife!” she said indignantly. “It’s like something you’d read of in the States, but who would expect such a thing to happen right here in Avonlea?”
“But we don’t know that he deserted her,” protested Anne, determined to believe her friend innocent till he was proved guilty. “We don’t know the rights of it at all.”
