Rachel living with me you could go to college. How do you feel about it?”
“I feel . . . as if . . . somebody . . . had handed me . . . the moon . . . and I didn’t know . . . exactly . . . what to do . . . with it,” said Anne dazedly. “But as for asking Mrs. Lynde to come here, that is for you to decide, Marilla. Do you think . . . are you sure . . . you would like it? Mrs. Lynde is a good woman and a kind neighbour, but . . . but . . .”
“But she’s got her faults, you mean to say? Well, she has, of course; but I think I’d rather put up with far worse faults than see Rachel go away from Avonlea. I’d miss her terrible. She’s the only close friend I’ve got here and I’d be lost without her. We’ve been neighbours for forty-five years and we’ve never had a quarrel . . . though we came rather near it that time you flew at Mrs. Rachel for calling you homely and red-haired. Do you remember, Anne?”
“I should think I do,” said Anne ruefully. “People don’t forget things like that. How I hated poor Mrs. Rachel at that moment!”
“And then that ‘apology’ you made her. Well, you were a handful, in all conscience, Anne. I did feel so puzzled and bewildered how to manage you. Matthew understood you better.”
“Matthew understood everything,” said Anne softly, as she always spoke of him.
“Well, I think it could be managed so that Rachel and I wouldn’t clash at all. It always seemed to
