een watching him ever since he had passed her and she had her
eyes on him now. Matthew was not looking at her and would not have seen
what she was really like if he had been, but an ordinary observer would
have seen this: A child of about eleven, garbed in a very short, very
tight, very ugly dress of yellowish-gray wincey. She wore a faded brown
sailor hat and beneath the hat, extending down her back, were two braids
of very thick, decidedly red hair. Her face was small, white and thin,
also much freckled; her mouth was large and so were her eyes, which
looked green in some lights and moods and gray in others.

So far, the ordinary observer; an extraordinary observer might have seen
that the chin was very pointed and pronounced; that the big eyes
were full of spirit and vivacity; that the mouth was sweet-lipped
and expressive; that the forehead was broad and full; in short,
our discerning extraordinary observer might have concluded that no
commonplace soul inhabited the body of this stray woman-child of whom
shy Matthew Cuthbert was so ludicrously afraid.

Matthew, however, was spared the ordeal of speaking first, for as soon
as she concluded that he was coming to her she stood up, grasping with
one thin brown hand the handle of a shabby, old-fashioned carpet-bag;
the other she held out to him.

"I suppose you are Mr. Matthew Cuthbert of Green Gables?" she said in
a peculiarly clear, sweet voice. "I'm very glad to see you. I was
beginning to be afraid you weren't coming for me and I was imagining
all the things that might have happened to prevent you. I had made up
my mind that if you didn't come for me to-night I'd go down the track to
that big wild cherry-tree at the bend, and climb up into it to stay all
night. I wouldn't be a bit afraid, and it would be lovely to sleep in a
wild cherry-tree all white with bloom in the moonshine, don't you think?
You could imagine you were dwelling in marble halls, couldn't you? And
I was quite sure you would come for me in the morning, if you didn't
to-night."

Matthew had taken the scrawny little hand awkwardly in his; then and
there he decided what to do. He could not tell this child with the
glowing eyes that there had been a mistake; he would take her home and
let Marilla do that. She couldn't be left at Bright River anyhow, no
matter what mistake had been made, so all questions and explanations
might as well be deferred until he was safely back at Green Gables.

"I'm sorry