there's a month yet, and dew-bleaching will work
wonders."

Only a month! Marilla sighed and then said proudly:

"I'm giving Anne that half dozen braided rugs I have
in the garret. I never supposed she'd want
them--they're so old-fashioned, and nobody seems to
want anything but hooked mats now. But she asked me
for them--said she'd rather have them than anything
else for her floors. They ARE pretty. I made them of
the nicest rags, and braided them in stripes. It was
such company these last few winters. And I'll make
her enough blue plum preserve to stock her jam closet
for a year. It seems real strange. Those blue plum
trees hadn't even a blossom for three years, and I
thought they might as well be cut down. And this last
spring they were white, and such a crop of plums I
never remember at Green Gables."

"Well, thank goodness that Anne and Gilbert really are
going to be married after all. It's what I've always
prayed for," said Mrs. Rachel, in the tone of one who
is comfortably sure that her prayers have availed much.
"It was a great relief to find out that she really
didn't mean to take the Kingsport man. He was rich, to
be sure, and Gilbert is poor--at least, to begin with;
but then he's an Island boy."

"He's Gilbert Blythe," said Marilla contentedly.