Anne of Green Gables (adapted), Lucy Maud Montgomery
Anne of Green Gables (adapted)
Lucy Maud Montgomery
Category: Novels
Genres: Coming-of-age,Young Adult,Humor
Level 3.082:29 h62.6 mb
Anne Shirley arrives at Green Gables by mistake. Matthew and Marilla wanted to adopt a boy, not a talkative red-haired girl with a huge imagination. But Anne soon fills their quiet home with energy, questions, dreams, and plenty of trouble. She makes a best friend, starts school, argues with Gilbert Blythe, makes embarrassing mistakes, and learns that growing up is not always easy. This is an adapted version of the story, shortened and simplified to A2 level.

Anne of Green Gables

[adapted]

by
Lucy Maud Montgomery

Anne of Green Gables (adapted)

Chapter I.
Mrs. Rachel Lynde Is Surprised

Mrs. Rachel Lynde lived beside the main road in Avonlea, where it went down into a little hollow and crossed a brook. The brook ran quietly past her house, and Mrs. Rachel herself seemed to keep watch over everything that passed her door. If she saw anything strange, she never rested until she knew the reason for it.

Mrs. Rachel was very good at managing both her own business and other people’s. Her housework was always done well, and she helped with the Sewing Circle, the Sunday school, and other church work. Still, she found plenty of time to sit at her kitchen window, knitting and watching the road. Almost everyone who entered or left Avonlea had to pass that way.

One warm afternoon in early June, Mrs. Rachel was sitting at her window when she saw something unusual. Matthew Cuthbert was driving past in his horse-drawn carriage. He wore his best suit and a white collar, which meant he was going somewhere important. This surprised Mrs. Rachel because Matthew almost never left home unless he had to. He was very shy and hated talking to strangers. Mrs. Rachel could not guess where he was going. At last she decided to visit Green Gables after tea and ask his sister Marilla.

Green Gables stood some distance from the road, at the end of a long grassy lane. Matthew and his sister Marilla lived there quietly, far from their neighbors. Mrs. Rachel thought this was a strange way to live. When she reached the house, she found the yard as neat as she expected. She knocked at the kitchen door and went in. Marilla Cuthbert was sitting there knitting, and the table was ready for supper.

Mrs. Rachel noticed three plates. Someone was clearly expected, but the food was simple, so the visitor could not be anyone important. This only made the mystery greater.

“Good evening, Rachel,” Marilla said. “Won’t you sit down?”
Mrs. Rachel soon came to the subject that had brought her there.
“I was afraid something was wrong when I saw Matthew going out today. I thought perhaps he was going for the doctor.”
“Oh, no,” said Marilla. “Matthew went to Bright River. We’re getting a little boy from an orphanage in Nova Scotia, and he’s coming on the train tonight.”

Mrs. Rachel was so surprised that for several seconds she could not speak.
“Are you serious, Marilla?”
“Yes, of course.”

A boy! Matthew and Marilla Cuthbert were going to adopt a boy from an orphanage! Mrs. Rachel could hardly believe it.
“What put such an idea into your heads?” she demanded.

Marilla explained that she and Matthew had been thinking about it all winter. Mrs. Alexander Spencer was going to the orphanage to get a little girl, so they had asked her to bring them a boy of about ten or eleven. Matthew was sixty now and could not work as easily as before. It was also difficult to find a good farm worker. They wanted a Canadian boy who was old enough to help with chores but still young enough to raise and educate.

Mrs. Rachel did not approve.
“Well, Marilla, I think you’re doing a very risky thing. You know nothing about this child or his family. I read about a family who adopted a boy, and he tried to burn their house down.”

Marilla continued knitting.
“I know there is some risk,” she said. “I’ve worried about it myself. But Matthew really wanted this, and he so rarely wants anything badly that I felt I should agree. There are risks in almost everything.”

Mrs. Rachel shook her head and said she hoped everything would turn out well. Then she told Marilla another terrible story about an adopted child who had poisoned a family’s well.
“But that was a girl,” she added.
“Well, we’re not getting a girl,” said Marilla.

Mrs. Rachel would have liked to stay until Matthew returned with the child, but he would not be home for another two hours. She decided to visit Robert Bell instead and tell him the news. It was sure to surprise all of Avonlea.

As she walked away, she still could hardly believe what she had heard.
“Matthew and Marilla know nothing about children,” she said to herself. “I pity that poor child.”
But if Mrs. Rachel could have seen the child waiting patiently at Bright River station at that very moment, she would have pitied the child even more.

Chapter II.
Matthew Cuthbert Is Surprised

Matthew Cuthbert drove the eight miles to Bright River in his horse-drawn carriage. He enjoyed the pleasant road, though he did not enjoy meeting people, especially women. Matthew was very shy with almost everyone except Marilla and Mrs. Rachel.

When he reached Bright River, the train was already gone. The station was almost empty, and at the far end of the platform sat a girl on a pile of wooden boards. Matthew hardly looked at her and went to find the stationmaster.

“The train came half an hour ago,” the stationmaster told him. “But there was a passenger for you — a little girl. She’s waiting outside. She said there was more ‘scope for imagination’ there.”
“I’m not expecting a girl,” Matthew said. “I came for a boy.”

The stationmaster said there must have been a mistake. Mrs. Spencer had arrived with the girl and said Matthew and Marilla were adopting her from an orphanage. Then he left Matthew to deal with the matter.

Matthew slowly walked toward the child. She was about eleven, very thin, and dressed in an ugly yellow-gray dress and old brown hat. Two thick braids of bright red hair hung down her back, and her small face was covered with freckles.

As soon as she saw him coming, she stood up with her old carpet-bag.
“I suppose you are Mr. Matthew Cuthbert of Green Gables?” she said brightly. “I’m very glad to see you. I was afraid you weren’t coming. If you didn’t come tonight, I planned to sleep in that wild cherry-tree. It would be lovely in the moonlight. You could imagine you were living in marble halls.”

Matthew could not tell her that there had been a mistake. He decided to take her home and let Marilla explain.
“I’m sorry I was late,” he said. “Come along.”

The girl carried her own bag because its handle was weak, and she talked as they went.
“Oh, I’m so glad you came! It seems wonderful that I’m going to live with you and belong to you! I’ve never really belonged to anybody. I was only in the orphanage for four months, but that was enough. The people were good, but there was very little scope for imagination.”

Soon they were driving away from Bright River. The girl looked eagerly at everything around her.
“I love pretty things,” she said. “When I left the orphanage this morning, I hated my ugly dress, so I imagined I was wearing a beautiful pale blue silk one. That made me feel much better.”

She talked about Prince Edward Island, its red roads, and everything she still wanted to learn.
“Isn’t it splendid to think of all the things there are to find out about? The world would not be half so interesting if we knew everything. There would be no scope for imagination.”

Then she asked if she talked too much.
“Oh, you can talk as much as you like,” Matthew said.
“I’m glad. People laugh because I use big words, but if you have big ideas, you need big words to express them, don’t you?”
Matthew thought that seemed reasonable.

She asked about Green Gables and was delighted to learn there was a brook near the house. Then she pulled one of her braids over her shoulder.
“What color would you call this?”
“It’s red, isn’t it?” Matthew said.
She sighed.
“Yes. That is why I can’t be perfectly happy. I can imagine away my freckles and green eyes, but I cannot imagine away my red hair. It will be my lifelong sorrow.”

A little later they turned a corner, and the girl suddenly cried out. They had entered a long road covered by great apple trees in full white bloom. The branches met above them, and the evening light shone through the flowers.

For once, the girl became completely silent. She looked up at the blossoms until they had passed through the whole road.
“What was that place called?” she finally asked.
“The Avenue. It is a kind of pretty place.”
“Pretty isn’t enough. It was wonderful! I shall call it the White Way of Delight.”

Soon they reached a long pond shining in the evening light.
“That’s Barry’s pond,” Matthew said.
“I don’t like that name. I shall call it the Lake of Shining Waters.”
Matthew told her that Mr. Barry had a daughter about her age named Diana.
“Diana! What a perfectly lovely name!”

As they crossed the bridge, the girl shut her eyes because bridges frightened her. When they reached the other side, she looked back.
“Good night, dear Lake of Shining Waters. I always say good night to the things I love.”

A little later Matthew said they were almost home.
“Oh, don’t tell me which house it is. Let me guess.”
She looked across the countryside until her eyes stopped on a house far back from the road, surrounded by trees.
“That’s it, isn’t it?”
“Yes, you guessed it,” Matthew said.

“Mrs. Spencer didn’t describe it to me. But as soon as I saw it, I felt it was home.”
She said she had been afraid all day that everything might be a dream. Now she knew it was real, and they were nearly there.

Matthew grew uncomfortable. Marilla would soon have to tell her that Green Gables was not meant to be her home. He found himself thinking about the child’s disappointment more than about the mistake.

They drove up the long lane to Green Gables. The yard was dark, and the poplar leaves moved softly around them.
“Listen to the trees talking in their sleep,” the girl whispered as Matthew helped her down.
Still holding tightly to the old carpet-bag with all the things she had inside, she followed him into the house.

Chapter III.
Marilla Cuthbert Is Surprised

Marilla came forward when Matthew opened the door, but she stopped when she saw the thin girl with red braids and bright eyes.
“Matthew Cuthbert, who is that? Where is the boy?”
“There wasn’t any boy,” Matthew said unhappily. “There was only her.”

Marilla stared at him. They had clearly asked Mrs. Spencer to bring a boy, but Matthew explained that the girl had been left for them at Bright River and he could not leave her there.

The child had been listening in silence. Now she understood.
“You don’t want me!” she cried. “You don’t want me because I’m not a boy! Nobody ever wanted me. I knew it was too beautiful to last. Oh, what shall I do? I’m going to burst into tears!”
She sat down at the table and cried hard.

“There’s no need to cry so,” Marilla said.
“Yes, there is! You would cry too if you thought you had found a home and then learned they didn’t want you because you were not a boy. Oh, this is the most tragical thing that ever happened to me!”

Marilla almost smiled.
“We’re not sending you away tonight. You can stay until we find out what happened. What is your name?”
“Will you please call me Cordelia?”
“Is that your name?”
“No, but I would love to be called Cordelia. It is such an elegant name.”

Marilla insisted on hearing her real name.
“Anne Shirley,” the girl said slowly. “But if you call me Anne, please call me Anne spelled with an E. It looks so much more elegant.”

Marilla agreed and asked how the mistake had happened.
Anne said Mrs. Spencer had clearly asked for a girl of about eleven, and the woman at the orphanage had chosen her. Anne had been so happy that she could not sleep the night before.

Then she turned to Matthew.
“Why didn’t you tell me at the station? If I had not seen the White Way of Delight and the Lake of Shining Waters, it would not be so hard now.”
Marilla looked at Matthew in confusion, but he only said Anne was talking about things they had seen on the road.

At supper, Anne could hardly eat.
“I’m in the depths of despair,” she said. “Can you eat when you are in the depths of despair?”
Marilla said she had never been in such a state.
“It is very uncomfortable,” Anne said. “When you try to eat, you feel as if you cannot swallow anything.”
Matthew suggested that she was tired and should go to bed.

Marilla took Anne upstairs to the small room in the east gable. It was very plain and clean, with white walls, a bed, a small table, and a little mirror. Anne said the nightgown from the orphanage was very poor and simple, but at least a person could still dream while wearing it.
Marilla told her to get into bed and said she would return for the candle.

When she came back, Anne was hidden under the covers.
“Good night,” Marilla said.
Anne suddenly looked out.
“How can you call it a good night when you know it is the worst night I have ever had?”
Then she disappeared under the covers again.

Downstairs, Marilla told Matthew they would have to visit Mrs. Spencer the next day and send Anne back to the orphanage.
“Yes, I suppose so,” Matthew said.
Marilla noticed his hesitation.
“Matthew Cuthbert, you don’t mean you want to keep her?”
Matthew struggled to answer.
“She’s a real nice little thing. It seems a pity to send her back when she wants so much to stay.”

“What good would she be to us?” Marilla asked.
“We might be some good to her,” Matthew said.
Marilla stared at him. She could see that Anne had already won him over.

Matthew said he could hire a farm worker and Anne could be company for Marilla, but Marilla refused.
“I’m not going to keep her.”
“Well, it’s as you say, Marilla,” Matthew said, and went to bed.
Marilla went to bed soon after, still determined that Anne must leave. Upstairs in the east gable, Anne cried herself to sleep.

Chapter IV.
Morning at Green Gables