But Echo Lodge is to be left just as it is. . .only of course they'll sell the hens and cow, and board up the windows. . .and every summer they're coming down to live in it. I'm so glad. It would have hurt me dreadfully next winter at Redmond to think of that dear stone house all stripped and deserted, with empty rooms. . .or far worse still, with other people living in it. But I can think of it now, just as I've always seen it, waiting happily for the summer to bring life and laughter back to it again."There was more romance in the world than that which had fallen to the share of the middle-aged lovers of the stone house.
Anne stumbled suddenly on it one evening when she went over to Orchard Slope by the wood cut and came out into the Barry garden.
Diana Barry and Fred Wright were standing together under the big willow.
Diana was leaning against the gray trunk, her lashes cast down on very crimson cheeks. One hand was held by Fred, who stood with his face bent toward her, stammering something in low earnest tones.
There were no other people in the world except their two selves at that magic moment; so neither of them saw Anne, who, after one dazed glance of comprehension, turned and sped noiselessly back through the spruce wood, never stopping till she gained her own gable room, where she sat breathlessly down by her window and tried to collect her scattered wits.
"Diana and Fred are in love with each other," she gasped.
"Oh, it does seem so. . .so. . .so HOPELESSLY grown up."Anne, of late, had not been without her suspicions that Diana was proving false to the melancholy Byronic hero of her early dreams.
But as "things seen are mightier than things heard," or suspected, the realization that it was actually so came to her with almost the shock of perfect surprise. This was succeeded by a queer, little lonely feeling. . .as if, somehow, Diana had gone forward into a new world, shutting a gate behind her, leaving Anne on the outside.
"Things are changing so fast it almost frightens me," Anne thought, a little sadly. "And I'm afraid that this can't help making some difference between Diana and me. I'm sure I can't tell her all my secrets after this. . .she might tell Fred. And what CAN she see in Fred? He's very nice and jolly. . .but he's just Fred Wright."It is always a very puzzling question. . .what can somebody see in somebody else? But how fortunate after all that it is so, for if everybody saw alike. . .well, in that case, as the old Indian said, "Everybody would want my squaw." It was plain that Diana DID see something in Fred Wright, however Anne's eyes might be holden.
Diana came to Green Gables the next evening, a pensive, shy young lady, and told Anne the whole story in the dusky seclusion of the east gable. Both girls cried and kissed and laughed.
"I'm so happy," said Diana, "but it does seem ridiculous to think of me being engaged.""What is it really like to be engaged?" asked Anne curiously.
"Well, that all depends on who you're engaged to," answered Diana, with that maddening air of superior wisdom always assumed by those who are engaged over those who are not. "It's perfectly lovely to be engaged to Fred. . .but I think it would be simply horrid to be engaged to anyone else.""There's not much comfort for the rest of us in that, seeing that there is only one Fred," laughed Anne.
