Marilla

Marilla had problems with her lungs.

I'll just step over to Green Gables after tea and find out from Marilla where he's gone and why.

It's no wonder Matthew and Marilla are both a little odd, living away back here by themselves.

Here sat Marilla Cuthbert, when she sat at all, always slightly distrustful of sunshine, which seemed to her too dancing and irresponsible a thing for a world which was meant to be taken seriously.

There were three plates laid, so that Marilla must be expecting someone home with Matthew to tea.

Something that for lack of any other name might be called friendship existed and always had existed between Marilla Cuthbert and Mrs. Rachel, in spite of—or perhaps because of—their dissimilarity.

Marilla was a tall, thin woman, with angles and without curves; her dark hair showed some gray streaks and was always twisted up in a hard little knot behind with two wire hairpins stuck aggressively through it.

If Marilla had said that Matthew had gone to Bright River to meet a kangaroo from Australia Mrs. Rachel could not have been more astonished.

"Are you in earnest, Marilla?" she demanded when voice returned to her.

Well, Marilla, I'll just tell you plain that I think you're doing a mighty foolish thing—a risky thing, that's what.