There had not really been time for Gilbert to begin to worry properly where Anne might be; the House of Dreams was more accurately a small cottage and when he did not find her in the cheerful sitting room or kitchen, when she did not answer his greeting, "Anne-girl, I'm home!" with her usual "Wonderful!" or "Darling Gil! There you are," he had walked straight into the back garden and nearly tripped over her himself.
"Anne! What—whatever are you doing?" he exclaimed.
The house had held the scent of the bouquet of roses she must have picked for their bedroom that morning, but there had been no fragrance of a simmering dinner and she had not cleared the table of her dish and spoon from luncheon, nor laid it with the china she used for dinner, the little nosegay she ornamented the table with every evening. She sat on the broad sandstone stoop in the light dress she'd worn when he left but the lace collar was unbuttoned and she had no book, no paper and pen, nothing to indicate why she would be perched on the back step and for some time it would seem.
"I, don't you worry now, I took a bit of a tumble- I must have missed my footing, and my ankle," she gestured to her outstretched legs, her feet visible with the rucked up hem of her pale dress, "I wouldn't presume to make a diagnosis, I'm only a doctor's wife, you know, but I think I must have sprained it, at least. I tried to get back in the house but I couldn't quite manage it. So I thought I would make the most of the late afternoon sunshine and wait for you here. I am glad the rain held off, else I might be a bit bedraggled now."
"Oh, my poor sweetheart!" Gilbert said and knelt beside her, thoughtless of anything but her, intent on his examination of her right ankle.
Anne was not one to complain very much, not about physical discomforts—she would wax rhapsodic about her disenchantment when a lofty tree was felled or if a monstrosity of a house obscured a sunset view of the bay, but about aches and pains, the general unwellness anyone might suffer, she was close-mouthed. He thought it might date to the time before and just after her arrival at Green Gables, when she was careful not to give any offense or offer any trouble, but he hoped as time went on, she would feel she could moan a little to him and know he would only care for her and give her a little cuddle besides. He respected Marilla Cuthbert very much and admired her; he knew she loved Anne dearly, but she was not a warm woman, not free with a caress and he could tell from Anne's response to him, from the way she squeezed his hand when he took it up on a walk beside the shore to the way she clung to him in the night, always turning into the palm that cupped her cheek, that she had missed such gentle comfort.
Now he must turn his attention to her injured ankle; he was worried it was more than a sprain if she could not bear weight on it but ankles were tricky and Anne's were slender and her dainty shoes would not have aided her at all. He unbuckled the low-heeled shoe and drew it off, then grinned at her a little before he reached up quickly to loosen her silk garter, rolled the lisle stocking down with care. Her ankle was dramatically swollen with an impressive bruise beginning, the blue-green of the hematoma starting to darken against her fair skin. The delicate landmarks of her malleoli were obscured by the swelling; he had seen worse injuries but this was not minor.
"Anne-girl, can you move your ankle for me?"
He saw that she tried but she was not very successful and when he looked at her face, he noted she tightened her lips against the pain, then bit her lower lip with the effort. He laid his hand on her leg above the ankle to stop her.
"No, that's enough. Will you let me?" he asked and she nodded, her brow still furrowed a little.
The coolness of the sandstone was leaching into his knees through his wool trousers and he thought she must feel it more through her thin voile dress and the longer time she'd been sitting. He tried to shift her ankle a little but she gasped right away and he knew it would tell him nothing more significant and cost her, probably tears, to prolong the examination.
"Let me get you indoors, up to bed, and then we'll see about this," he said.
"I don't see how exactly, Gil. I don't mean to be a baby about it, but I, it rather hurts. How—what are you doing?" she exclaimed as he put his arms around her and lifted her up.
He was sorry she was hurt but he admitted to himself he loved to hold her this way, to feel her lay her head against his shoulder and relax her body into his arms, confident in his strength. If he told her, she would laugh, he supposed, and tease him that he was a Canadian Boreas, carrying off Oreithyia; he had missed her wit as much as her whimsy, her sweet face and grace, those years she was in Summerside and he was toiling away at his medical studies. He couldn't imagine he would ever tire of her warmth, her spirit, her tender tenacity but he must get her into bed, as she was clearly flagging a bit, the evidence the quiet way she nestled against him and only looped her arms around his neck, wordlessly.
He took the stairs easily enough and set her down on the edge of the bed. That she had made before she went out of the house and the bedroom was neat and pretty, the curtains pulled back, his book on the bedside table and her bed jacket hanging on the bedpost like a lacy banner. Anne sighed in relief to be settled and he lifted her legs up as well.
"Let me just elevate this one a little," he said, pulling his pillow free from its sentinel situation at the head of the bed and raising her leg so he could tuck it under.
"That already feels a bit better. Oh Gil, what a clumsy fool I am! And you have yet another patient and not even any supper ready for you!" Anne said.
He knew she was apologetic and felt guilty, but neither charge bothered him. She also looked adorably incongruous in the bed in her day-dress and braided hair; he was used to seeing all that glorious red hair down around her shoulders and only a loose negligee in this setting. He didn't think her ankle was broken but only very badly sprained and rest and some cold compresses should do wonders so he allowed himself to be a little wicked.
"Oh my! Gilbert Blythe, what are you doing?" Anne exclaimed, her cheeks a sudden, ruddy rose.
He'd reached up again to untether the other stocking from her uninjured leg but he'd taken a bit more time and used a little more finesse; he allowed himself to caress the soft skin of her thigh under the silken bow and stroked the stocking down and pulled it off with a flourish. He took her left ankle in his grasp and appreciated its elegant structure, the curve of her heel. How finely made she was! He let himself explore and touch, reveling in the texture of her skin, the wonderful nakedness of her bare foot and the graceful arch.
"Well, I thought it would be obvious, Anne. I'm a physician, I must compare the injured ankle to the healthy one, to complete my examination, and now that you are more comfortable, I mean to take my time," he said while his hand stroked up her calf, beneath the folds of her skirt.
Oh, she was sweet and so exquisite, so desirable, his wife, his Queen Anne that he'd never thought he could win over so entirely. All her many letters over the past few years had begun to convince him of the depth of her love but nothing matched the sound of her sigh as he touched her, her indrawn breath when he embraced her, the dark look in her grey eyes as she began to understand desire and how it was the perfect partner for her affection, as his was for her. He could not permit himself to be so bold until her ankle healed, could only give her these few seeking caresses and all the kisses she asked for, sweet or merry or even insistent on her pretty mouth, but it might be a blessing, this new constraint, an avenue to new discovery they would not have wandered otherwise.
"This is… an examination, then?" she asked, a little breathless and he was pleased that he could rouse her so easily, that she always turned to him so gladly. "This is how you treat all your patients, Dr. Blythe?" she added, teasing and provocative but unworried, that he could tell. She had called his bluff and knew it and that too he rejoiced in, how she came into her power over him and used it only ever to raise him up next to her.
"Ah, well, you have the best of me. This is something… special. Only for you."
"So, it is not the Blythe Maneuver? I should not look in the next issue of Orthopaedia for a monograph signed Gilbert J. Blythe, MD?"
He laughed. Anne Blythe was a miracle he did not deserve but he would thank God on his knees for her.
"I think I would tremble to have you review such a document and in any case, I should let you rest a little and see about scaring up a little picnic supper for us. I seem to recall you have been happy to eat a meal in the bed, even if there are no ferns or drooping willows to give a suitable 'atmosphere,'" Gilbert said.
"Oh, you are the dear man, aren't you? There is some cold chicken and a few late peaches—with some bread and butter, I think we would do well enough. And then you can tell me all about your day and whether there's any news of the new minister and his wife. I am sadly behind the times since Miss Cornelia has not been to visit and Leslie never gossips," Anne said comfortably, that little wifely tone that was new since their wedding much in evidence.
"Yes, that will do and I'll make sure to speak to Miss Cornelia myself on my way in tomorrow so you may be informed. I suppose she may know a likely little lass who could come help you with the chores for a few days while you rest that ankle and before you say it, just think of how happy a few pennies will make the child and how little it will cost us," Gilbert said.
"I will concede as I can't imagine how I'll be able to keep house for you and get you a proper dinner, hobbling around, but I shan't like it very much," she said, pausing to consider something; he could tell by the way she tilted her head a little and wondered what sort of revelation he was in for.
"Although, perhaps Miss Cornelia knows of an overlooked girl who'd like to spend a few hours reading some fairy books as well. I do miss teaching when I think of little Elizabeth and Paul. Or perhaps a hired girl who has a hankering to write her own stories. Only, you needn't say all that, just tell her to pick from the race of Joseph and she'll know," Anne said.
He could see she was beginning to enjoy the idea of a little younger company and thought he'd ask Miss Cornelia to make sure Leslie knew to call as well as the hired girl he was sure Miss Cornelia would nearly whisk out of a magician's black hat, though in her case, it was more likely to be an impressively flamboyant indigo bonnet trimmed with cherries and ostrich feathers and striped ribbon. But now he must hie himself to the kitchen and assemble a tray for dinner with everything Anne had asked for and a little of the plentiful fresh shortbread Mrs. Desmond had brought; he'd never known anyone to be so grateful for a simple treatment for chilblains but he was learning something everyday he could never have imagined in his solitary room at McGill, when fumes of the dissecting room were dissipated only by the bloomy, summer scents Anne conjured in her letters, like the ones drifting through their bedroom window.