Mea culpa, that was a mistake, maybe not in terms of storytelling, but in where I chose to end the chapter. I think now I should have begun ch 36 with May's disappearance and ended with Ro's note to Gilbert. That would have been much better. I never meant to mess with you. Thank you for everyone who decided to keep reading. kwak :o)

Chapter thirty-seven

The Star and the Unicorn is a plush three storey building, with velvet chairs, silk rugs and brass receptacles for the hunched up men who pace around the lobby smoking cigarettes and cigars. The girl behind the marble-topped desk seems to be expecting Gilbert. At least she shows no surprise when a young man with split eyebrow and a bound wrist runs up to the desk and asks for Miss Shirley's room.

'Name?'

'Blythe,' Gilbert pants.

'Full name?'

'Of course,' Gilbert says, and duly supplies it.

'Sorry sir,' says the receptionist, shyly. 'I require your full name.'

'Aurelius,' Gilbert adds, a little frustrated now. He only wanted a room number, not access to the Queen.

'Aurelius, yes.' The girl nods. Gilbert realises she is reading these questions from a small slip of paper. 'One last thing,' and she leans forward inviting Gilbert to lean forward too.

'Yes?' Gilbert mutters, frowning.

'What sort of flower,' the girl says, her cheeks reddening, 'did you place in a midsummer wreath?'

'Wreath?' Gilbert takes a step back, and looks to the elegant black and white marble staircase. Anne is up there all right; these questions had come straight from her. 'They were lilies,' Gilbert answers. 'Lily of the valley, to be precise.'

'Room 27,' the girl tells him, 'and don't talk to anyone else on the way.'

He dashes up the stairs, giving no heed to his bruised ribs and almost sprints down the hall. When he knocks it takes a full minute before Anne comes to the door. He is bouncing up and down when she opens it, bursting with need to see her.

'Anne!' he erupts as the door swings open, and rushes into her arms. Anne is wearing a robe, the sort the hotel provides, and her skin is warm and wet. She lurches backward with the strength of his embrace, and does not stop until her leg strikes the walnut bedposts at the foot of the bed.

'Oh sweetheart, are you hurt?'

Anne eyes are huge. 'No, I didn't feel a thing –'

'And the rest of you, they weren't rough with you, were they?' and he brings his hand to her belly. 'Is everything all right?'

'Mmm,' she nods, wrapping her arms around his fine firm waist. 'I'm fine. Really,' she assures him, and traces a finger along his face. 'But you're not –'

'You're mistaken, Anne,' he says, hazel eyes blazing, 'I can't remember being this happy in my entire life.'

His body protests when he picks her up, but instead of wincing he rejoices in the pain. It was worth it, all of it was worth it to have her in his arms again, and he spins her round the room till the skirts of her robe fly open.

'Bath or bed?' he asks her next.

Anne decides she would like to return to the bath, and invites Gilbert in too. It's a slippery, tangled, frantic affair. In the end they realise she had better sit astride him. He is barely inside her before he knows he won't last more than a minute. All the panic, the exhaustion, the relief, the joy, the waiting, the pain, the not knowing, and then the knowing, it has built up inside him to such a degree there is no way he can hold it in any longer.

'I'm sorry – Anne I can't –'

'Don't be sorry,' she whispers into his neck,' I've missed you so much, give it all to me…'

He does so, and makes such a heartrending moan, the guest next-door bangs upon the wall.

'It does echo in here,' Anne giggles, referring to the cavernous, tiled bathroom the bath sits in. She brings her hand to Gilbert's chin, and lifts his head till his eyes meet hers. His chest is heaving, and hot scented water drips down a ripe bruise on his shoulder. 'Thank you,' she tells him, kissing the bruise, 'thank you for trying to get to me.'

'You're not mad?'

'Do I look mad?'

He grins. 'A little,' and brings his hand up to her wild red hair.

Anne leans back, arching her back and her neck till her hair is dipped in the water, coming up sleek as a seal. 'I promise you, I'm not mad. Tired, hungry, anxious for May. You know where she is, I take it?'

They step out of the bath and Gilbert helps himself to a second robe, wrapping it around him.

'Yes,' he says, quietly impressed, 'how did you know that?'

'If you didn't have some idea you would have pulled my arm out of my socket, trying to find her. Let me guess, May's disappearance has nothing to do with Isobel Hackthorne and everything to do with Davy.'

'Again,' says Gilbert, wholly amazed now, 'how could you know?'

Anne gives him another small smile. 'When you sit in a cell for twenty-four hours, you have a lot of time to think,' she says softly. Her voice isn't tired so much as sad; she wanted to be wrong, she wants to be told Davy is innocent of such a charge. But no, her stepbrother had to go and make another rash mistake. Why? Why did he always go out of his way to break anything that was good and sweet and true?

'Tell me what you know?' Anne says, sitting on the bed.

Gilbert is already shimmying into his trousers. 'Not yet. First we get some food into you; we're going to have to make another journey soon.'

They order sandwiches, fruit, cheese, things they can take on the way. When it arrives Gilbert is still shirtless and Anne isn't much better. There is so much to talk over: what happened during her interview, his Aunt and Uncle's reaction, his father turning up in the Glen, the meeting with Paul Irving. Finally Gilbert gets to the note his mother wrote to him, conveying her suspicions about Davy.

'Yes,' Anne cuts in, licking mayonnaise from her fingers, 'I think your mother is right. The moment you showed me her letter, when we were camped on the hill, I had an uncomfortable sense that Davy was not there to get some remedy from Ro. He was looking for something – or someone. I'm convinced he overheard your folks talking about little May.'

'And you think he went after her?'

Anne purses her lips together, her grey eyes wide and searching. 'I think he was either after May, or he was after… us.'

'Us – or you?' Gilbert says, his eyes narrowing.

'I'm sure it was May. He took her didn't he?'

'We don't know that for sure.'

'Here's what I know,' says Anne the sleuth reporter. 'I know Davy and Margaret knew each other intimately, otherwise she could never have known the meaning behind Davy's gift to me. I also know Davy proposed to Ruby on a whim, then the very same night he tried to ditch her –'

'Wait a minute,' Gilbert cuts in, 'ditch her?'

'Ruby finally told me why they "eloped". It was the night of the Midsummer Dance remember, folks coming from afar as Grafton and White Sands?' Gilbert nods for her to continue. 'And they did come from all over, including a young man in Navy colours who took Davy aside and had what Ruby described as a tedious looking chat.'

'She didn't hear what they were saying?'

'No. I think Davy made sure of that, because he never introduced them, though later he told Ruby the officer was an old chum.'

'Go on,' says Gilbert, making his own conclusions now.

'It wasn't long after their chat that Davy insisted he had to go to Charlottetown. And Ruby insisted she had to go with him. She thought they were eloping, but I don't think he had any intention of marrying her; he just wanted to get out of Avonlea with the least fuss possible. He booked them into a hotel and took her to the station in the morning, I can't think why except he knew people would come looking for her –'

'And he knew they could easily find her there,' Gilbert finishes.

'Then he disappeared. Ruby said he went privateering, but we also know Ruby has become very fond of stretching the truth.'

Gilbert thinks of the pink heart necklace, but for now he decides to say nothing. 'So where did he go?'

'I wish I knew. All I know is he came back more desperate than ever, and wanted May for himself.'

'Not for himself,' Gilbert says, bringing out his mother's note. He presses the wrinkled page against his knee, and rubs his tired eyes. 'Sorry, it's a bit of a scrawl.'

'I'm familiar with it,' Anne grins.

'Here,' he says and begins reading his mother's words. 'Margaret swore her health was sound, and I had no reason to doubt her. I knew the ailment Davy contracted always gets worse when a body is strained, and I can't imagine the strain Margaret was under could have been much worse. She'd been kicked out of home in the middle of winter, and was heavily pregnant, yet she appeared to be in perfect health. I knew if Davy had infected her it could have lead to May's deafness, but I always thought this coincidental rather than conclusive. What I am trying to say is the connection between these things is not what made me realise of my mistake. It was the tattoo the silly boy has got for himself: Father's Pride in three inch letters across his back, and underneath what I first took to be some little five pointed stars. In the hours after I last wrote to you I have realised they aren't stars at all. Gilbert, they are mayflowers.'

Anne groans. 'Won't have a thing to do with his daughter, but etched her name into his skin.'

'It seems he does care, Anne, why else would he take her back?'

'Back!' Anne snaps. 'He has no claim on May. It's Margaret's word against his, and she must hate him for renouncing her the way he did.'

'Unless,' Gilbert says, tucking the note in his pocket, 'he doesn't want May for himself. Remember I told you I met Margaret's father, Mr Morrissey? He told me he had three children?'

'Yes,' Anne says. 'A daughter in Guelph – that's where the reformatory is – and two sons. One in the army and one in the navy.'

'What if the naval officer who met up with Davy at the Midsummer Dance was Margaret's brother? What if he was there to pass on a message that Margaret's father wanted to see him? What if he told Davy where to find his daughter?'

'You think Margaret wants her baby back?'

Gilbert raised his eyebrows in assent. 'I think Davy means to take May to Guelph.'

'But Gilbert,' Anne says, leaping up from the bed, 'what are we doing here? We should be at the port, watching for him to cross the Strait.'

'I don't think he'll do that just yet. Davy used to be a thief, he knows how these things work. My bet is he plans to wait a while. You can't just kidnap someone, not on a little Island like this, where everyone knows everyone else. Pa says he means to alert the reformatory, get them to keep an eye on Margaret. They'll do it too. This is a serious crime.'

'I know it,' Anne agrees. 'Why do you think all those men are sitting around the lobby downstairs? I had to make the poor girl at reception promise she would only allow you into my room.'

'Yes, I was going to ask about that.'

'It's the Echo,' Anne explains, rolling her eyes, 'They always have a few reporters posted outside the police station. One of them spotted me going in with the detective. They think I have the big scoop on the woman who was arrested for stealing a baby in Glen St Mary.'

Gilbert can't help himself, and starts to laugh. 'They think you have the scoop, don't they know you are the scoop!' Anne rolls her eyes again. 'So how do you plan to get out of here unseen?'

'I don't,' Anne says, fastening her shirtwaist. 'Uh uh,' she reprimands when Gilbert tries to help. 'If I let you help, I won't get it on for another hour!' and she laughs. 'I have no plans to skulk out the back like a criminal, in fact I mean to demand an audience with Mr Oliver, himself. If he wants this story, he'll have some serious grovelling to do.'

'You don't mean you'd write about May do you?'

'Of course not,' Anne replies. 'But Oliver doesn't know that. We need to get to White Sands, don't we? I take it that's where we're heading next.'

'I thought we should talk to Mr Morrissey, find out what he knows. Maybe that's where Davy took May, makes sense when he doesn't know the first thing about taking care of a baby.'

'I thought the same thing. Well Mr Oliver can purchase our tickets, and some accommodation for the night.' Anne had been lacing her boots, and stands up now, her chin rising with her. 'Come,' she says, 'throw on your shirt, we going to find our Mayflower.'

'Anne?' says Gilbert, a grin on his face as he watches her march toward the door. 'I think you should put your skirt on first.'

The meeting with Mr Oliver goes better than Gilbert expected. What makes this even more surprising is the reason he was so effusive is because Anne told him she was married.

'I didn't mean to, not exactly, but he would go on, begging me to come back and work for him. So I told him that I had to go because my husband was waiting for me.'

'And he liked that?'

Anne folds the envelope that contains the allowance Oliver supplied for her, and tucks it into her jacket pocket. 'He did,' she says. 'Do you remember a while back, your mother and I came up with this idea for me to write a sort of How To column for the single fellow, offering advice on everything from how to sew a button to how to cook soup?'

Gilbert offers his arm and they cross the street to Charlottetown Station. 'Yes I remember, he adored the idea – until he found out you were only sixteen.'

Anne fumes. 'The two-faced buffoon. Telling me he could never allow an unmarried girl to advise grown men because his readers would be outraged. I tell you who would be outraged, his highfalutin advertisers! I'm sure that's why he killed my story on Miss Hamilton, because the rich families she serves are the same rich families that place advertisements in his paper! Two tickets to White Sands,' she says next, passing a crisp two dollar bill through a window in the booth. 'First Class,' she adds.

Gilbert hides his laugh with a cough.

'But now that I'm married, he thinks I am the perfect choice to write this column,' she continues. 'Suddenly I'm respectable.'

'Very respectable, Selkie's child,' Gilbert teases.

Anne pokes out her pink tongue. 'Thank you, good day,' she says to the rather confused ticket seller, before turning to Gilbert again. 'So, what do you think I should do?'

They are walking with haste to platform seven, when Gilbert suddenly halts.

'You're asking me?'

'Weeellll,' Anne equivocates, 'I don't have all the answers. I want to keep working for Ro, of course, but it doesn't pay very much. This way I could stay in Avonlea and write for the Echo just like your mother.'

'A little too much like my mother,' Gilbert mutters. 'Anne, I love you for who you are. I can't imagine you ever being satisfied working for Oliver, not now you know what you know.'

Anne makes a deep, dramatic sigh. 'Oh I knew you were going to say that,' she says, her full lips curling into something she hopes resembles a smile.

She is trying for nonchalant, but Gilbert knows how she truly feels. The constant refrain of income, security, savings, home is something Anne can now hear too. The hope Gilbert has that Eggers will keep his end of the deal is feeling more and more like a distant dream. Avonlea's tiresome dictates to maintain one's respectability and abide by the rules, sound like simple common sense now. Instead he and Anne had forged their own path, they had made their own world, and they had broken the rules. But not all of them. One thing Gilbert knows for sure: he will never put Anne in harms way again. Dependable, that's what he needs to be, a solid foundation for his family. Living off the land, seeking out herbs and stories, that dream belongs to the secret world they had left behind on the hill.

'I'm going to take care of you, you believe that, don't you? I don't want you worrying about that. You can stay and work and live with my folks and I'll go back to school. We'll have April to September together every year until I finish. We can manage with that, can't we?'

Anne looks up at him tenderly, and strokes his dear bruised face. 'We've certainly managed to fit a lot of living into these last six months. Perhaps you're right, Blythe, I don't think we could survive a whole year.'

...

GGG: goodness, thank you. I liked what you said about John and Gilbert. When I set this story up with that lyric about breaking what I had in mind is that a boy has to break away from his father at some stage. I think this happens because parent and child recognise so much of themselves in each other and it drives them crazy. I like that Gilbert learned curiosity and rebellion from his mother, and love and duty from his father. I'm so happy to know you're still reading! Thank you :o)

Pelirroja: I guess that's the risk of fostering, the knowledge the child you invested so much time and love with won't be in your life forever. Thank goodness for people like that. M rated action? You haven't got there yet? Oh you are in for a treat :o)

Guest: Yes! Fred makes a big appearance in the next chapter. Diana in the one after :o)

Regina: you make great points about the JB man and the PI man, I never thought of that. I thought it was funny that JB saw this beautiful house and evidence of a rich life and all he noticed was the lack of wife and family; because to John that was the ultimate success. I wouldn't say I was married to a JB sort, though since we moved to our little house by the stream he's become very ax swingy and powertoolish which I secretly LOVE. I have some experience of the PB type (or rather the Royal Gardner type) however. People think Roy in RD was this overblown poser, if only they knew how much of it was based on real life. Ah, men are wonderful, curious beings! P.S. when I read small bear I always think of Charlie Sloane's backside ;o)

FKAJ: trust you to find a truncheon funny ;oP I'm so glad Paul made a hit with readers, I loved the cadence of his words, so balanced and succinct. Love a man who can pull off a top hat! Will he make an appearance again, yeah I reckon he will, he and Ro are still old friends after all. Thanks for picking up on the primula blooming. I always knew it would be May who brought it back to life. I like that these unlikely orphans become catalysts for big adventures :o)

Guest: Thank you!

astrid: hope your questions have been answered :o)

Guest: Yes, I like that John is difficult, just like Marilla is difficult. And there will definitely be a grandchild scene!

wow: I'm loving all the questions you have, it's so satisfying. Yeah Davy needs a good slap, though he probably needs a good hug too - the idiot. I was so touched by what you said about your mum. I remember my own moment too. Top marks for 'regular lovesick pillow sniffer' Ah, you never disappoint!

Guest: thanks!

Guest: I hope I've answered some of your questions :o)

geek: A linguist? Awesome! Yes, the little I know about signing has fascinated me completely. Of course hands can be as expressive as a voice. I feel such gratitude that signing has survived. I have never seen Anne with an E, dunno who the hell Bash is, but I'll take the compliment. Good to know I made you blush, if I don't then I'm just not doing it right. Thanks for taking the time to comment, I know everyone is busy and this is a long story, the longest one I have ever written, and one I have managed to write without any great gaps for you to wait through. It means more than I can ever say to know there are readers out there coming along for the ride :o)