Typhoid & Gossip Ch 56: Gilbert - Arguments, an anne of green gables series fanfic

Author's Note:

For those who have read the previous chapter before this one was posted - go back and reread the end... the tangent I'd developed of Davy following Mr. Carroll to Kingsport didn't work once I went over my outline... it would have been that - a tangent. So... more realistic he fails in the attempt.

A Talking Cat - Yes, I think she does, but I think I remember it being Mrs. Bennet... :D

Astrakelly - Yes... I agree, the drama needs to end and Anne & Gilbert to man up and get together... which is why we're not detouring with Davy to Kingsport.

Denie1943 - Will he have a "come to Jesus" moment here? Wait and see

YodaChick - Yes... that virginity test might happen... Shutter... But basically like a Pap smear.

— Gilbert —

Tuesday, August 3rd, 9:30am

On the train from Charlottetown to Carmody, PEI

I was fuming on the train as it slowly rounded the bends around every little out cropping and farm. I'd heard once that when the politicians in Charlottetown got the funding for the railroad, someone had in their head the smart idea that if they were paid by the mile to make our little rail road as long as possible. Which was why, with Charlottetown out of sight now we were slowly weaving around a small outcropping of the red sandstone the island is known for.

I'd had no new word from home about my wayward, wife? Fiancé? Anne. I wanted to find her and shake some sense into her. Why couldn't she have used some sense when dealing with the gossip. Why lie? And now? Insisting that it would be best to just break everything off so that she wouldn't stand in the way of my scholarship. It was her fault that I was facing loosing it. No, I thought, It was Mr. Philips and his wife Prissy for starting the gossip in the first place. I clutched my fists, wanting to fight Mr. Philips. Knock some sense into him. I'd deal with Anne later, first though I was going to get him to apologize like Charlie did.

Which was why, soon as the train arrived I grabbed my carpet bag, threw it over my shoulder and headed to Mr. Harmon Andrew's home instead of Apple Bough or Green Gables. I knocked hard on the door where a frazzled Prissy answered. "We're busy getting ready for Mr. Ingles arrival this afternoon, Mother wants it perfect for the perfect son in law." She spat. "Oh Hello Gilbert."

"Where's your husband?" I growled.

She rolled her eyes. "Off to Kingsport, business he said with one of his partners for that hotel. Something about standards, and moral issues. He's going to miss my sister's wedding, and Mother has been absolutely frazzled with the children underfoot during the wedding preparations. I've had to send Father to take them fishing to get them out of being underfoot. You and Anne will understand soon as you've got them old enough."

I could feel the nails digging into my palms my fists were so tight. "Why..." I growled. "Is he trying to destroy my life? Why are you? Don't you know gossiping is just as much of a sin as sexual sin?"

Her eyes went wide. "I..."

"I heard all about it. How you wrote home soon as I checked in as Mr. and Mrs. Gilbert Blythe, couldn't you tell I had such a fever that I could barely stand? How I had fever ramblings such that I didn't know what was real and wasn't? I don't even remember it. Just know about it from the gossip you spread. Maybe I didn't even check us in as such and it was all your idea. I nearly died from that typhoid fever. Somehow I guess your husband hasn't gone off to work on that next hotel but cause me problems. Just what is his issue? And answer quick because I might just hit a woman for the first time though my Dad taught me better..."

She gasped. "I don't know..." She sighed then crumpling. "He's jealous. Did you know that he hates the hotel work? Became a teacher to avoid it, but he wasn't that good was he? Spent the two years he taught at Avonlea courting me, even I know he didn't teach us much. But he was handsome even if he had a grand view of our future. He's still quite fetching even nearly ten years later. He kept bragging to my father how he'd be going to Redmond in the fall which was why he wouldn't keep teaching. Only he never got in. He was going to be a lawyer, yet for three years he'd applied and get denied. And then, his former students, are the best of the best. The boy who skipped school to go west with his father for a few years, and the scrawny orphan girl tie for the highest marks at Queens. And by then we'd moved to his family home to take over the hotel for his grandfather. There was no other option by that point. And we'd hear about the prized student - Gilbert Blythe at Redmond. President of his class, leader of the football team. And now? The recipient of the Cooper Prize. Even I know that's quite the feat, and hadn't been given out in five years. In one word, you were perfect."

"I wasn't." I growled.

She sighed. "And then you came to stay with us, and he'd checked on the two of you, and well, to report back to me that you were perfect even in bed. And that is one area he's prided himself as an expert on. Then you checked out, and he started to doubt your story that you'd eloped. That maybe you weren't perfect... Well, we'd be heading soon to return to Avonlea for Jane's wedding. I was shocked to hear about your illness. I mean I knew you were sick at the hotel, but I hadn't... Well, I do agree with my husband, the marriage bed should be celebrated but not profaned by abusing it before or out of marriage." She was glaring at me.

I was doing everything I could to keep myself from punching her. I could see red as I glared at her. "Prissy Philips, if your husband due to his jealousy causes issues with my scholarship why I'll knock his perfect nose out such that it'll be broken the rest of his life. And don't think I can't. Airing my sins."

She stuck her nose up. "Well, you've just confirmed that you're not moral enough for that scholarship. Perhaps if you were truly repentant. They say that a fever can bring out a true heart of a man, and clearly yours is bent towards sexual sin."

I slammed my fist into the wall inches from her head. "Don't think this is over. Soon as I can I'll be on my way to Kingsport to find your husband and he might not come home to you. At least not as pretty as he is now."

I turned then, grabbing my carpet bag dropped onto the floor. With each stomp I silently cursed every word I'd heard from sailors about Mr. Philips until I was back onto the main road and heading towards home. I dropped my bag off on the porch at Apple Bough not even bothering to say hello to my folks, marching past Mother who called out to me, determined to now find Anne. The other source of my problems.

Banging on the kitchen door at Green Gables, louder and harder then I ever had before it was suddenly opened to a wide eyed Dora. "Gilbert?" She whimpered.

"Where's Anne?"

"She's not here. I... Minnie May and I were about to walk over, she's visiting with Fred and Diana."

"That Gilbert?" Mrs. Lynde burst into the kitchen, pushing Dora aside and grabbed me by the ear to yank me into the room. "Now... Least what I could get from Davy between talks of real men discuss things over salt water taffy. Where'd he get that idea I'll never know and asking Marilla to make him plum taffy. Anne came announced you two never had married, and had been living in sin all this time. And that she'd have nothing more to do with you. Well the good book says what to do in that situation."

"They're not?" Dora whispered.

"No..." I Growled. "Not that we hadn't tried to elope."

"Well, the good book says that when a man is caught fornicating with a maiden he's to marry her. You go fetch Anne and bring her home."

"There's not going to be a wedding." Even if I had planned to drag Anne home and to a minster ideally first. "I mean to have it out with her then I'm packing to leave for Kingsport. Anne's not the only one trying to destroy my life."

Mrs. Lynde yanked my ear then. "Don't think I hadn't turned over my knee my own grown sons and I can't do that to you. Now, go get the wagon ready for I think I'd rather like to see that babe, little Fred Wright. You can drive us ladies down."

I glanced at Dora who looked wide eyed. "I'll just grab my gloves and signal Minnie May!"

Which was how I was pinned next to Mrs. Lynde, driving the wagon from Green Gables over to Fred's. Why he'd never named his homestead yet baffled all. He'd left it to Diana he claimed, and after a decade of friendship with Anne they'd failed to name it.

So we'd pulled up to the unnamed farm, and I glaringly helped Mrs. Lynde down I didn't bother to wait for Diana or Fred to open the door. Instead I marched up, slammed open the door, and pushed past a startled Diana burping little Fred on her shoulder. "Where's Anne?" I growled.

"Upstairs changing she was burping him when he'd made such a mess not only on the rag on her shoulder but the back side of her dress, still upset stomach..."

I didn't bother to listen, instead I pushed past her, marched up the stairs and pushed open the door to the guest room where a half dressed Anne gasped.

—*—*—*—*—

Author's note:

Jealous Mr & Mrs Philips... perhaps its not the most flushed out, but a little insight into why they're doing this...