In the garden of Primrose Hollow stood an old, slightly bumpy iron cauldron, steaming in the clear, sparkling air. Acorns rattled from the trees, and squirrels raced across the grass. The dry oak branches rustled, and the asters swayed, and the leaves rustled in the light wind. Soon the capricious wind dried a handful of dark dresses, their color was bluish black, pale lilac in certain light. The light hems of the dresses flared up. They seemed to herald the loss that had befallen this cottage.

The air in inside Primrose Hollow was brittle, like ice. Sadness, and loss, seemed to pulsate, like a gentle haze, from every corner of that previously so, happy and homely home, all the former playfulness and laughter had been wiped away. Only occasionally a ray of light glimmered in the tea glasses that were carelessly piled on the table, amid stacks of books, and drafts of essays in which Di's, strong clear handwriting was visible. Carefully Nan moved Alice's craft basket off the chair, and with a frown she sorted through mail, not black-edged telegrams, no, flower arrangements for Alice, and the cold fear in her heart eased, for another letter had come from Jerry. A faint smile rose on Nan's pale lips, and she quickly put the letter in her pocket, like a precious treasure, which it was.

Footsteps echoed on the stairs, reluctant, tired, footsteps and Di stood on the brightly colored carpet in the living room. Nan glanced at her twin, and suddenly she remembered the old story of how, in the Avonlea years, Mumsy had worn mourning for a long time because of Matthew's death. Black didn't suit Di's colors at all. It made her pale, and colorless, and emphasized the thinness of her features. Red of her hair, glowed like burnished copper, like a living flame.

"Did you get any sleep because when I woke up you weren't in our room," Nan inquired. Di sighed, and shook her head, and with trembling hands she put the tea on. Soon there were three cups on the table, and a jar of raspberry jam.

Nan raised her eyebrows and inquired "Who is that jam for?" A faint smile lit up Di's greenish gray eyes, which seemed even larger, and soulful, than usual, for they were surrounded by bluish rings, traces of sleepless nights, and she answered, in a rough, tear-drenched voice, "It is for Alice."

At that moment the front door opened.

Gust of fresh air, scented with mulch of falling leaves, flooded the room, and curtains danced whisper-light, in the breeze.

Nan turned and glanced at Alice for a time. The golden-haired girl seemed same as before. The dark mourning dress she was wearing seemed to emphasize and elevate her, as if she seemed to be carrying suffering, like wearing a veil, which made a very mysterious and even exciting impression.

Alice's face was pale, and she smiled distantly but warmly at Di when she noticed the teacups, and the jam. Di inquired "You were gone when I woke up. Did you go to the music library?"

Alice nodded, as she placed sheet music folders on the side table. She then sat down, and with graceful movements scooped one spoonful of raspberry jam into the bottom of her teacup, before pouring fragrant, dark tea over the top. The light smell of incense and beeswax, from her clothes, mixed with the smell of tea, and the tension on Di's face eased. Alice smiled at Di, lightly touching her hand, in passing, as she fetched from the kitchen pumpkin scones, she had baked yesterday.

Silently Nan watched Alice and Di, and she felt completely lost. It was as if something was happening in front of her, but she did not have the keys to interpret the situation correctly.

So, shaking her head, Nan carefully unsealed Jerry's letter with her knife. The rustle of the opening varnish startled both Alice and Di, and their faces changed color. Nan felt guilty as she remarked "I got a letter from Jerry."

Alice, nodded lightly, and Di said nothing, but she just looked, and Nan was interpreting her twin's gaze as a silent accusation. In the crossfire of two unwavering swift glances, greenish gray and violet, Nan straightened her ankles, under the table, and inquired, seeking calm, "Isn't the latest issue of Perennial coming out soon?"

Di sighed, and said "Yes, but when the news reached Dorian, he decided to change the plans a bit. We've all been invited to Redmond's Great Cabinet Room, next Saturday." Nan noticed that she seemed to be watching Alice very closely, but the blond girl's face was calm, and Nan could hear her humming, some French-sounding, fatal fragment.

Di tilted her head and suddenly asked "Alice, isn't that from Massenet's Werther?" Alice nodded silently. Nan exclaimed, "Goethe's Werther, I remember years ago Walter read that epistolary-novel in a trance, and he wore a lot of yellow and dark blue, for some time afterwards. Does this mean that you are also involved in what Dorian is planning, Alice?" Alice, shrugged her shoulders, with a graceful gesture that revealed nothing. Feeling annoyed Nan swore to herself that she would learn that gesture, as it was extremely effective.

Perennial's office premises were in chaos.

There were sheets of paper and sketches everywhere, and Dorian Gardiner was leaning on his desk, his fine features were strained. Lazily, Dorian adjusted his grey-speckled silk neckerchief, and thought about the past weeks. His birthday had succeeded beyond expectations. The graceful Ivor Novello performance by silken Irene Howard had been most pleasing, in an aesthetic sense, especially after Dorian discovered from Thompson that Alice had left hurriedly in the middle of that performance.

Miss Howard´s company had been refreshing, the few days that the honey-blond well-groomed girl had spent at Gardiner Hall, as Aunt Adeline's guest. Adeline had been attentively following Dorian and Miss Howard´s conversations, from a distance, when they had been sitting in various coffee shops of Kingsport, in shimmering fall days. Miss Howard had made use of Adeline's contacts and credit in the stores in Kingsport and she had packed quite a pile of new clothes, silk, satin, and the softest linen in her trunks from the shops of Kingsport, before she had departed into Charlottetown, or so she had claimed.

One evening Aunt Dorothy had glanced at Miss Howard´s cloying rose-parfumed missives in passing, and she had smiled in her pointed style, and said slowly, "Dorian, Dorian, that girl is perhaps the worst thing that could happen to you. So if you want advice, cut off now your contact. She's pretty and musical, of course, but she's just a surface shine, and cutting pettiness, no heart at all."

Dorian had sighed, and looked at Dorothy, and he had said wearily, "Miss Howard makes me laugh, doesn't that mean something?" Dorothy just shook her head, and she whispered "Oh my boy, you are far too innocent. Miss Howard is hunting, and you are the prize. Have you so quickly forgotten fair Alice?"

Dorian had bitten his lip, and shook his head in silence. Dorothy had kissed him lightly on the cheek, and Dorian had smelled his aunt's familiar slightly spicy perfume, and suddenly he had asked, out of pure curiosity, "Aunt Dorothy, why have you and Adeline never married?"

Dorothy had sat on the floor of Dorian's room, and toyed with her necklace, and at last answered slowly, "Adeline was engaged, once. Her fiance was killed in the Boer War, and as for me, I am too busy. I have no time for men, for my various organizations take up all my time. "

Dorian chuckled, "Sometimes I feel like you're like Glasworthy's June Forsythe, all spirit and will." Dorothy rose gracefully, and with a dark chuckle she declared "I'm not a redhead, and I don't have a broken engagement in my past. Honey, don't make romances where there aren't any." "Isn't there something Irene Heron-like about golden Alice?" Dorian inquired with a slightly wistful tone in his voice. Dorothy had glanced sharply at Dorian and said in a serious tone. "Dorian. Alice is a living girl, not some literary or romantic heroine, so treat her like a human being, not some hazy dream, and most importantly, listen to her with intent and patience. You have a Gardiner tendency to get carried away sometimes."

The atmosphere in Redmond had been extremely tense when news of the autumn attacks on the Somme front came. Dorian had only seen Alice in Redmond´s halls from a distance, she had most often been walking with Di Blythe, their arms twined together, or alone, only pale flash, of golden hair and mauve-colored dress, balancing stacks of books, in dusty tables, far recesses of particular libaries.

And then the news about Walter had reached Dorian, too, by curt note from Alice. Her flowing handwriting had been barely legible. After the burning numbness, the disbelive, and hurt that still ached, Dorian had begun to plan.

Tirelessly, with feverish, burning enthusiasm, Dorian had begged, planned, plotted, and finally ordered, he had unflinchingly invoked the power of his family name on the Redmond campus, and finally one by one, Redmond trustees had nodded.

Exhausted, Dorian brushed his hair out of his eyes, and poured a drop of French cognac into glass. Its sweet, spicy fumes mingled with the musty air of the office, and for a few moments in time, Dorian remembered Walter's wide eyes, and ruddy cheeks, as they had sat one evening in the corner of a cabinet, and the scent of French perfume and hair oil had hung in the air, and the crackling gas lamps cast their flickering light on the worn parquet, and in the orchestral montage, the notes of Bizet's Carmen had shimmered as the pulsating notes of Habanrena split the room. And on stage, Carmen enchanted Don Jose, with a rose. And with a faint start, Dorian had noticed that Walter's gaze had lingered on the soldiers' uniforms, when Carmen had defied the soldiers, before the intoxicatingly intense Seguildilla, that aria, always raised Dorian's own pulse, a few Walter had suddenly straightened up when the dark-eyed Escamillo had arrived and the toreador's aria echoed, full of vibrant, forceful masculinity. Dorian remembered Walter's tears on his cheeks every time Michaela came on stage.

After the evening was over, Dorian had jokingly asked "Do you happen to have a Michaela in Glen?" Walter had given Dorian a pointed look, and said with deceptive calm, "No, but there is a tea rose." And in response Dorian had hummed a fragment from Don Jose´s passionate rose aria, and Walter had just shaken his head in vaque way. After that adventurous evening, their correspondence had been full of references to Carmen, and the sonnet that Walter had written in honor of his birthday was a memory of that memorable evening. Dorian sighed, and with a quick flick of his wrist drained his glass.

Suddenly the door opened and a figure dressed in black stood in the doorway, it was Di. Dorian quickly filled another glass and handed it to Di. Di glanced pale-cheeked at Dorian and weakly shook her head.

Dorian shrugged and said calmly "French brandy. Sometimes your brother used to drink this with me, not often but sometimes." Suddenly Di took a step forward and with a defiant gesture raised the glass. Dorian smiled and said softly, "To your brother."

Di nodded, and drowned her glass with few dainty sips. Dorian watched with amusement as a slight blush rose on Di's pale features and her gray-green eyes flickered dimly, and slowly broken expression in their expressive depths were obscured even for a moment. Then Di in her efficent way took out her typewriter, straightening her posture, she began to write, the tap-tapping, of typewriter echoed in the room.

Outside light dimmed, and a light rain fell on the cobblestones, and late into evening Dorian and Di sat quietly, and mourned, between them were Walter's work form Perennial, his scribblings, sheets, and sketches, clear handwriting, vague rapid scribbles, ideas that never took final form.

The dim moonlight illuminated the garden of Primrose Hollow. Alice Parker carefully closed the gray folder illustrated with the stamp of the Redmond Music Society, and carefully she undid many of the pins, and the heavy, fragrant golden blond, - fairy hair, as Walter had said, - slowly spread down her back, slightly curled. Sighing, Alice stretched, and glanced at the unopened letter on her desk, it was Walter's letter. And biting her lip, Alice closed her eyes and made a quick sign of the cross, and caressed her prayerbeads, in her fingers. Moonlight and candel light flickered on Walter's letter.

Golden Alice.

I'm sorry, if this letter is perhaps not what you might expect. You may be sitting reading this sitting alone in the moonlight, and the light of the rays bleaches your hair to golden white, and in that light you may seem almost like a spirit being, utter fulfillment of my childhood dreams. Perhaps you did not know that I loved to look at you in the dusk of evenings, when we sat in Rainbow Valley, and a quiet light sadness united us. Your hair, then smelled like incense, and a little bit of honey, and there was light scent of wild mint and the stream gently lapped. It may be so that perhaps soon, Dorian will shower you with roses from Gardiner greenhouses, all of the various improbable shades of cultivated flowers, that are so, far away from blooming violets, and bluebells that grow on the banks of Lowbrige Episcopalian Cemetery, where we often sat, under that hauntingly lovely liactree, and laughed together. Passage of time is inexorable, and in the end, we humans are just grains of sand in a great hourglass, and now it is so, that my own time may be ending soon.

Do you remember when Dorian took me to see Carmen and for weeks afterwards all I could talk to you about was the card aria, the impression it had made on me. The whole milieu, the mountains, and the truth shown by the cards, for Carmen, a premonition, or a warning, which finally came true outside the bullring of Seville in the last act, in a feverish and desperate outburst. And now, only last night I have seen my own cards, or rather my Piper's flute calls me, soon, he and one another. And you, know what it means, if he is waiting for me.

My fingers are cramping so, I must soon end this missive of mine, as they will soon call lights out. I can tell you now that I have here written poetry that I never imagined I would write. Powerful, raw, and truthful, but also sensitive and tender. The whole spectrum of humanity, has revealed its variable features to me. In your latest letter you asked my opinion of Massenet, Gogound, or Berlioz, and I must say that I cannot answer, but I will say this, you almost broke my heart when you sung Elgar, for me that one time. If it's a performance for Redmond's Music Society, trust your intuition, in all things. I know you will be absolutely radiant, as you always, have been. Now I'm going to ask a little request, and I can almost see you shaking your head in your typical shimmeringly regal, mild amusement. I'll gift you those notes, my Mahler. On the condition that you copy them and give copy of them to Una. If there is going to be black-edged telegram, I implore you, please, don't forget your light, golden hilarity that you have so recently gained anew.

With all my love

W.

Cautiously, with tears streaming down her cheeks, Alice laid letter on the table, and shook it a little. A few cut-out pages of the notebook fluttered in the envelope, and wiping her tears, Alice glanced at the sheets. They were poems, one was the one Walter had written of her before, in most vaque way. Aftermath, now finally in finished and polished form, and the other was new, and its verses, were poignant and tender, full of whispery charm. Alice read the poem through a few times, and then she wrote a copy of it, with trembling hands, and folded the original carefully into a clean envelope that she slipped into pages of her Shelley.

Creeping, quiet footsteps were heard on the stairs, and soon the door to Alice's room opened. Alice turned and a pale Di stood in the doorway. The red-haired girl swayed, and with quick steps Alice reached out her hand. Di's fingers were cold from the autumn fog that filled the streets of Kingsport. Quietly Di whispered, "Can I stay here?"

Silently, Alice nodded, and she thought of those long, and lonely nights, after that hurried telegram arrived from Ingelside, when she had felt haunted, for her sleeplessness had returned, as always in the autumn-time, with a vengeance and with an aching heart, Alice had looked up at the shadowy ceiling, and counted her heartbeats, the intervals between them as she waited for dawn to come. She had been startled as Di had climbed up beside her, smelling faintly of ink, fresh, salty tears, and of the poppy syrup found in the Primrose Hollow´s medicine cabinet.

Di now, glanced at Walter's letter, which was open on Alice's desk, and glistening tears glistened in her eyes, but they did not fall. And in a quavering voice, Di inquired "So you've read yours. I haven't read mine yet, because if I do, the last bit of him will be gone, I want to keep him alive as long as possible. And I know his poetry and other writings remain, but it's not quite the same." Alice nodded, and with slow leisurely movements she combed Di's hair and tiredly Di rested her head on Alice's lap as she murmured in drowsy fragmentary voice "My head is spinning. Alice you are so warm, and your parfume is like violets, that Walter loved, and nutmeg I think, I really love that scent, as I also.."

What else Di was going to say, or confess, Alice didn't know, as soon only soft and peaceful breathing could be heard in the room as Di had fallen asleep, worn down into a thread as she was. Carefully Alice laid Di down on her bed, and covered her with a striped blue-green blanket. The blue-black shadows of the early hours of the morning played on the walls as Alice toiled in the kitchen.

And slowly, as the golden October light rose, the denizens of Primrose Hollow awoke to the fragrant smell of carrot buns that wafted all over house as soft as a gentle caress.