Chapter 14

The week that followed the dinner at the Winstons was a busy one. Katherine Brooke made her long-awaited visit, and Susan was greatly pleased with the laughter that rang through the house, and at having another person to care for.

On the first evening at Rosewood Cottage, Katherine sat across from Anne with a wondering look on her face. She'd been candid with herself about her concerns, worried that Anne would not be the same- and yet she was. At first, she had been startled by the stick Anne carried and the casual way Susan assisted her so often, however it soon faded under the comfortable comradeship she remembered. Anne now sat on the sofa after Susan had tucked her there warmly, and met her friend's look with dancing eyes. "And so who is he?"

Katherine's cheeks flushed, and she frowned, ostensibly to hide her self-conscious look. "He's the secretary to the British counsel," she admitted, her eyes twinkling. "He moved to Ottawa a few months ago."

Anne's smile was huge. "Is he handsome?"

Katherine flushed. "Not really," she said bluntly, making Anne laugh. "He's thin and awkward and wears giant spectacles."

It took Anne some time to stop laughing, and even Susan popped her head in to find out what was the matter. "Darling Katherine, there must be something about him-"

Katherine gave a grudging smile. "There's more than something, I will confess that. He's intelligent, and well read, he's travelled and lived in Europe for several years now." She rolled her eyes at her own foolishness, and a smile broke through. "His family are lovely, and he treats me like I am- special. He even holds doors open for me, and he tells me if he likes the way I look," she said, flushing in embarrassment.

Anne's smile was tender. "Of course he does. You are magnificent- and that is a French tailor you are wearing, unless I am mistaken?"

Katherine smiled down at the smart brown suit she wore. "I decided to indulge myself on the last voyage."

Anne beamed. "I told you that clothes were important. Well, I wish your young man all the success in the world."

Katherine's dark eyebrow flew up dryly. "You don't wish me success?"

"No, darling. If he wins your heart, it's he who is the fortunate one."

Katherine was with Anne for four days, coming to her classroom on Friday, and spending each evening talking with her friend until late. She attended church with Anne and Susan on Sunday morning, and after the service stood by while a surprisingly conscious Anne introduced her to Penny and Andrew Winston, and most interestingly of all, one Doctor Gilbert Blythe. Katherine studied him curiously. It had taken several years for Anne to tell her about him- and she would rarely mention him afterward. He seemed polite, and kind- and Katherine admitted frankly that he was an incredibly attractive man. He spoke to her courteously about their common year at Redmond, and yet Katherine was intrigued to see that his eyes always followed Anne. Unless she missed her guess, something was brewing there.

Only days after Katherine had left Four Winds, a barely conscious Gilbert pulled himself out of bed, dressing quickly and trying not to shiver in the cold dawn. Breakfast was silent, and Mrs Leary tut-tutted as she watched young Doctor Blythe slumping against one hand with his elbow on the table, pushing his oatmeal around the plate listlessly. Eventually he abandoned the attempt, and it was with great reluctance that he readied himself to go into the office.

Several hours and innumerable cups of tea later, Gilbert was slightly more awake, hoping that he would not be needed for any emergencies that day. He did various small jobs around the office between huddling over the stove for heat, and when nothing further needed his attention he sat down at his desk, his eyes watching out the frosted window blearily.

A good portion of the town seemed to be unwell with influenza. The cases varied from moderate to severe, and Gilbert had talked himself hoarse encouraging people to drink plenty of fluids, wash their hands and to stay out of the cold. For some of the farmers he had been caring for this was the equivalent of a jail sentence- and Gilbert despaired at times of making them see sense. He himself set a terrible example, coughing and sneezing and refusing to go to bed when he was needed.

A sign was up in Andrew's window to say that he had gone home, and Gilbert had been relieved that Penny had managed to keep him from going out in the cold again. She and Lizzie were well themselves, and he had last seen Andrew rasping as he worked over the papers from the office, and grumbling about the enforced bed rest.

On this day Gilbert too was considering going home when the door opened, and a swirl of cold wind made him shudder. He looked up to see Susan Baker dusting the snow off her coat.

"Susan? What can I do for you?" he asked, surprised.

She looked taken aback at the sound of his voice. "Doctor Blythe, by the sound of you, you should be at home."

"I'm well enough, Miss Baker. Was there something you needed?"

Susan looked at him closer, and muttered- "Goodness, you're just as bad as Anne is-"

Gilbert stood then, instantly alert. "Is she not well?"

Susan hedged. "Oh, well enough, I suppose. I'm a mite concerned about a cold that she has-"

"Is it a cold or influenza?" Gilbert asked, shrugging on his coat without delay.

"Doctor, she says it's only a cold-" she broke off at the short bark of laughter that swiftly turned into a cough of his own.

"If she's feverish it's influenza," he said grimly.

Susan sighed. "Doctor, she insists that it's nothing to worry about. I just wondered if there was anything I should be doing that I'm not."

Gilbert was standing by the door then with his bag. He gave her a stern look. "Susan, you know what she's like. If you think I need to be there, then you call me no matter what she thinks." He gave her a faint grin. "Blame me for it, if you like. I've got broad shoulders."

Susan followed him out of the door and into the icy streets, trying to hide her sigh of relief. She didn't know what to do with Anne sometimes, she really didn't….

Gilbert followed Susan up the steps to the stone cottage, already hearing the coughing within. As he was ushered in through the door he walked straight towards Anne's bedroom with his bag, without pausing to wait for a puffing Susan, who gave him a slight scowl at his impertinence. What if she'd been indisposed? Anne, however, was sitting up in bed with a book, and gave her housekeeper a pointed look.

"I'm fine," she said huskily, and began to cough once more, her eyes watering.

Susan tried to catch her breath then. "And when Doctor Blythe tells me that, I will accept his word." She turned for the kitchen, leaving doctor and patient looking at each other.

"So," Gilbert said drolly. "Fine, are we?"

Anne's chin came up. "Gilbert, I would have called you if I needed to-" she said protesting, as he sat on the edge of her wide bed to pull off his gloves. He then took her slim wrist in his fingers to check her pulse, and Anne sighed, surrendering.

"Susan and I came to an agreement," he said to her in perfect unconcern as he checked his pocket watch. "If she thinks you're not looking after yourself, and you need a doctor, she'll call me, no matter what you say."

Anne scowled. "And what of the ethics of treating patients who say they don't need to be treated?"

Gilbert shrugged, as he moved cool hands up to probe the soft skin under her jaw. "The Hippocratic oath is pretty flexible when you've known them since they were eleven and they don't have the common sense to call you themselves." Her eyes were flashing, and he grinned at her. "She just wants to be sure that you're safe, Anne. She only comes to me if you're scaring her." His eyes were regretful when she flinched at his touch. "The glands in your jaw are swollen, and I'm guessing that throat must hurt a fair bit."

Anne tried to clear it with a wince, and then looked at him as if seeing him for the first time. She fell to studying his face carefully. "Say something to me," she said suspiciously.

Gilbert's eyebrows flew up. "I beg your pardon?"

This time she heard the hoarseness in his voice, and her eyes blazed indignantly. "I knew it! You're sick as well!" As his scoff turned into a coughing fit that took a short time to stop, she sat in bed with crossed arms and a crosser face. "As if you shouldn't be at home right now."

"And people still need a doctor," he retorted. "How long were you teaching like this?"

Anne gave him a disgruntled look. "It only got this bad on Thursday," she admitted. "I canceled school yesterday."

Gilbert sighed. "Well, at least you had the sense to do that." He pulled out his stethoscope and regarded her with a quirked eyebrow, waiting for her consent to continue. Her cheeks were flushed from the cold, so it was difficult to tell if he was embarrassing her, and Anne eventually nodded, giving a shiver as he placed his stethoscope against her white nightgown. "I'd quite forgotten about this part, Gil."

"What, stethoscopes?"

"No. The way you seem to get sick more often in the first year teaching young children- they love to share their illnesses."

Gilbert continued to check her, wondering how this wasn't more uncomfortable for the two of them. After a minute of listening intently, he sighed. "Well, your chest is clear, thank heavens. But you need to call me if your breathing becomes worse. It's a bad one going around, and I don't want to take any chances."

Susan had come back into the room with a tray, and just in time to see Gilbert move to sit down on the chair by her bed to repack his bag. He looked up to see the housekeeper place a second cup on Anne's dresser.

"Before you head out in the cold you may as well have that, Doctor," she said grimly. "The two of you are as bad as each other."

Gilbert was sheepish as he took the drink, and Susan bustled around the room tidying as he sipped it. "Thank you, Susan."

"Have you eaten today?" the older woman asked imperiously, and Gilbert gave Anne a mute look of appeal. "Err- I had breakfast."

She stalked out of the room muttering, and Anne chuckled. To his surprise then she asked him to turn away for a moment, and got out of bed, taking a green dressing gown from the end of the bed.

"Susan is preparing you some lunch, I believe. We'd best move out to the sitting room."

"You're supposed to stay in bed, Anne. And she doesn't have to-" Gilbert protested, making Anne smile.

"No, but she will." Anne pulled her red hair from the gown then, and frowned slightly as she looked around for her stick. "The sitting room is just as warm. And at some point Susan will realise that she served a gentleman tea in my bedroom and she will be properly scandalised."

Gilbert looked down at the tea cup in some dismay- he'd somewhat forgotten as well. He then watched Anne try to take her tea cup as well as her stick.

"For Pete's sake, give me the tea," he said impatiently. "You don't have to manage everything on your own."

Anne shot him an impatient look that made him smile as she went, and within minutes the two of them were being served tea and toast by the fire. Gilbert looked at a large bunch of flowers on the table and frowned. "Who found orchids at this time of the year?"

Anne cleared her throat with some difficulty, and her face was hot. "Oh. Apparently those are from Mr Ford." In her own discomfort she did not notice Gilbert's, and continued as evenly as she could. "Susan told him I was unwell, and he sent those."

Gilbert's jaw set slightly, however he was too old now to let her know he was bothered by it. Another gentleman who had once showered Anne with exotic flowers she had no real love for came to mind, and it was with difficulty that he kept his voice even. "I see. Orchids were never really you, I thought."

Anne swallowed her tea rather quickly, and flinched at the heat on the back of her throat. "They aren't," she said thickly. "However you couldn't expect Mr Ford to know that. I like flowers I can live with."

"Like lilies of the valley."

Anne only nodded then, knowing that both of their minds were on the same posy that had been tucked into her belt at convocation. She glanced at him and sighed. Gilbert clearly had no wish to discuss the past, she could see that. Had he wanted to discuss it, though, she would have. Thinking of that day over six years ago, and the way a smiling, perfect Christine had clung to Gilbert's arm, Anne's brows lowered.

"May I ask you an impertinent question?" she asked quietly. "You aren't under any obligation to answer."

His look was startled. "You want to ask me something I don't have to answer?"

Anne clasped her hands in her lap. "I want to ask you something that I have no right to ask."

Gilbert exhaled. "Well, that certainly puts a fellow at ease." He folded his arms, and looked at her dryly. "You ask, and we'll see."

Anne's cheeks were pale. "Gilbert, why didn't you marry Christine?"

He was thankful that he had put down his cup earlier, and looked at her in some shock. "Why would I have?" he asked cautiously.

She floundered then. "You were always with her, I assumed- well, all of Redmond assumed-"

"They assumed wrong," he said bluntly. She looked at him in bewilderment, however he didn't appear to wish to elaborate.

Anne cleared her throat carefully. "Oh. Then- I'm sorry for the assumption."

Gilbert gave Anne an odd look. What on earth had possessed her to ask that? Christine had told him everyone knew about her engagement. Although if they were going to be asking things they had no right to ask…..

"I might also ask why you didn't end up with Roy," he said lightly, not missing the way Anne stiffened. He suddenly stopped in trepidation. He didn't know any part of the story- had Roy betrayed her? Had he broken off the engagement and hurt her?

Anne wrapped the dressing gown around her protectively, and stared into the fire. She spoke carefully. "Because I refused his offer of marriage. I told you that when you first came here to see me."

Gilbert drew in a long breath. "I would say that I wasn't really at my best that night. I may not exactly have understood."

The silence was longer this time, and Anne watched him shift on the chair, his face uncomfortable. She couldn't keep back a sigh. What was the harm? The truth was easier than a lie would have been.

"He proposed to me just after Convocation," she said quietly. "I realised immediately that I couldn't say yes, and I turned him down."

Gilbert's mouth tightened. "But you were with him for almost two years- why right then-?"

He saw the look in her grey eyes then, the one telling him to keep his distance. "I thought that he was the right person for me. And despite how hard I tried to make him fit into my life, I realised at that moment that it wouldn't work."

His voice was almost angry then. "You were with him for two years, Anne! I had people telling me constantly how in love with him you were! How could you be mistaken- how could everyone have been mistaken?"

Anne's eyes flashed dangerously, and she moved as if to stand. "Gilbert Blythe, I do not need you of all people to cast my folly up to me-"

He put a hand on her arm quickly to stop her from moving, his face fierce. "Look, Anne, I swear I'm not doing that- but I just don't understand. I was there."

Anne crossed her arms tightly across her chest, her eyes glittering with fire. "It's really quite simple, Gilbert. I thought that I loved him. He looked like everything I imagined I would want as a girl. But I didn't love him."

Gilbert exhaled. "Anne, everyone was so sure-"

"The same everyone who said that you were marrying Christine?" Anne asked, her chin lifting.

There was silence in the room, and every tick of the clock was loud in his ears. At last Gilbert sighed. "I suppose so. But it looked as if you cared."

Anne scorched him with her eyes. "Gilbert, I fooled myself into thinking that I cared for him. Is it any wonder everyone else thought that? I know now how hard I tried to make that a reality. No one wants to imagine themselves a flirt who leads a man on, and so I kept trying. And I have been punished for my folly in ways that you can't even comprehend, Gilbert."

He picked up his cup again to keep shaking hands steady, and paused to drink the scalding brew to give them time. At last he shook his head. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to upset you."

Anne's voice was cool. "That was six and a half years ago, Gilbert. I've had a long time to come to terms with my mistakes. I cannot go back, so I have to live with it. And I do. But it is not up to you to hold me accountable for what I did to Roy."

He glared at her then. "I wasn't doing that! I never wanted you with him, you must have known that- but it looked like you were!" He ended with another cough, and when he had caught his breath he exhaled, exhausted. "Look, I've made plenty of mistakes of my own over the years; I would never claim otherwise."

Anne had wrestled with telling Gilbert to leave in her anger, her lips almost white with fury, and her breathing fast. As she looked at him though, the years of estrangement that had passed between them made her bite back the bitter words. Instead, she looked into his tired face, and when she was again mistress of herself, her voice was low. "It tainted how I remember our Redmond years. I can't think of them without abhorrence. There is no way of measuring the damage I did back then."

Gilbert looked at her then with a frown. "To Roy?"

Anne gritted her teeth. "Well, of course to him- not that it lasted long. He was married within six months of Convocation. His wife is a sweet little thing, according to Phil."

His wife-

Gilbert paused in some confusion. He'd known that Gardner was married- five years ago he had attended a function for the Kingsport hospital- one which he had left abruptly. One of the many glittering events that he was expected to attend as the Cooper Prize winner, along with the top students from Redmond's medical school. Chandeliers and glassware gleamed, and champagne flowed freely as he and Jeremy sat with friends, jovial and freed from responsibility for just one evening. He'd been enjoying his dinner in fact, when the host of the benefit introduced Kingsport Hospital's new patron Royal Gardner, apparently just returned from his wedding tour and taking over family responsibilities on his return. Gilbert had frozen in his seat in dumb shock, and didn't dare turn his head towards the front.

That meant she was there.

He'd carefully placed down his glass and grabbed his black coat without a word. Ignoring Jeremy's attempts to call him back, he shrugged the coat on as the liveried servants opened the doors, and blindly strode from the building without a word. A shaken Gilbert tried to catch his breath as he crossed the cobbled road. He wouldn't stay there, he thought stubbornly- he was doing just fine on his own. He wouldn't go back to that misery, he wouldn't put himself there ever again.

Gilbert now sat in Anne's sitting room, his breathing uneven. If he'd known- if he'd only stayed and seen that it wasn't Anne! Self disgust filled him yet again, and it was with an effort that he turned back to the red-headed girl in the chair across from him. Unconsciously he rubbed a chest that felt uncomfortably tight, trying to remember what he and Anne had been talking about.

"So you- you still hear from Phil?"

Anne nodded, her face closed. "From time to time. She came to see me in hospital a year ago- I don't think she really knew what to do with me though." She listlessly stared into the fire, her chin resting on one slim hand. "I was in fairly bad shape at that time- I truly appreciated that she came, but it was so soon after the accident. I can't have been edifying company."

Gilbert's throat was raw, and he swallowed then. "You can hardly blame yourself for that, Anne. Surely she understood." He tried to smile. "So if Roy married so swiftly, it sounds as he wasn't permanently damaged."

A look of grief crossed her face, and he flinched at his own tactlessness.

Anne swallowed painfully. "I didn't only hurt him."

Gilbert closed his eyes and sighed. He was quiet for a time, and then gave her a faint smile. "They say that we should learn to live without regret."

Anne's smile was self-mocking. "Then 'they' are idiots."

Gilbert chuckled at her bluntness. "Well, I never quite managed it, either." He paused then, soberly. "It wasn't fair of me to make you tell me any of that. I'm sorry."

She gave the ghost of a smile. "I would like to have seen you try and make me if I was unwilling."

He shrugged then. "I'd know better than to try." He was silent then, and sighed. "It's all in the past now, anyway."

The excursion back in time had worn Anne's nerves to a thread, and as she sat across from Gilbert, she drew in a deep breath. "Gilbert, why are you here with me?" He looked at her in shock, however before he could speak, Anne continued, her voice wooden. "You are every last inch the doctor I knew you would become. And I am more grateful that I can express for the care that you have given."

His look was cool. "Why do I feel there is a 'but' coming?"

Anne's eyes held a flash of green in their grey depths. "Because I am afraid that you feel you owe me something. You don't. And as-" here she paused, nervously. "-as much as I have enjoyed our time, I am aware that it must not be the case for you."

Gilbert had paled. "What would make you say that?" he asked after a moment.

Anne swallowed. "Because five months ago you declared it impossible that we should be friends."

To her utter shock he suddenly laughed at her words. "You declared that for five years, and we got over that." He sobered then, and then it was as if the brief levity in the room had never existed. Anne clenched her jaw, and to his shock she spoke with an honestly that cut like a knife.

"Gilbert, there are times when we forget, and somehow everything goes back to who we once were. And then something happens, and we become distant again. I will not intrude in your life, because I don't really believe you want me in it." He looked at her, almost paralysed, and her voice was passionate and low. "I will not impose on you, Gilbert, and I will not push myself into your world."

Gilbert stood to his feet quickly, and walked to the fireplace. Suddenly he turned on her in fury. "Anne, you are already in my world. Do you really not see that?"

"But not by your choice!"

At this he snapped. "No! Not by my choice! By my choice I cut myself off from everything and everyone I ever knew back home. I chose to neglect my family, my friends, I chose to work myself so hard that I wouldn't feel anything anymore. I don't think I could have made worse choices, to be honest. So no, I didn't choose for you to come here. But that doesn't mean that I'm sorry you are here now." Anne stared up at him in shock. She watched him rake his hand through his brown hair. "Look, you said it yourself, that we can't go back. But I'm in your world now, and you're in mine." He suddenly drew back, realising just how much he had said. Clamping his mouth shut, he dropped to his chair with a tired look, only to see the tears pooling in her eyes. He breathed deeply. "And I'm not sorry."

Gilbert watched her visibly try to calm herself, her jaw clenched tightly, and he put his head in his hands. He should have known it was unwise to enter into an argument while they were both unwell- probably prompting them to say things they might later wish they hadn't. He'd been waiting for her to order him to go, for her to storm from the room- but as had been happening since the moment she arrived in the Glen, she surprised him again.

"I'm not sorry either," she said faintly, and his heart seemed to stop at the tear that fell down her cheek. His eyes followed it as it dropped onto her gown, and he looked up from it dumbly.

"You're not?"

"No." The smile she gave him was tentative, and his shoulders relaxed ever so slightly.

For long minutes the two of them sat in silence, until a curious Susan came to see what the matter was. She looked between the quiet pair, staring oddly at Anne. Gilbert came back to earth guiltily, as she left the room to fetch his belongings. She returned to find the two of them unnervingly speechless, and looking anywhere but at the other.

"I should let you go back to bed," Gilbert said, at last.

Anne shivered, her arms folded. "You should do the same."

He stood to his feet then, stretching sore muscles and yawning.

Anne tried to hide the blush that seemed to start at her slippered feet, watching Gilbert pull on his coat. She tried to catch her breath, feeling the urge to smooth his collar down as he was doing, to stroke the cheeks that were too flushed with the cold. She swallowed suddenly. His hands had been so gentle as he examined her, and she had been afraid to look up to see his hazel eyes so close to her own. Afraid that he would see, afraid that the situation between them would become even more complicated than it was now.

He helped her to her feet, and there was an odd hesitancy in him as he bent to pick up his bag and cleared his throat. When her grey eyes came up to meet his, he sighed.

"I don't think we need to go over the past again. But I don't understand why you keep trying to tell me that I don't owe you anything." Gilbert's cheeks reddened, and he continued slowly. "Anything I owe to you, I owe to a- a friend." At those words he saw her forehead suddenly crease, and her breath caught. She didn't speak for a moment, desperately trying not to cry. She could only nod, as a tear fell down her cheek.

Gilbert couldn't quite meet her grey eyes, feeling as if he was intruding on some private moment. He cleared his throat again, trying not to wince himself. "You'll call me if you start feeling any worse?" he asked gently.

"I will," she whispered and tried to smile. "And- thank you."

At her last words Gilbert looked up, and he held her gaze for a long moment before stepping away. Susan appeared out of nowhere with a basket of food, telling him stiffly that she would be in through the week to pay Anne's bill. To his credit, he only nodded, and placed his hat on his head. He smiled at her, and then he was gone.

Ten minutes later, Susan came into the sitting room to see Anne seated on the sofa, with the evidence of tears on her face. She lowered herself to sit beside her and wiped her work-worn hands on her apron.

After a moment, Susan spoke. "Anne, is there something that I need to know about Doctor Blythe?"

Anne looked up at Susan in shock. "Whatever do you mean?"

Susan's voice was unaccountably brittle. "Any time he comes here he seems to upset you."

"Susan, no-" Anne faltered, now seeing how her housekeeper must view the situation. "It's not like that."

"I shouldn't have gone to him at all!" Susan clucked anxiously. "There's a new doctor at Lowbridge I can try."

Anne drew in a shaking breath. "No, Susan. You did right to call Gilbert. It's just that we- we have a very complicated past."

She stood up then, assisted by the older woman, whose brow was lowered in concern. In some frustration Susan sighed. "What kind of complications?"

Anne's long red braid swung around her shoulders as she turned, and Susan was surprised to see the curious smile on her face. "If you can name it, Susan, we've probably complicated it."

A short time later, and Anne was tucked back up in bed with a fresh cup of tea, and the warm fire burning in the grate. Susan was smoothing the counterpane with a capable hand, when she bent down to pick up a clean handkerchief from the floor that she knew was not Anne's. She hesitated before placing the neatly folded cloth on Anne's bedside table.

"It's probably not my place to say this, but the doctor shouldn't come into your home as familiarly as he does. I'm not saying he does it on purpose, but it isn't quite proper."

Anne's cheeks whitened, however to Susan's surprise, she gave a dry smile then. "There's the rub, Susan dear. I'm afraid we were never terribly good at being proper."