Chapter IX
When October came and with it the soft whispers of the wind and the leaves flying off the trees at each corner, Robert's company slowly started to fall apart. Di was very worried about him and to be honest she couldn't think of anything else but about how disappointed and stressed her sweetheart was in that moment. She couldn't listen to the soft whispers of the wind, nor she could focus on anything apart from her lessons at the Glen school and those private lessons she was giving three times a week.
It wasn't just the situation of Robert she was worried about, in fact she was mostly worried about the situation she was put in. Di knew that if nothing that would cause the rise of Robert's company would occur, he would decide on going back to Ottawa and this could mean that he could ask her to come with him, and this means that he would probably ask her to marry him.
Of course, Di wasn't sure whether or not Robert could propose to her or not, but after all that was the possibility which she could face in a matter of months, weeks or even days. What should she answer him if he asked her? Of course she loved him, loved him wholly and truly but… They started courting just a few months earlier, and somehow (although it would be very romantic) it didn't seem right for Di to accept Robert's proposal and actually marry him so soon. It just wasn't… right. Neither sensible, she concluded.
Was Di enough in love with Robert to follow him to Ottawa, leave her home and her beloved family with her teaching and her pupils, and follow him to the strange city she hardly knew? Di didn't know, and every time when she thought that she knew the answer, something in her stomach was telling her otherwise. But Di continued on living as normal, she was teaching at school with a smile on her face, she was marking the exams in a speed of light, she was visiting her siblings and friends on regular basis, she was taking walks with Robert and Carl respectively and sometimes she could forget about her dilemma.
On one day in the middle of October, Di woke up to the sound of wind blowing in the window of her room. It was Saturday and therefore the one day when Di could actually wake up whenever she wanted, so she wasn't surprised when she looked at the clock standing on her night-table and realised that it's almost midday. Di took her time, she dressed up in her nice dark purple dress with a lace neckline and she brushed her short red locks while watching the Rainbow Valley out of her window. She then walked downstairs and made her way to the kitchen, where she was met with the delicious smell of Susan's cooking coming from the oven and then with her Mother sitting in her chair with a cup of tea in her hand.
Anne looked up from the book she was reading and smiled at her daughter in this mysterious smile Di hadn't seen before on her Mother's face "Good morning, darling." she said softly and offered Di a chair.
Di sat down on the chair next to her Mother and looked at her curiously "What is it?" she asked her.
Anne shrugged and pretended that she started reading her book again, although she couldn't hide a small grin creeping in the corner of her red mouth "Nothing, dear." she replied "I'm just happy to see you."
Di furrowed her eyebrows and she looked in the direction of thesound of the footsteps behind her "Di, dear, here's your breakfast. Your favourite apple pie and coffee, the one you always liked the most." Susan put the plate and the cup in front of Di and her eyes were smiling even though her small lips hardly moved.
Di looked at Susan seriously "Susan, did something happen about which I'm not aware of?" she asked.
"I don't know anything Di, dear, and that you may tie to." she answered her hurriedly, returning back to the kitchen. Di shook her head and turned to her breakfast, her mind working on its full capacity, thinking about all of the possibilities that could or could not explain the difference in this morning compared with any other morning she had experienced before.
On the same day, just one hour after Di finished her breakfast and sat down to marking her class's "mini-tests", a tall young man with dark blonde hair and be coal-black eyes knocked on the door of Ingleside and Di, without any thinking, knew that it was Robert.
She smiled and put the papers and her pen aside, she stood up and flew downstairs straight into the arms of Robert Keats, whose eyes were as shiny as the eyes of Anne and earlier Gilbert's were, although Di didn't know it yet. Di put on her shoes, her grey hat and a coat, she put her arm in Robert's arm and allowed him to lead their way to the Rainbow Valley.
"Oh, isn't Rainbow Valley the most beautiful place you have ever seen, Rob?" Di exclaimed when the two of them strolled alongside the reds, yellows and oranges surrounding them "Especially in the autumn, it's so beautiful." she said dreamily.
Robert looked down at Di and he sighed contentedly "Very beautiful." he whispered and one could only wonder whether he was talking about the woman in front of him or the place surrounding her.
Di looked up at him and grinned at him sweetly "Everyone is so happy today, I must do nothing but wonder where is this fountain of happiness from which everyone was drinking this morning." she said "Do you know where this place is?" she asked him.
"If you'll close your eyes and imagine the sound of a waterfall, you can almost see it." he whispered into her ear and Di did just as he said.
Her face turned into peace and calmness and joy. Robert watched her for a little while, trying to remember this small precious moment that would stay in his mind forever "Can you see it?" he asked her.
She opened her eyes slowly and smiled at him lightly "Yes." she replied and Robert bent down to kiss her lips tenderly. Di then stopped him and put her hands in his own "Robert?" she said.
"Yes, Diana?" he replied with a small grin.
"You haven't kissed me like that for a while, not since your company started to fall apart." she started "Does that mean that your company is doing better now?" she asked him expectantly, her heart beating faster than she would like it to.
Robert squeezed her hands "In a way." he answered and Di sighed with relief "What I mean is that it will be doing better."
Di's brows furrowed again "What do you mean?" she asked him.
"My father made it possible for me to re-open my company in Ottawa, in January." he replied cheerfully "And I can do nothing but to take this opportunity and come back to my hometown, where my company will be prospering better, so that I could eventually settle down." he said the last sentence more seriously than he should, in Di's eyes.
She started breathing heavily and then blinking furiously, her mind whirling around her like a cloud of hopelessness. That was it, she thought, and what should she do when… "Diana Blythe, will you marry me?" Robert asked her in a low, full of hope and certain voice.
Di looked at him as if he was completely mad. Her mouth was slightly opened but no sound left it. She looked in Robert's eyes, so full of hope and poetry and love. She looked in the reflection in his eyes, her own self, and her mind was blank, and so was her face.
"If you're worried whether your family will approve, you needn't worry," Robert said suddenly "-I asked your father for his approval today in the morning and he said that he is more than happy to allow me to take you as my wife." he smiled at her again.
Di's cheeks turned positively red and her heart seemed to stop beating. She put her hands on her cheeks. So that's why everyone, Mother, Susan and now Robert were so happy and joyful, they all knew that he would propose to her that afternoon. But what should she answer, what should she answer, what? She must think quick! But she couldn't, and she looked away from Robert's eyes, and looked at the White Lady standing in front of her instead.
Robert observed each of Di's movements and wasn't quite sure what to do himself, he therefore put his hands on her shoulders and turned her around to face him "What is it, dear?" he asked her worriedly.
"I… don't… know." she murmured slowly.
"What don't you know, Di? You know that you can tell me everything that's in your head right now." he said with a soft smile on his face, although his eyes were betraying him, he was full of fear that her answer wouldn't be the one he desired.
Di gulped to hold back tears and took a deep breath "Robert, I love you, I really do." she said eventually "And I want to be your sweetheart just as much as I want you to be mine but… It's all so quick… so soon. I simply don't know what to answer you."
Robert put her in his arms and kissed the top of her head "Of course you do." he whispered "Everyone does, dear, in a situation like this."
Di pulled away and looked at him seriously again "I don't." she said helplessly "And Robert, you must give me time to think."
Robert looked at the side and the smile from his face vanished, his face was almost grey compared with all the trees around him which seemed like a perfect composition of autumn's warmest colours "I didn't think that you would want that." he said eventually, his voice changed "But alright." he turned his head to Di and grinned bitterly at her.
Di smiled at him radiantly and kissed his cheek softly "Thank you, Rob." she whispered "Thank you, darling. I promise that I will give you the answer soon."
"I hope so, dear, because it seems," he whispered back into her hair "-that I can't live without you." Di put her head against his chest and there was only one question that sounded in her head "But can or can't I live without you?".
"So… What are you going to do?" Carl asked Di. The two friends were going back together from the Glen school straight after their lessons, when Di decided on telling Carl about her secret proposal she got from Robert and her confusion as well as nervous state of her mind and her body.
Carl listened to her patiently, nodding from time to time, sometimes feeling sorry for Di who had to fight a huge battle with her own self, and sometimes forbidding himself even to show some kind of a grin which was lurking in the corner of his mouth. Di on the other hand was relieved that she could tell the story to Carl, he was after all one of her closest friends and she needed to get just as much different opinions on the topic as she possibly could.
"I don't know yet." Di sighed, tightening the scarf around her neck "I told my parents, and Nan of course."
"What did they say then?" Carl asked her.
"Mother was calm, and she talked with me for a while about it. She was in a simmilar situation to me, long time ago when she was in Redmond herself, you know." Di explained "She told me that I will know what decision to make but that I have to give myself some time. Father on the other hand said that he thinks I probably shouldn't waste my time on thinking about it and he's right in a way, Robert is supposed to re-open his company in Ottawa in less than two months time." she sighed again "But the worst of everyone is Nan. She thinks that it is ridiculous that I didn't answer Robert right away and that I didn't accept him in the first place, but you know Nan, she wants everything to be so romantic, and asking for some time to give an answer to a proposal is so much less romantic than the quick, certain and breathless "I will"."
Carl looked in Di's eyes and let out a small chuckle, making Di to laugh quietly as well "Maybe it is less romantic, but it's more sensible." Carl said eventually "Di, do you… do you… love him?" he asked her shyly.
"I do." she replied earnestly "But I don't know if I love him enough to marry him, to be his wife for the rest of my life. I don't know if I love him enough to leave my family, friends and a career and follow him to the unknown land of Ottawa. Carl, I don't know what to do." she groaned and put her arm in his own.
Carl sighed helplessly and squeezed her arm "I think you do, but you just haven't realised it yet." he said "Maybe, deep down, you feel that you know what is right or wrong decision in this case but you simply reject this idea and don't consider it as an option."
"But what idea?" Di asked him.
Carl opened his mouth and then closed it before he opened it up again "I don't think that I'm the right person to ask." he said finally, quietly.
Di looked up at him "I won't trouble you anymore, Carl." she said decidedly "What kind of a friend am I, to make you talk with me about some tragic love affairs of mine."
"Especially, with a friend like me, the old bachelor." he replied and the two of them laughed together "Just you wait and see, Bruce will be married and will become a father before I will stand at the altar."
Di punched him playfully in the arm "Oh, shush." she told him laughingly "You're just trying to be such a brave and a grown-up man. Of course you'll marry Carl, one day."
"Maybe." he answered her calmly, although his heart started to beat quickly "Who knows?"
"Watch out, maybe one day I will become a rebel, an absolute wicked woman," she said excitedly, and Carl's eyes started to laugh "-and I will say to myself: "Robert can pick some other Anne Hathaway" and I will kidnap you and marry you instead." she started laughing so hard that tears started to flow down her red cheeks. Carl laughed too, although his laugh was a bitter one. Di would hear its bitter tones if she didn't get a headache in that moment, because her tears suddenly turned from the funny little 'laughy' tears, into sorrowful and hopeless tears, and the sound of her laughter turned into a sound of sobbing.
Carl put his arm around her shoulders and kissed her forehead tenderly "Oh, Carl!" she cried "How could such a joke make me so hysteric?" she asked more herself than she asked Carl "Oh, Carl, Carl! I don't know what to tell Robert! I love him, I love him… I do…" she sobbed into his shoulder.
Carl put his hand on her head "I know you do." he whispered, and he too said it more to himself than he said it to Di.