They walked silently home from the Glen station by the short-cut to Ingleside. Anne still seemed so sad and silent as they entered the house where she caught her foot in a croquet hoop and nearly fell headlong into a clump of phlox.

Gilbert said, "O-o-o-ps!" and steadied her with a hand trying to break the tension which had been playing between the two all night. Upon failure Anne snatching her hand away from his he decided to give her some space and go to his study, despite how tired he was he's stay in there a few minutes to let her ready herself for bed.

He opened his study door and he sat at his desk.

He had tried on the way home to talk to her, but whatever he said just went the wrong way.

"Had a nice evening?" he had asked trying to start up the flair she had in her to describe what had happened.

"Oh, lovely," said Anne . . . "spent the evening under a harrow."

He had swallowed and wondered what was wrong, but the way she had spat it to him he dare not ask.

"What made you do your hair that way?" said Gilbert still trying to make conversation.

"It's the new fashion." She had said shorter still.

He looked sadly to her but she didn't notice, Her hair seemed completely flat on the top and parted harshly right down the middle of her hair. He missed the classical Anne's 'grown up' style, the rounded pompadour. "Well, it doesn't suit you." He said thinking it belonged to women who either didn't know how to care for their hair and was trying to do their hair up, or else older women who cared little for modern fashions "It may be all right for some hair but not for yours."

"Oh, it is too bad my hair is red," said Anne icily.

He had meant nothing about her red hair! Why would he mean anything about her red hair!? She must know by now he loved her hair, it was part of her. But he hadn't defended himself. He was too tired and it seemed wise to drop the subject.

He had opened his mouth a couple of times to try and start a conversation but upon seeing the storm brewing on her face he had not said anything.

He moved some papers on the desk and there he saw the small package, hidden on the desk. He ripped it open and sat in relief as he opened it to find the diamond pendent necklace he had order. Well if he was a thoughtless cad at least he had a way of making it up to her now. Although he didn't much want to approach her the way he was feeling right now. He looked again on his desk and saw a small envelope peeking out from under the ripped open package. He reached for it and opened it silently.

Doctor Blythe,

Your diagnosis was correct. They have operated and it was a success. The specialist out here made the same diagnoses and operated immediately.

Will talk more upon my arrival,

Yours Sincerely,

Dr Parker.

Gilbert sighed an even bigger sigh of relief, he found a weight which had been invisibly and silently weighing him down lift suddenly. He took a moment to allow himself a few tears of relief before he thought of who he could share the good news with.

Anne.

His bride!

He broke into a step which even he could have mistaken as a Young Gilbert's stride, taking two steps at a time just as he once did… if he took more than one step at a time, he would be with Anne all that sooner!

He burst into the room . . . he flung a little packet on the table . . . he caught Anne by the waist and waltzed her round and round the room like a crazy schoolboy, coming to rest at last breathlessly in a silver pool of moonlight.

"I was right, Anne . . . thank God, I was right! Mrs. Garrow is going to be all right . . . the specialist has said so."

"Mrs. Garrow? Gilbert, have you gone crazy?" she asked him in almost the same tone as she earlier spoke but not quite, perhaps she had soften?

"Didn't I tell you? Surely I told you . . ." he asked her, maybe, maybe he hadn't, this would explain in part Anne's cold behaviour towards the subject she was always so supportive normally, if she didn't know about it… "well, I suppose it's been such a sore subject I just couldn't talk of it. I've been worried to death about it for the past two weeks . . . couldn't think of anything else, waking or sleeping. Mrs. Garrow lives in Lowbridge and was Parker's patient. He asked me in for a consultation . . . I diagnosed her case differently from him . . . we almost fought . . . I was sure I was right . . . I insisted there was a chance . . . we sent her to Montreal . . . Parker said she'd never come back alive . . . her husband was ready to shoot me on sight. When she was gone I went to bits . . . perhaps I was mistaken . . . perhaps I'd tortured her needlessly. I found the letter in my office when I went in . . . I was right . . . they've operated . . . she has an excellent chance of living. Anne girl, I could jump over the moon! I've shed twenty years."

Anne laughed sweetly in some delight! Oh what music! Compared to the tinny laugh of Christine, Anne's was like music!

"I suppose that is why you forgot this was our anniversary?" he felt her taunt.

Gilbert released her long enough to pounce on the little packet he had dropped on the table.

"I didn't forget it. Two weeks ago I sent to Toronto for this. And it didn't come till tonight. I felt so small this morning when I hadn't a thing to give you that I didn't mention the day . . . thought you'd forgotten it, too . . . hoped you had. When I went into the office there was my present along with Parker's letter. See how you like it."

"Gilbert . . . and I . . ." she blushed which he loved to see her do.

"Try it on. I wish it had come this morning . . . then you'd have had something to wear to the dinner besides that old enamel heart." He flirted as he slipped around the back of her looking in the mirror kissed into her neck "Though it did look rather nice snuggling in that pretty white hollow in your throat, darling." He said brushing her hair to one side with his hand and kissed into the back of her neck his hand dropped from her hair and slipped around her front to her breast where he gave he a gentle squeeze "Why didn't you leave on that green dress, Anne? I liked it . . . it reminded me of that dress with the rosebuds on it you used to wear at Redmond." He looked up cheekily with a twisted smile and peered over her shoulder looking into her eyes through the mirror.

"You do love me, Gilbert? I'm not just a habit with you? You haven't said you loved me for so long."

"My dear, dear love!" he exclaimed in shock letting her go enough only to turn her on the spot in his arms "I didn't think you needed words to know that. I couldn't live without you. Always you give me strength. There's a verse somewhere in the Bible that is meant for you . . . 'She will do him good and not evil all the days of her life.'"

The diamond pendant slipped to the floor, unheeded for the moment. It was beautiful . . . he kissed her again before he reached around the back of the dress and slowly but surely unbuttoned every last one of the buttons, he helped her arms out and casually let the dress fall to the ground. "Put it on." He breathed. Anne pulled back and looked at him confused. "the dress the green dress, put it on." She bit her lip and moved towards the wardrobe. She took the dress from the hanger and just as she was about to slip it on he called again. "only the dress." Anne looked again at him and a smile teased her lips, if it weren't for the unmistakable look on her husbands face she would have doubted her own ears! But she wilfully obeyed taking off her corset. He pulled her on top of him the moment the dress hung from her.

"Gil." She whispered. "Are you sure?" she asked him, before he grinned again and loosen her hair letting fall round her shoulders down her front and back.

"Aren't you?" he asked her before he captured her lips again. He was delighted when her fingers started playing with the buttons on his shirt. He reached round and played with her long loose red hair.

He took off her dress almost as quickly as Anne had put it on, while Anne pressed her husband against the side of their bed as she swiftly removed his clothing until they were both undressed and bare before each other Anne pressed further to have him lay on the bed. He wilfully obeyed.

It didn't take long for them to come up in gasps of delight.

"I love you Anne-Girl." He whispered.

She smiled down at him as she sat atop of him. "Oh, if we could keep this moment for ever, Gilbert!" She gasped. He kept her to him, he loved this angle, Anne! On his lap! Her whole body to play with, their bodies undeniably joined!

"We're going to have some moments." He told her with a raised and flirting eyebrow "It's time we had a second honeymoon. Anne, there's going to be a big medical congress in London next February. We're going to it . . . and after it we'll see a bit of the Old World. There's a holiday coming to us." He played with her hair as she came from on top of him lay beside him and relaxed momentarily in his arms "We'll be nothing but lovers again . . . it will be just like being married over again." He looked down at her lovingly "You haven't been like yourself for a long time. You're tired and overworked . . . you need a change. I'm not going to have it cast up to me that doctors' wives never get a pill. We'll come back rested and fresh, with our sense of humour completely restored."

Well, try your pendant on and let's get to bed. I'm half dead for sleep . . . haven't had a decent night's sleep for weeks, what with twins and worry over Mrs. Garrow."

"What on earth were you and Christine talking about so long in the garden tonight?" asked Anne, peacocking before the mirror with her diamonds, before she picked up a hairbrush and started to plait her hair in two thick pigtails.

Gilbert yawned. And went into explaining the evening he had with Christine.

"…Christine was never very entertaining, but she's a worse bore than ever. And malicious! She never used to be malicious."

"What did she say that was so malicious?" Anne asked him.

"Didn't you notice? Oh, I suppose you wouldn't catch on . . . you're so free from that sort of thing yourself." He admired in his wife. She really was made of better salt then Christine, such a sweetheart! "Well, it doesn't matter. That laugh of hers got on my nerves a bit. And she's got fat. Thank goodness, you haven't got fat, Anne-girl." He looked at Anne with her pigtails in, there was the girl he had fallen in love with! There she was!

"Oh, I don't think she is so very fat," said Anne charitably. "And she certainly is a very handsome woman."

"So-so. But her face has got hard . . . she's the same age as you but she looks ten years older."

"And you talking to her about immortal youth!"

Gilbert grinned guiltily.

"One has to say something civil. Civilization can't exist without a little hypocrisy. Oh, well, Christine isn't a bad old scout, even if she doesn't belong to the race of Joseph. It's not her fault that the pinch of salt was left out of her. What's this?"

"My anniversary remembrance for you. And I want a cent for it . . . I'm not taking any risks. Such tortures as I've endured this evening! I was eaten up with jealousy of Christine."

Gilbert looked genuinely astonished. It had never occurred to him that Anne could be jealous of anybody.

"Why, Anne-girl, I never thought you had it in you."

"Oh, but I have. Why, years ago I was madly jealous of your correspondence with Ruby Gillis."

"Did I ever correspond with Ruby Gillis? I'd forgotten. Poor Ruby! But what about Roy Gardner? The pot mustn't call the kettle black."

"Roy Gardner? Philippa wrote me not long ago that she'd seen him and he'd got positively corpulent. Gilbert," She said with what he thought was a satisfying grin. "Dr. Murray may be a very eminent man in his profession but he looks just like a lath and Dr. Fowler looked like a doughnut. You looked so handsome . . . and finished . . . beside them."

"Oh, thanks . . . thanks. That's something like a wife should say. By way of returning the compliment I thought you looked unusually well tonight, Anne, in spite of that dress. You had a little colour and your eyes were gorgeous. Ah-h-h, that's good! No place like bed when you're all in. There's another verse in the Bible . . . queer how those old verses you learn in Sunday School come back to you through life! . . . 'I will lay me down in peace and sleep.' In peace . . . and sleep . . . goo'night." He managed as he slumbered off to sleep.

He felt her slide into bed with him at some unknown time later. He felt her snug into his chest and whisper much as she did when they were first married 'I love you Gilbert.'

To exhausted to let her know he heard her the thought ran through his mind at last;

All was right in the world.

AN: The conversation is at length in Anne of Ingleside but I thought it was taking the mick a little to use it all. I would suggest reading the last three chapters of Anne of Ingleside along with these first three chapters.

It was hard work writing it in parallel with Anne's POV. But I always felt sorry for Gilbert in this last chapter where all was explained, poor boy keeps all his cards close to his chest!

Again, there are parts of this which heavily involves Anne of Ingleside, I'm not going to hide it, All work which is in bold is not my own but is LM Montgomery's and has not been used for any benefit other then my own and (hopefully) yours in enjoying this chapter. The characters here ALL belong to LM Montgomery and her 'Anne' works. If there is a copyright issue it is not intended.