of such a sacred nature to everybody. We are kindred spirits."

"Yes, I believe you are. Well, I am going to ask a favor of you. I would
like to go and see Miss Lavendar if she will let me. Will you ask her if
I may come?"

Would she not? Oh, indeed she would! Yes, this was romance, the very,
the real thing, with all the charm of rhyme and story and dream. It was
a little belated, perhaps, like a rose blooming in October which should
have bloomed in June; but none the less a rose, all sweetness and
fragrance, with the gleam of gold in its heart. Never did Anne's
feet bear her on a more willing errand than on that walk through the
beechwoods to Grafton the next morning. She found Miss Lavendar in the
garden. Anne was fearfully excited. Her hands grew cold and her voice
trembled.

"Miss Lavendar, I have something to tell you . . . something very
important. Can you guess what it is?"

Anne never supposed that Miss Lavendar could GUESS; but Miss Lavendar's
face grew very pale and Miss Lavendar said in a quiet, still voice,
from which all the color and sparkle that Miss Lavendar's voice usually
suggested had faded.

"Stephen Irving is home?"

"How did you know? Who told you?" cried Anne disappointedly, vexed that
her great revelation had been anticipated.

"Nobody. I knew that must be it, just from the way you spoke."

"He wants to come and see you," said Anne. "May I send him word that he
may?"

"Yes, of course," fluttered Miss Lavendar. "There is no reason why he
shouldn't. He is only coming as any old friend might."

Anne had her own opinion about that as she hastened into the house to
write a note at Miss Lavendar's desk.

"Oh, it's delightful to be living in a storybook," she thought gaily.
"It will come out all right of course . . . it must . . . and Paul will
have a mother after his own heart and everybody will be happy. But Mr.
Irving will take Miss Lavendar away . . . and dear knows what will
happen to the little stone house . . . and so there are two sides to it,
as there seems to be to everything in this world." The important note
was written and Anne herself carried it to the Grafton post office,
where she waylaid the mail carrier and asked him to leave it at the
Avonlea office.

"It's so very important," Anne assured him anxiously. The mail carrier
was a rather grumpy old personage who did not at all look the part of a
messenger of Cupid; and Anne was none too certain that his memory was to
be t