Rae had settled down to filling a hope chest and writing daily letters of portentous length to Brook Hamilton. She was changed…more gentle, thoughtful, womanly. There was no more pretending to be hard-boiled. Love, Sid told her teasingly, did mellow people remarkably. The old flippancy was gone, though she laughed as much as ever and never had her laughter, thought adoring Pat, been so exquisite.

Pat had resigned herself to the fact of Rae’s engagement. But she would not be getting married for at least three years. They had those years to look forward to…years, dreamed Pat, of companionship and plans and all the dear intimacies of home.

Winter slipped away…spring and summer passed. September wore a golden moon like a ring and again autumn brewed a cup of magic and held it to your lips. Only Tillytuck secretly thought it rather slow. The beaus came no longer, since Rae was known to be bespoken and Pat, so it was said, thought no one good enough for her.

“Life is getting a bit tedious here, Judy,” he said, mournfully. “There doesn’t seem to be as much glamour, romantically speaking.”

Perhaps Judy thought so, too. She sighed…it was not like Judy to sigh. Pat would have another birthday in a week…and not a beau in sight. Even David, Judy had decided, had really no serious intentions, and she hated him for it as sincerely as if she had never disapproved of him. She did not want Pat to marry him, but that was for Pat to decide, not for him. As for Jingle, there never was any word of his coming home for a visit.

“He’s grown away from us, Judy. We’re only memories to him now. He has his own work and his own ambitions. Even his letters aren’t just what they used to be.”

Pat hadn’t seemed to care. She was more taken up with Silver Bush than ever and she and Sid were “thick as thieves” again. Which was all to the good, as far as it went. To be sure, of late weeks, Sid had taken to gallivanting again. Nobody could find out where he was going although Judy had certain uneasy suspicions she never breathed to anyone. Judy sighed again as she clapped her baked beans and bacon in the oven. Then she brightened up. Every one needed a liddle bite once in so often and as long as she, Judy Plum, could provide it there was balm in Gilead.

A week later Judy looked back to that day and wondered if what had happened had been a judgment on her for thinking life had got a bit dull. For Pat’s birthday had come and that evening Sid had brought May Binnie in and announced, curtly and defiantly, and yet with such a pitiful, beaten look on his face, that they had been married that day in Charlottetown.