Mother, too, was stronger and better than she had been for years. She said with a laugh that she was having a second youth. She was able to join in the family life again and go about seeing her friends. It seemed like a miracle for they had all accepted the fact for years that mother would always be an invalid, with a “good day” once in a while. Now the good days were the rule rather than the exception. So in spite of May that year was the pleasantest Pat had known for a long time…except for that odd persistent little ache of indefinable longing under everything. It never exactly ceased…though she forgot about it often…when she was gardening…sewing…planning…when Little Mary came to Silver Bush and wanted some of Judy’s “malicious toast”…when Bold-and-Bad trounced some upstart kitten for its own good…when she and Suzanne and David sat by the Long House fire…when she and Rae took sweet counsel together over plans and problems…when she wakened early to revel in Silver Bush lying in its misty morning silence…her home…her dear, beloved, all-sufficing home…when Winnie came to Silver Bush, purring over her golden babies. For Winnie had twins…Winnie and Rachel…babies that looked as if they had been lifted bodily out of a magazine advertisement. When Pat looked at the two absurd, darling, round-faced, blue-eyed mites on the same pillow she always swallowed a little choke of longing.

Rae expected to be married in another year. Her hope chest was full to overflowing and she and Pat were already planning the details of the wedding…a regular clan wedding, of course.

“The last big wedding at Silver Bush,” said Pat.

“What about your own?” asked Rae.

“Oh, mine. It won’t be a smart event. David and I will just slip away some day and be married. There isn’t going to be any fuss,” said Pat hurriedly…and turned the conversation to something else. She was very, very fond of David but things were nice just as they were. She did not want to think of marrying at all. The thought of leaving Silver Bush was not bearable.

Rae looked at her curiously but said nothing. Rae was very wise in her generation.

“It doesn’t do to meddle,” she reflected sagely. “I sometimes wish I’d never written Hilary about Pat’s various beaus. Perhaps it did more harm than good…if he had come sooner…”

Well, life was full of “ifs.” For instance if she had not gone to the dance where she met Brook? She had been within an inch of not going. Rae shuddered.

“When Rae is married,” Pat told Judy, “I want her to have the loveliest wedding we’ve ever had at Silver Bush.”

“Oh, oh, it ought to be wid a whole year to get riddy in,” agreed Judy.