Who knows whether or not Sid Gardiner slept that night? Surely May Binnie did—with the same contented, smug smile on her face. Joy did—though she thought fleetingly of the stricken look on Cecilia's face before slipping into dreams about Jake Penhallow. Blythe awakened at midnight feeling that something was wrong—without knowing exactly what. We do not know if Cecilia slept that night or not. She has never said. But a traveller going along the road by Ingleside that night might have seen a light burning steadily in one of the windows.

Sid came by Ingleside the next morning, almost before anyone was up. Grandfather had gone out on a call, and Cecilia had slipped out of bed like a wisp of smoke and gone to watch the sun rise on the verandah. That was where Sid found her. She looked up at him with a set face and wounded eyes, but made no move to go to him and shrank from him when he tried to drop a kiss on her cheek.

"It wasn't what you are thinking," he said, by way of greeting.

She said nothing with her voice, but her eyes questioned him.

"I was seeing her home," Sid said.

"Oh," said Cecilia.

"But only because Father made me!" Sid dropped down on the step beside her. "May is always coming by to Silver Bush—she's there almost every day now that Pat is home—she likes to pretend she and Pat are friends—when Pat can't stand her. But she doesn't come to see Pat she comes to see—"

"You," Cecilia finished.

"Yes," Sid admitted.

"She's always hanging around you!" Cecilia exploded. "What does she think I am? Why don't you tell her to run away, Sid? Every time you let her do it and say nothing it encourages her—and makes me feel like—like you might like her! You Silver Bush people—why don't you tell her to get lost?"

She looked like, as Browning had written, 'all spirit and fire and dew.' Sid clasped her hand.

"That isn't the way it's done at Silver Bush," was all he said, but Cecilia slumped in acquiescence. They had a certain way of doing things at Ingleside, too.

"But do you swear it?" she said. "That you're telling me the truth?"

"I swear it," Sid said. "It isn't May Binnie I care about—in a thousand years I couldn't love May Binnie as much as I love you."

"Oh, Sid!" Cecilia said, and threw herself in his arms. "I love you, too."

Grandmother found them there, much later, and threw open the door with a wry smile.

"Isn't it a bit early for spooning?" she questioned with a small laugh.

"Oh!" Cecilia and Sid sprang apart. "It—it isn't what you think, Mrs. Blythe!"

"I know exactly what it is, you young things," said Grandmother aimably. "But oh, be glad there is no Mrs. Rachel Lynde in this day and age. Sid, would you like to stay for breakfast?"

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"What are you pouring over, dearest?" Auntie Faith laid her hand against Cecilia's hair and reflected how very much like Una's it was.

"A letter," said Cecilia, looking up with wet lashes. "It came in the post today—it's from Mother."

Faith put a slim hand to her throat. "Will you—could you--?"

"I'll read it to you, to all of you! Uncle Jem! Aunt Nan! Everyone! Come here?"

"A letter from Una!" Cecilia waited until they were all assembled in the kitchen and then read, eyes and face all astar.

Dearest Cecilia,

There is a little robin redbreast outside my window, celebrating the spring. Can it be spring again? Last spring I wanted to sink into the pillows and sleep forever. Today I want to go out. Does it smell like wet earth in Rainbow Valley? Are the bells in the Tree Lovers ringing? March is supposed to go in like a lion and out like a lamb. June goes in like a lamb and out like an angel. It is the sweetest month of all. You were born in June, dear one, and so it will always be the sweetest month to me.

Have you grown much? Would I recognize you if I saw you on the street? The girls who work in the hospital have outrageous hair-cuts—darling, promise me you won't do anything outlandish with your hair!

Today is the sort of day that reminds me of the text, 'Ye know not what the day may bring,' I am reminded that the days do not always bring sorrows—sometimes they bring joy.

Your loving

MOTHER

Cecilia read the last with a quaver in her voice. She passed the letter to Aunt Faith, who read it over again hungrily. "She sounds better—thank God, she sounds better!"

"Thank God," Uncle Jerry reiterated. "I'm going to get Carl on the long distance."

Cecilia looked very strange. "It was a sweet letter," said Grandmother, putting her arm about the girl. "Walter said once that Una was in love with spring—that she was the only person he ever knew that loved it as much as he did. Cecilia? Cecilia—darling?"

Cecilia put her head down on the table and cried and cried—and laughed. She sobbed as if her heart was breaking—and laughed as if the sun was shining in her heart.

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Cecilia was sixteen on the twentieth of June. Grandmother asked Cecilia if she would like to have a party at Ingleside.

"Are you sure?" Cecilia gasped. "Grandmother—it will be so much work—"

"How many times do you turn sixteen?" Grandmother said with a smile. So she and the aunts got to work, cleaning and cooking and writing out invitations. "This is going to be a party that is a party," Aunt Rilla said.

"What was your sixteenth birthday like, Auntie Rilla?" Cecilia asked.

Rilla laughed. "Horrible. It was during the war—we ate slept and breathed war. There was no time for parties. I hope you will have a sweet, carefree sixteen."

Aunt Rilla's voice was full of laughter but her eyes were worried. More and more news came every day from overseas about Hitler's powerful army. Rilla looked out into the yard and heard the shouts of her boys in Rainbow Valley. Gilly's loud laugh and Owen's yells. She clasped her hands together like the Rilla of Ingleside of yore.

"Please God," she whispered. "Let them all have carefree sixteens—let them have many, many happy years."

Though Hitler's armies might have their eye on Poland, at Ingleside they were scrutinizing the guest list.

"Cathy and Nellie Douglas, of course," Joy said, making a tick mark next to their names. "And Alice Flagg—Helen Elliot—Gabby and Amy Penhallow—and—and—?"

"Of course I want Jake to come," said Cecilia with a smile.

"Well we could hardly leave him out," Joy said in a no-nonsense voice, trying to hide the flush creeping up her cheeks. "We're inviting the whole junior and senior classes. What about Sid Gardiner?"

"Yes," said Cecilia laconically.

"Yes?" asked Joy.

"All is well," said Cecilia.

"Good!" said Joy. "See, I told you it would be."

The girls shared a companionable smile and Aunt Nan shook her head.

"They have secrets from us, Faith," she said in mock despair.

"Good," said Aunt Faith. "Every young girl needs a secret or two."

"Let's go and plan where we'll put the fairy lights," said Joy, dragging Cecilia and Trudy from the kitchen.

The women watched them go, dancing together between the trees like wood-nymphs. "Let's make this a party to remember," said Grandmother, laying her hand against the pane. "It will be Cecilia's last birthday at Ingleside—I've had a letter from Shirley."

"Una?" Aunt Rilla asked.

"Is almost well enough to go home," Grandmother clarified. "Shirley will come for her soon—by September, I'm sure."

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The party was a wild success. Even before it was over everyone knew that. Never had Ingleside been so full of light and music and dancing and laughter and pretty girls and handsome boys. Joy caught up with Cecilia during one of the dances and whispered in her ear. Jake Penhallow had asked her to be his 'steady.'

"I've got a present for you," Blythe whispered, as Cecilia sat out a dance at the refreshments table. It was the first time she had sat out all night—her feet ached and her pretty silver slippers were almost worn through. She smiled prettily at Blythe, though. He held out a small, folded piece of paper. She took it—their fingers brushed—and Cecilia thought again of the girl Blythe had said he'd liked. Was she here? Was it Cathy Douglas? She'd danced with him twice—though she'd danced with Gil three times.

"Cecilia! There you are?"

Cecilia drew her hand back and dropped the paper Blythe had given her in her lap. "Sid!"

"Hi," he nodded companionably at Blythe, who scowled, then turned back to Cecilia. "I've got a present for you," he whispered.

"What is it?" Cecilia laughed, and whispered back.

"Come with me to Rainbow Valley. I'll give it to you there."

Sid pulled Cecilia to her feet, and she gave Blythe an apologetic smile. In her haste, the folded paper he had given her fell to the ground, unnoticed.

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The moon was shining down on Rainbow Valley, bathing everying in a lovely pearly sheen—like the pearls Sid was fastening around her neck.

"To replace the sorry yellow beads I gave you at Christmas," he murmured. "But these are real."

"Real!" Cecilia touched her hand to her throat. "But where—how—?"

"They were my Mother's when she was a girl," Sid said. "I told her I wanted to give you something meaningful—she told me I might have these."

"Oh—Sid," Cecilia's heart thumped with the implication of it all. "I can't—I don't think—"

"You can," Sid said. "You already have." He stood back in the moonlight and looked at her gloatingly—a vision of loveliness in blue silk, with a nimbus of light around her neck—that he had put there.

"Look at my Cecilia!" he called, raising his arms to the spirits of the night. "Look at her—look at her—and see how lovely she is!"

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"What a party," said Joyce with a yawn. "The best part of being the birthday girl is that you don't have to clean up."

"Nor does the birthday girl's guest," Cecilia smiled shyly. She had asked Joy to stay the night as a special treat. She had wanted Joy instead of Trudy because—well, because tonight she felt close to Joy. It was such a difference from the way things used to be.

"Look at my feet!" Joy stuck out one dainty golden-slippered foot. "I've worn them through."

Cecilia stuck out her own foot in her tattered slipper and laughed.

"What a magic night!" Joy said. "A night wind—I love a night wind, don't you?—a crescent moon—and thou. It's your birthday for fifteen more minutes by the hall clock—happy birthday, Cecilia."

She held out a small parcel, and Cecilia took it, and opened it. A very pretty enamel charm on a thin gold chain was nestled inside.

"It's nothing compared to Sid's pearls," Joy sighed.

"It's lovely," said Cecilia, and fastened it, too, around her neck. "And I have something for you, Joy."

"It's not my birthday!" Joy protested.

"Still," Cecilia said, and handed Joy and envelope.

Inside was an old photograph of two small girls. One with midnight black hair, and one with chestnut brown. Both were smiling, and both had their arms around each other.

"Is that—us?" Joy asked. "But it can't be."

"No," said Cecilia. "It's your mother and mine. There are no pictures of us because we didn't like each other for so long."

"We didn't?"

"I didn't think you liked me—until just recently," Cecilia admitted.

"I love you," Joy said. "You're my cousin. But I was jealous—I was jealous of how—close—you were to—"

"To Blythe," Cecilia finished.

"To Blythe?" Joy looked shocked. "No. I was jealous because of how close you were to Grandmother."

"Not Blythe?" Cecilia could not believe her ears.

"No! Blythe is my brother—he'll always be," Joy said slowly. "Of course we love each other. But you get to live with Grandmother—she always took such care with you—the rest of us she sees all the time but you, hardly ever until you came. I was afraid you'd be her favorite."

"That was silly," Cecilia said truthfully. "If anyone has enough love to go around it's Grandmother."

"I know that now," Joyce said. "I suppose I also thought—that you couldn't possibly like me. I knew you loved me—cousins are supposed to love each other—but you're so wholesome and sweet. I could never be like that in a million years. It made me feel so—so woefully in adequate."

"Joyce," said Cecilia, taking her cousin's hand. "You are wholesome and sweet. Like an apple blossom—you're beautiful and you're good."

"I guess I've been stupid," Joy admitted.

"I guess we both have!" Cecilia amended. "We've wasted so much time. Let's go to bed, dear—my birthday is ended, finally. I'm exhausted—but I'm going to snuggle under the covers and stay up and talk with you. I've got a backlog of secrets to share with you, dear—months and months of them!"

"Oh, and I have, to you!" Joy said. "Did I tell you what Jake said to me while we were waltzing—?"

Whispering and laughing, the girls climbed the stairs together.

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A/N: I hope this makes up for some of Joy's previous behavior and explains somewhat why she acted that way. That's all for now, folks, but Cecilia and Joy are going to be friends from now on.