--not adenoids. Irene had a cold yesterday and I know she gave
it to him, kissing him. He is not quite such a nuisance as he was; he
has got some backbone and can sit up quite nicely, and he loves his
bath now and splashes unsmilingly in the water instead of twisting and
shrieking. Oh, shall I ever forget those first two months! I don't know
how I lived through them. But here I am and here is Jims and we both
are going to 'carry on.' I tickled him a little bit tonight when I
undressed him--I wouldn't bounce him but Morgan doesn't mention
tickling--just to see if he would smile for me as well as Irene. And he
did--and out popped the dimples. What a pity his mother couldn't have
seen them!

"I finished my sixth pair of socks today. With the first three I got
Susan to set the heel for me. Then I thought that was a bit of
shirking, so I learned to do it myself. I hate it--but I have done so
many things I hate since 4th of August that one more or less doesn't
matter. I just think of Jem joking about the mud on Salisbury Plain and
I go at them."

CHAPTER XI

DARK AND BRIGHT

At Christmas the college boys and girls came home and for a little
while Ingleside was gay again. But all were not there--for the first
time one was missing from the circle round the Christmas table. Jem, of
the steady lips and fearless eyes, was far away, and Rilla felt that
the sight of his vacant chair was more than she could endure. Susan had
taken a stubborn freak and insisted on setting out Jem's place for him
as usual, with the twisted little napkin ring he had always had since a
boy, and the odd, high Green Gables goblet that Aunt Marilla had once
given him and from which he always insisted on drinking.

"That blessed boy shall have his place, Mrs. Dr. dear," said Susan
firmly, "and do not you feel over it, for you may be sure he is here in
spirit and next Christmas he will be here in the body. Wait you till
the Big Push comes in the spring and the war will be over in a jiffy."

They tried to think so, but a shadow stalked in the background of their
determined merrymaking. Walter, too, was quiet and dull, all through
the holidays. He showed Rilla a cruel, anonymous letter he had received
at Redmond--a letter far more conspicuous for malice than for patriotic
indignation.

"Nevertheless, all it says is true, Rilla."

Rilla had caught it from him and thrown it into the fire.

"There isn't one word of truth in it," she declared hotly.