Cherry took a deep breath as the taxi started up the hill. Now she and Josie could see Spencer Hospital, a huge cluster of white buildings on top of the hill. Spencer was really a city in itself with its trim yards, broad avenues, landscaped lawns, and well-kept tennis courts. And to Cherry, in her probationer days, it had seemed like a terrifying labyrinth. But now the very sight of it rapidly drawing nearer filled her with the memories of the three thrilling years she had spent there with her friends who had trained and worked with her until graduation.

Cherry closed her dark eyes, remembering that first week when she, an awe-struck “probie,” had met the classmates who were to share so many exciting experiences with her. She could see them now in their humble gray probationers’ dresses which they, as student nurses, discarded for blue and white uniforms, white stockings, and broad black velvet bands on the cuff of their caps. They had herded together as probies, and they had kept in touch with one another ever since.

There had been red-haired, full-of-fun, Gwen Jones; earnest, rather rabbity-looking, but really very efficient, Josie Franklin; plump Bertha Larsen; hazel-eyed Vivian Warren; Mai Lee, the lovely Chinese-American girl; and Ann Evans, now Mrs. Jack Powell. Later, as visiting nurses, they had all, except Ann, shared an apartment in New York’s Greenwich Village, No. 9, the headquarters of the Spencer Club.

Cherry opened one dark-brown eye and closed it again quickly. Shivering, she pulled the covers up until her black curls were hidden beneath the thick, crazy-quilt comforter.

It was a hot afternoon at the end of August. The whole Midwest town of Hilton looked wilted. Even this tree-shaded block, and the Ameses’ big, gray frame house and lawn, wore a dusty, tail-end-of summer look. Cherry, sitting forlorn on the porch steps, debated whether the long summer ever would be over.

“Of course, summer is my favorite season,” she argued to herself. “But I’ve had enough of doing nothing. What I want is a new fall hat and new, exciting things to do!” She wrinkled her nose as if trying to detect any first autumn briskness in the air.

The hot breeze carried to her only the scent of over-ripe greenery. Cherry sighed and pushed her black curls off her forehead, off the back of her too-warm neck. She fanned her red cheeks, muttering, “Where, on, where is that mailman?”

Cherry gave the pillow a poke and sleepily sat up. She shook her short, black curls off her red cheeks, and wriggled to the edge of the bed to see out the window. She was in the one place where a lively young nurse never expected to be — home! She was right here in her own room, in her own house, in her own small town of Hilton, Illinois. Her gay read-and-white room with its sun-filled windows was a highly satisfactory place to be, this sweet-smelling June morning, especially after traipsing with the Army Nurse Corps from the Pacific across the Atlantic, with flights in between, and then being a veterans’ nurse besides.

Almost — almost there! A very few minutes more, with the train hurtling and whistling past the wintry prairie farms — in minutes she would be there!

Cherry stood up unsteadily in the train aisle and pulled her luggage down from the overhead rack. She straightened her khaki hat on her black curls, straightened her Army Nurse’s jacket, drew on her leather gloves. Then she sat on the very edge of her plush chair. The train was slowing down now. Johnson’s big barn and the outskirts of Hilton skidded past. Cherry’s cheeks were very red, her dark eyes brilliant.

“New York — London — Panama — the Pacific — I’ve seen them all — I’ve flown over Europe — ” Cherry thought, ” — but — well, Hilton, Illinois, I’m coming home!” For this was the destination and the day she had been dreaming of.