“It’s going to be closed,” Sally says.

“No way,” Gillian tells her.

But when they get there, the drugstore is dark. They stare through the window at the rows of shampoos, at the rack of magazines, at the counter where they drank so many vanilla Cokes. Everything in town is closed today, but as they turn to go they see Mr. Watts, whose family has owned the drugstore forever and who lives in the apartment above. He’s following his wife and carrying the two sweet potato pies they’re taking to their daughter’s over in Marblehead.

“The Owens girls,” he says when he spies Sally and Gillian.

“Check.” Gillian grins.

“You’re closed today,” Sally says. They trail Mr. Watts, though his wife is waiting at the car, signaling for him to hurry. “What happened to that girl? The one who stopped talking?”

“Irene?” he says. “She’s in Florida. She moved there about a week after her husband died last spring. I think I heard she’s already remarried.”

“Are you sure we’re talking about the same person?” Sally asks.

“Irene,” Mr. Watts assures them. “She’s got a coffee shop down in Highland Beach.”

Gillian and Sally run all the way home. They’re laughing as they run, so they have to stop every now and then to catch their breath. The sky is gray, the air is raw, yet it doesn’t bother them in the least. All the same, when they reach the black gate, Sally suddenly stops.

“What?” Gillian says.

It can’t be what Sally thinks. What she thinks she sees is Gary Hallet out in the garden, crouching down, digging at the cabbages, and that just cannot be.

“Well, look who’s here,” Gillian says, pleased.

“They did it,” Sally says. “With the dove’s heart.”

As soon as he sees Sally, Gary stands, a scarecrow in a black coat who doesn’t know whether or not he should wave.

“They did not,” Gillian says to Sally. “They didn’t have anything to do with it.”

But Sally doesn’t care if Gillian phoned Gary last week and asked what on earth he was waiting for. It doesn’t matter if he’s had the aunts’ address folded into his coat pocket ever since that phone call. By the time she runs down the bluestone path, it doesn’t make a bit of difference what people think or what they believe. There are some things, after all, that Sally Owens knows for certain: Always throw spilled salt over your left shoulder. Keep rosemary by your garden gate. Add pepper to your mashed potatoes. Plant roses and lavender, for luck. Fall in love whenever you can.