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through, she badly needed to go to the toilet. But asking where it was was embarrassing.
    “I’ll wait for you,” Jess said. “I want to be with you when you see your room.”
    Why? Min wondered. What if she didn’t like it? Was it some sort of test?
    The room was at the front of the house, across the hall from the living room where they had eaten their sandwiches. It had walls the colour of ivory. The windows had venetian blinds, which Jess closed. They were deep blue. But what made the bedroom different and special was the Tiffany lamp next to the bed. It was dome-shaped and made of many bits of coloured glass. The light, shining out through the glass flowers and leaves, diamonds and starry bits, covered the pale walls with rainbow splotches. The lamplight, falling on the bed, was a plain warm yellow, but everywhere else was coloured.
    The lamp was like a paintbox, Min thought later, when she had had a chance to study it, and the walls were the painter’s palette — or maybe the painting itself.
    As she stood staring at it, her eyes wide, Jess reached out and gently spun the glass dome so that new patterns blossomed.
    “That’s …” Min began.
    But she could not find a word to fit.
    “Enchanting, maybe,” Jess said, flipping open the fitted sheet, blue to match the blinds. “I don’t know either. When you come up with the perfect word, tell me.”
    Min reached for a pillow and put it into its pillowcase.
    “This room will be your private domain. Nobody will come in here without being invited. Maude will try, of course, but if you don’t want company, put her out. She’s used to it. It’s early, but I bet you’re tired out. How about you dig out your night things while I find you a good book to read until you fall asleep?”
    “Yes, please,” Min said, grateful to have her longing for sleep so readily understood. Feeling shy, even though she was alone, she scrambled into her nightgown and slid under the quilt. She was lying there, watching the door, when Jess returned with three books. Min eyed them but yawned as she did so. Jess laughed.
    “You needn’t read,” she said. “I personally can’t settle without a book. I think you’ll like any one of these.”
    The phone rang at that moment. While Jess went to answer it, Min flipped through the books.
Adam and Eve and Pinch-Me, The Great Gilly Hopkins
and
Chance and the Butterfly.
She read the blurbs on the back covers. Her eyes widened. Had Jess done it on purpose? All three of them were about foster children!
    In the distance, she could hear Jess laughing. She must still be on the phone. Min examined the books more carefully.
    Were the kids foundlings? She checked. Gilly Hopkins had a mother. So did Sara Moone. She leafed through the third book. She could not be sure. But the girls were definitely not foundlings. They had been given up, but not thrown away the way she had been. Maybe it wouldn’t feel all that different, but Min thought it would.
    “All right, all right. Call me tomorrow,” she heard Jess say.
    What was that about? Min wondered, putting down the books in a tidy pile and trying not to grow tense. It would not matter to her, whatever it was about.
    Somebody knocked. Min jumped and sat waiting. Nobody came in. It had to be Jess. She looked at the door, waiting for the woman to come back in.
    Another knock.
    Then Min remembered. Jess had said she would not come in unless Min asked her to. Feeling foolish, Min called unsteadily, “Come in.”
    Jess opened the door and entered, smiling. “I thought you must have stepped out,” she teased, “or fallen asleep. That was Toby’s mother, Laura, on the phone. She’s a close friend, has been for years, but she’s about to complicate our lives. I’ll explain in the morning. You look as though you’re half asleep already. I brought you one more book. I thought you should have a funny one.” She handed over a copy of
The Prince in the Pond.
    Min stared at it. Without looking up, she