“Now, Mosey, you like the new teacher’s well’s I do, else why were you showin’ off before her, ridin’ Ladybird like mad.”
“Mebbe she’s all right,” admitted the boy.
“I wonder ef she guesses you aint my really truly brother. Ef I only had your beaut-i-ful red hair an’ white eyebrows, stead of havin’ yaller hair an’ brown eyebrows. I can’t do nothin’ jist now ’bout my hair, but s’pose I cut off my eyebrows an’ make them look nice an’ white like yours. Mosey,” coaxingly, “you cut them fer me.”
“Naw,” answered the boy, “What’d Mar say? she’d put a tin ear on me.”
“You know she never does nothin’ to us really, Moses, no matter how she jaws. Come on, you clipped yer pony so lovely an’ evenlike. The horse-clippers is bangin’ on the wall behind you.”
“I dassent do it, Betty,” replied Moses. “Anyhow this ole pair of scissors ’d do the job better.”
“Then you don’t love yer li’l sister ef you don’t want her to look like you.” Betty almost wept.
“Orl right Betty, I’ll do it, but ef it is a poor job don’t blame me,” returned Moses as he advanced with the scissors.
Betty winced slightly as the chilly weapon touched her face, but recollecting the importance of the issue at stake she submitted tamely to be shorn. In a few moments Moses stepped back to contemplate the result of his drastic work. There was no denying that it had totally changed his little sister’s appearance. A queer expression on Moses’ face made Betty enquire anxiously, “What is it? Don’t I look orlright Moses?”
“You look orful, jist like you was growin’ a pair of speckled toothbrushes. What ’ll Mar say? You carn’t go to school like that.”