"How should I know? Nobody has told me; where is he?"
"With father; I expect they will come in soon."
Although I felt pleased to see my brother again, of whom I had heard nothing all the time he had been away, I was not pleased that he had broken off his apprenticeship and had to begin afresh.
My mother had started to put the children to bed and to lay the table. When it was dark my father came in with my brother, and after the simple greetings were exchanged we sat down to supper. I noticed now how handsome my brother had become. Although he was only sixteen years of age, he was much taller than my father, and of such gracefulness that I could hardly take my eyes from him. His face was very beautiful. His eyes blue and large, and shadowed by most exquisite lashes. On his upper lip a fair, downy moustache showed, but his under-lip was, I thought, just a little too full.
"What are you going to do now?" I asked him once during the meal. "Speaking frankly, you are too big (and too handsome I had almost added) to be an apprentice."
"You are right, my beloved sister," he answered with a touch of scorn in his voice; "for that sort of position I have grown too big and, to tell the truth, too superior."
"Too superior?" I asked in amazement, and noticed how white and beautiful his hands were. He looked at his well-kept nails thoughtfully for awhile.
"Yes, too big and too superior to have my ears boxed."
"Did they?" I gasped, not daring to complete my sentence.