Jacob Metz looked at his offspring—what did the child mean? Why, he thought she was right sweet and surely her aunt kept her clean and tidy. But before he could answer his sister spoke authoritatively.
"Jacob, I wish you'd tell her once that she daren't have curls! She just plagues me all the time for 'em. Her hair was made to be kept back and not hangin' all over."
"Why then," Phœbe asked soberly, "did God make my hair curly if I daren't have curls?" She spoke with a sense of knowing that she had propounded an unanswerable question.
"That part don't matter," evaded Aunt Maria. "You ask your pop once how he wants you to have your hair fixed."
The child looked up expectantly but she read the answer in her father's face.
"I like your hair back in plaits, Phœbe. You look nice that way."
"Ach," her nose wrinkled in disgust, "not so very, I guess. Mary Warner has curls, always she has curls!"
"Come," said the father as he rose from his chair, "you be a good girl now to-day. I'm going now."
"All right, pop. I'll tell you to-night how I like the teacher."
After the breakfast dishes were washed and the other morning tasks accomplished Phœbe brought her comb and ribbons to her aunt and sat patiently on a spindle-legged kitchen chair while the woman carefully parted the long light hair and formed it into two braids, each tied at the end with a narrow brown ribbon.
