"But you had to give up Virginia reels and pretty dresses."
"Yes, but I learned there are deeper, more important things than dancing and wearing pretty dresses."
She looked at Phœbe, but the girl had bowed her head over the dress bundle and appeared to be thinking.
"And so," continued Mother Bab softly, "my bundle ended with that dress. Since I dress plain I don't wear colors, just gray and black. But I always thought if I had a girl I'd start a dress bundle for her, for it's so much satisfaction to get it out sometimes and look over the pieces and remember the dresses and some of the happy times you had when you wore them. But the girl never came."
"But you have David!"
"Yes, to be sure, he's been so much to me, but I couldn't make him a dress bundle. He wouldn't have liked it when he grew older—boys are different. And I wouldn't want him to be a sissy, either."
"He isn't, Mother Bab. He's fine!"
"I think so, Phœbe. He has worked so hard since he's through school and he's so good to me and takes such care of the farm, though the crops don't always turn out as we want. But you haven't told me what you are going to do, now that you're through school."
"I don't know. I want to do something."
"Teach?"