if
she can come down next week to help with the dresses. But don't stay too
long, for it's been so hot all day and I think it's goin' to storm yet."

"Don't worry about me if it rains. I won't start for home if it looks
threatening. I'll wait till the storm is over."

Aunt Maria filled a basket with her delectable cookies and the girl
started up the hill. It was, indeed, a hot day, even for August. Phoebe
paused several times in the shelter of overhanging trees as she plodded
up the steep road. On the summit she climbed the rail fence and perched
in the cool shade for a little while and looked out over the valley
where the town of Greenwald lay.

"It's lovely here, and I'm wondering how I can be happy when I know that
I am going to leave it soon and go to the city for a long winter away
from my home. But there's a voice calling to me from the great outside
world and I won't be satisfied until I go and mingle with the multitude
of a great city. It is life, life, that I want to see and know. And yet,
I'm glad I'll have this to come back to! It gives me a comfortable
feeling to know that this is waiting for me, no matter where I go--this
is still my home. Sometimes I wonder if Aunt Maria could possibly be
speaking wisely when she says it is all a waste of money to run off to
the city and study music. But what is there on the farm to attract me? I
don't want to marry yet"--the remembrance of Phares Eby's pleading came
to her--"and if I do marry some time, it won't be Phares. No, never
Phares! Ach, Phoebe Metz, you don't know what you want!" she said to
herself as she jumped from the fence and ran down the road to the Eby
farm.

At the gate she paused. Mother Bab stood among her flowers, her
white-capped head bare of any other covering, the hot sunshine streaming
upon her.

"Mother Bab," she cried, "you are simply baking in the sun!"

"No," the woman turned to Phoebe and smiled. "I'm forgetting it's hot
while I look at the flowers. You see, Phoebe, I was in the house sewing
and trying to keep cool and all of a sudden my eyes grew dim so I
couldn't sew. The fear came to me, the fear that my sight is going,
though I try not to strain them at all and never sew at night. Well, I
just ran out here and began to look and look at my flowers--if I ever do
go blind I'm going to have lots of memories of lovely things I've seen."

Phoebe drew Mother Bab's face to her and kissed it. "You just mustn't
get blind! It would be too d