ise.

"Yes."

"See anything pretty?"

"Ach, yes. A lots of things. I saw the prettiest finger ring with a blue
stone in. I wish I had it."

"What would Aunt Maria say to that?" wondered David.

"Ach, she'd say that so long as my finger ain't broke I don't need a
band on it. But I looked at the ring at any rate and wished I had it."

"You dare never wear gold rings," Phares told her.

"Not now," she returned, "but some day when I'm older mebbe I'll wear a
lot of 'em if I want."

The words set the boys thinking. Each wondered what manner of woman
their little playmate would become.

"I bet she'll be a good-looking one," thought David. "She'd look swell
dressed up fine like some of the people I see in town."

"Of course she'll turn plain some day like her aunt," thought the other
boy. "She'll look nice in the plain dress and the white cap."

Phoebe, ignorant of the visions her innocent words had called to the
hearts of her comrades, chattered on until they reached the little green
gate of the Metz farm.

"Now you two must climb the hill yet. I'm glad I'm home. I'm hungry."

"And me," the boys answered, and with good-byes were off on the winding
road up the hill.

As Phoebe turned the corner of the big gray house she came face to face
with her father.

"So here you are, Phoebe," he said, smiling at sight of her. "Your Aunt
Maria sent me out to look if you were coming. It's time to eat. Been to
the store, ain't?"

"Yes, pop. I went alone."

"So? Why, you're getting a big girl, now you can go to Greenwald alone."

"Ach," she laughed. "Why, it's just straight road."

They crossed the porch and entered the kitchen hand-in-hand, the
sunbonneted little girl and the big farmer. Jacob Metz was also a member
of the Church of the Brethren and bore the distinctive mark: hair parted
in the middle and combed straight back over his ears and cut so that the
edge of it almost touched his collar. A heavy black beard concealed his
chin, mild brown eyes gleamed beneath a pair of heavy black brows. Only
in the wide, high forehead and the resolute mouth could be seen any
resemblance between him and the fair child by his side.

When they entered the kitchen Maria Metz turned from the stove, where
she had been stirring the contents of a big iron pan.

"So you got back safe, after all, Phoebe," she said with a sigh of
relief. "I was afraid mebbe something happened to you, with so many
streets to go across and so many tea