rror in the walnut bureau, but the glass was hung too high
for a satisfactory scrutiny of her features. She pushed a cane-seated
chair before the bureau, knelt upon it and brought her face close to the
glass.

"Um," she surveyed herself soberly. "Well, now, mebbe if my hair was
combed I'd look better."

She pulled the tousled braids, opened them and shook her head until the
golden hair hung about her face in all its glory.

"Why"--she gasped at the sudden change she had wrought, then laughed
aloud from sheer childish happiness in her own miracle--"Why," she said
gladly, "I ain't near so funny lookin' with my hair opened and down
instead of pulled back in two tight plaits! But I wish Aunt Maria'd
leave me have curls. I'd have a lot, and long ones, longer'n Mary
Warner's."

"Phoebe!" Aunt Maria's voice startled the little girl. "What in the
world are you doing lookin' in that glass so? And your knees on a
cane-bottom chair! You know better than that. What for are you lookin'
at yourself like that? You ought to be ashamed to be so vain."

Phoebe left the chair and looked at her aunt.

"Why," she said in an amazed voice, "I wasn't being vain! I was just
lookin' to see if I am funny lookin' that it made Miss Lee laugh at me.
And I found out that I'm much nicer to look at with my hair open than in
plaits. You say still I mustn't have curls, but can't you see how much
nicer I look this way----"

"Ach," interrupted her aunt, "don't talk so dumb! I guess you ain't any
funnier lookin' than other people, and if you was it wouldn't matter
long as you're a good girl."

"But I wouldn't be a good girl if I looked like some people I saw
a'ready. If I had such big ears and crooked nose and big mouth----"

"Phoebe, you talk vonderful! Where do you get such nonsense put in your
head?"

"I just think it and then I say it. But was that bad? I didn't mean it
for bad."

She looked so like a cherub of absolute innocency with her deep blue
eyes opened wide in wonder, her golden hair tumbled about her face and
streaming over the shoulders of her white muslin nightgown, that Aunt
Maria, though she had never heard of Reynolds' cherubs, was moved by the
adorable picture.

"I know, Phoebe," she said kindly, "that you want to be a good girl. But
you say such funny things still that I vonder sometimes if I'm raisin'
you the right way. Come, hurry, now get dressed. Your pop's goin' way
over to the field near Snavely's and you want to gi