ent to live with the Cutters, she seemed to care about
nothing but picnics and parties and having a good time. When she was not
going to a dance, she sewed until midnight. Her new clothes were the
subject of caustic comment. Under Lena's direction she copied Mrs.
Gardener's new party dress and Mrs. Smith's street costume so ingeniously
in cheap materials that those ladies were greatly annoyed, and Mrs.
Cutter, who was jealous of them, was secretly pleased.

Tony wore gloves now, and high-heeled shoes and feathered bonnets, and she
went downtown nearly every afternoon with Tiny and Lena and the Marshalls'
Norwegian Anna. We High-School boys used to linger on the playground at
the afternoon recess to watch them as they came tripping down the hill
along the board sidewalk, two and two. They were growing prettier every
day, but as they passed us, I used to think with pride that Antonia, like
Snow-White in the fairy tale, was still "fairest of them all."

Being a Senior now, I got away from school early. Sometimes I overtook the
girls downtown and coaxed them into the ice-cream parlor, where they would
sit chattering and laughing, telling me all the news from the country. I
remember how angry Tiny Soderball made me one afternoon. She declared she
had heard grandmother was going to make a Baptist preacher of me. "I guess
you'll have to stop dancing and wear a white necktie then. Won't he look
funny, girls?"

Lena laughed. "You'll have to hurry up, Jim. If you're going to be a
preacher, I want you to marry me. You must promise to marry us all, and
then baptize the babies."

Norwegian Anna, always dignified, looked at her reprovingly.

"Baptists don't believe in christening babies, do they, Jim?"

I told her I did n't know what they believed, and did n't care, and that I
certainly was n't going to be a preacher.

"That's too bad," Tiny simpered. She was in a teasing mood. "You'd make
such a good one. You're so studious. Maybe you'd like to be a professor.
You used to teach Tony, did n't you?"

Antonia broke in. "I've set my heart on Jim being a doctor. You'd be good
with sick people, Jim. Your grandmother's trained you up so nice. My papa
always said you were an awful smart boy."

I said I was going to be whatever I pleased. "Won't you be surprised, Miss
Tiny, if I turn out to be a regular devil of a fellow?"

They laughed until a glance from Norwegian Anna checked them; the
High-School Principal had just come into th