I kind of kept watch on Shelley's mad career after that. It was mad most of the time. He had already begun to fight as well as to use language, and by the time he was ten he was a very nasty scrapper. And ready--it soon got so that only boys new-come to town would taunt him about his golden locks. And unless they was too much out of Shelley's class he made believers of 'em swiftly. From ten to twelve he must of had at least one good fight a day, what with the new ones and the old ones that still couldn't believe a boy in velvet pants with curls on his shoulders could really put it over on 'em. His mother believed his clothes was tore and his face bunged up now and then in mere boyish sports, and begged him not to engage in such rough games with his childish playmates. And Shelley, the little man, let her talk on, still believing he was like little Paul McNamara, that had a crooked foot. He wasn't going to shame his mother as well as himself. I don't know just how Shelley ever got his big illumination that curls was not a curse put on him by his Maker. But he certainly did get it when he was round twelve. After two years of finish fights he suddenly found out that curls is optional, or a boy's own fault, if not his mother's, and that they may be cured by a simple and painless operation. He'd come to the observing age. They say he'd stand in front of Henry Lehman's barber shop every chance he'd get, watching the happy men getting their hair cut. And he put two and two together. Then he went straight to his mother and told her all about his wonderful and beautiful discovery. He was awful joyous about it. He said you only had to go to Mr. Lehman's barber shop with thirty-five cents, and the kind Mr. Lehman would cut the horrible things off and make him look like other boys, so please let him have the thirty-five. Then Shelley got a great shock. It was that his mother wanted him to wear them things to please her. She burst into tears and said the mere thought of her darling being robbed of his crowning glory by that nasty old Henry Lehman or any one else was breaking her heart, and how could he be so cruel as to suggest it? The poor boy must of been quite a bit puzzled. Here was a way out of something he had thought was incurable, and now his mother that loved him burst into tears at the thought of it. So he put it out of his mind. He couldn't hurt his mother, and if cutting off his disgrace was going to hurt her he'd have to go on wearing it.