After asking for the mail at the post-office she turned homeward, feeling like singing from sheer happiness. Then she looked down at her pink damask rose--it was withered. "I'm goin' home now so I guess I won't be decorated no more." She unpinned the flower, clasped its short stem in her hand and raised the blossom to her face. "Um-m-m!" She drew deep breaths of the rose's perfume. "Um-m!" "Does it smell good?" Phœbe turned her head at the voice and looked into the face of a young woman who sat on the porch of a near-by house. "Does it smell good?" The question came again, accompanied by a broad smile. Quickly the hand holding the flower dropped to the child's side, her eyes were cast down to the brick pavement and she went hurriedly down the street. But not so hurriedly that she failed to hear the words, "LITTLE DUTCHIE" and a merry laugh from the young woman. "She--she laughed at me!" Phœbe murmured to herself under the blue sunbonnet. "I don't know who she is, but that was at Mollie Stern's house that she sat--that lady that laughed at me. She called me a Dutchie!" The child stabbed a fist into one eye and then into the other to fight back the tears. She felt sure that the appellation of Dutchie was not complimentary. Hadn't she heard the boys at school tease each other by calling, "Dutchie, Dutchie, sauer kraut!" But no one had ever called her that before! Her heart ached as she went down the street of the little town. She had planned to look at all the gardens of the main street as she walked home but the glory of the June day was spoiled for her. She did not care to look at any gardens. The laughing words, "Does it smell good?" rang in her ears. The name, "Little Dutchie," sent her heart throbbing. After the first hurt a feeling of wrath rose in her. "Anyhow," she thought, "it's no disgrace to be a Dutchie! Nobody needn't laugh at me for that. But I just hate that lady that laughed at me! I hate everybody that pokes fun at me. And I ain't goin' to always be a Dutchie. You see once if I don't be something else when I grow up!" "Hello, Phœbe," a cheery voice rang out, followed by a deeper exclamation, "Phœbe!" as she came to the last intersection of streets in the town and turned to enter the country road. She turned a sober little face to the speakers, David Eby and his cousin, Phares Eby. "Hello," she answered listlessly. "What's wrong?" asked the older boy as they joined her.