"And another thing," smiled Isabel: "you must have not only sewing
lessons, but singing lessons--special ones, all by yourself. For since
you and Fult are sweethearts, and to be married some day, and he is
so very fond of music,--of course that is why he has been on the hill
so much,--it is your duty to learn the things that will give him
happiness. And now let's go down and find the dress."
From a miscellaneous stock of saddles, bridles, ploughshares, hardware,
salt, coffee, sugar, crackers, and stick candy in glass jars, they
finally extracted several bolts of gingham and calico, and selected the
prettiest. Going up again, Isabel quickly cut out the dress, and pinned
it on Lethie.
"I'll run up again and finish this after dinner," she said, "and
to-morrow you can begin another in class. I wonder, Lethie, if you know
how pretty you are? You ought to be dressed in silks and gossamers all
the time, like a fairy princess."
A rosy flush dyed Lethie's milk-white skin. "I never had no looks,"
she said. "You are the one that's pretty--the prettiest ever I seed!"
"In a beauty-show I'd never for an instant hold a candle to you," said
Isabel. "Do you mind taking your hair down and letting me see it before
I go?"
Lethie unfastened the large knot tightly drawn to the back of her head,
and her beautiful pale gold hair fell in a thick shower, almost to her
knees.
"Truly a fairy princess!" said Isabel. "Now do you mind if I put it up
for you as a fairy princess ought to wear hers?"
She plaited the shining tresses in two large braids, and, leaving the
hair loose and waving about Lethie's face, wound the braids about her
head coronet-fashion, then held the child off, and gazed at her.
"Lethie," she said, "when I go home, I'm going to take you with me and
astonish the Blue Grass with your beauty. I mean it!" as Lethie looked
at her breathless. "From this day I'm going to adopt you for a younger
sister, and see that your looks are properly set off."
As soon as dinner was over, Isabel returned to work on the dress,
and by four it was finished and on Lethie, as were also a pair of
Isabel's white canvas shoes and white stockings. Before the two started
up the hill together, Lethie gazed at her reflection in the little
looking-glass on the porch, with a loudly beating heart.
Isabel managed to see Fult before the playing began.
"Lethie is here to-day," she said; "and must be your partner the first
time, and at least half the others."
So Lethie was made happy again by seeing Fult come to claim her. And
she was no longer afraid of shaming him. Joy flushed her cheeks. She
hoped he would say something about her changed appearance; but when
he seemed abstracted and failed to, she was not deeply disappointed.
Her unselfish heart demanded very little. To be near him, and to catch
Isabel's reassuring smile across the circle, filled her cup.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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