Patchwork Part 3

Well, the father was always talking about the flag and what it means and how every man should be ready to fight for it. And one day the boy said that he would never fight for it and be shot to pieces, that the old flag made him sick, and one soldier in the family was enough."

"Oh!" Phbe opened her eyes wide in surprise and horror.

"And the father told the boy," the old man went on in a fixed voice as though the veriest details of the story were vividly before him, "that if he would not take back those words he never wanted to see him again.

It was better to have no son, than such a son, a coward who hated the flag."

Here Granny appeared with the lemonade and the story was abruptly ended.

Phbe refrained from questioning the man about the story but as she sat under the arbor and afterwards, as she started up the street of the little town, she wondered over and over how a boy could be the son of a soldier and hate the flag, and whether the story Old Aaron told her was the story of himself and Nason.

CHAPTER III

LITTLE DUTCHIE

"AUNT MARIA said I dare look around a little," thought Phbe as she neared the big store on the Square. Her heart beat more quickly as she turned the k.n.o.b of the heavy door--little things still thrilled her, going to the store in Greenwald was an event!

The clerk's courteous, "What can I do for you?" bewildered her for an instant but she swallowed hard and said, "Why, we want twenty pounds of granulated sugar; ourn is almost all and Aunt Maria wants to make some strawberry jelly to-morrow. She said for Jonas to fetch it along on his home road."

"All right. Out to Jacob Metz?"

"Yes, he's my pop."

"I see. Anything else?"

"Three spools white thread, number fifty."

"Anything else?"

She shook her head as she handed him the money. "No, that's all for to-day. But Aunt Maria said I dare look around a little if I don't touch things."

"Look all you want," said the clerk and turned away, smiling.

Phbe began a slow tramp about the big store. There was the same gla.s.s case filled with jewelry. The rings and pins rested on satin that had faded long since, the jewelry itself was tarnished but it held Phbe's interest with its meagre glistening. One little ring with a tiny turquoise aroused her desire but she realized that she was longing for the impossible, so she moved away from the coveted treasures and paused before the ribbons. Some of those same ribbons had been in the tall revolving case ever since she could remember going to that store. The pale sea-green and the crushed-strawberry were faded horribly, yet she looked at them with longing. "Suppose," she thought, "I dared pick out any ribbon I want for a sash--guess I'd take that funny pink one, or mebbe that nice blue one. But I kinda think I'd rather have a set of dishes or a doll. But then I got that rag doll at home and that pretty one that pop got for me in Lancaster and that Aunt Maria won't leave me play with. That's funny now, that she says still I daren't play with it for I might break it, that I shall keep it till I'm big. But when I'm big I won't want a doll, and then I vonder what! What will I do with it then?"

She stood a long time before a table crowded with a motley gathering of toys, dolls and books. With so much coveted treasure before her it was hard to remember Aunt Maria's injunction to refrain from touching.

"Well, anyhow," she decided finally, "I won't need any of these things to play with now, for I'm going to be out in the garden and the yard with the flowers and birds. So I guess my old rag doll will be plenty for playin' with. But I mustn't look too long else Aunt Maria won't leave me come in soon again. I'll walk down the other side of the store now yet and then I must go."

She pa.s.sed slowly along, her keen eyes noticing the varied a.s.sortment of articles displayed for sale. A long line of red handkerchiefs was fastened to a cord high above one counter. Long shelves were stacked high with ginghams, calicoes and finer dress materials. There were gaudy rugs and blankets tacked to the walls near the ceiling. Counters were filled with gla.s.sware, china and crockery; other counters were laden with umbrellas, hats, shoes----

"Ach," she sighed as she went out to the street, "I think this goin' to Greenwald to the store is vonderful nice! It's most as much fun as goin'

in to Lancaster, only there I go in a trolley and I see black n.i.g.g.e.rs"--she spoke the word with a little shiver, for Greenwald had no negro residents--"and once in there me and Aunt Maria saw a Chinaman with a long plait like a girl's hangin' down his back!"

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?"

Phbe 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!" Phbe 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! n.o.body 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!"

"h.e.l.lo, Phbe," a cheery voice rang out, followed by a deeper exclamation, "Phbe!" 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.

"h.e.l.lo," she answered listlessly.

"What's wrong?" asked the older boy as they joined her.

Both were plainly country boys accustomed to hard farm work, but their tanned faces were frank and honest under broad straw hats. Each bore marked family resemblances in their big frames, dark eyes and well-shaped heads, but there was a distinct line drawn between their personalities. Phares Eby at sixteen was grave, studious and dignified; his cousin, David, two years younger, was a cheery, laughing, sociable boy, fond of boyish sports, delighting in teasing his schoolmates and enjoying their retaliation, preferring a tramp through the woods to the best book ever written.

The boys lived on adjacent farms and had long been the nearest neighbors of the Metz family; thus they had become Phbe's playmates. Then, too, the Eby families were members of the Church of the Brethren, the mothers of the boys were old friends of Maria Metz, and a deep friendship existed among them all. Phbe and the two boys attended the same little country school and had become frankly fond of each other.

"What's wrong?" asked Phares again as Phbe hung her head and remained silent.

"Ach," laughed David, "somebody's broke her dolly."

"n.o.body ain't not broke my dolly, David Eby!" she said crossly. "I wouldn't cry for _that_!"

"What's wrong then?--come on, Phbe." He pushed the sunbonnet back and patted her roguishly on the head. But she drew away from him.

"Don't you touch me," she cried. "I'm a Dutchie!"

"What?"

She tossed her head and became silent again.

"Come on, tell me," coaxed David. "I want to know what's wrong. Why, if you don't tell me I'll be so worried I won't be able to eat any dinner, and I'm so hungry now I could eat nails."

The girl laughed suddenly in spite of herself--"Ach, David, you're awful simple! Abody has to laugh at you. I was mad, for when I was in Greenwald I was smellin' a rose, that pink rose you gave me, and some lady on Mollie Stern's porch laughed at me and called me a LITTLE DUTCHIE! Now wouldn't you got mad for that?"

But David threw back his head and laughed. "And you were ready to cry at that?" he said. "Why, I'm a Dutchie, so is Phares, so's most of the people round here. Ain't so, Phares?"

"Yes, guess so," the older boy a.s.sented, his eyes still upon Phbe.