anner that made all the difference, her jet-black hair
as curly as Kate's, her eyes big and dark, her lips red. As for
looking at Kate twice, no one ever looked at her at all if Nancy Ellen
happened to be walking beside her. Kate bore that without protest; it
would have wounded her pride to rebel openly; she did Nancy Ellen's
share of the work to allow her to study and have her Normal course; she
remained at home plainly clothed to loan Nancy Ellen her best dress
when she attended Normal; but when she found that she was doomed to
finish her last year at school under Nancy Ellen, to work double so
that her sister might go to school early and remain late, coming home
tired and with lessons to prepare for the morrow, some of the
spontaneity left Kate's efforts.

She had a worse grievance when Nancy Ellen hung several new dresses and
a wrapper on her side of the closet after her first pay-day, and
furnished her end of the bureau with a white hair brush and a brass box
filled with pink powder, with a swan's-down puff for its application.
For three months Kate had waited and hoped that at least "thank you"
would be vouchsafed her; when it failed for that length of time she did
two things: she studied so diligently that her father called her into
the barn and told her that if before the school, she asked Nancy Ellen
another question she could not answer, he would use the buggy whip on
her to within an inch of her life. The buggy whip always had been a
familiar implement to Kate, so she stopped asking slippery questions,
worked harder than ever, and spent her spare time planning what she
would hang in the closet and put on her end of the bureau when she had
finished her Normal course, and was teaching her first term of school.

Now she had learned all that Nancy Ellen could teach her, and much that
Nancy Ellen never knew: it was time for Kate to be starting away to
school. Because it was so self-evident that she should have what the
others had had, she said nothing about it until the time came; then she
found her father determined that she should remain at home to do the
housework, for no compensation other than her board and such clothes as
she always had worn, her mother wholly in accord with him, and marvel
of all, Nancy Ellen quite enthusiastic on the subject.

Her father always had driven himself and his family like slaves, while
her mother had ably seconded his efforts. Money from the sale of
chickens, turkeys, bu