fat curl over her right shoulder, with a rose stuck
through it.

Twenty-three years ago one's sisters did not strain at the household
leash, nor crave a career. Carrie taught school, and hated it. Eva kept
house expertly and complainingly. Babe's profession was being the family
beauty, and it took all her spare time. Eva always let her sleep until
ten.

This was Jo's household, and he was the nominal head of it. But it was
an empty title. The three women dominated his life. They weren't
consciously selfish. If you had called them cruel they would have put
you down as mad. When you are the lone brother of three sisters, it
means that you must constantly be calling for, escorting, or dropping
one of them somewhere. Most men of Jo's age were standing before their
mirror of a Saturday night, whistling blithely and abstractedly while
they discarded a blue polka-dot for a maroon tie, whipped off the maroon
for a shot-silk, and at the last moment decided against the shot-silk in
favor of a plain black-and-white, because she had once said she
preferred quiet ties. Jo, when he should have been preening his feathers
for conquest, was saying:

"Well, my God, I _am_ hurrying! Give a man time, can't you? I just got
home. You girls have been laying around the house all day. No wonder
you're ready."

He took a certain pride in seeing his sisters well dressed, at a time
when he should have been reveling in fancy waistcoats and brilliant-hued
socks, according to the style of that day, and the inalienable right of
any unwed male under thirty, in any day. On those rare occasions when
his business necessitated an out-of-town trip, he would spend half a day
floundering about the shops, selecting handkerchiefs, or stockings, or
feathers, or fans, or gloves for the girls. They always turned out to be
the wrong kind, judging by their reception.

From Carrie, "What in the world do I want of a fan!"

"I thought you didn't have one," Jo would say.

"I haven't. I never go to dances."

Jo would pass a futile hand over the top of his head, as was his way
when disturbed. "I just thought you'd like one. I thought every girl
liked a fan. Just," feebly, "just to--to have."

"Oh, for pity's sake!"

And from Eva or Babe, "I've _got_ silk stockings, Jo." Or, "You brought
me handkerchiefs the last time."

There was something selfish in his giving, as there always is in any
gift freely and joyfully made. They never suspected the exquisite
ple