It was one of the loveliest days of April, the day Annabelle was born...

I was ten years old and my brother Tom

was eight... We worshipped her from the first... or not quite from the first, for curiosity was our first feeling... Tom said to me: Is this what a newborn baby looks like...? She's as red as a tomato, or as a rose... Is that because she was born with the roses?... And I answered, laughing: Perhaps!

Annabelle grew quickly and began to sit up... Her eyes were big and blue... and her hair blonde and curly.

She was our toy... our angelic child... and we were very proud of her... We hovered around her all day

Her elder sister spoiled her, and she repaid her with selfishness, jealousy, and ingratitude... How is this empty-headed adolescent girl to be requited?

long, and if we heard her crying at night Tom would get up and fly up the stairs like the wind, and when calm and peace had settled again he would say, going back to his bed: She's all right now.

Annabelle began to walk and talk... and we were thrilled with delight at every step and every word she said... I think we wished she would stay a baby forever.

Then suddenly, one day, I found she had turned

seventeen and I had turned twenty-seven.

At that time I was giving lessons at a local institute... and my brother Tom, who was now twenty-five, was a partner in the law firm my father had founded.

My brother was about to marry Claire, whom we all loved... and our house was making ready — though there was no need to make ready, since the celebration was at the bride's house; but Mother wanted to whitewash the house from top to bottom... and to put new curtains at all the windows, and so on.

Annabelle and the bride's sister were to be brides-maids... It had been decided that I should be a brides-maid, but my little sister Annabelle protested and said:

How dull to have Laurel for a bridesmaid —