Dab Kinzer | Page 2

was frequently taken by strangers for a good two years older than he was. It was sometimes very hard for him, a boy of fifteen, to live up to what was expected of those extra two years.
Mrs. Kinzer still kept him in roundabouts; but they did not seem to hinder his growth at all, if that was her object in so doing.
There was no such thing, however, as keeping the four girls in roundabouts of any kind; and, what between them and their mother, the pleasant and tidy little Kinzer homestead, with its snug parlor and its cosey bits of rooms and chambers, seemed to nestle away, under the shadowy elms and sycamores, smaller and smaller with every year that came.
It was a terribly tight fit for such a family, anyway; and, now that Dabney was growing at such a rate, there was no telling what they would all come to. But Mrs. Kinzer came at last to the rescue; and she summoned her eldest daughter, Miranda, to her aid.
A very notable woman was the widow. When the new railway cut off part of the old farm, she had split up the slice of land between the iron track and the village into "town lots," and had sold them all off by the time the railway company paid her for the "damage" it had done the property.
The whole Kinzer family gained visibly in plumpness that year, except, perhaps, Dabney.
Of course the condition and requirements of Ham Morris and his big farm, just over the north fence, had not escaped such a pair of eyes as those of the widow; and the very size of his great barn of a house finally settled his fate for him.
A large, quiet, unambitious, but well-brought-up and industrious young man was Hamilton Morris, and he had not the least idea of the good in store for him for several months after Mrs. Kinzer decided to marry him to her daughter Miranda; but all was soon settled. Dab, of course, had nothing to do with the wedding arrangements, and Ham's share was somewhat contracted. Not but what he was at the Kinzer house a good deal; nor did any of the other girls tell Miranda how very much he was in the way. He could talk, however; and one morning, about a fortnight before the day appointed, he said to Miranda and her mother,--
"We can't have so very much of a wedding: your house is so small, and you've chocked it so full of furniture. Right down nice furniture it is too; but there's so much of it, I'm afraid the minister'll have to stand out in the front yard."
"The house'll do for this time," replied Mrs. Kinzer. "There'll be room enough for everybody. What puzzles me is Dab."
"What about Dab?" asked Ham.
"Can't find a thing to fit him," said Dab's mother. "Seems as if he were all odd sizes, from head to foot."
"Fit him?" exclaimed Ham. "Oh, you mean ready-made goods! Of course you can't. He'll have to be measured by a tailor, and have his new suit built for him."
"Such extravagance!" emphatically remarked Mrs. Kinzer.
"Not for rich people like you, and for a wedding," replied Ham; "and Dab's a growing boy. Where is he now? I'm going to the village, and I'll take him right along with me."
There seemed to be no help for it; but that was the first point relating to the wedding, concerning which Ham Morris was permitted to have exactly his own way. His success made Dab Kinzer a fast friend of his for life, and that was something. There was also something new and wonderful to Dabney himself, in walking into a tailor's shop, picking out cloth to please himself, and being so carefully measured all over. He stretched and stretched himself in all directions, to make sure nothing should turn out too small. At the end of it all, Ham said to him,--
"Now, Dab, my boy, this suit is to be a present from me to you, on Miranda's account."
Dab colored and hesitated for a moment: but it seemed all right, he thought; and so he came frankly out with,--
"Thank you, Ham. You always was a prime good fellow. I'll do as much for you some day. Tell you what I'll do, then: I'll have another suit made right away, of this other cloth, and have the bill for that one sent to our folks."
"Do it!" exclaimed Ham. "Do it! You've your mother's orders for that. She's nothing to do with my gift."
"Splendid!" almost shouted Dab. "Oh, but don't I hope they'll fit!"
"Vit," said the tailor: "vill zay vit? I dell you zay vit you like a knife. You vait und zee."
Dab failed to get a very clear idea of what the fit would be, but it made