the right answer," sez I. "I'm goin' to leave tomorrow."

Her face grew long in a minute, when she see I meant it. "Happy--you
don't really mean that, do you?"

"Barbie," I sez, "I had to leave before, or take sides. Well, you an'
the boss are warrin' again; I can't fight you, an' I won't side again
him. You don't leave me any choice--I just have to go away again."

"Oh, I don't want you to go away again," she sez. "You allus find more
in things than the rest of 'em ever do, an' I want you to tell me all
about those two queer men you spent the winter with, an' to teach me
just the way the one you call Hammy used his voice. Happy, you just
can't go away again."

"I don't want to go away again," sez I, an' I was down-right in earnest
by this time, "but you make me. Barbie, you are hard-hearted. You know
that your father thinks the world of you--"

"He don't think one speck more of me than I do of him," she snaps in.

"Yes, but he's different," I sez. "He's your father, an' he has to
guide and correct you."

"Well, he don't have to throw in my teeth that I'm a girl every tine I
want to do anything."

"I'm disappointed in you," I sez to her in a hard voice. "I thought
that you would be game, but you're not."

"What ain't I game about?" sez she.

"You're ashamed of bein' a girl," sez I.

"I ain't," sez she. "I'm glad I'm a girl, an' I want to tell you that
the' 's been just about as many heroines as heros too. I don't mean
just these patient women who put up with things; I mean heroines in
history. Look at Joan of Arc!"

"I never heard of her before," sez I, "but I reckon she must have been
Noah's wife." She breaks in an' tells me the story of the French farm
girl who got to be the leader of an army and whipped the king of
England an' was finally burned; an' then, naturally, became a heroine
an' a saint.

"She didn't wear boys clothes, did she?" I sez, thinkin' I had her.

"Yes, she did!" sez Barbie.

"Well, she ought to be ashamed of herself," I said; but I knew I was
gettin' the worst of it, so I changes the subject. "But speakin' about
the Ark," sez I, "there's another example of your obstinacy. When I
went away from here you was fussin' with the school-teachers because
they said this whole earth was once under water, an' now I find you
cuttin' around an' linin' out missionary-preachers because you ain't
suited with the way the Bible was wrote. It looks to me as if you ought
to get old enough sometime