She looked at me with her eyes snappin', but in a second her face broke into a grin. "The' ain't a mite o' use in your tryin' that," sez she. "You like me just as I am, an' you don't need to feel it's your duty to work in any that teacher stuff. Gee, but I'm glad you came back It looks as if me an' Dad is in for a long siege of it this time, an' you'll keep me from gettin' lonesome." "Not 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.