“Daddy, girls do! So, if our folks don’t put up too much of a—”
“Aha!! Now you said a mouthful; if your folks don’t! Darling, I’ll say just two words as my part in this crazy stunt: ‘Nothing doing’!! Kathlyn’s work is mighty important; singing isn’t.”
Sarah had not grown up from infancy in kindly Tom’s cabin without knowing that his “no” was a “no!!” and not a flimsy, hollow word which a whining, or a sniffling, or a bawling child could switch around into: “Oh, all right, if you want to.” So Sarah still sat on that low stool; or, to turn it around almost backwards,—Sarah sat on that stool,—still. So still that Tom’s old tin clock on its wall hooks was soon dominating that small room with its rhythmic ticking, as a conductor’s baton controls a brass band’s pianissimos. Finally Sarah said softly, slowly, sadly and with a big, big sigh:—
“I did so want to go.” And that small clock was ticking, ticking, ticking...
For a full hour Sarah and old Tom sat talking and rocking, until Sarah, phoning to Doris, said:—
“My Dad says no.”
And Doris, phoning back to Sarah, said:—
“So did my Dad.”
And, as Virginia Adams was that trio’s
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