Josiah, being the third child, would talk as long as he had a listening audience. Finally Pa finally cut him off gently and moved on to Jake. “And what did you think about Miss Porter, Jake?”
“She’s okay,” was his two-word critique. Then he went on with much greater enthusiasm. “The older boys let me play with them today! Albert says I have a great arm. There’s a new boy called Duncan who helped me up to the first branch so I could climb the big tree in the yard. It was so much fun! I went almost to the top before the teacher rang for us to come back inside. Duncan and Albert even waited to make sure I got down okay, but I never needed any help.” At this point Pa interrupted what was quickly becoming one of Jake’s well-known big brags.
“Do you have homework, Jake?”
“Nope,” Jake replied.
