“Oh, I don’t?”
“Well, what is it, then?”
“Willie Miller.”
“What?”
“Willie Miller!” Laurence said. “That’s what his own gran’mother said his name was. She said his name’s Willie Miller.”
Upon this the others shouted in derision; and with the greatest vehemence they told him over and over that Willamilla’s name was Willamilla, that Willamilla was a girl’s name, that Willamilla was consequently a girl, that she was a girl anyhow, no matter what her name was, but that her name actually was Willamilla, as her own grandmother had informed them. Grandmothers, Daisy and Elsie explained pityingly, are supposed to know the names of their own grandchildren.
Laurence resisted all this information as well as he was able, setting forth his own convictions in the matter, and continuing his argument while they continued theirs, but finally, in desperation, he proposed a compromise.
“Go on an’ call him Willamilla,” he said bitterly, “—if you got to! I doe’ care if you haven’t got any more sense’n to call him Willamilla when his real name’s Willie Miller an’ his own gran’mother says so! I’m goin’ to call him Willie Miller till I die; only for heavenses’ sake, hush up!”
The ladies declined to do as he suggested; whereupon he withdrew from the dispute, and while they talked on, deriding as well as instructing him, he leaned upon the gate and looked gloomily at the ground. However, at intervals, he formed with his lips, though soundlessly, the stubborn words, “His name’s Willie Miller!”
“Oh, I tell you what’d be lovely!” Daisy cried. “Maybe she knows how to walk! Let’s put her down and see—and if she doesn’t know how already, why, we can teach her!”