Still he didn’t seem to take me seriously. “I’d as leave go A.W.O.L.,” he said.
“Yes? And maybe get caught and sent to Atlanta because you ducked out when the outfit was expecting travel orders? And you wouldn’t want to throw up a chance to go overseas anyway. God, I should think you’d be so excited you couldn’t think straight.”
I could see that he was beginning to weaken, but he promptly thought of another objection. “What about your hair? You don’t suppose anyone would be foolish enough to think I had grown hair that long, do you?” He thought that objection was insurmountable.
But I jumped it at once. “I’d just as leave have my hair cut boy fashion,” I told him. “Can get it done somewhere in a few minutes’ time. What do you say?”
Well, he didn’t know what to say. He always was a slower thinker than I and it took him several minutes to digest the whole idea.
“There isn’t anything that might come up during your absence, is there? I mean, anything that I couldn’t do?” I asked, before he had time to answer.
He considered the possibilities for a moment and answered a rather dumb “No—I guess not. I could show you where everything is anyway.”
“Well—” I said. “Then it’s all settled. Let’s start.”
“But your hair!” he objected again, as if he were reaching for straws of argument for support, “Aunt Elinor will throw a fit when she sees you minus your hair.”
“Pooh—what do I care for Aunt Elinor? And anyway, it’ll grow out again. I can have typhoid fever or something for an excuse. Come on!”