"Lemme see!" Mierd shrieked.
"No, Mierd! It'll cut you! Bandershanks, get your hands off! Quit that! Girls don't know how to handle pocket knives. 'Specially one with four blades!"
"I know how just as much as you do!"
"Mierd, you do not! Hot diggity, look at the middle blade! Old Wallace Goode will have a fit when he sees this!"
"You'd better not take it to school."
"Yeah, Walker, I've gotta take it to school! Wallace and all the rest of 'em will wanta see it! Just think! I'll be the only boy there with a pearl-handled knife! Clyde, what'd you bring me?"
"Well, now, Wiley, I'll tell you. When I stopped in Little Rock the day before yesterday, I saw something that reminded me so much of you I just had to buy it."
"What?"
"Go in yonder and look in the top of my knapsack and get that yellow box, the one that's not wrapped up."
As soon as Wiley ran out the door, Clyde cupped his hand against the side of his lips and whispered, "Mierd, it's a monkey on a string!"