"My name is Gertie Cowles. I came from Minneapolis. My mamma owns part of the Joralemon Flour Mill.... Are you a nice boy? We just moved here and I don't know anybody. Maybe my mamma will let me play with you if you are a nice boy."
"I jus' soon come play with you. If you play soldiers.... My pa 's the smartest man in Joralemon. He builded Alex Johnson's house. He's got a ten-gauge gun."
"Oh.... My mamma 's a widow."
Carl hung by his arms from the gate-pickets while she breathed, "M-m-m-m-m-m-y!" in admiration at the feat.
"That ain't nothing. I can hang by my knees on a trapeze.... What did you come from Minneapolis for?"
"We're going to live here," she said.
"Oh."
"I went to the Chicago World's Fair with my mamma this summer."
"Aw, you didn't!"
"I did so. And I saw a teeny engine so small it was in a walnut-shell and you had to look at it through a magnifying-glass and it kept on running like anything."