"Wait a minute! you can't both have it!" cried Perce. "The oldest first!"
"I'm the oldest," declared Moke.
"So I've heard you say," Perce replied. "But I don't see how anybody ever remembered."
"They looked out for that when they named us," said Moke.
"It was uncle Moses's idea," said Poke. "He told 'em, 'Call the oldest by my first name and the youngest by my last name——'"
"'And that will fix it in folks's minds,'" Moke completed the quotation.
"That was before they discovered the moles," said both together.
"I never thought of that," said Perce. "But whenever anybody asks me which is the oldest, I think of your initials, and run over in my mind—L, M, N, O, P;—M comes before P; then I say, 'Moke's the oldest.' But how could they tell you apart before they saw the moles?"
"They tied a red string around Moke's ankle," said Poke.
"But once the string came off, and Ma thinks it might have been changed," said Moke.