Of course it is Ahyokah. My father knew she was there listening just as well as I did. He, too, probably heard her open the door just a crack behind us soon after we sat down. That is why he lowered his voice to whisper those words about Red Bird to me. Though he is growing older, it seems as if his senses have not become dulled.

He looks over at me and shakes his head. “You see how it is around here,” he says. “I can never say anything without your little sister hearing it. Even if there is nothing worth hearing from my old mouth.”

Ahyokah pushes her way out through the door, walks straight over to our father, and plops herself down at his feet.

“That is NOT so!”

“Must I tell that story? Even if I cannot tell it well?”

“Yes, you must! You are a great storyteller, Father.”

I am both pleased and irritated right now. I’m pleased that my father may be about to tell another story. But I am irritated that my little sister has thrust herself right into the middle of this special time I was having with him. She has him every day when he is at home. She also has been with him in the western lands. Over the last three years, from what everyone says, she and her mother have often traveled west to see him, spending weeks and weeks at a time in his company while Sally’s two brothers took care of her farm and house. This is the first time I’ve been with my father in so long. It should be my time with him, not hers. Doesn’t she understand that?

But of course she doesn’t. She may be bright, but she is just a little girl. And because she seems to like everyone—including the grumpy big brother who just walked into her life—she probably can’t even imagine how jealous I am feeling about her. She is such a likable child. If she were anyone else’s daughter I would probably think she was adorable and not like a splinter stuck in my foot.

I shake my head. It has come to me that I should be ashamed of myself. How can I be thinking in such a selfish way? Ahyokah is a big part of my father’s life. And she does not seem to have any problem about sharing him with me. I am the one who has the problem. I am the one who is the problem.