"I am quite as strong as you, and if it comes to a fight I can take the oars. The current is not yet very strong; but I wish to get out of it, for the see-sawing up and down makes me a little bit sea-sick. I am not your governess. I am just a girl who has come to live at the Merrimans', and I can make myself very pleasant to you if you make yourself pleasant to me, or I can take not the slightest notice of you. There are heaps and heaps of other girls about. There are all the Singletons."