Father jokes all the time, but there is something underneath that isn't a joke at all." "I should like to talk to your father.

I want to find out, if I can, what he really believes." "You won't find out that," said Patty, "by talking to him." "You mean he will not tell me ?" "Oh, he may tell you; but you won't know it.

Half the time when he is telling the truth, it sounds like a joke, and that keeps people from believing him.

He says the best way to keep a secret is to shout it from the housetops; and I've heard him say things straight out that sounded so far fetched nobody would think he was in earnest.

I was the only person who knew that he was speaking the truth.