"Sure it can," she said. "But democracy is a civilized commodity, Johnnyin a primitive society it's a luxury the society can't afford. What guarantees have you got that the clan will elect the best possible leader? Or that, having elected him, they'll follow him along the best paths?"
Shorty softly parted the bushes and looked in. Two of the well-known sharpers who hung around the camps had enticed little Pete in there, and to a game of three-card monte. They had inflamed his boyish conceit by allowing him to pick out two cards in succession, and with small bets."Spies nothin'!" said Si. "Why, them fellers hain't brains enough to tell a battery from a regiment, nor pluck enough to take a settin' hen offen her nest. Let them go at once.""Hello, Injianny; what are you doin' here?" inquired a man in civilian clothes, but unmistakably a gambler."Guerrillas," said Shorty."I did.""Before that metaphor becomes any more mixed," Dr. Haenlingen said, "I want to clear one thing up. I am not going to divulge any basic facts about my division, now or ever."