“You will be a lobster and turn all red if you are a bad boy,” declared Mabel, who was always in a bad temper when she was made to mind Bubby.
“Why, Mabel,” murmured Dot, who knew a thing or two about lobsters herself, “you wouldn’t boil Bubby, would you?”
“Don’t have to boil ’em to make ’em turn red,” declared Mabel, referring to the lobster, not the boy. “My father brought home live lobsters once and the big one got out of the basket on to the kitchen floor.”
“Oh, my!” exclaimed the interested Dot. “What happened?”
With her imagination thus spurred by appreciation, Mabel pursued the fancy: “And there were three little ones in the basket, and that old, big lobster tried to make them get out on the floor too. And when they wouldn’t, what do you think?”
“I don’t know,” breathed Dot.
“Why, he got so mad at them that he turned red all over. I saw him—”
“Why, Mabel Creamer!” interrupted Tess, unable to listen further to such a flight of fancy without registering a protest. “That can’t be so—you know it can’t.”
“I’d like to know why it can’t be so?” demanded Mabel.
“’Cause lobsters only turn red when they are boiled. They are all green when they are alive.”