A story! Mary Frances was always ready to listen to a story.
"Won't you tell me, please?"
Aunty Rolling Pin cleared her voice, and rolled back an inch or two to a more comfortable place on the table.
"You see, it's this way, child," she began.
"In the days of your great-grandmother there were no stoves, only open fireplaces were used for cooking,—and kettles were just as black then as that old black Pot there.
"So, when the Pot called the Kettle black, the Kettle said:
"'Black yourself!' and no harm was done.
"But when your mother got that fine new cook stove, she bought that bright, shiny Kettle, too.
"But that silly old Pot doesn't know that the new Kettle is bright and shiny, so it keeps on calling names. That Pot doesn't know it's fooling itself,—for all it sees is its own homely old black self in the shiny Kettle making faces.
"And that's what comes of calling names, child," chuckled Aunty Rolling Pin, as she ended her story.