"Fly away home!" they said. Then they ran to the kitchen to see what there was for dinner. They sniffed good things cooking.
Take went to the stove and lifted the lid of a great kettle. It was such a queer stove!
Here is a picture of Take peeping into the kettle. It shows you just how queer that stove was.
"It's rice," Take said.
"Of course," said Taro. "We always have rice in that kettle.
What's in this one?"
He peeped into the next kettle. It was steaming hot. The steam flew out when Taro opened the lid, and almost burned his nose!
That kettle had fish in it. When it was ready, Grannie and Mother and the Twins had their dinner all together. Bot'Chan was asleep.
After dinner Grannie said, "I'm going for a little nap.""We shall keep very quiet so as not to disturb you and Bot'Chan,"Taro said.
When the little tables were taken away, the Mother said, "Come, my children, let us sit down beside the hibachi and get warm."The "hibachi" is the only stove, except the cook-stove, that they have in Japanese houses. It is an open square box, made of metal, with a charcoal fire burning in it. In very cold weather each person has one to himself; but this day it was just cold enough so the Twins loved to cuddle close up to their Mother beside the big hibachi.
The Mother put on a square framework of iron over the fire-box.
Then she brought a comforter--she called it a "futon"--from the cupboard. She put it over the frame, like a tent. She placed one large cushion on the floor and on each side of the big cushion she put a little one.
She sat down on the big cushion. Taro sat on one side and Take sat on the other, on the little cushions. They drew the comforter over their laps--and, oh, but they were cozy and warm!
"Tell us a story, honored Mother," begged Taro.
"Yes, please do!" said Take.
"Let me see. What shall I tell you about?" said the Mother. She put her finger on her brow and pretended to be thinking very hard.
"Tell us about 'The Wonderful Tea-Kettle,'" said Take.
"Tell us about 'The Four and Twenty Paragons,'" said Taro.
"What is a Paragon?" asked Take.
"A Paragon is some one who is very good, indeed,--better than anybody else," said the Mother.
"Are you a Paragon?" Take asked her Mother.
"Oh, no," cried the Mother. "I am a most unworthy creature as compared with a Paragon.""Then there aren't any such things," said Take, "because nobody could be better than you!"The Mother laughed. "Wait until I tell you about the Paragons.
Then you'll see how very, very good they were," she said.
"Once there was a Paragon. He was only a little boy, but he was so good to his parents! Oh, you can't think how good he was! He was only six years old. He was a beautiful child, with a tender, fine skin and bright eyes. He lived with his parents in a little town among the rice-fields. The fields were so wet in the spring that there were millions and millions of mosquitoes around their home. Everybody was nearly bitten to death by them. The little boy saw how miserable and unhappy his parents were from the mosquito-bites. He could not bear to see his dear parents suffer;so every night he lay naked on his mat so the mosquitoes would find his tender skin and bite him first, and spare his father and mother.""Oh, my!" said Take. "How brave that was! I don't like mosquito-bites a bit!"
"You don't like beetle-bites any better, do you?" Taro said.
"Well," said Take, "I'd rather the beetle should bite me than Mother.""Well, now, maybe you'll be a Paragon yourself sometime," the Mother said.
"There weren't any women paragons, were there? " asked Taro.
"Oh, yes," said the Mother. "Once there was a young girl who loved her father dearly, and honored him above everything in the world, as a child should. Once she and her father were in a jungle, and a tiger attacked them. The young girl threw herself upon the tiger and clung to his jaws so that her father could escape.""Did the tiger eat her up?" said Taro.
"I suppose he did," the Mother answered.
"Was it very noble of her to be eaten up so her father could get away?" Take asked, "Oh, very noble!" said the Mother.
"Well, then," said Take, "was it very noble of the father to run away and let her stay and be eaten up?""The lives of women are not worth so much as those of men," her Mother answered.
Take bounced on her cushion. "I don't see how she could honor a man who was so mean," she said.
Take's mother held up her hands. She was shocked. "Why, Take!"she said. "The man was her father!"
"Tell us another," said Taro.
"Please, honored Mother, don't tell me about any more Paragons,"said Take.
Her Mother was still more shocked.
"Why, little daughter," she said, " don't you want to hear about the Paragon that lay down on the cold, cold ice to warm a hole in it with his body so he could catch some fish for his cruel stepmother to eat?""No, if you please, dear Mother," said Take, "because all the Paragons had such horrid parents.""My dear little girl," the Mother said, "you must not say such dreadful things! We must honor and obey our parents, no matter what kind of persons they are.""Well," said Take, "we love and honor you and our Father--you are so good and kind." She put her hands on the matting in front of her, and bowed to the floor before her Mother.
Taro saw Take do this, and he wanted to be just as polite as she was; so he rolled over on his cushion and bowed to the floor, too.
"Now, tell us about the 'Lucky Tea-Kettle,'" begged Take.
Their Mother began: "Once upon a time--"
But just as she got as far as that they heard a little sound from Bot'Chan's cushion in the corner, and the covers began to wiggle.
"There's Bot'Chan awake," said the Mother. "I must take care of him now. The 'Lucky Tea-Kettle' must wait until another time."And just at that minute bright spots of sunshine appeared on the paper screen, and the shadows of leaves in pretty patterns fluttered over it.
"The sun is out! The sun is out!" cried the Twins.
They ran to the door, put on their clogs, and were soon dancing about in the bright sunshine.
