A young girl recalls two things that she did that were similar. One time, her mother left her alone to get dinner for her father and the hired men, and the other time everyone left her alone. Both times her parents talked about what happened and made it stick in the girl's mind. The first time, the girl's mother had to take her sister Teresa to the dentist. She showed the girl how to make rice for dinner. The girl read the clock wrong, so she burned the fire for a long time. The amount of rice her mother told her did not look like enough for all of the men, so she thought maybe she had misheard her and she added more rice. When the girl's father came into the kitchen, he remarked about how hot it was. He laughed, and he laughed all throughout dinner. He told the girl to put a plate under the butter that was melting in the hot kitchen. When the mother and Teresa got back, the father said what had happened, and Teresa pinched the young girl because when she let the butter melt she always got in trouble. The next time the young girl was left alone, the whole family left. Her mother and father talked about it a long time before they left. Before they left, her mother said to be a good girl, and to eat dinner with a tablecloth at the table like they always did. Her father joked around and told her not to steal the end of the road, but then he also told her not to hack the knives, which is to tap them against each other. The mother tells the father not to be bitter and that those things are past, to which the father responds that nothing is ever past. The young girl recalls that her sister Augusta who was sent away to their grandmother used to hack knives. Augusta was a very bad girl, and she did worse things than hacking knives but the young girl did not know what. When the father was angry at Augusta, the mother would take the young girl and Teresa on a walk, and Augusta would be crying when they came back. When the family leaves and the young girl is alone, she goes out to the pig corral and sits on the corn watching the pig squeal. She thinks about the knives, and wonders why Augusta hacked them. She thinks there is something exciting about it. The girl goes inside and gets the knife box. She taps the knives together, but does not find it to be any fun. She decides that she will ask her father to show her how to hack knives the way it is wrong to do, but promise not to do it. The girl puts the knives away, and feeds the pig and then herself. After dinner, she decides to scrub the kitchen, because Teresa always scrubbed it when their mother was away. She scrubs the floor hard, and dries it crossways, because this was harder so she thinks it must be more right. When the girl's family gets home, they give the girl a present of figs. After dinner, the mother acts queer, and she sends the girl to bed early and she and the father talk. Teresa wants to scold the girl for scrubbing the floor, and she says it will take three scrubbings to get it into shape again, but the mother will not let her. The next day, the father does not go to plow, and the young girl is called inside to her parents. They ask why she hacked the knives, and she says that she did not, because she thinks that not understanding the hacking means that she did not do it. The girl then says that she did hack the knives, but she did not know how to. The father says that she knew how to all too well, and the parents question whether Augusta taught her. The mother talks about the time that the girl made too much rice, and asks if the girl thought she knew better. The girl said that she thought she made a mistake listening, and she starts crying. Her parents say that as a punishment, she will turn the grindstone while her father gets out the nicks on the knives. The girl laughs because she has always wanted to turn the grindstone. The girl turns the grindstone, but her arms soon tire and she cannot turn it anymore. The father calls Teresa over to continue, and Teresa calls the girl a baby. The girl is sent inside to her mother, where she explains that her arms got tired. The mother says that she must learn that the way of the transgressor is hard. The mother says that she will take away the girl's white handled knife as a punishment, and the girl responds that the mother can use her knife as a butter knife, because she had heard her mother tell Teresa she wanted to do this. The mother is annoyed, and she says that the girl must go to the bedroom and kneel to God and ask Him to make her a good girl. The girl does not want to pray, and she is annoyed. She whispers to her mother that God said something to her. When her mother asks what He said, the girl replies, "silly." It was an uncomfortable morning after that, and the girl sat in her high chair without speaking until dinner time. She thought about grown-ups, and how they did not understand how things really were.