One hot day, a woman is riding a train with three young children who are her two nieces and nephew. A man is also in the train car. The children are noisy. The woman tries to control them, but they are running and spinning around like a tornado. The children are especially fond of asking “Why” questions. The aunt does not have good answers to these questions. The man in the train car is annoyed by the children and gives them an angry look.

The younger of the two girls begins to loudly recite the same line of a poem over and over about a million times, annoying the man further. The aunt calls the children over to tell them a story, and they sit down reluctantly because they don’t think she is a good storyteller.

The aunt begins to tell a story about “a little girl who was good.” The little girl makes a lot of friends, and some people save her from a wild bull because she is good. The children interrupt the story to ask more questions such as, “Would they have saved her if she hadn’t been good?”, which the aunt is again unable to answer well. The children call the story stupid.

Suddenly, the man speaks, saying to the aunt, “You don’t seem to be a very good storyteller.” The aunt tells him that it is hard to tell a story for children, and he sets out to prove her wrong by telling a story of his own.

In the man’s story, there is a little girl named Bertha. He describes how good she was, saying, “She ate food that was good for her, got good grades in school, and showed good manners to everyone.” When the older girl asks if Bertha was pretty, the man replies that she was not very pretty, but she was “horribly good,” which the children think is a fascinating and enjoyable phrase. The man goes on to say that Bertha had been given three medals for being good and she wore them proudly.

One day, the prince of the country heard about how good Bertha was and decided to let her walk in his park, which was normally reserved for adults. The bachelor explains that there were a variety of colored pigs in the park. Bertha also finds that there were no flowers in the park, which made her sad because she had promised not to pick any flowers and now was not even tempted. The man describes the rest of the park, which was full of colored fish, parrots, and “hummingbirds that could hum popular music.” Bertha entertained herself by walking around the park and listening to her medals clink together.

Suddenly, a wolf entered the park. He came to the park to find a pig to eat. However, because Bertha’s white dress was as clean and fresh as newly fallen snow, the wolf noticed her first. Bertha hid in a bush that made it hard for the wolf to smell her. However, she started to shake from fear, causing her medals to make noise. The wolf, who had started to leave, heard the medals and came back for Bertha. He spotted Bertha. He caught Bertha. He ate Bertha. Chomp!

The man finishes the story by noting, “The only things left were her shoes, pieces of clothing, and the three medals for goodness.” The children praise the man’s story, saying it is the most beautiful story they have ever heard. Their aunt, however, scolds the man for telling a story that is inappropriate for children. The man replies that the story kept them quiet, directly comparing his abilities to the aunt’s. The bachelor gathers his things and leaves the train. As he leaves, he thinks to himself with amusement that the children will keep hassling her in the future with demands for an inappropriate story!

This is the end of the story. In my opinion, the writer seems to value imagination more than goodness. You might, however, disagree with his priorities.

Thank you for listening.