"You MUST quit reading the murder trials in the newspapers, Penrod.

And when you read words you don't know how to pronounce you ought to ask either your papa or me." "Well, I am askin' you about sumpthing now," Penrod said.

"Can't I even have a few PINS without stoppin' to talk about everything in the newspapers, Mamma ?" "Yes," she said, laughing at his seriousness; and she took him to her room, and bestowed upon him five or six rows torn from a paper of pins.
"That ought to be plenty," she said, "for whatever you want to make." And she smiled after his retreating figure, not noting that he looked softly bulky around the body, and held his elbows unnaturally tight to his sides.

She was assured of the innocence of anything to be made with pins, and forbore to press investigation.

For Penrod to be playing with pins seemed almost girlish.