“I heard something far from pleasant about you, little Tack,” said the big Nail.
There were many other tacks in the box, but there were also many nails. They were all together in one big white box, and whichever size was wanted could be picked from the lot.
But the Nail which was the biggest of all, or about the biggest, was talking to the Tack which was about the smallest of all the tacks in this big box.
“Well, I suppose you want me to ask you what it is,” said the Tack, moving a little in the box.
“You needn’t ask me if you don’t want to,” said the Nail haughtily.
“But of course I want to; that is only natural,” said the Tack.
“I thought you would want to,” said the Nail, in a hard, metallic voice. Now a metallic voice is a voice which sounds as hard and cold as any metal could be. Of course that was the natural sort of voice for a nail to have—still it was not a very cheerful voice to hear.
“The Master said that he had kept forgetting things all day long. And then he said that he had a head like a tack.”
“Well, what of it?” asked the Tack. “Is that all?”
“That’s all, little Tack,” said the Nail. “Isn’t that enough?”
“I don’t think that was so dreadful,” said the Tack.
“Perhaps you don’t understand,” said the Nail.
“Perhaps not,” the Tack agreed.
“I’d better make sure you understand and so I will tell you. The Master meant that his head was so small and stupid that he couldn’t remember anything, and when he said that his family told him he mustn’t talk so about himself. There, little Tack, you see you have a little stupid head. No head at all, and because it’s such a poor head they’ve made that sad saying about it. There was never such a thing said of a Nail.”
“Maybe not,” said the Tack angrily, “but I can hang just as many pictures as you can. Maybe you are used for big pictures but I am used for small ones—nice little favorites, photographs and so forth. I’m just as useful in my way. Just as useful,” the Tack repeated.
“But what is more,” the Tack continued, “I have very little use for you in saying such a thing. You are supposed to be a friend of mine. A nail is a sort of relation of a tack. I don’t blame the people for saying such things. In their opinion my head is very small, and quite rightly too, and I have not the things they call brains—neither have you. So I don’t blame them in the least.
“But I blame you, Nail, for coming and telling me something to make me unhappy. It’s not doing me any good. I can’t change my head. You’re just like a creature who wants to be praised because you didn’t say the mean thing yourself; but you did worse than that—you repeated it. Bah!” The Tack moved away disgusted, and the Nail moved far to one side of the box, feeling much ashamed.