When Dola and Babee were little girls, they were the best of friends. They dressed the same and liked the same things, so much so people often mistook them for twins or sisters. They went everywhere together and everyone in the village knew of their steadfast friendship.

As they blossomed into young ladies, they made a promise to marry two men who were born of the same mother and father so they may be together for the rest of their lives. As luck would have it, there were two brothers who came of age to be married. Dola and Babee married the two brothers and moved into the same house. They were very happy.

A few days after their marriage, Dola planted a kola-nut tree and prayed to the spirit of the tree for a child. She did this every morning before anyone else in the house woke up.

A few months later, the kola-nut tree grew to the height of one metre but the village goats would eat its leaves. Seeing her best friend’s tree being eaten by the animals, Babee gave Dola a large earthen pot that had a hole in the bottom.

“Here, put this bottomless pot over your tree and it will stop the animals from eating its leaves,” Babee said.

Dola did so and it stopped the animals from reaching the tender kola-nut leaves. She was very happy and the tree soon grew into a large tree. A few years later, the kola-nut tree yielded its first kola-nuts. The nuts were the best quality nuts in the village and the villagers gladly paid a considerable amount of money to Dola for the kola-nuts. She soon became a wealthy woman.

Babee was jealous of her friend, seeing how rich she had become. So, one day, Babee demanded her bottomless pot that protected the tree to be returned to her.

“How can I do that? The tree is too big now and I cannot lift the pot out without cutting the tree first,” Dola pleaded.

But Babee was adamant. “I want my pot back!”