“POOR TABBY!”
But more unpleasant was the arrival at home. The first sight which met the children’s eyes, on their return, was poor Tabby stretched out lifeless on the floor of the kitchen, and their uncle bending over her with a flushed face and knitted brow; while their mother, who stood beside him, was vainly endeavouring to calm him.
“Accidents will occur, dear brother—”
“There has been gross carelessness somewhere,” growled the sailor; and turning suddenly round toward the children, whom he now first perceived, he thundered out to Johnny, “Was it you, sir, who shut the cat into my room?”
“No,” answered Johnny very promptly: then he added, “Alie and I have been out a long time; we have been all the way to the farm.”
“I may have shut the door myself,” said the mother, “without knowing of the cat being in the place.” And, to turn the sailor’s mind from his loss, she continued, “I’m going up to the village, Jonas, and I’ve a very large basket to carry; Johnny’s just come off a long walk, or—”
“I’m your man!” cried the sailor; “I’ll help you with your load. Just wait a few minutes till I’ve buried this poor thing in the garden. I shouldn’t like the dogs to get at her—though she’s past feeling now, poor Tabby!” And as the stern, rough man stooped, raised his dead favourite, and carried it away, Alie thought that she saw something like moisture trembling in his eye.
“Alie,” said her mother, “go into that room, and carefully collect the broken pieces of the bottle which poor Tabby managed to knock off the shelf; and wash that part of the floor which is stained by the liquid: be attentive not to leave a drop of it anywhere; for the contents of the bottle was deadly poison, and I cannot be too thankful that the cat was the only sufferer.”
Alie obeyed with a very heavy heart. She was grieved at the death of Tabby, grieved at the vexation of her uncle—most grieved of all at the thought that she had not acted openly and conscientiously herself.