Before the clock had finished striking six the next morning, Dennis and Maisie were in the stable-yard. Tom was there, pumping water into a pail, and Jacko the raven was there, stalking about with gravity, and uttering a deep croak now and then. Jacko was not a nice character, and more feared than liked by most people. He was a thief and a bully, and so cunning that it was impossible to be up to all his tricks. In mischief he delighted, and nothing pleased him more than to frighten and tease helpless things, yet, with all these bad qualities, he had been allowed to march about for many years, unreproved, in Aunt Katharine’s stable-yard. Maisie had been very much afraid of him in the days when she wore socks, for he had a way of digging at her little bare legs with his cruel beak whenever he could get near her. She was not frightened of him now that she was older, especially when Dennis was with her, but still she did not trust him, and took care this morning not to cross his path on her way to speak to Tom.
“If Jacko knew about the kittens,” remarked Dennis as they passed, “he’d go and peck out their eyes.”
“Oh!” shuddered Maisie; “but,” she added in a whisper, for she always fancied Jacko understood, “their eyes aren’t open yet, and besides Madam would claw and scratch at him.”
“He can claw and scratch too,” said Dennis. “I expect he could kill Madam and her kittens easily. And then he’d bury them, just as he does his food, you know, and then.”
Fortunately for Maisie, who was listening with horror to this picture of cruelty and crime, Dennis stopped at this point, for they were now close to Tom, who with his back towards them was making a dreadful noise with a creaking pump handle.
“I say, Tom,” he called out. Tom slowly turned his freckled face over his shoulder, but did not leave off his work. “Madam’s kittens are not to be drowned,” shouted Dennis at the top of his voice.
“They’re all to be saved,” added Maisie in a shriller key.—“Oh Dennis, I don’t believe he has taken it in. Do tell him to leave off pumping.”
But just then, Tom’s pails being full, he left off of his own accord, and proceeded to carry them into the stable.
“You do understand, Tom,” said Maisie anxiously, for she had an idea that Tom rather liked drowning kittens. “Not to be drowned.”
Tom’s voice having answered indistinctly from one of the stalls, she turned to follow Dennis, who was already half-way up the steep ladder which led to the loft. After all, Madam could not be told the good news, for she had gone out for a stroll, leaving her family in a little warm furry heap in their bed.