"Scamp is very fond of Snowball," said Linda, "but he hates all other cats, and he'd kill them if he could catch them. One day, in Conway, he saw a white puss rather like ours, and it was so funny to watch him, because he couldn't make up his mind whether he ought to lick it or chase it."
"How beautifully clean she is!" said Sylvia, taking the pretty soft creature on her lap, and stroking the long, silky fur. "Do you wash her?"
"We do sometimes," replied Linda. "But she doesn't like it at all, poor dear. It takes three of us to manage it, two to hold her, and the other to soap and rinse her. I never try it without the boys. Once I thought I had such a splendid idea. I was going to try dry cleaning. I rubbed her fur thoroughly well with flour, and I was just brushing it out again when she screwed herself from my arms and jumped through the open window. It was pouring with rain, and when she came back she was simply a pudding. I didn't know what to do, and the boys were away; so I let out the parrot, and put her inside the cage, and then watered her with the watering can till I got the paste off her."
"Poor Pussie, what a shame!" said Sylvia.
"So it was, but I really couldn't help it that time. She should keep herself clean, and then she wouldn't need to go through such troubles. Would you like to come and see the hens and my bantams?"
There was a stableyard at the back of the house which led into a field where the fowls were kept. They were a pet hobby with Mrs. Marshall, who spent many hours among her poultry, and had a particularly good strain of white Leghorns which she greatly valued. There were a number of neat wire runs, each with its small wooden henhouse, and in several of these were interesting families of chickens, varying in size from sweet fluffy atoms, as yellow as canaries, to long-legged creatures which Sylvia thought were not pretty at all.
"They haven't grown their full feathers yet," said Linda. "They're ugly ducklings still, but they'll be very handsome by and by. Look at this fussy old hen. I set her myself during the Easter holidays. She was so broody that she actually insisted on sitting on a Liebig pot. I suppose she took it for an egg. She'd have wondered why it didn't hatch, I expect, if I hadn't given her some real eggs instead."
"You seem to know all about keeping hens," said Sylvia.
"I know a little more now, but I made a most dreadful mistake once. Mother told me to go to the henhouse, and see if there were any eggs to send to Aunt Edith. I knew that sometimes the hens laid in the barn, so I thought I would go there instead. I hunted about and found a nest with ten lovely brown eggs in it. They were quite warm, so I was sure they must be perfectly fresh, and I put them in my basket and carried them to the house. Mother was in a hurry for the post; she didn't ask where I had got them, but only said I had been quick, and packed them up in a box at once. Next morning she went to the barn to feed a broody hen that was sitting there on some very particular eggs that she had bought specially, and to her horror she found them all gone! They would have hatched in a few days, so you can imagine how angry she felt, and what a scolding she gave me for not going to the henhouse as I was told. I think it was even worse, though, for Aunt Edith. She had meant to make a Simnel cake with the eggs Mother sent her, and she broke one after another, and each had a little chicken inside it!"
"How dreadful!" laughed Sylvia; "I should think she didn't made her cake."