Calm yourself.
TOBY-DOG
Jove! The telling it alone! ... But—you old sly-boots—didn't I see her one day armed with a sponge standing over you, holding you down on the toilet table?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (quite embarrassed, lashing his tail)
An old story! The long, fluffy hairs on my legs (which give them the outline of a Zouave's) had somehow gotten dirty. She insisted upon washing me. I persuaded her that I suffered atrociously under the sponge....
TOBY-DOG
What a fibber you are! Did She believe you?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
'Um ... at first. It was my own fault tho' when She didn't. Turned over on my back, I proffered the candid belly, the terrified and forgiving eyes of a lamb about to be sacrificed. I felt a slight coolness, nothing more. A fear that my sensibilities might be destroyed, took possession of me. My rhythmical wailings increased, then subsided, then went up again like the noise of the sea (you know the strength of my voice). I imitated the calf, the whipped child, the cat in the night, the wind under the door. Little by little I grew enraptured with my own song, so that long after She had finished soiling me with cold water I continued wailing, my eyes fixed on the ceiling. Then She laughed tactlessly and cried out, "You're as untruthful as a woman!"
