“I won't let her look at me that way.”
So she started on a run for the girl. She didn't get quite up to her. Before she got quite to her, the girl sort of flashed up to my sister. That was about all I could see. The next I saw, she was standing just where she had always been, and my sister was flopped down on the ground with her arms over her head, yelling bloody murder. So I jumped out of the tree and ran up to my sister. Her face was all scratched up. There were four long scratches on each side of her face where the girl had raked her with her claws. So Mamie Little came running too, and helped my sister up.
“If I was a boy,” she said, “I wouldn't let anybody do that to my sister unless I was a 'fraid-cat.”
“Aw! who's a 'fraid-cat?” I said. I wasn't no more 'fraid-cat than she was, but I guess J knew that girl.
So Mamie Little took my sister by the arm. “Come on,” she said. “I guess everybody around here is a 'fraid-cat. You and me will be mad at them and stay mad for ever and ever!”
So I had to go. I wasn't going to hit the girl. I just thought I'd sort of push her away—only maybe a little rough—until I pushed her inside her gate, so I could show a smarty like Mamie Little who was a 'fraid-cat and who wasn't. I walked over to where the girl was, and she waited for me. All I had time to see was the girl's eyes turning to something like prickly black fire, and something plumped against me like a bag of flour shot out of a sling. It was as if her body hit against me everywhere at once. And then something grabbed my hair and yanked me, and I felt scratches burning on my face, and, somehow, I was on the ground, yelling and holding my arms above my head. The girl was standing where she had always been. I heard Mamie Little and my sister yelling:
“Scratch-Cat! Scratch-Cat!”
Swatty came on the run. He was pretty mad, because him and me was chums, and I was his cow-cousin and his double Dutch uncle, and he ran right past me and up to the girl. He gave her a push with his hand, and it sort of pushed her around; but she straightened up again and just looked at him.
“You scratch-cat!” he said, as mean as he knew how. “Who are you scratching around here, I'd like to know?”
I thought she'd jump on him and claw him, like she did me; but she didn't.