Dot wavered a long time between “Fairy” and “Elf” as a name for the fourth kitten, and finally she decided on “Bungle”! That was because the little, staggery thing, when put down on the floor, tried to chase Aunt Sarah’s ball of yarn and bungled the matter in a most ridiculous fashion.
So, Spotty, Petl, Almira and Bungle, the kittens became. Aunt Sarah had a soft spot in her heart for cats—what maiden lady has not? She approved of them, and the children told her their whole adventure with Sandy-face and her family.
“Butter her feet,” was the old lady’s single audible comment upon their story, but the girls did not know what for, nor just what Aunt Sarah meant. They seldom ventured to ask her to explain her cryptic sayings, so they carried the kittens downstairs with puzzled minds.
“What do you s’pose she meant, Ruth?” demanded Agnes. “‘Butter her feet,’ indeed. Why, the old cat would get grease all over everything.”
So they merely put the kittens back into the basket, and left the dining-room to Sandy-face and her family, until it was time for Uncle Rufus to set the table for evening dinner.
“Das old cat sho’ done feel ter home now,” said the black man, chuckling. “She done got inter dat basket wid dem kittens an’ dey is havin’ a reg’lar love feast wid each odder, dey is so glad ter be united once mo’. Mebbe dat ol’ speckled cat kin clean out de mice.”
Of course, Uncle Rufus was not really a “black” man, save that he was of pure African blood. He was a brown man—a rich, chocolate color. But his daughter, Petunia Blossom, when she came to get the wash-clothes, certainly proved to be as black—and almost as shiny—as the kitchen range!
“How come she is so dreful brack, I sho’ dunno,” groaned Uncle Rufus. “Her mudder was a well-favored brown lady—not a mite darker dan me—an’ as I ’member my pappy an’ mammy, ’way back dere befo’ de wah, wasn’t none o’ dese common brack negras—no, Ma’am!
“But Pechunia, she done harked back to some ol’ antsister” (he meant “ancestor”) “wot must ha’ been marked mighty permiscuous wid de tarbrush. Does jes’ look lak’ yo’ could rub de soot off Pechunia wid yo’ finger!”
Petunia was enormously fat, too, but she was a pretty colored woman, without Uncle Rufus’ broad, flat features. And she had a great number of bright and cunning pickaninnies.