The two smallest girls searched all about the shed, and then a wail arose from Dot, when she was assured that her own, and Tess’ kitten, were really not to be found. Dot’s voice brought the whole family, including Uncle Rufus, to the shed door.
“Al-mi-ra and Bungle’s lost-ed!” sobbed Dot. “Somebody came and took them, while poor Sandy was asleep. See!”
It was true. Not a trace of the missing kittens could be found. The shed door had not been opened by any of the family before Tess and Dot arrived. There was only a small window, high up in the end wall of the shed, open a very little way for ventilation.
How could the kittens have gotten away without human help? It did look as though Almira and Bungle had been stolen. At least, they had vanished, and even Dot did not believe that there were kitten fairies who could bewitch Sandy’s children and spirit them away!
Sandy-face herself seemed the least disturbed of anybody over the lost kittens. Uncle Rufus declared that “das cat sho’ nuff cyan’t count. She done t’ink she’s sho’ got all de kittens she ever had.”
“I do believe it was that Sam Pinkney boy,” whispered Tess, to Agnes. “He’s just as bad as Tommy Rooney was—every bit!”
“But how would he know where we had housed the kittens for the night?” demanded Agnes. “I don’t see why anybody should want to take two little, teeny kittens from their mother.”
Tess and Dot watched closely the remainder of Sandy’s family. They believed that the mother cat did discover at last that she was “short” two kittens, for she did not seem satisfied with her home in the woodshed. Twice they caught her with a kitten in her mouth, outside the woodshed door, which had been left open.
“Now, Sandy,” said Dot, seriously, “you mustn’t try to move Spotty and Petl. First thing you know you’ll lose them all; then you won’t have any kittens. And I don’t believe they like being carried by the backs of their necks—I don’t. For they just squall!”
Sandy seemed offended by the girls’ interference, and she went off by herself and remained out of sight for half a day. Tess and Dot began to be worried about the mother cat before Sandy turned up again and snuggled the two remaining kittens in the basket, once more.