"This is the most dreadful place I was ever in!" thought the China Cat, who, of course, could do nothing to save herself. "If they let me fall I shall be broken, all dirty and soiled as I am."
But Jeff was not going to let that happen.
"Heah! Gib me back mah cat, whut I done got at de fire!" he said, and he grabbed it from his sister's hand.
"Oh! Oh! Oh!" wailed the little black girl.
"Heah! Hush yo' noise now!" called Jeff's mother. "Set up to de table an' hab yo' brekfus'! Stop playin'!"
"Dear me, they call that playing!" thought the China Cat. "I wonder what they would do in a game of tag? Oh, what is ever to become of me?"
Jeff took the toy and set it on a shelf in the kitchen, and then he sat down to his breakfast. Every once in a while he would look up at the China Cat.
"I's glad I done got yo'," Jeff would murmur. "Yo' suah am a fine toy!"
After breakfast he took the China Cat down off the shelf and let his sisters look at her. But no sooner did one of the little colored girls have the cat in her hands than she darted out of the basement.
"Now I's got her, an' I's gwine t' hab some fun!" cried Arabella. Arabella was the name of this one of Jeff's sisters. "I's gwine to hab fun wid dis cat!"