"Whut yo' gwine do?" asked Arabella, who had got over her crying spell.
"I's gwine make a stable fo' my cat," answered the colored lad.
"Cat's don't live in stables! Dey lives in under de back porch," said Arabella. "In a box."
"Cats do so live in stables, 'cause I done seen 'em!" declared Jeff. "An' dey catches rats an' mice. I's gwine make a stable fo' my cat whut I done got at de fire an' de p'liceman didn't see me!" and he laughed as he thought of how he had fooled the officer.
Jeff hunted around in the woodpile until he found what he wanted. This was a large cigar box, and with a knife Jeff soon cut a hole in one side, large enough to slip the China Cat through.
"Dere's her stable!" he declared with satisfaction.
As for the China Cat, when she was shut up in the cigar box, she wanted, most dreadfully, to sneeze. For the box smelled very strongly of tobacco, and it made her nose tickle. But she dared not so much as utter a faint aker-choo for fear she would be heard. So the China Cat held back the sneeze, though it made her nose ache, and she was very glad when Jeff took her out of the cigar box stable.
During the remainder of that day the colored boy and his sisters and brothers took turns playing with the China Cat. For, after a while, Jeff allowed the others to handle his toy. And the China Cat was passed around among the colored children so often that she kept getting more and more dirty. And on account of having spots of molasses on her, every bit of dirt and grime that touched her stuck right there. Jeff and his brothers and sisters did not think of washing themselves, much less of washing the China Cat.
At last, after having been much handled and passed from one to another, the China Cat was set on a shelf in the kitchen of the basement tenement where the colored family lived. Many other colored folk lived in the same house, and in adjoining houses.
"At last I have time to breathe, but I am so dirty I do not know what to do," said the China Cat to herself. "I do not believe that any of the other toys that came from the workshop of Santa Claus ever had such an unpleasant adventure as I am having."