“An’ that hain’t all my ol’ cat kin do—you jest watch now.”
Putting a silver thimble in the middle of the sitting-room floor, the animal’s proud owner went to the door and called: “Kitty, kitty, kitty, kitty!” And pretty soon a big black and white cat bounded into the room, with an arched back and fluffy tail. It seemed instantly to get its eyes on the shiny thimble. Pouncing on the silver finger piece, it took the thimble in its mouth to the furnace register and dropped it through the iron grating.
“Meow!” it said, looking up at its beaming master as though in expectation of another toy.
“Hain’t that smart?” the lock tender cackled. “Does it every time, by gum! Thimbles an’ spools an’ buttons—they all go down the register [[157]]when ol’ Spotty gits a whack at ’em. Eh, Spotty?” and he affectionately rubbed the purring cat’s arched back.
“I should imagine, sir, that you—aw—have quite a collection of articles in your furnace pipe.”
The cat fondler looked up quickly.
“Oh!… I git the stuff out ag’in,” he waggled.
The Harmony Hustler studied the iron grating.
“By removing the register, I presume.”
“Naw. I go down cellar an’ reach my arm in the air pipe.”