Poor Dicky was completely paralyzed with terror. Up came the gray nose and wicked-looking eyes nearer and nearer, and yet poor Dicky sat without stirring, his terrified eyes fastened on the horrible monster that could crush him with one grasp of his paw. At last he was opposite the cage, and was about to reach out his paw to seize it, when the spell that kept Dicky silent seemed broken, and he fluttered about, uttering cries of terror. The strong paw still held the cage, and the other paw reached in between the wires; but as the frightened bird, in his agitation, fluttered within reach of the relentless paw, Mrs. Polly gave a shrill whistle, and then another louder still.
A rustling was heard in the bushes outside the window, and at the sound Graywhisker descended the curtain and scurried into the closet, disappearing into his hole as the house-cat, with gleaming eyes, jumped on the window-sill and glared around.
“Which way did he go?” she demanded.
The gray nose was pushed cautiously out of the hole, and a voice said,—
“Mrs. House-cat, did you ever get left?”
CHAPTER II.
When Posy caught up the kittens to carry them back to their nest in the barn, it was no wonder that the barn-cat followed her with a distressed and anxious countenance. Posy had been in such a hurry that she had taken one of the barn-kittens and one of the house-kittens!
The barn-cat tried very hard to make the little girl understand her mistake, and ran about her with her tail in the air and crying dismally; but Posy didn’t understand, and ran back to the house after putting the kittens in their nest. How the barn-cat did wish she could speak! She looked at the kitten that belonged to the house-cat. It was very pretty,—maltese, with a little white on the breast and about the nose, very like its mother.
“It’s rather a good-looking kitten, there’s no doubt about that,” said the barn-cat, “but to my mind not half so pretty and cunning as my little tiger-kitten that Posy left in the kitchen. That house-cat doesn’t know how to bring up a family; she’ll spoil this one just as she has all of her others. It’ll grow up as vain and indolent as she is herself. I’m sure I don’t want it here. Come,” she said, poking the kitten with her paw, “you just run home again, will you?”