It was after the girls had bought everything they came for, and were on their way to camp. Out of a gate, across their road, bounded two small boys, each of whom held a wriggling black kitten.
“Won’t you hurt the kitty if you hold it by just one leg?” inquired Winona of the nearest boy.
“It don’t matter if we do hurt ’em—they ain’t any good anyhow,” he explained. “We’re going to drown ’em in a minute.”
“Oh, no!” protested Winona.
“Well, will you take ’em?” asked the other boy. “Mother says she can’t keep any more cats.”
Winona took the victims on the spot, and put them into the continuous pocket all around the bottom of her Balkan blouse. The small boys went back into their yard, where they were heard announcing, “Mother! A girl took the kitties!” And Winona stood still with a kitten at each hip.
“You’d better give them back,” said Nataly, who was afraid of cats.
“Oh, I couldn’t!” said Winona. “It’s so nice to be alive, even if you’re a cat—and there isn’t really any Cat-Heaven, you know.”
“Well, advertise them for sale, then,” said Louise impatiently. “Good home and kind treatment wanted for two black kittens—salary no object.”
She wasn’t in earnest, but Winona was.