“Well, no one in our house would try to kill you. I would like to do something for you. Will you follow me home?”
“Oh, no! no!” she said gaspingly. “I ain't got no acquaintance with you.”
I was silent for a few seconds, planning what to do for her. I could not see her very plainly, for she kept herself well in the background, but I could see enough to make me half sick with pity. She was skin and bone, and her eyes were the most terrified things I had ever seen.
“Will you wait here a few minutes?” I said at last. “I know where I can get you a nice chicken bone. I'll run and find it, and come to you as quickly as I can.”
“I never had no chicken bones,” she said faintly.
“Don't move then, and I'll get you one,” I returned, and I sped away.
Thinking it over, I wonder now I had patience—I, who am supposed to be so impatient—to go back to the house, to wait till the door was opened, and then to sneak in, find the bone that I had secreted in a corner of Mary's room, seize it in my mouth, skulk down-stairs, wait for another ring at the bell, and dash out again.
Well, I did it, and I laid the bone down near the cat. Then I went off a little way, and one of the most beautiful sounds I have heard so far in my short life was her hungry teeth crunching that bone. There was a good deal of meat on it, and of course she ate that first, but the bone went too. She put her head first on one side then on the other, till she cracked it all to pieces.
“SHE PUT HER HEAD FIRST ON ONE SIDE THEN ON THE OTHER, TILL SHE CRACKED IT ALL TO PIECES.”