Both were now staring at the basket; and at that very moment the blanket covering—stirred!
"Ith a dog!" Pattie Batch exclaimed.
"Dog!" the outraged John Fairmeadow roared. "Nothing of the sort! No ma'am!"
Pattie Batch clasped her hands. "It ith, too!" she cried. "I thaw it move."
"It is not!"
"Ith a kitten, then."
"It is not a kitten!"
Thereupon—while the Shadow, by whom John Fairmeadow had been dogged that night, now peered with acute attention through a break in the frost on the window-pane—thereupon, without any warning save a second slight movement of the blanket, a sound—and not by any means a growl—the thing was certainly not a dog—a sound proceeded from the depths of the basket.
Pattie Batch jumped away.