“Oh, I know her,” said the woman who had spoken about letting cats out of bags. “She lives out near me. So she has come to the country for her summer vacation again, has she? And brought a cat with her. She always did like cats.”
The boy did not stay to hear all this. He was again running on after Blackie, for he wanted to earn that dollar. And Blackie, not knowing anything about the boy, nor that he would be kind to her, ran on as fast as she could.
Pretty soon some other boys saw the red-haired lad running after the black cat, and they shouted to him.
“Hi, there, Carrots!” they called, naming him Carrots in fun because his hair was the color of carrots. “Hi, there, Carrots! What you chasin’ that cat for?”
“For a dollar,” answered the red-haired boy, with a grin.
“We’ll help you!” said the other boys, quickly.
“All right,” invited the red-haired boy. “Come along!”
There were three boys now chasing after poor Blackie, and the cat was getting tired.
“I must get away from them, somehow,” she thought. “I wonder what Speckle did when he was chased like this? I ought to have asked him before I came away. Next time I run off I’ll know more about it. And maybe I won’t run off again.”
Blackie turned around the corner so quickly that she ran right between the legs of an old gentleman who was walking along.