"Well," said William, coldly. "What you going to do now?"
"Me?" said Ginger.
"Yes. Jus' tell me how you're going to replace a valu'ble cat wot you've just let loose. Jus' tell me wot I'm goin' to do. Am I going home to say I've got a valu'ble cat, in a highly nervous state, and then them find there's nothing in the basket but jus' air? This is all I get for being his cat-carrier! Well, you let it loose, an' you've got to replace it. That's sense, isn't it? I was jus' quietly carryin' a valu'ble cat, in a highly nervous state, down the road, an' you come along an' let it loose. Well, wot you goin' to do?"
"Well, wot can I do?" said Ginger, helplessly. "I din't know the thing was a cat lunatick, did I? It oughter be in a cat asylum. You never told me you was carryin' a wild cat or a mad cat. You jus' said a cat. You——"
But the white ball of fury had appeared again, flying over the wall and down the road at full speed. William grasped his empty basket, and started after it.
"Come on!" he shouted, as he ran. "Come on! Catch it! Catch it!"
They raced down the road after the flying white ball—first the cat, then William, then Ginger—through a garden, leaving a cursing gardener in their rear—in and out of a house, leaving its irate owner ringing up the police—first the cat, then William, then Ginger, breathless and afire with the chase.
Along a wall, the cat on the top and William and Ginger at the foot.
They nearly got her then. She fell into a rain-tub in a private garden at the foot of the wall, but scrambled out and fled again, dripping and grimy ... through a muddy ditch ... the ball of fury was now, not white, but a dingy grey ... and suddenly right into a tabby cat with a broken ear, who was washing its face by the roadside. There was a whirl of claws and flying fur....
"Get it now!" yelled William. "Get it while they're fighting."