Tate opened the door, and was greeted by a black cat, and then by a gray one. A yellow kitten sprang out upon Johnny, and a hen, with a lame leg bound up in a rag, pecked at Dotty’s feet.
“Do crazy folks live here?” muttered Johnny.
Tate fumbled at the latch of the sitting-room door, but could not lift it, and it was opened from within by Mrs. Piper—a woman so fat and queer that Dotty concluded it must be Peter’s mother, and she had eaten the whole “peck of peppers” at a meal. Her cheeks were the color of peppers, and her false hair, which was very false indeed, had fallen down from the top of her forehead and drifted round to one side.
“How do you do, my pretty pets?” said she to the three visitors, and stroked Dotty’s face with her hand, which had an old kid glove on it without any fingers.
The room was not very large for a school-room. There were only ten scholars in it, and they all seemed to feel quite at home; but Dotty looked in vain for the gingerbread. There was a little earthen tea-pot on the air-tight stove, also a flat-iron.
“What a queer school!” thought she; for the hens in the back room cackled so loud as to drown the voice of a little girl reading. Mrs. Piper saw Dotty laugh behind Johnny’s shoulder, and she laughed too.
“You think I’m a funny old woman,” said she, “because I keep hens in the shed; but it’s a very warm place for ’em, dear. When I had little boys of my own, I didn’t keep cats and hens; but now my little boys are all gone, and I want something to love—do you see?”
“Yes’m,” said Dotty, very sorry Mrs. Piper’s boys were all gone, but thinking that did not make the cats and hens any the less funny.
“The reason I want little children to come to my school is, because my hens and cats can’t talk to me, and sometimes I am lonesome. I teach my scholars to be good,” said she, turning to shake a little girl for snapping apple-seeds; “that is better than book-learning. I am talking to them to-day about truth. Do you always tell the truth, little dear?” said she to Dotty, so abruptly that Dotty found it hard to keep from laughing.