Mr. Withers—that's the new young man—brought the dog, as he said he would. He's a beautiful Scotch terrier, and he said he would kill rats like anything, and was two years old, and had had the distemper; that is, Mr. Withers said the dog would kill rats, and of course Mr. Withers himself never had the distemper.
Of course I wanted to see the dog kill rats, so I took him to a rat-hole in the kitchen, but he barked at it so loud that no rat would think of coming out. If you want to catch rats, you mustn't begin by barking and scratching at rat-holes, but you must sit down and kind of wink with one eye and lay for them, just as cats do. I told Mr. Withers that the dog couldn't catch any rats, and he said he would bring me some in a box, and I could let them out, and the dog would kill every single one of them.
The next evening Sue sent me down to the milliner's to bring her new bonnet home, and don't you be long about it either you idle worthless boy. Well, I went to the milliner's shop, but the bonnet wasn't done yet; and as I passed Mr. Withers's office, he said, "Come here, Jimmy; I've got those rats for you." He gave me a wooden box like a tea-chest, and told me there were a dozen rats in it, and I'd better have the dog kill them at once, or else they'd gnaw out before morning.
When I got home, Sue met me at the door, and said, "Give me that bandbox this instant you've been mornanour about it." I tried to tell her that it wasn't her box; but she wouldn't listen, and just snatched it and went into the parlor, where there were three other young ladies who had come to see her, and slammed the door; but the dog slipped in with her.
In about a minute I heard the most awful yells that anybody ever heard. It sounded as if all the furniture in the parlor was being gnashed into kindling wood, and the dog kept barking like mad. The next minute a girl came flying out of the front window, and another girl jumped right on her before she had time to get out of the way, and they never stopped crying, "Help murder let me out oh my!"
I knew, of course, that Sue had opened the box and let the rats out, and though I wanted ever so much to know if the dog had killed them all, I thought she would like it better if I went back to the milliner's and waited a few hours for the bonnet.
I brought it home about nine o'clock: but Sue had gone to bed, and the servant had just swept up the parlor, and piled the pieces of furniture on the piazza. Father won't be home till next week, and perhaps by that time Sue will get over it. I wish I did know if the dog killed all those rats, and how long it took him.