"Come up at once," she cried.
There was a long pause, and then a feeble broken little sob: "Caught in a trap."
The world seemed suddenly to reel round before Mammy-ana's eyes, and it was only with a super-verminous effort that she stopped herself from fainting. Sick with dread, she hurried downstairs, and, guided by the sound of Squarky-woo's voice, made her way straight to the kitchen. At the sight of her darling caught fast in the hideous engine of destruction, the last remnant of hope fled despairingly from her heart.
"Oh, Squarky-woo," she cried, "oh, you little fool!" and great tears of misery almost blinded her.
Squarky-woo crushed back his sobs when he saw his mother weeping.
"Don't cry, Mammy-ana," he said, "I am not worth it. I am only a wicked, ungrateful little beast, and I don't mind dying."
Then Mammy-ana broke down helplessly and sobbed out that he was all she had in the world, and that it was all her own fault for not having told him what a trap was like, and that Heaven knew she had done it all for the best. A sad, twisted little smile flickered across Squarky-woo's face, but he only shook his head and repeated bravely:
"No, mother, it was all my fault."
"Oh," she cried, "I might have known what would happen. Your father's blood was bound to come out."
Squarky-woo's eyes lit up with a great pride. "Yes," he said, "it has taught me how to make a fool of myself, but it will also teach me how to die."