“‘Of course you don’t know,’ said Mischief, after waiting a moment for him to answer. ‘It’s because every drop of water in that cloud has thin, gauzy wings of fog, and when they happen to come across a cold breeze—as they often do in these high mountains—they shiver and fold up their wings so they can’t fly any more, and down they come in what you call a rain storm. I knew that before I had my eyes open. Now,’ she continued, ‘I’m going to try you just once more, and then we must be going. Did you ever see a kitten walk on tip-toes?’
“‘Never,’ said Fred. ‘Except,’ he added slyly, ‘when they jump after butterflies.’
“Mischief laughed outright. ‘Dear me, you funny boy,’ she said, ‘where have you been to school? Why, all kittens walk on tip-toes, from morning till night. That little crook that looks like a knee is really a kitten’s heel. Horses walk the same way, only they have just one toe to walk on, and that longer then your arm. You ask that little gray-bearded man with the blue spectacles, that comes here once in a while, and he will tell you that many thousand years ago horses had as many toes as kittens, but they are such great, awkward things that all their other toes have been taken away from them. A cow has—’
“‘I know!’ cried Fred. ‘She has a cloven hoof, without any toes at all.’
“‘You’re all wrong, as usual,’ said Mischief briskly; ‘what you call hoof is her two toes. Though why she should be allowed to keep more than a horse, I never could see. Great red thing!’ Just then, a big drop of rain came down, spat! on Mischief’s nose. She rubbed it off hastily with her nice little mouse-gray gloves, and looked about her with a frightened air. ‘It never will do for me to be caught in a shower,’ she said, ‘or my gloves and dress will be spotted. They’ve been in the family a long time and were imported from Malta.’ Another drop struck her face, tickling her so that she sneezed violently.
“‘Come!’ she cried, and started off at a full run, down the mountain-side, pulling Fred after her as before. ‘Hurry, hurry,’ she screamed; ‘faster, faster!’
“Fred now saw, to his horror, that instead of descending the side on which they had come up, she was making straight toward the slope where the rocks were bare and red.
“‘Stop, stop, Mischief!’ he cried breathlessly, ‘we shall go over the cliff!’
“Before the words were fairly out of his mouth they were on the crumbling edge of a precipice. In that instant Fred could see the road and the brook a thousand feet below them.
“He braced his feet against the stones and tried to snatch his hand away, but Mischief held it more tightly than ever. With one wild bound they were over the brink, out in the empty air, falling down, down—