I begged him not to tell my mother about Bay's sickness. I had become very fond of him, and he was so sweet and patient--and tame,--and I just couldn't bear to have him killed. Whether he would have granted my pet.i.tion or not was not to be tested. While I was speaking, Bay uttered a shrill scream, leaped up high in the air, and fell over on his back, dead.

We hurried on the funeral that I might go home with Cousin Frank that evening. I pulled up the tombstone from the head of Caspar Hauser's grave and made an epitaph on the other side for Bay. There might not be another slate broken in the family for months. At the present rate of mortality among my pensioners, it behooved me to be economical. I had not time to indite such an elaborate testimonial to the worth of the deceased as graced Caspar Hauser's last resting-place. Yet I thought the tribute not amiss, and the drop into poetry elated me and electrified my audience. The lines were engraved perpendicularly upon the slate to give the rhyme effective room:--

"Alas! and Alack A DAY!

Poor Litle BAFFINS BAY!"

My visit lasted three days instead of one and a half. I brought back with me something worthy of the pride that swelled my happy heart to aching. One of Cousin Frank's men had taken two young hares alive, and given them to his mistress a week ago, and she and Cousin Frank had arranged a pleasant surprise for me. Before I had been in the house an hour I was taken to the dining room to see the dear little things already housed in a cage, made by the plantation carpenter. None of your lemon-box makeshifts, but a strong case in the shape of a cottage, of planed wood, painted white on the outside. There were two rooms in it with a round door in the dividing wall. One was half full of soft, sweet-smelling hay for Darby and Joan to sleep upon. Their names were ready-made, too. The other room was a parlor where they were to eat and to live in the daytime. Broad leather straps by which the box could be carried were made to look like chimneys.

The whole family collected to admire my treasures when I got home, and Mary 'Liza was so much interested in Darby and Joan that she brought up her cats, Cinderella and Preciosa, to be introduced and make friends with "their new cousins"--so she said. Cinderella was black-and-white, Preciosa yellow-and-white, very large, and with long fur as soft and fine as raw silk. Mary 'Liza put them down close to the cottage.

"You must be very good and never hurt either of the beautiful hares--you hear?" she said, and we all looked on to see what they would do.

Bless your soul! they walked once around the cottage in a lazy, indifferent, supercilious way, hardly glancing at their "new cousins,"

then Preciosa yawned, tiptoed back to her place on the rug, doubled her toes in under her, and half closed her "greenery-yallery" eyes in real, or simulated slumber. Cinderella purred about her mistress until she seated herself again to work upon her seventh chemise, then jumped up into her lap and composed herself to slumber.

After that, I had no fear that the well-fed, pampered creatures would molest my pets. Everybody sympathized in my good fortune. The weather was intensely warm, and Uncle Ike's own august hands rigged up a shelf against the garden fence, making what I called a "situation" for my cottage. Not even Argus could get at them there, had he been evilly disposed, and he had excellent principles for a puppy. Darby and Joan nibbled lettuce and cabbage from my fingers inside of three days, and if they were in the bedroom when I approached their dwelling, would bustle out to see if it were milk, or greens, or, maybe, clover blossoms that I had for them.

The happy, happy days went by, and I announced to my father one evening as we sat at supper that I really "began to believe the curse was lifted from my pets."

"The curse! Mary Hobson Burwell! what a word!" cried my mother.

My father held up his hand.

"One moment, if you please, mother! Explain yourself, Molly!"

"I mean," answered I, bravely, "that it used to seem as if a wicked fairy had cursed a curse upon anything I took a fancy to. Like the girl in the song, and her tree and flower, and dear gazelle, you know. But Darby and Joan make me hope--"

The words were blasted upon my tongue by a terrible scream.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

Chapter X

Circ.u.mstantial Evidence

[Ill.u.s.tration]

The garden gate was close to the dining-room windows, and the windows were not high above the ground. I rushed for the nearest. The moon was bright, and I was in time to see three cats jump down from the shelf on which the cottage was "situated," and dart away in as many different directions. One ran close along the wall of the house, and I recognized Preciosa. Hurling myself over the window-sill, I was the first of our startled party to reach the scene of the tragedy.

The attack had been made from the three exposed sides of the cottage, the cats thrusting their claws between the bars and dragging my darlings up against these.

My father opened the cottage door and took out the mangled, palpitating bodies.

"Oh, father!" I shrieked. "Are they killed?"

"Yes, my daughter."

Then I went crazy. So raging and raving crazy that when I came partially to my senses, I did not recollect what I had been saying or doing since I heard the awful truth. I had been removed from the dark and b.l.o.o.d.y ground in some way and by somebody, for I was lying on my mother's bed.

The consciousness of where I was had in it some drops of the oil of consolation. Next to the close embrace of the mother's arms there is no other resting-place on earth that so aptly typifies the safety and healing grace of Heaven to the child of whatever age, as Mother's Bed.

In our house, to be laid upon that miracle of elastic fluffiness was to become, in fancy, a blessed ghost, cradled upon a cloud. The sick child, the hurt child, the repentant child--were received into that holy asylum without other certificate than his or her need.

Finding myself there made me feel that there might still be something worth living for, and to care for. My mother was by me and her arm was under my head; my father stood at the foot of the bed, kind and compa.s.sionate; Mam' Chloe was putting a bottle of hot water to my feet, and there was a strong smell of cologne in the air. I was very weak; my head felt queer and light, and although I was not crying, something seemed to grab me inside and shake me every little while--a short, sharp shake that made me gasp. Before I could open my eyes I heard my mother's voice say:--

"I wish the dear child did not take things so much to heart. It will bring her a great deal of sorrow in her future life."

Ah, blessed mother of mine! for so many years beyond the sight and hearing of the vicissitudes of that life, then new and all untried--yours was but a partial prophecy. Against the sorrows born of "taking things so much to heart," I set a wealth of joy and beauty and love that have been made mine own by the same nature and habit.

What she said or meant was little to me at that moment, for as I blinked confusedly about me, I saw Mary 'Liza, neat and upright, in her own especial chair by the window, and Preciosa was on her lap.

An electric bolt quivered through me. I started up and pointed at the placid pair, my hand shaking like a leaf, my voice thick with spluttering wrath:--

"_She_ did it! I want her killed."

"Dear child, lie down, don't talk, you are dreaming," cooed my mother, trying to force me gently down to the pillow.

I put her aside, and tried to form articulate words.

"_That, cat, did, it!_ I saw her. I'll kill her! Let me get up."

My father came to my mother's help.

"Take the cat out of the room, Mary Eliza," he ordered calmly. And to me--"Now, Molly, we will hear what you have to say."

He heard and weighed the evidence before I was put to bed in my own room. My head still went around queerly when I raised it, but my mind was clear. He sat by me and stroked my hand gently while he got my testimony. His kindness to his orphaned niece was unfailing, but he seldom caressed her, and n.o.body ever romped with her. He listened to my story first, and as patiently as if he were not to hear any other.

I was hotly positive that the big cat I had seen jump from the shelf and dash by the window so close to me that I could have touched her by leaning over the sill, was Preciosa. There was no other cat of her size and color on the plantation. Beyond this conviction the prosecution had not a sc.r.a.p of testimony to offer. On the side of the accused were the record of a blameless life; the lack of motive, inasmuch as the accused was fed abundantly with daily bread far more convenient for her than the raw flesh she had never desired before,--and, as a "clincher," an alibi was set up by Preciosa's mistress, who, coming into the chamber a few minutes after the disaster, had found the cat sleeping upon the rug just as she had left her when the supper bell rang,--and with never a speck of blood on her paws and fur.

"She had licked it off, then!" I stormed. "I tell you I did see her! I did! I _did_! I DID! Father! you know I wouldn't tell a story about it--don't you?"

"I believe that you think you saw her, my daughter. We all believe that.

But you may have been mistaken. You were very much excited, and the cat ran fast, and it was in the night, recollect, and the moon is not as bright as the day. Altogether, we must take it for granted that Preciosa is not guilty, and keep a sharp lookout for the strange cat that did the mischief."

"It was Preciosa--hateful old thing!" I insisted, angry and sullen. "She ought to be killed!"

My father arose with decision that showed the case was concluded.

"Mother! you will see that our little daughter does not talk any more about this to-night? She will, I hope, feel differently in the morning."

I did not. In saying my prayers at bedtime I pointedly omitted--"Forgive us our trespa.s.ses as we forgive those who trespa.s.s against us." I did not mean to forgive Preciosa. Furthermore, I was not at peace with her mistress and advocate. The more I mused, the hotter the fire burned, until I was ready to convict my father of injustice, and my mother of rank favoritism for the alien. I sulked violently at breakfast, and as I was not reproved, grew so stubborn and disrespectful over my lessons that I was sent to my room to stay there until dinner was ready. The term of banishment had still an hour to run, and I was leaning, listless and wretched, out of the window when Mam' Chloe and Uncle Ike met in the yard directly beneath, and part of the low dialogue reached me.

"Ef I could onct ketch that Precious-O-sir in some o' her tricks, you'd see the fur fly,--mind!" said the butler.

"I suttinly is mighty sorry for po' Miss Molly," answered his wife.

"Looks-if hur heart is pretty nigh broke. It's right down pitiful to see how much sto' she sot by them young old hyars. You mus' see ef you can't get her some mo'."