MISTRESS KITTY FAGAN CALLS ON MASTER BYLES GRIDLEY.
"I 'd like to go down to the store this mornin', Miss Withers, plase.
Sure I've niver a shoe to my fut, only jist these two that I've got on, an' one other pair, and thim is so full of holes that whin I 'm standin' in 'em I'm outside of 'em intirely.""You can go, Kitty," Miss Silence answered, funereally.
Thereupon Kitty Fagan proceeded to array herself in her most tidy apparel, including a pair of shoes not exactly answering to her description, and set out straight for the house of the Widow Hopkins.
Arrived at that respectable mansion, she inquired for Mr. Gridley, and was informed that he was at home. Had a message for him,--could she see him in his study? She could if she would wait a little while. Mr. Gridley was busy just at this minute. Sit down, Kitty, and warm yourself at the cooking-stove.
Mistress Kitty accepted Mrs. Hopkins's hospitable offer, and presently began orienting herself, and getting ready to make herself agreeable. The kindhearted Mrs. Hopkins had gathered about her several other pensioners besides the twins. These two little people, it may be here mentioned, were just taking a morning airing in charge of Susan Posey, who strolled along in company with Gifted Hopkins on his way to the store."Mistress Kitty soon began the conversational blandishments so natural to her good-humored race. "It's a little blarney that'll jist suit th' old lady," she said to herself, as she made her first conciliatory advance.
"An' sure an' it's a beautiful kitten you've got there, Mrs. Hopkins.
An' it's a splendid mouser she is, I'll be bound. Does n't she look as if she'd clans the house out o'them little bastes, bad luck to em.
Mrs. Hopkins looked benignantly upon the more than middle-aged tabby, slumbering as if she had never known an enemy, and turned smiling to Mistress Kitty. "Why, bless your heart, Kitty, our old puss would n't know a mouse by sight, if you showed her one. If I was a mouse, I'd as lieves have a nest in one of that old cat's ears as anywhere else. You couldn't find a safer place for one.""Indade, an' to be sure she's too big an' too handsome a pussy to be after wastin' her time on them little bastes. It's that little tarrier dog of yours, Mrs. Hopkins, that will be after worryin' the mice an' the rats, an' the thaves too, I 'll warrant. Is n't he a fust-rate-lookin' watch-dog, an' a rig'ler rat-hound?"Mrs. Hopkins looked at the little short-legged and short-winded animal of miscellaneous extraction with an expression of contempt and affection, mingled about half and half. "Worry 'em! If they wanted to sleep, I rather guess he would worry 'em! If barkin' would do their job for 'em, nary a mouse nor rat would board free gratis in my house as they do now. Noisy little good-for-nothing tike,--ain't you, Fret?"Mistress Kitty was put back a little by two such signal failures.
There was another chance, however, to make her point, which she presently availed herself of,--feeling pretty sure this time that she should effect a lodgement. Mrs. Hopkins's parrot had been observing Kitty, first with one eye and then with the other, evidently preparing to make a remark, but awkward with a stranger. "That 's a beautiful part y 've got there," Kitty said, buoyant with the certainty that she was on safe ground this time; "and tahks like a book, I 'll be bound. Poll! Poll! Poor Poll!"She put forth her hand to caress the intelligent and affable bird, which, instead of responding as expected, "squawked," as our phonetic language has it, and, opening a beak imitated from a tooth-drawing instrument of the good old days, made a shrewd nip at Kitty's forefinger. She drew it back with a jerk.
"An' is that the way your part tahks, Mrs. Hopkins?""Talks, bless you, Kitty! why, that parrot hasn't said a word this ten year. He used to say Poor Poll! when we first had him, but he found it was easier to squawk, and that's all he ever does nowadays, --except bite once in a while.""Well, an' to be sure," Kitty answered, radiant as she rose from her defeats, " if you'll kape a cat that does n't know a mouse when she sees it, an' a dog that only barks for his livin', and a part that only squawks an' bites an' niver spakes a word, ye must be the best-hearted woman that's alive, an' bliss ye, if ye was only a good Catholic, the Holy Father 'd make a saint of ye in less than no time!"So Mistress Kitty Fagan got in her bit of Celtic flattery, in spite of her three successive discomfitures.
"You may come up now, Kitty," said Mr. Gridley over the stairs. He had just finished and sealed a letter.
"Well, Kitty, how are things going on up at The Poplars? And how does our young lady seem to be of late?""Whisht! whisht! your honor."
Mr. Bradshaw's lessons had not been thrown away on his attentive listener. She opened every door in the room, "by your lave," as she said. She looked all over the walls to see if there was any old stovepipe hole or other avenue to eye or ear. Then she went, in her excess of caution, to the window. She saw nothing noteworthy except Mr. Gifted Hopkins and the charge he convoyed, large and small, in the distance. The whole living fleet was stationary for the moment, he leaning on the fence with his cheek on his hand, in one of the attitudes of the late Lord Byron; she, very near him, listening, apparently, in the pose of Mignon aspirant au ciel, as rendered by Carlo Dolce Scheffer.
Kitty came back, apparently satisfied, and stood close to Mr.
