"MAMMY!"
"Yes; you bettuh holler, 'Mammy!"' she panted. "My goo'ness, if yo' pappy don' lam you to-night! Ain' you got no mo' sense 'an to let white boys 'suede you play you Affikin heathums? Whah you britches?"
"Yonnuh Verman's," quavered Herman.
"Whah y'own?"
Choking, Herman answered bravely:
"'At ole cat tuck an' th'owed 'em down cistern!"
Exasperated almost beyond endurance, she lifted the lath again.
But unfortunately, in order to obtain a better field of action, she moved backward a little, coming in contact with the bars of the cage, a circumstance that she overlooked. More unfortunately still, the longing of the captive to express his feelings was such that he would have welcomed the opportunity to attack an elephant. He had been striking and scratching at inanimate things and at boys out of reach for the past hour; but here at last was his opportunity. He made the most of it.
"I learn you tell me cat th'owed--OOOOH!"
The coloured woman leaped into the air like an athlete, and, turning with a swiftness astounding in one of her weight, beheld the semaphoric arm of Gipsy again extended between the bars and hopefully reaching for her. Beside herself, she lifted her right foot briskly from the ground, and allowed the sole of her shoe to come in contact with Gipsy's cage.
The cage moved from the tottering chair beneath it. It passed through the yawning hay-door and fell resoundingly to the alley below, where--as Penrod and Sam, with cries of dismay, rushed to the door and looked down--it burst asunder and disgorged a large, bruised and chastened cat. Gipsy paused and bent one strange look upon the broken box. Then he shook his head and departed up the alley, the two boys watching him till he was out of sight.