peacefully as if he were asleep. No pain—no struggle.”
“It sounds easy,” said Anne dubiously.
“It IS easy. Just leave it to me. I’ll see to it,” said Phil reassuringly.
Accordingly the chloroform was procured, and the next morning Rusty was
lured to his doom. He ate his breakfast, licked his chops, and climbed into
Anne’s lap. Anne’s heart misgave her. This poor creature loved her—trusted her.
How could she be a party to this destruction?
“Here, take him,” she said hastily to Phil. “I feel like a murderess.”
“He won’t suffer, you know,” comforted Phil, but Anne had fled.
The fatal deed was done in the back porch. Nobody went near it that day. But
at dusk Phil declared that Rusty must be buried.
“Pris and Stella must dig his grave in the orchard,” declared Phil, “and Anne
must come with me to lift the box off. That’s the part I always hate.”
The two conspirators tip-toed reluctantly to the back porch. Phil gingerly
lifted the stone she had put on the box. Suddenly, faint but distinct, sounded an
unmistakable mew under the box.
“He—he isn’t dead,” gasped Anne, sitting blankly down on the kitchen
doorstep.
“He must be,” said Phil incredulously.
Another tiny mew proved that he wasn’t. The two girls stared at each other.
“What will we do?” questioned Anne.
“Why in the world don’t you come?” demanded Stella, appearing in the
doorway. “We’ve got the grave ready. ‘What silent still and silent all?’” she
quoted teasingly.
“‘Oh, no, the voices of the dead Sound like the distant torrent’s fall,’”
promptly counter-quoted Anne, pointing solemnly to the box.
A burst of laughter broke the tension.
“We must leave him here till morning,” said Phil, replacing the stone. “He
hasn’t mewed for five minutes. Perhaps the mews we heard were his dying
groan. Or perhaps we merely imagined them, under the strain of our guilty
consciences.”
But, when the box was lifted in the morning, Rusty bounded at one gay leap to
Anne’s shoulder where he began to lick her face affectionately. Never was there
a cat more decidedly alive.
“Here’s a knot hole in the box,” groaned Phil. “I never saw it. That’s why he