Part 3

"Well, you find some place," said Yowler. "I did, so you can, too, if you try hard enough." With that he turned tail and stalked away through the wood.

Jazbury and Fluffy followed him, mewing, until he turned on them so fiercely that they were frightened. Then they stopped and stood looking after him until he disappeared in the wood, and never once did he look back, or say one word of good-bye to them.

IX

"There! He's gone away mad," mewed Fluffy. "Now what shall we do?"

"Do! Why just what we have been doing," said Jazbury. "He wasn't any good to us, anyway."

"Yes, but I want to go home. Oh, I _do_ want to go home; and we don't know the way."

"Why don't we? Guess I could find it just as well as Yowler."

"Oh, could you? Could you, Jazbury?"

"Listen, Fluffy!" said Jazbury. "There was something mother told me, and I'd forgotten all about it. I just remembered a little while ago. She said cats--and kittens, too, if they weren't too little--could always get home from any place if they just didn't worry about it and try to remember the way to go. All they have to do is to love their home, and run along without thinking, and then they'll get there."

"I don't know what you mean," said Fluffy, "but let's go anyway. Even if we don't get home we can't be any more lost than we are now."

"But we _will_ get there," declared Jazbury. "Come on! We might as well go right now."

"All right; I'm ready."

The two little kittens set out at once, and without any more talk about it. They trotted away through the green depths of the wood, and after a while the trees grew thinner, and then they came out of the wood upon a hot, sunny stretch of dusty road.

"We go this way," said Jazbury, and he set off down the road just as if he knew exactly where he was going.

"Are you sure this is the right way?" asked Fluffy.

"Now, Fluffy, you mustn't ask me that," said Jazbury. "I mustn't think about it, but just run along, and we'll get there. Don't you be afraid."

Fluffy said no more, but padded along after Jazbury. Jazbury never stopped or looked around. He just went running straight on down the dusty road.

After they had gone for quite a distance Fluffy heard a noise behind them, a thudding sound, and with it a sound of rumbling and rolling. He looked around, and there behind them came a great, enormous horse and a buggy, with two ladies driving in it.

"Jazbury," he mewed softly, "there's something coming."

Jazbury stopped and looked round. Then he ran over to the side of the road, and crouched down. "Come over here till they get past, Fluffy," he said.

Fluffy trotted over and crouched down beside him.

Nearer and nearer came the horse and buggy, the horse thudding along and the buggy rumbling after it.

Just as the buggy came to where the kittens were one of the ladies cried out, "Oh, Sarah! Look there! Look at those kittens."

The buggy stopped, and the two ladies leaned forward, staring at Jazbury and Fluffy.

"How do you suppose they ever got here?" asked the lady.

"I don't know," answered her companion. "I suppose some one wanted to get rid of them and dropped them here."

"Isn't that wicked! What shall we do about it?"

The talking went on. The kittens could hear the voices, one soft and gentle, the other quick and decided.

"Let's get down among the weeds, Fluffy," whispered Jazbury. "Then we can creep away."

The kittens ran, crouching, down into a dry gutter beside the road. There they were almost hidden by the dusty weeds.

"Oh, Sarah! They're running away!" cried the soft-voiced lady.

"I'll catch them!" said the other. She hastily clambered down from the buggy, and ran over to the side of the road and parted the weeds. When the kittens looked up they could see her big face above them looking down at them. Then her hands came down through the weeds, and caught them by the napes of their necks. One hand caught Jazbury and the other hand caught Fluffy. The hands lifted them out of the weeds and up into the air.

The kittens were very much frightened. Fluffy hung quietly, with his legs and tail curled up, and his head on one side, but Jazbury fought and struggled, and tried to scratch the hand that held him.

"Did you ever see such a little wildcat?" the lady called to her friend, as she carried the kittens back to the buggy.

"Here! Let's put them in a bag!" cried the other lady.

She dived down under the seat of the buggy and got out a big brown bag, and held it out with the mouth open ready for the kittens to be dropped into it.

A moment later and Fluffy and Jazbury found themselves in the bag, with the mouth of it tied tight, so that they could not possibly get out. The bag, with them in it, was laid in the back part of the buggy, and then the rumbling and thudding began again as the buggy drove on. The kittens were jolted and shaken about.

"Oh, Jazbury!" mewed Fluffy. "What do you s'pose they're going to do with us?"

"I don't know. We'll have to try to get out."

Jazbury began to tear and bite at the loose threads of the bag, but he could not make even the least little hole in the bagging. After awhile he gave it up and began to mew loudly.

"Mew! Me-ew-ew-ew!" he cried.

"Mew-ew! Me-ew-ew-ew! Mew-ew-ew!" cried Fluffy.

The buggy rumbled and jolted. The kittens mewed and mewed. Now and then they stopped and listened. Then they could hear the voices talking up above them. Then they would mew again louder than ever.

After a while the buggy stopped, and the bag with the kittens in it was lifted out and carried into the house. The bag was opened again, and the two big faces looked in on them.

"Did you ever see anything as dirty as the black one?" said the lady who caught them. "I hated to touch him. I know one thing; if I'm going to keep him, the first thing I'm going to do is to give him a good scrubbing with tar soap."

"Oh, Sarah!" cried the other. "You oughtn't to wash cats. You'll make him sick. Get the white one out for me, won't you? I'm afraid to put my hand in. I'm afraid the black one will scratch me."

Miss Sarah put her hand down in the bag, and lifted Fluffy out and gave him to her companion.

"Isn't he too sweet?" cried that lady. "He doesn't look a bit dirty, either. I'm going to take him right over home and give him something to eat. I expect he's hungry."

After she had gone, Miss Sarah closed the bag and carried it a while and dumped it down again. Jazbury heard her call, "Bring me a basin of water out in the shed, Hannah, and that tar soap from up in the bathroom closet."

Jazbury did not know what the words meant, but they frightened him.

A little later the bag was untied again and turned upside down, and Jazbury was shaken out of it. Trembling and frightened, he looked about him. He was in a shed. Miss Sarah was there, and another woman with a checked apron on.

"Poor little thing! He looks scared to death," said the woman with the checked apron.

"I know," said Miss Sarah. "I just hate to wash him, but I can't take him into the house till he's clean."

Then a terrible thing happened to Jazbury. Miss Sarah stooped and picked him up, and before he could catch his breath she had put him in a basin of water. He spit and mewed and fought, but she held him there. She splashed water over him, and she rubbed him with soap. She rubbed the soapsuds in around his ears, and over his forehead, and even down his little black nose. She soaped his legs and his body and his tail. Then she washed the soapsuds off. Last of all, she wrapped him in a towel and rubbed and rubbed and rubbed him.

By that time Jazbury was too miserable to fight. He only shivered and shook and mewed pitifully now and then.

"There!" said Miss Sarah at last. "That's about as dry as I can get you. You poor little thing! You shall have a good meal to comfort you."

She carried Jazbury into the house, and his fur was so clean that it fairly shone and glistened like black satin. "You're a real beauty," said Miss Sarah, "and I never would have guessed it when I picked you up in the road."

That's the way Jazbury began life in his new home. It was a very pleasant home except for one thing; Miss Sarah would wash him every now and then.

He had plenty to eat and drink. There were soft chairs and sunny spots to sleep in, and as soon as he was used to the place, and Miss Sarah thought he would not run away, he was allowed to go out of doors whenever he wanted to.

The first day he was allowed to go out he found there was a flower garden in front of the house. It was a fine place to play. Paths wound about among the flower beds. Bees buzzed busily from bloom to bloom, and bright butterflies floated about overhead.

Jazbury examined it all over. There was a paling fence between it and the garden next door. When Jazbury came near this fence he saw a little furry white face peering through at him between the palings. It was Fluffy.

"Oh, Jazbury!" he called joyfully. "I was watching for you. I hoped you'd come out soon."

"Why! did you know I lived here?"

"Yes. The lady that carried me away that day just took me in next door. I knew our yards were next to each other."

"Come on over," said Jazbury.

Fluffy squeezed through between the palings, and the two little kittens greeted each other joyfully. They rubbed noses and purred and purred. After that they began to play. They ran races along the paths, and tried to catch the butterflies, and had a fine time together.

At lunch time Fluffy had to go home, but he and Jazbury agreed to meet out in the garden every single day, unless it rained, and play together just as they used to do. It made Jazbury very happy to know he was to have his little friend living so near him.

X

It was a warm, sunny day in June.

The two little kittens had met as they often did, under a large blush rosebush in the garden. Jazbury did not seem as lively and playful as usual.

"What's the matter with you, Jazbury?" asked Fluffy. "You seem so quiet. Don't you want to play?"

"No."

"Why?"

Jazbury was silent for a moment. Then he said, "I've just had a bath again."

"Oh, Jazbury! Not again?"

"Yes, again. With water. And soap. And rubbed afterward. You know. I told you all about it."

"But, Jazbury!" cried Fluffy. "What does she do it for? Of course you _were_ dirty at first. You know you were. You really needed to be washed then. I don't believe you could have cleaned yourself, you were so _very_ dirty. But you don't need to be bathed now."

"Course I don't. I wash and wash myself. I wash every day. I wash myself just as much as you do. And I'm not going to stand being _scrubbed_ with water. No, I'm not."

"But what are you going to do about it?"

"I'll tell you what I'm going to do. I'm going to run away. _I'm going home!_"

Fluffy started.

"Oh, Jazbury! You're not--not _really_ going home? Where our mommas live?"

"Yes, I am. I'm going away tonight before she has a chance to wash me again."

"Oh, goody! goody!" cried Fluffy. "And I'll go, too. May I, Jazbury? I want to."

"All right. You meet me out here tonight when it's too dark for any one to see us. I'll be waiting for you."

The two little kittens were so excited over this plan that Jazbury grew quite cheerful again. How wonderful it would be to see their mothers again, and to play in their own back yards. They felt as though they could hardly wait to set out on their homeward journey.

XI

It was dark; the stars were in the sky, and the fireflies were flickering among the flowers of the garden when Jazbury and Fluffy met under the rosebush again.

"Are you there, Jazbury?" mewed Fluffy.

"Yes; waiting for you. Come on!"

The two little kittens stole down the garden path to the gate, and out into the road beyond.

"Are you sure you can find the way, Jazbury?" asked Fluffy.

"Now, Fluffy, you mustn't begin asking me that," said Jazbury. "If I begin thinking, we'll get lost. We've just got to go along the way I _feel_ like going, and then we'll get there."

The kittens were silent after that. They trotted along steadily through the starlit night. They had no trouble about keeping to the road, for kittens can see just about as well in the dark as in the light.

They came to the place where the ladies had found them that day that now seemed so long ago. After a while they passed a big white gate, and a long lane leading up toward a barn. There was a farm-house on beyond the barn. They heard a dog barking there.

"Oh, Jazbury! I hope that dog won't come and catch us," whispered Fluffy.

"Course he won't. He's too far away to see us."

The next moment the kittens stopped short, their little hearts leaping with terror. Something was moving stealthily among the weeds at the roadside. A dead twig cracked. There was a sound of breathing, and a gleam of big yellow eyes.

"What's that, Jazbury?" whispered Fluffy.

"Hus-s-sh! I don't know!"

There was a silence. "Jazbury, I'm scared. Let's get away," whispered Fluffy again.

"Hush, I tell you!"

The thing, whatever it was, was coming out from the weeds. Jazbury's tail grew big. His fur stood on end. The next moment a well-known yowl broke the stillness.

"Yowler!" cried Jazbury.

"Yeh! Yowler," answered that kitten, as he gave a leap out from among the weeds. "Hello, kits! I didn't know who you were until I heard you whispering together. Where are you bound for?"

"We're going home," said Jazbury. He was not at all glad to meet with Yowler again.

"Going home, are you! Well, now, that's not half bad. If you like, maybe I'll go along with you."

"But I thought you wanted to live on a farm," said Fluffy.

"Well, so I did, and I've been living there, but I don't have to stay in one place all the time."

"Don't you like it there?" asked Jazbury.

"Sure I did. Like it fine. Sure had a grand time. But I guess maybe the baker's looking for me, and I might as well go home. One place's just as good as another for me."

Neither Jazbury nor Fluffy wanted Yowler with them again, but they did not know how to tell him that.

"Well, let's go on," said Jazbury. "No use staying here all night."

As the three kittens trotted along through the starry darkness Yowler began to ask the kittens about where they had been living, how they had been treated, and what they had to eat.

"Had pretty good times, didn't you?" he said at last.

"Yes; but we like our own homes best!" mewed Jazbury.

Yowler was silent for a while. Then suddenly he burst out, "Tell you what! I said I liked it fine at the farm, but I didn't. They treated me mean. Never got a thing to eat but mice and rats, and had to catch everything for myself. They kept me in the barn, too, and if I even so much as poked my nose outside it the dog was after me. Wow! If I'd had a home like you two, catch me leaving it! But some kits have all the luck."

Fluffy and Jazbury felt quite sorry for Yowler. He must indeed have had a very hard time. But then, as Fluffy said to Jazbury later on, if he hadn't been so mean to them and run away and left them, he might have found a good home, too, just as they had, and have stayed there if he had chosen to.

XII

Mother Bunch and Aunt Tabby were sitting on the kitchen steps, feeling very sad.

It was a long time since little Jazbury had run away and left them, but they could not get used to being without him. Bitterly did they miss his fun and his liveliness and all his pretty ways.

"The quickest, strongest, handsomest kitten I ever had," said Mother Bunch.

"If I only hadn't boxed his ears that time," mourned Aunt Tabby, "maybe he wouldn't have run away."

"You mustn't let yourself think that," mewed Mother Bunch. "I guess we were both of us a little hard on him."

Suddenly there was a sound of scratching and scrabbling on the fence between the yard and the lot.

"Oh, if that were only little Jazbury," mewed Aunt Tabby sadly.

"Don't say that; you know it couldn't be," said Mother Bunch.

A moment later both cats sprang to their feet with a loud mew.

Above the top of the fence appeared a little black and white face, two white paws, a black body, a black tail waving like a flag. It was Jazbury.

He jumped down into the yard, and rushed up to his mother and Aunt Tabby. Fluffy followed him.

"Momma! momma!" he mewed. "Oh, Aunt Tabby! I'll never run away again. Oh, I'm so glad to be home!"

He and his mother and Aunt Tabby rubbed noses, and the cats kissed Jazbury, cat fashion, and mewed aloud with joy.

"And little Fluffy, too!" cried Mother Bunch. "Oh, how glad your mother will be to have you home again. She's so unhappy about you."

None of them noticed, at first, that Yowler had followed the other two kittens into the yard, and was now sitting over near the fence grinning at them.

"It was very, very naughty of you to run away, Jazbury," said his aunt. "We've been worried to death about you."

"I know," mewed Jazbury, "and I'm so sorry. But I'll never do it again, Aunt Tabby. Indeed I won't."

"I suppose you ought to be punished," sighed his mother, "but I'm so glad to have you back again I haven't the heart to do it."

At that moment Aunt Tabby espied Yowler sitting there grinning at them.

"Did you go away with that Yowler cat?" she cried. "Did you, Jazbury? Tell me at once."

"Well, yes, I did."

"I knew it! It's all his fault. S-s-st! Gr-r-r-r! Get out of here, you bad cat!" And Aunt Tabby flew at Yowler so fiercely that he gave a wild miaw, and flew over the fence and disappeared from sight.

"And don't you ever dare to come back again," Aunt Tabby growled after him.

And Yowler never did. Maybe he went back to the baker's, and maybe he left the neighborhood in search of a better home, but at any rate Jazbury never saw him again.

And now Jazbury and the two cats settled down on the kitchen steps together, and Jazbury told his mother and Aunt Tabby all his adventures ever since that early morning when he had stolen away from home.

Little Fluffy had already climbed over into his own yard in search of his mother, so there were only the three of them.

The two older cats listened eagerly to Jazbury's tale. "And I'll tell you one thing, Aunt Tabby," mewed Jazbury as he ended his story, "I learned to keep myself clean while I was at Miss Sarah's. You needn't ever bother over that again."

"Well, that's a good thing," replied his aunt. "Almost worth running away for, I should say."

"I don't know about that," sighed his mother. "I don't know whether even that was worth all the unhappiness he gave us."

And Jazbury felt very sad at the thought of all the trouble he had caused.

That night the kitten slept in his own cellar again, with his dear mother and Aunt Tabby, one on either side of him. How safe and warm and happy and sheltered he felt.

When his mother and Aunt Tabby awoke the next morning, however, Jazbury was no longer there.

"What _has_ become of him?" mewed Aunt Tabby. "He surely can't have run away again."

"Oh, no! Never think such a thing," cried his mother. "He has just gone on upstairs. Let's go and find him."

The two cats hurried up the cellar steps together. They found the door at the top already open. As they entered the kitchen they saw Jazbury dragging something in from the shed beyond. Something that was too heavy for him to lift.

"Jazbury, what _have_ you got there?" cried his mother.

Jazbury dropped the thing and ran over to her. "It's the rat," he said.

"The rat!" cried Aunt Tabby. "Not the rat that lived in the shed, and that I've been trying to catch for such a long time!"

"Yes, that's the one," mewed Jazbury.

The cats could hardly believe him. They ran over and examined the rat all over, sniffing at it.

"But how ever did you manage to do it?" cried Aunt Tabby. "Why, the creature's almost as big as you are."

"Well, you see, I _had_ to learn to catch big things in the wood," mewed Jazbury. "The rat didn't know that; he thought he could frighten me the way he had done before. So when I went out to the shed early--before you were awake--he came out to catch me; but I caught him, instead."

Then how his mother and Aunt Tabby praised and petted him! Not another kitten in the neighbourhood, not even Fluffy himself, could have done such a thing as that.

But Jazbury was not spoiled by their praises. "Any cat could have done it," he said, "if they could only have caught it. It was only because he thought he could frighten me that I had a chance to get him."

But from that time on Jazbury became famous as a mouser, and he kept himself so clean that when he grew up he was one of the handsomest cats in all the neighbourhood around.

THE END