Of course Meg’s attention was held at once.

“Where did you get any kittens, Charlie?” she asked, half inclined not to believe him.

Charlie wriggled along the ground till he was a safe distance from Bobby, then scrambled to his feet.

“A man gave ’em to me,” he said. “He wants me to drown ’em!” and away he skated as fast as he could go.

“Bobby!” Meg almost screamed. “Bobby! don’t let him drown the kittens.”

Meg was, as her family said, “crazy” about all animals, and kittens were her special delight. But then Bobby didn’t like the idea of drowning four helpless little cats in the icy cold water of the pond, either. He started after Charlie Black, and Meg went after him and really 142 wished she didn’t have a new dress for a moment because she found the box a nuisance to carry.

Charlie could skate fairly well, but that was when he was watching where he was going. This time he was watching Bobby instead and as a result he failed to see a curb and went over it with a jolt that landed him on his knees. Before he could rise, Bobby and Meg had caught Up with him.

“Where––are––the––kittens?” gasped Meg.

“In a bag,” Charlie answered sullenly.

“You give them to us,” said Bobby sternly. “If no one wants them, we can take them home.”

“The man said to drown them––they’re his cats and I guess he has a right to say what he wants done with them,” Charlie retorted.

Meg thought about this a minute.

“I’ll go see the man,” she announced calmly. “Where are the kittens?”

Now whether Charlie really didn’t want to drown the little, soft helpless kittens, or whether he was afraid of Bobby––perhaps his reasons were mixed as reasons often are––no one knew. But he said that Meg and Bobby could come 143 home with him and he would give them the kittens.

The bag was in the woodshed and it was such a dirty old bag––made of canvas that looked as though it had been carried for years and never washed––that involuntarily Bobby held it at arms’ length from him.

“They won’t bite you,” said Charlie scornfully, thinking he was afraid of the kittens––they could be heard mewing inside the bag.

“What is the man’s name and where does he live?” Meg asked quietly.

“Ah, I was only fooling––he doesn’t care what happens to those old cats,” said Charlie. “It’s Mr. Fritz––over on Beech Street. He’s cross enough anyway without being asked a lot of extra questions.”

But Meg was determined to see Mr. Fritz and she made Bobby go around to Beech Street with her.

“It’s just as Charlie said––they are his kittens,” she argued. “And of course if he says they have to be drowned they have to be: only we won’t do it.” 144

“Don’t you want to look at them?” asked Bobby, swinging the bag gently.

Meg shook her head.

“Not if somebody has to drown them,” she said.

Mr. Fritz lived in a large old-fashioned house, set back from the street. When the children rang the door bell a deaf woman who did all the housework for him––he was an old bachelor––came to the door.

“We don’t want to buy anything,” she declared, frowning at the bag Bobby was carrying.

“We’re not selling anything––these are kittens,” Bobby explained, but without raising his voice. He didn’t know she was deaf.

“What did you say?” she asked.

“Kittens!” Bobby repeated, a little more loudly. “Mr. Fritz’s kittens.”

“He wears gloves,” said the maid crossly. “And my bread is in the oven and I can’t be bothered.”

Meg stood on tiptoe and shouted.

“Is Mr. Fritz home?” she cried. 145

To her dismay a deep voice somewhere back in the house answered her.

“That he is,” it said. “Won’t you come in?” and there stood Mr. Fritz himself, looking at her curiously.

Bobby with the bag and Meg with her dress box, stepped inside and the maid closed the door. That made the hall so dark that poor Bobby, unable to see where he was going, but moving ahead blindly, walked to the basement stairs and made the most fearful clatter as he lost his balance and fell half way. He managed to catch one arm around the banister rail and check his descent, but the bag of kittens went all the way.

“Bobby! Are you hurt?” Meg called fearfully.

“Bless me, child, I hope you haven’t broken anything,” said Mr. Fritz anxiously.

Bobby felt his way to the bottom of the stairs and found the bag.

“Not unless I smashed the kittens,” he said cheerfully, toiling up again.

Mr. Fritz opened the door of a room at the 146 back of the house and enough light came out to show Bobby and Meg how to go in. Once inside they found it was evidently Mr. Fritz’s sitting room. It was rather untidy, but comfortable and warm, with books and papers spread about.

“Now what can I do for you?” said Mr. Fritz, looking at his visitors very kindly and trying not to show that he was surprised to see them.

“I’m Bobby Blossom,” Bobby introduced himself, “and this is my sister Meg. We came to ask you if you would care if your kittens weren’t drowned.”

“Eh? My kittens––not drowned?” repeated Mr. Fritz. “But they are––I gave that Charlie––what’s his name––Black, I gave Charlie Black fifty cents to drown them for me this afternoon.”

Meg looked ready to cry. Any one that paid to have kittens drowned, must, of course, get what he paid for.

“He didn’t say you paid him,” Bobby said slowly. “Meg and I thought perhaps you wouldn’t care and we could keep them.”

“Are those the kittens in that bag?” asked 147 Mr. Fritz. “Do you mean to tell me that worthless boy hasn’t done anything with them? And he sends them back to me? Wait till I catch him!”

“Oh, he didn’t send them!” Meg cried in quick alarm. “He told us he had them and Bobby and I wouldn’t let him drown them. Then he said they were your kittens and you wanted them drowned. And of course you can do anything you want to with your kittens, but I thought you wouldn’t mind if we kept them.”

Mr. Fritz nodded his head several times.

“I see,” he said at each nod. “I see––you want to save the kittens and let them grow up and howl on the back fences. Well, I think there are enough cats in this world already. But as long as I don’t have to take care of the kittens, it makes no difference to me what becomes of them. You may have them, if you wish.”

Meg thanked him and was ready to go, but Bobby had something else on his mind.

“Do you want that fifty cents back from Charlie Black?” he asked.

“You could get it for me, I suppose,” Mr. 148 Fritz said with a laugh. “No, Bobby, let him keep his fifty cents. After all, he earned it, for the stipulation was that he was to dispose of the kittens. I didn’t say they must be drowned.”

Mr. Fritz shook hands with Bobby and Meg and asked them to come and see him again. He went to the door with them, which was fortunate for the hall was so dark Meg was afraid Bobby would fall downstairs a second time, and watched them go down the gravel path.

“We’ll have to hurry,” said Bobby. “Mother will wonder where we are.”

The twins saw them coming and their sharp eyes spied the bag the first thing.

“What have you got, Bobby?” shrieked Dot. “Bobby, what’s in the bag?”

“You needn’t tell the neighborhood,” Bobby said a little crossly, for he was tired, “but kittens are in it.”

“Kittens!” Twaddles shouted, leaping ahead to spread the news.

“Mother!” he called, racing into the house. “Oh, Mother, come and see the kittens Bobby has in a bag!” 149

Mother Blossom and Aunt Polly and Norah came into the hall and Bobby sat down on the rug, with Meg and the twins almost on top of him.

“They’re four,” he explained as he began to untie the string that was knotted around the bag. “Charlie Black was going to drown them for Mr. Fritz, but he said Meg could have them. Maybe they are pretty.”

He turned down the bag and a black kitten walked out. Then a gray and white one. Then a yellow one and next a striped “tiger” kitten.

Norah started to laugh.

“Four, is it?” she giggled. “Then I must be seeing double, Bobby, for there’s six already and––yes, here’s another––that makes seven!”

Well, there they were––seven kittens, none especially fat and none especially pretty, all “just kittens,” as Twaddles named them.

But Meg thought they were lovely and she was anxious to take them out to the garage and give them some warm milk. The garage was always chosen as a good place to feed stray animals, for the cement floor could be more 150 easily washed than the linoleum that was the pride of Norah’s heart in the kitchen.

“Meg, darling, we simply cannot keep all those kittens,” Mother Blossom declared regretfully. “Seven kittens are a great many and I don’t believe Annabel Lee will welcome so much company.”

“But, Mother, we can’t drown them!” said Meg, her eyes round with horror. “We have to take care of them.”

“I think you children will have to find homes for them,” Mother Blossom announced. “Think over all the folk you know and try to find homes for these homeless little cats. That will be something for you to do, too, Dot and Twaddles.”

“I’m going to think now,” said Twaddles, sitting down on the lowest step of the stairs.