eunice and kenneth were allowed to get up at six o’clock on christmas morning, if they would promise not to wake anybody else. but this was a very funny rule, because when they ran into the play-room where the stockings were hung, mother and grandmother were always there before them; and franklin, who had pretended to be fast asleep, would give a wild whoop from behind his door. this happened every time, and for years afterwards the striking of a match would set eunice’s heart beating, and she would think, “oh, it’s christmas, and six o’clock has come!” when it might not be christmas at all, and she would have to shake herself very hard to remember that she was grown-up.
[10]
this morning kenneth was the first to reach the play-room, and so it was he who first saw—but grandmother grabbed him by the seat of his legged nighty, and put her hand over his mouth, saying, “wait till eunice comes!”
it was then that eunice saw too, and gave a little squeal of delight,—the kind that she always gave when she saw one, although she had never seen one looking out of the top of a stocking before. and this one had a lace ruff around its neck. otherwise the stocking was just as usual, all bunchy, with a queer, fat foot made by the orange in the toe. but she could not believe that what she saw at the top of the stocking was true.
“bang!” went kenneth on one of his new noisy presents that franklin had given him; and “e-ow!” went the thing in the top of eunice’s stocking. then it was true after all!
“do take her out, quick!” said mrs. wood, laughing. “i’m so afraid she’ll stick to the candy elephant underneath.”
[11]
“there, i’m glad that’s over!” said grandmother, with a sigh. “i wasn’t up with her but seven times last night.”
“aren’t you going to look at your other things?” asked kenneth, blissfully sucking a hind leg of sugar dog.
“oh, mother, it has white toes!” eunice cried.
“say, mother, this is bully!” exclaimed franklin, from the other side of the room where his table was set. franklin considered himself too old to hang up a stocking now.
“my present for grandma’s on the breakfast-table,” kenneth explained. “it cost thirteen cents. eunice’s didn’t cost but nine.”
“and a white end to its tail,” said eunice.
“this book’s better than the one that other fellow had,” said franklin.
“and it spit at me—such a cunning baby spit! mother, did you hear it spit?”
“well, i believe that i’ll take another nap,” said grandmother, with a yawn.
[12]
“i’ll go back and get dressed,” said mrs. wood. “kenny dear, sit off that gum-drop, please. and don’t eat but three candy animals before breakfast.”
“eunice did!”
“never mind what eunice does. it’s your business to look after kenny. yes, mother, i’m coming.”
and before the children had really looked at all their presents, it was breakfast-time.
“what’ll you name your cat?” asked franklin over the oatmeal. all franklin’s rabbits had names, and could tell each other apart.
“i don’t know yet,” said eunice. “i think i’ll have to wait and see what her yell is.”
eunice had a language of what franklin called “yells,” in which she talked to all animals, and the strange part of it was that the animals seemed to like it. some of these yells were a kind of song, and others appeared to mean certain things which the animals understood.
[13]
eunice did not call her new christmas present “kitty, kitty,” but “wee-je-wee-je, wee-je, kim-um-sing!” which meant “come.” so in a few days the kitten was known as “weejums,” and eunice said that weejums had chosen the name for herself.
she was a very lonely little kitten at first, and spit at everybody who tried to feed her. but this was only because she missed her own[14] mother, and had not yet learned to trust these new friends. she wept nights, and her baby face sometimes had the look of quite an old cat, it was so sad.
“and she never smiled,” eunice said afterwards, “until i learned how to make that same pur-r-ow in my throat that the alley cat did.” then she decided that she had made a mistake after all, and that eunice was her mother.
she learned to come to eunice’s door every morning with a little soft “e-ow?” followed by a very fierce “wow!” if she was not let in. sometimes she came so early that eunice would be sleepy, but there was never any sleep after the kitten was in the room, for she was one of the dreadfully playful kind; whenever eunice moved her toes, she would spring at them, worrying the bedclothes with wide bites, and soft thudding hind-kicks. and if put down on the floor, she would leap back instantly to dab at eunice’s eyelashes, or tangle herself joyously in her hair, chewing very hard as the curls became caught in her teeth.
[15]
she never came to any other door, or spoke to any other member of the family, and seemed to know that she was eunice’s cat.
but she hated to be dressed in dolls’ clothes, and would switch her tail very hard, and sit down “back-to,” whenever dolls were mentioned. of course if she could have seen[16] how sweet she looked with her paws sticking out of a frilled sleeve, and her whiskers showing daintily against the dark blue of a velvet bonnet, she would not have minded at all. but she refused to look in the glass when held up to it, and only slanted back her eyes and ears in a bored way that eunice called “chinese dignity.”
one day mrs. wood was receiving some very elegant people in the parlor, when weejums came, or rather rolled into the room. she had on a sunbonnet, and a pair of dolls’ riding pants, which were so tight that her tail had to be curled around inside like a watch-spring. this gave her a most peculiar gait, as her front legs advanced in stiff hops, and her hind legs went to places that her front legs had not planned at all.
mrs. wood’s back was towards the door, and she did not see weejums until the senator and his wife began to laugh. then she pounced on the kitten and carried her out, feeling very much mortified, although[17] she knew that she should laugh herself when the callers were gone.
but weejums had reason to be glad that she had run into the parlor that day, for it put an end to the most uncomfortable part of the dressing-up. after this, mrs. wood forbade eunice to dress the kitten in any garment that was not built to contain a tail.
but weejums still took part in all the plays that eunice thought of, and even went coasting with her on the blue sled. her tail always swelled before they reached the bottom of the hill, but it went back to its normal size again soon afterwards, and she liked being pulled up the hill on the sled, without having to put her pink toes into the snow.
one saturday afternoon, the children all went to see “uncle tom’s cabin,” and came home talking very fast about topsy and eva, and the real bloodhounds, “as big as calves,” that chased eliza across the ice.
“there will be scenes from ‛uncle tom’s cabin’ in the nursery to-day, at four,” eunice[18] announced at breakfast one morning. “it will be the first appearance of weejums on any stage.”
mrs. wood said that she would come, and bring some ladies who were to call that afternoon, and franklin came, and brought some boys who were helping him build the new rabbit-house.
the price of admission was four pins; and cyclone, the dog, was tied near the door, with a pincushion strapped to his back for a money-box. cyclone whined and looked miserable whenever a pin approached, for he knew that he had a sign, “pay here,” fastened to his collar, and thought it meant that the pins were to be stuck into him.
when everything was ready, eunice threw open the folding doors between her room and the nursery, and said in a solemn voice, “first tableau. ‛of such is the kingdom of heaven!’”
the tableau was kenneth, standing in a high chair, buttoned into one of his mother’s[19] corset covers, which reached nearly to his feet. the grown-up audience was wondering what this had to do with “uncle tom’s cabin,” when franklin said, “oh, pshaw! that’s wrong. that part doesn’t come in yet.”
“it does so,” said eunice, putting her head out from behind the door.
“does so,” echoed kenneth from the high chair.
“aw, you mustn’t talk,” jeered franklin. “you’re nothing but the nightmare uncle tom saw in the last act.”
“ain’t either!” said kenneth, bursting a button off the heavenly robe, in his wrath. “i’m little eva.”
“it’s no fair talking,” said eunice. “mother, is it fair talking to the tableau?”
“let’s have the next scene,” said one of the ladies, applauding very hard.
“oh, yes,” said eunice, looking quite pleased. “the next scene is eliza crossing on the ice, pursued by the fierce bloodhound.”
eunice was eliza, and weejums was the[20] bloodhound, and the cakes of ice were newspapers spread on the floor. eunice, screaming loudly, clasped her doll to her bosom and jumped from paper to paper, then stopped and wiggled a string, and the fierce bloodhound followed, with gentle pounces and wavings of a tortoise-shell tail.
but when the audience clapped its delight, the tail grew so big with terror that you could scarcely see any kitten at all behind it, and dashed off the stage to hide under the nursery bureau. and the whole audience left their seats and crawled around on hands and knees with the actors, trying to coax the fierce bloodhound out.
but he wouldn’t come, and so they could not have any more scenes from “uncle tom’s cabin,” as weejums was to have taken the part of miss ophelia and any number of others. so the last tableau was announced as “a sorrowful widow weeping over her husband’s grave.”
eunice was the widow, with a red tablecloth over her head, which was the nearest she could[21] find to anything black, and kenneth was the grave, down on all fours, covered with a yellow lamb’s-wool rug. he was dreadfully warm and uncomfortable in this position, but behaved very well, until franklin gave a kind of snort and said, “ho, who ever saw a grave with panties on!”
then the grave turned a complete somersault, and lay there chuckling wickedly, while the sorrowful widow took off her red tablecloth and scolded him.
the audience went away then, and eunice found that cyclone had slipped the pincushion around under his stomach, and chewed all the bran out. and when weejums came out from under the bureau, she had to squeeze herself so flat that she howled all the way, and some black, yellow, and white hairs were left behind. but this was because she was getting to be a big kitten now, and could no longer have gone into a christmas stocking.
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