wooden box and a note for “Miss Millicent Grosvenor.”

Oh, wow and wag everlasting—it’s the mongoose!

[Pg 71-73]

CHAPTER III

THE WHITE MAN’S WAY

Told by Tibbie, the Cat

AS this record of events at Dale End now enters on a phase demanding intelligence of a somewhat high order for its recital, I take up the tale at a point where Dan becomes incoherent. I admit I was greatly interested myself when Minkie, without waiting for Evangeline to do up her blouse, glissaded down the stair rail and rushed the cage into the morning-room. I had heard of mongooses from Tommy Willoughby, who lives in our road, as he had come across them when the Colonel commanded the Galway Blazers at Alexandria. He says they eat crocodiles’ eggs, and are therefore held in high regard by the Egyptians, and the Egyptians, judged by their treatment of cats, are evidently a sensible [Pg 74]race. Yet there are no crocodiles’ eggs at Dale End, fresh ones, that is, so I pity this poor stranger if Jim or Mole catches him dining in the hen-house. I tried a young Dorking myself once, and Jim behaved very unfeelingly with a whip.

A

[Pg 74]

Dan, of course, tore after Minkie with his mouth open, and his stump of a tail pointing north. I crept in noiselessly, and watched proceedings from beneath a wide and deep leather chair. I could see a thing like a big red rat behind some wooden bars which ran down one side of a soap box. The animal had a sharp muzzle, small paws with fairly useful claws, and a tail that was almost the size of the remainder of its body.

“A mongoose can fight,” I reasoned, “and its huge tail shows that it can turn quickly.” Dan, naturally, took no stock of these essentials. He was nearly beside himself with excitement, and Minkie had to grab him with one hand while she held Captain Stanhope’s letter in the other.

“Do be quiet, Dan!” she cried, shaking him. “Tibbie, where are you?”

[Pg 75]

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