"Move those kittens away, like a good chap," Baffin called out to me. "They’ll worry Prudence when she wakes up. Hates the silly beggars, you know." But to our surprise, when Prudence did wake up, she stretched forth a foot, and began to tease the plumpest of them with the point of her shoe. "Funny objec’s, ain’t they, when they’re fat and soft, like this?" said Prudence. "Breakable, ain’t they? No strength in their legs. On’y fit to lie on their backs an’ be tickled." And Prudence stooped down, and lifted the plump one into her lap. "Ooh, my! ’is little pores ain’t ’arf soft!" She spoke in the woman’s voice that we had heard but once before. "’Is little pores ain’t ’arf soft; you could bite ’em." She kissed a paw. "Ain’t ’e got a funny morsel of a nose. Sich a cheeky nose; such a teeny one. You could bite it. You—you——" She lifted the absurd little animal to her face, and rubbed her cheek against his cosy side, and she kissed his impertinent nose. "Oo’s a precious, then!" continued Prudence. "Oo’s a sleepy precious. My, ’e’s a sleepy little ’elpless little lump of fat! Ain’t you, boy? What price a see-saw, fat boy?" She held him so that he hung by his shoulders in an attitude that was not suggestive of dignity. And she dandled and bounced him in a manner with which kittens are not familiar. She lifted him to her face again, and made as if to kiss the nose once more. But the lips, half bunched for that purpose, parted suddenly, as if with pain—as if with wonder—as if with horror. The kitten slipped from her fingers, and fell with an indignant mew into the soft, warm haven of her lap. And Prudence’s hands went up to her startled face, and her hair fell over her like a shroud, and she sobbed as women sob. "Oh, Gawd!" she cried; "its eyes, its eyes! Its little, winkin’ eyes! Oh, mother, _mother_!" *XXV* *A TALK WITH JAMES* I had extinguished the flame of the doctor’s gas-stove, and was warming myself on the lid, when James burst in and interrupted me. "Come off it, like a dear, and listen," said James. "I’ve had a proposal!" I wondered, for a moment, whether this flippant manner of stating a serious fact did not call for some form of fatherly rebuke. But all that I actually said was: "Well, I hope you think you’ve started soon enough." "Started!" echoed James, regarding me with an air as of dignified amazement. "My dear young man, I _started_ years ago. Why, Baffin was my third; and Baffin began to woo me before I was eleven." "How long ago was that?" I meekly inquired. "Don’t you be rude," said James. "I take a grown-up size in almost everything. If Baffin perseveres, I suppose I shall really have to accept him—if it’s only to make him leave off wearing those New Art ties. But, really and truly, I’d rather not be married at all. I don’t believe I’ve got a married mind. I’m much too fond of rats."