About three o’clock on Christmas afternoon, Hogan’s rifle exploded
prematurely and killed a rabbit. The intense astonishment of McCue, Quinn
and Phelan nerved Hogan for more glory, and he fired at every tuft of
hill-weed until his cartridges were gone, and his temper too.
“Bad cess to me goon!” he shouted, “’tis twisted it do be, an’ I’ll thank
ye for th’ loan av yere piece, McCue.”
“G’wan,” said McCue, “’till I show ye a thrick!”—and he blazed away at
a rapidly vanishing cotton-tail and missed. Occasionally, firing by
volleys, they scored a rabbit to four rifles, and, at sunset, McCue
spread out a dozen or so cotton-tails on the newly fallen snow before the
door of the hill shanty. Phelan wiped his brow with the back of his fist.
“Phwere’s th’ naygur?” he demanded.
Hogan looked at his watch and began to swear, just as Cassius appeared
over the hilltop, a tin box under his arm, and on his face a smile of
confidence.
“Have ye th’ ould Tom!” demanded Quinn, as Cassius shuffled up and,
depositing the tin box on the doorstep, looked cheerfully around.
“Evenin’, gemmen, evenin’,” said Cassius, licking his lips and leaning
down to pinch the fat rabbits lying in a row; “Kinder cold dishyere
Chris’mus, gemmen. ’Spec we gwinter ’sperience moh snow——”
“Have ye the cat?” repeated Quinn sternly.
“’Cose I has,” said Cassius indignantly, “an’ I’se come foh de cash——”
“Phwat’s that!” snarled Hogan.
“Hould a bit!” interposed Quinn; “is the tom in the box now?”
“’Cose he is,” repeated Cassius; “yaas, sah, dasser mighty fine kitty,
dat is! Hit ain’t no or’nary cat, hit ain’t,—no sah. Dasser pole-cat,
sah, dat is!”
“’Tis a Dootch cat!” said Phelan.
“Sure Poles is Dootch, too,” observed McCue; “Phwat are ye waitin’ for I
dunno?” he added, scowling at the darkey.
“I’se lingerin’ foh mah cash,” said Cassius.
“G’wan!” said Phelan briefly.
Cassius turned an injured face from one to the other. There was a hostile
silence. Phelan produced a flour sack and threw the rabbits into it, one
by one.
“’Scuse me, gemmen,” began Cassius,—when an exclamation from Quinn
silenced him and drew the attention of all to a black and white object
advancing across the snow toward the shanty.
“Lan’s sake!” muttered Cassius, “pole-cat in de box gwineter draw all de
pole-cats in dishyere county!”
“’Tis a rabbit!” said McCue, seizing his gun.
“It’s a cat!” said Hogan, “d’yez mind th’ tail of ut!”
“Dat ain’t no cat,” said Cassius contemptuously, “dasser skunk.”
“Skoonk is it? An phwat’s a skoonk, ye black mutt?” demanded McCue.
At the same instant Phelan fired and missed; Quinn, paralysed with
buck-fever, clutched his rifle, mouth agape, while Hogan, in an access
of excitement, began shouting and kicking the darkey from snowdrift to
snowdrift.
“Now will ye grin!” he yelled; “G’wan home ye omadhoun!—”
“Leggo mah wool!” retorted the darkey, and rose from the snow with sullen
alacrity: “Wha’ foh yoh yank mah kinks?”
“Faith then, fur luck an’ bad luck,” said Hogan and followed McCue into
the deserted shanty.
A moment later, Quinn and Phelan came back after an eager but fortunately
fruitless quest for the game, and McCue and Hogan issued from the shanty,
bearing the tin box, ready to return to the barracks.
“Me heavy hand on th’ naygur!” growled McCue: “he’s gone, where?—I dunno,
but he’ll carry the bag o’ rabbits or me name’s not McCue! Call him,
Hogan.”
“Come out, ye bat-o’-th’-bog, ye! Where are ye now!—the Red Witch o’
Drumgoole follow ye?” shouted Hogan, tramping around the shanty and
poking under the steps.
“Lave th’ black scut,” said McCue with dignity, “I’ll carry the sack.
Have ye th’ sack?” he added, turning to Phelan.
“I have not,” said Phelan, “’twas there foreninst the shanty.”
“Now the red itch o’ Drumgoole on him!” shouted McCue. “Usha, musha, he’s
gone wid the sack, an’ divil a bit or a sup av a shtew ye’ll eat the
night! Sorra the rabbit he’s left!—me heavy hand on him an’ his!—may the
saints sind him sorrow this blessed night!”
“We have th’ ould tom in th’ box,” said Quinn, with a significant
flourish of his rifle.
“There’s no luck in it—Care killed a cat, an’ worrit the kittens.
Begorra!—I’ll kill no cat at all, at all!” replied McCue superstitiously.
“May the Dootch robbers choke whin they sup this night!” shouted Phelan;
“Wirra the day I set eye on the naygur an’ his Dootch whippets!”
“They’ll have no luck, mark that!—McCue!” said Hogan: “We’ve their Tom in
a box an’ they’ll have no luck!”
They gathered up their rifles in silence; McCue carried the box; one
by one they filed down the darkening hillside toward the village where
already a lantern or two glimmered along the stockade and the bugles were
sounding the evening call.
When the sportsmen reached the barracks, and it became known that
the Jägers’ tom-cat had been captured, the regiment went wild with
enthusiasm. It was decided not to open the box at once, because the cat
might hastily migrate toward the familiar barracks of the Jägers; but
Quinn, the prime mover in the capture of Thomas, was selected a delegate
of one to present the box to Colonel Bannon as a surprise and a Christmas
gift from the whole regiment.
So, that night, the regiment ate their Christmas dinner in eager
anticipation, and their hilarity was scarcely marred by Hogan’s report
that the Jägers’ barracks resounded with a joyous din of feasting and
song.
“May th’ banshee worrit thim! Let them be wid their futther—an’—mutther!
May the red banshee sup with them in hell!” said Quinn as he rose in
obedience to the orderly who said the Colonel would receive him.
He took the tin box gingerly, for the animal inside was very lively, and
he followed the orderly to the door of the messroom in the officer’s
quarters.
Here the orderly left him a moment but returned directly and whispered:
“The colonel knows it’s the Dootch cat ye have,—but ye’ll say ye bought
it. Sure he’s a dacent man, is Colonel Bannon, an’ no love lost betwixt
him an’ Fallback. Are ye ready now?”
“Yis,” said Quinn firmly, forage-cap in one hand, box in the other: “is
the rigiment outside on the parade?”
“It is, an’ ready to cheer.”
“Then in I go,” said Quinn.
The colonel sat at the head of the table, flanked by his staff and
line officers. His face, a little red with Christmas cheer, was
gravely composed for the occasion. His officers, to a man, beamed with
anticipation.
“Quinn,” said the Colonel.
“Sorr,” said Quinn, standing at attention.
“This is a very pleasant occasion,” said the Colonel, “and I am gratified
that my men have remembered their colonel upon this blessed day. I am
told you have a surprise for me, Quinn.”
“Yis sorr,—a cat, sorr.”
“A cat!” said the Colonel in affected surprise.
“We’ve lost our goat, sorr, but we’ll conshole our sorrow wid a cat,
sorr—Colonel Bannon’s cat if you plaze, sorr.”
The Colonel’s eyes twinkled.
“’Tis a dacent kitty, sorr,” said Quinn, undoing the rope that held the
lid; “a Dootch Kitty they do say from Poland, sorr, where we sint for a
dozen an’ this is the pick o’ them.”
The Colonel suppressed a smile; the officers gurgled.
“I have the spachless honor, sorr,” said Quinn, placing the box on
the table before the Colonel,—“I have the unmintionable deloight in
presinting to our beloved Colonel in the name av his beloved rigiment,
this illegant kitty!”
And he took off the lid.
There was a silence. Suddenly a long slender black and white creature
sprang from the box to the table, flourishing a beautiful bushy tail;
there came a yell, a frightful stampede, a crash of glass, a piteous
shriek from the Colonel under the sofa: “Quinn! Quinn! Ye murtherin’
scut! ’Tis a skoonk! Usha, but I’ll have yer life fur this night’s work!”
And Quinn, taking his nose firmly in both hands, pranced away like one
demented—fled for his life through the falling snow of that blessed
Christmas night.
* * * * *
In the barracks of the Jägers was song and jest and Christmas
cheer:—shouting and feasting and heart-friendships, and the intermittent
din of trombones.
Cassius, feeding to repletion in the kitchen with a bowl of rabbit stew
between his knees, paused to hold his aching sides because it hurt him to
laugh when he ate. Beside him on the floor, Thomas licked his whiskers,
and yawned and stared into the dying fire.