p out,
but could not. The stuff was spongy and sticky and clingy, and he had now
sunk deep into it up to his stomach.

"What ever shall I do?" he thought to himself, when horrors! the kitchen
door opened and Diana, a big, fat darky with a red and yellow spotted
turban on her head appeared in the doorway.

[Illustration]

On seeing a little head looking at her from the pan of dough, she threw up
her hands in fright, turned and fled down the hall, calling, "Mis' Mason!
Mis' Mason! Come heah quick! Someone done gone and left a little niggah
baby in my bread dough!"

As she ran through the hall, Zip made an extra effort to jump out, but
instead of doing so, he upset the pan off the chair, and dog and dough
rolled on the kitchen floor together. Shaking off as much of it as he
could, Zip raced out the door, leaving a trail of dough behind him. He did
not dare get in the doctor's buggy in that mess, so he crawled under the
garden fence and ran down to the river, where he might wash himself off
before going home.

When the Mason cat saw him disappear under the garden fence, she went into
the kitchen to see what he had done to make all the noise he had just
before he ran out all covered with the white stuff. As she stood by the
pan smelling the dough to discover what it was, Diana and Mrs. Mason came
hurrying into the room. Not seeing anyone there but their cat, who was
standing right beside the dough, they of course thought it was she that
had caused all this trouble. So Diana grabbed up a broom and would have
pounded her to a jelly in her anger at spoiling all her nice bread dough,
but pussy was too quick for her. She saw what was coming and flew out the
door and hid under the currant bushes in the garden, from which place she
could hear Diana scolding and talking to herself as she cleaned up the
mess.

"I do declar' to goodness, I done goan to kill dat cat some of these days.
Just wait till I ketch her, I'll tie a peppah box to her tail!"

"Hark!" said the cat. "I wonder who is giving that long, penetrating
whistle. Oh, I know now whose dog that was! It was Zip, Doctor Elsworth's
pet fox terrier that everyone thinks so smart and that everyone is talking
about in the village these last few days because he found the silver the
burglar had stolen from the Judge. If I had known it was he, I would not
have pounced on him, but I was only half awake when I saw a dog trying to
sneak into our kitchen. It is a law with me to ju