up, you lazy thing,' she refused to be
shaken off till his body was actually dragging on the floor, a sign of
his complete humiliation. As soon as he threw off his unwelcome
burden, Jett always ran away to hide. With his tail slinking, his ears
drooping, and crawling rather than walking, he was the most
abject-looking, miserable cat in existence. Bessie meanwhile flirted
herself saucily and chuckled with the conscious air of having done a
very smart thing."

CHAPTER VI

THE PARROT AT A PARTY

A parrot there I saw, with gaudy pride
Of painted plumes, that hopped from side to side.

"How did you happen to get away from the Morrises?" asked my brother.

The red-bird laughed heartily, as if the recollection were exceedingly
amusing.

"Well," said he, "it all came about through Johnny's having a tea
party. For months he had been coaxing and begging his mother to invite
his schoolfellows to the house and entertain them with games and plays
and music, ending with a fine supper. Early in the spring when he
began talking of it, it was too cold, his mother said. Then after a
while it was too rainy, or too warm, or they were house-cleaning, or
something, and so she kept putting him off from one time to another,
hoping by deferring it to make him forget it. The Morrises always
spent the month of August at their seaside cottage, and the night
before they left home, Johnny tried to get Mrs. Morris to promise that
he might have the party the very first thing on their return.

"'I'll think about it, my dear,' she answered.

"'Whenever you say you'll think about it then I'm pretty sure not to
get what I want,' sighed Johnny."

[Illustration: The Summer Tanager.]

"His mother seemed to be much amused at this statement. 'Oh, no, my
son, it doesn't always turn out that way; but you know it wouldn't do
for me to promise to have it just as soon as we get back,' she
objected. 'I am always very busy just at our return. It might be very
inconvenient for me to prepare for a children's evening at that time;
but when I am ready I shall take pleasure in getting up a nice party
for you sometime in the autumn.'

"This sounded well, but it was not definite enough to suit Johnny.
However he said no more at that time. While the family were gone
Bessie and I had the back porch to ourselves, and no one being there
except the housemaid to whom she could display her superiority over me,
she grew to be quite agreeable.