the hall as they went through it. When
they came into the paddock their ears became aware of a distant
high-pitched din; and the farther they went down it the louder and more
horrible grew the din.

Over the broad round face of Lady Ryehampton spread an expression of
suspicious bewilderment; Mrs. Dangerfield's beautiful eyes were wide
open in an anxious wonder; the piquant face of Erebus was set in a
defiant scowl; and Sir Maurice looked almost as anxious as Mrs.
Dangerfield. Only the Terror was serene.

"Surely those brutes I brought haven't got out of their cages," said
Sir Maurice.

"Oh, no; those must be visiting cats," said the Terror calmly.

"Visiting cats?" said Lady Ryehampton and Sir Maurice together.

"Yes: we encourage the cats about here to come to the home so that if
ever they are left homeless they will know where to come," said the
Terror, looking at Lady Ryehampton with eyes that were limpid wells of
guilelessness.

"Now that's a very clever idea!" she exclaimed. "I must tell the
managers of my other homes about it and see whether they can't do it,
too. But what are these cats doing?"

"It sounds as if they were quarreling," said the Terror calmly.

It did sound as if they were quarreling; at the door of the home the
din was ear-splitting, excruciating, fiendish. It was as if the voices
of all the cats in the county were raised in one piercing battle-song.

The Terror bade his kinsfolk stand clear; then he threw open the
door--wide. Cats did not come out. . . . A large ball of cats came
out, gyrating swiftly in a haze of flying fur. Ten yards from the door
it dissolved into its component parts, and some thirty cats tore,
yelling, to the four quarters of the heavens.

After that stupendous battle-song the air seemed thick with silence.

The Terror broke it; he said in a tone of doubting sadness: "I
sometimes think it sets a bad example to the kittens."

Sir Maurice turned livid in the grip of some powerful emotion. He
walked hurriedly round to the back of the home to conceal it from human
ken. There with his handkerchief stuffed into his mouth, he leaned
against the wall, and shook and rocked and kicked the irresponsive
bricks feebly.

But the serene Terror firmly ushered Lady Ryehampton into the home with
an air of modest pride. A little dazed, she entered upon a scene of
perfect, if highly-scented, peace. Twenty-three kittens and eight cats
sat staring earnestly through bar