142 BEYOND THE PASTURE BARS 



The squirrels do not know to this day that Cal- 

 ico is not their real mother. From the first they 

 took her mother's milk and mother's love as right- 

 fully and thanklessly as the kittens, growing, not 

 like the kittens at all, but into the most normal of 

 squirrels, round and fat and splendid-tailed. 



Calico clearly recognized some difference be- 

 tween the two kinds of kittens, but what differ- 

 ence always puzzled her. She would clean up a 

 kitten and comb it slick, then turn to one of the 

 squirrels and wash it, but rarely, if ever, complet- 

 ing the work because of some strange un-catlike 

 antic. As the squirrels grew older they also grew 

 friskier, and soon took the washing as the signal 

 for a frolic. As well try to wash a bubble. They 

 were bundles of live springs, twisting out of her 

 paws, dancing over her back, leaping, kicking, 

 tumbling as she had never seen a kitten do in all 

 her richly kittened experience. 



I don't know why, but Calico was certainly 

 fonder of these two freaks than of her own nor- 

 mal children. Long after the latter were weaned 

 she nursed and mothered the squirrels. I have 

 frequently seen them let into the kitchen when the 

 old cat was there, and the moment they got 

 through the door they would rush toward her, 



