"Poor Puss!" said Emma, opening the door and meeting the cat's green,
unabashed gaze. "Did it get shut up in the nasty dark larder, then?
Who did it, then?"

She was bending down with her back to William, stroking the cat in the
doorway. William seized his chance. He dashed past her and up the
stairs in stockinged feet like a flash of lightning. But Emma, leaning
over the cat, had espied a dark flying figure out of the corner of her
eye. She set up a scream. Out of the library came William's mother,
William's sister, William's brother, and cook.

"A burglar in the larder!" gasped Emma. "I seed 'im, I did! Out of the
corner of my eye, like, and when I looked up 'e wasn't there no more.
Flittin' up the 'all like a shadder, 'e was. Oh, lor! It's fairly
turned me inside! Oh, lor!"

"What rubbish!" said William's mother. "Emma, you must control
yourself!"

"I went into the larder myself 'm," said cook indignantly, "just
before I came in to 'elp with the greenery ornaments, and it was
hempty as--hair. It's all that silly Emma! Always 'avin' the jumps,
she is----"

"Where's William?" said William's mother with sudden suspicion.
"William!"

William came out of his bedroom and looked over the balusters.

"Yes, mother," he said, with that wondering innocence of voice and