"Hadn't any aunt!--you numskull. What has that got to do with it?"

     "Heaps. Because if he'd had one she'd a burnt him out herself! She'd a roasted his bowels out of him 'thout any more feeling than if he was a human!"

     Aunt Polly felt a sudden pang of remorse. This was putting the thing in a new light; what was cruelty to a cat might be cruelty to a boy, too. She began to soften; she felt sorry. Her eyes watered a little, and she put her hand on Tom's head and said gently:

     "I was meaning for the best, Tom. And, Tom, it did do you good."

     Tom looked up in her face with just a perceptible twinkle peeping through his gravity.

     "I know you was meaning for the best, aunty, and so was I with Peter. It done him good, too. I never see him get around so since--"

     "Oh, go 'long with you, Tom, before you aggravate me again. And you try and see if you can't be a good boy, for once, and you needn't take any more medicine."