Page:Rootabaga Pigeons by Carl Sandburg.pdf/216

 whispered halfway between yes and no, always hesitating and nothing else.

"The bye-low is whistling his bye-low and bye-low again," Peter said to herself with a murmur. "It is spring in the tall timbers and over the soft black lands. The hoo hoo and the biddywiddies come north to make a home again. The booblow blossoms put their cool white lips out into the blue mist. Every way I point my ears there is a bye-low whistling his bye-low and bye-low again. The spring in the timbers and black lands calls to the spring aching in my heart."

Now the three whispering cats heard what Peter Potato Blossom Wishes was murmuring to herself about the spring heartache.

And Hannah, the yes-yes cat, answered yes-yes. Hannah More, the no-no cat, answered no-no. And Susquehannah, the stuttering cat, hesitated halfway between yes-yes and no-no.

And Peter rubbed their fur the right way, scratched them softly between the ears, and