In one
corner lived a ragged-plumaged Houdan hen, on which the boy
lavished an affection that had scarcely another outlet.
Further back in the gloom stood a large hutch, divided into
two compartments, one of which was fronted with close iron
bars. This was the abode of a large polecat-ferret, which a
friendly butcher-boy had once smuggled, cage and all, into
its present quarters, in exchange for a long-secreted hoard
of small silver. Conradin was dreadfully afraid of the
lithe, sharp-fanged beast, but it was his most treasured
possession. Its very presence in the tool-shed was a secret
and fearful joy, to be kept scrupulously from the knowledge
of the Woman, as he privately dubbed his cousin. And one
day, out of Heaven knows what material, he spun the beast a
wonderful name, and from that moment it grew into a god and
a religion. The Woman indulged in religion once a week at a
church near by, and took Conradin with her, but to him the
church service was an alien rite in the House of Rimmon.
Every Thursday, in the dim and musty silence of the
tool-shed, he worshipped with mystic and elaborate
ceremonial before the wooden hutch where dwelt Sredni
Vashtar, the great ferret.
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