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Great Small Cat and Others

<h2 class="illo"> A MEMORY </h2> One frosty morning, by arguing, reproaching and beguiling in turn, we coaxed from under cover of a heap of rubbish in the alley, one of the dirtiest yellow and white gutter kittens ever seen; one that had been eyeing us timidly and insolently from the safe protection of his smelly hiding place for several days. Gaunt, miserably hungry and shivering with the cold, he did not respond to our overtures of trying to make him a mite happy on Christmas day, with the eagerness one would naturally expect. When he did condescend to come, his steps were very deliberate and he carried himself with a certain sad dignity as if he had found the cold world hopeless, and had shut his young heart against all trust. From his manner it was more to politely oblige us that he came at all, than because he wished a merry Christmas or even our acquaintance. By dropping our air of patronage and assuming a respectful one, we were finally able to cajole him to the doorstep and at last to the warmth [110] of the kitchen and a saucer of food. Although he was not a bit shy, it was plainly his first introduction into the interior of any house. He was a typical alley kitten, and probably a graceless one, born in the gutter with no pretensions to breeding or even good looks. But with all this, a lover of cats could plainly see that he was not a common "yeller cat" but had a superior strain of blood in his veins from somewhere. Young as he was, it gave him a distinct individuality which impressed us from the very first. His short life had in all likelihood been a hard one; probably he had been abandoned in infancy and obliged to make his own living by depredation, and knew only the cruelty and insult of a homeless alley existence. There may still be people in the world—civilized people—who do not care for cats, but we, liking all cats and fancying the calm dignity of this one in particular, were at once in hopes he would forsake his back-door haunts and come and live with us as our very own. As he looked wise enough to solve life's problem on almost any lines, we tried to tempt him to think seriously on all the comforts our home afforded and the life of ease and luxury it would bestow. We gave him feasts and promised him all sorts of other good things, if he would only abandon his former dissipated ways and stay with us. He was always such a very serious cat, never seeming to have a kitten's natural playfulness, not enough to even chase his own tail once in a while as most kittens do. We never could coax [111] him even under the most alluring temptation to be otherwise than grave and tolerant of our levity and as we had our little romps with him we called him in laughing sarcasm, "Jiminy Christmas." We had no idea of giving one so dignified this trifling name permanently, but he so quickly learned to respond to it, and as no other was suggested more appropriate in its place, it was gradually established as the regular name by which he was known. He surely was a most welcome addition to our household and we tried to make him feel this and to know that we were honored by his stay. Although he was growing fat and beautifully sleek and was most friendly, graciously accepting all that we gave, but giving very little in return, we noticed that he did not seem quite content and at ease, but was restless, as if some previous and neglected affair were on his mind and calling him elsewhere. There was nothing that we could actually complain of, still there was something comforting and permanent that was lacking in his presence. He was good—at least, part of him was good; but we had no idea, as we came to know later, of that other part that was, well—not so good. At the time all we could see was that something was plainly fretting him, something chafing him almost beyond endurance. After we were better acquainted we found that close beneath his gentlemanly exterior lay a veritable wild and vagabond nature, a vagrant ancestral strain that nothing could tame. His queer combination of inheritances was the cause of constant [112] strife in his nature, and the vagrant germ was likely to break out at almost any time into attacks of "spring fever," which would force all ties of the gentlemanly part to the wall and inevitably he would fare forth. We tried in every way to coax him into contentment and domestic ways, but the very fact that he was under surveillance and obliged to do things, even for our loving satisfaction, was irritating to him and made the "wild strain" chafe under the bondage. He seemed to try to please us as hard as we tried to please him, and appeared grateful and affectionate, but he could not hide that smoldering, hungry yearning in his eyes nor the fact that he was tugging continually at the chains of his restraint, waiting, listening and planning some sort of polite escape, respectability growing more and more irksome every day. Afterwards, when we came to know his besetting sin more intimately, we gave him credit for manfully putting up a good fight this first time against that vagrant embryo that was stirring an almost irresistible desire in his breast. The migratory instinct grew more insistent day by day, doubtless restrained for a time by a sense in his gentlemanly nature of certain obligations due us for our hospitality, but at last it was too much for his politeness even and with a hasty "good-bye" and a "thank you, ma'am, for your goodness" off he scampered somewhere out where he could be free, and into the uncertainty of his former tramp existence, but with the exquisite joy of liberty speeding his heels. [113] We felt very sorry and really quite culpable in not having been able to offer sufficient inducement to hold this tantalizing little vagabond. Although we did not wish him any misfortune, we did hope that if adversity should overtake him in the mysterious, hot, irritating madness of his desire, he would remember our hospitable roof, and come straight back to us. He must have had an unusually good time and turned himself loose recklessly, for it was many months before we saw him again, and when he did appear he had grown to full and magnificent cathood. He came to our door as an undoubted friend, bubbling over with vitality, every fiber in his body, even to his tail, buoyant with pride and action. He was still rather superior in manner and quite sure of himself and his reception, not that he would intrude himself upon us, but if agreeable to all he would "bide a wee." He looked as if the open road and the chase had afforded him more than a sumptuous living, for although well weathered by his tramp life, he was as chipper as ever and his muscles hard with a healthy well-fed leanness. Evidently, if we wanted this little savage at all we must accept him as a proposition and law unto himself. And we did want him, feeling sure that he was of the right sort, with merely a dash of mystery and adventure about him. He was made more than welcome, and his toes surreptitiously buttered according to ancient superstition, a process said to keep cats from roaming. He graciously settled into the old ways, accepting our love and forgiveness [114] as freely as it was given, and this time was good enough to stay with us for several months. As week succeeded week and he was still a contented member of our household, showing no signs of going his own way, we felt certain the talisman had worked and grew to be fairly sure of him. We really believed that the fleshpots of servitude had opened his eyes to the folly of his former disreputable ways, and that in pure physical content he would now settle down into the easy berth offered him and the tameness of domesticity. But it seems that this was only the "gentlemanly part," for the time being having a holiday, and that our assurance was a creation of our own desire and doomed to disappointment. The time came all too surely when he began to show a decided weariness of walls and a diminished appetite for things cooked, perking his ears with a curious, listening look in his dark eyes, as of constant, waiting expectation, listening to something calling from afar. The roaming strain in his blood ever ran true on its glorious course, and it was not long before his days were empty and life too unbearably dull under the ease of our, perhaps too lavish, hospitality. Much to our chagrin he plainly showed that he was weary to death of having to account for days, and being locked up nights. We recognized the signs and knew that this was one of his periods of utter revolt, when all clogging connection with civilization would prove too galling in comparison with the joys of the [115] open, and knowing the nature of the sledge hammer that was pounding in his breast, stood by and watched the struggle with amused interest. We were certain that we had given him the sense of the restfulness of a settled home with its comforts, and were also sure of having gained his gentlemanly gratitude and affection. But "you never can tell," and so we waited and wondered in curious uncertainty as to the outcome. Summer passed, and it was not until the leaves were smitten with frost and falling scarlet and gold in the autumn woods that Jiminy Christmas' vagabond blood tantalized him into faring forth. The free way in which the cheery chipmunks and the squirrels were scampering among the naked tree-tops, rattling the dry branches and sending a rain of nuts on his great playground, set the wheels of discontent to buzzing so fiercely in his roving nature that it actually hurt him to stay within bounds. We felt that if he were able to resist the merciless torment this time, he would indeed be a warrior worthy of laurel. In the end the lure of life in the open won; or was it the old militant alley and chummy gutters? But whichever it was, the summons proved too enticing, and so one evening, half-apologetically, as if dragging himself away from an almost overpowering temptation to stay, he rubbed his "Aufwiedersehen" about our feet. We watched him fade like a ghost into the surreptitious joy of the blue gloaming, carrying his tail with an air of regret and shame, but resolutely, and quickening his pace with every step, never [116] to be seen again until all hope had long been given up. As the months and finally more than a year passed and no prodigal returned, we feared that he had shaken the dust from his paws and the memory of our home from his mind, forever, and gone the final way of all such vagabonds. We were honestly puzzled over this wild independent streak in his nature, and naturally rather indignant over his lack of appreciation. Still, his next appearance was anxiously waited for and there was never a day that we did not look and hope that out of the mysterious everywhere, somehow, someway, this ungrateful cat would come back to the warm spots in our hearts, and the empty spot on our hearth that were waiting for him. One lovely morning, in the early spring, on going out on the back porch for a breath of the fresh morning world and a general survey of things blossoming, little did we dream of seeing our renegade. Yet there he was, sitting modestly on the very edge of the farthest corner, as if claiming nothing, nor asserting anything, but actually there, come back to us from the mysterious absence of a whole year. "And is it you?" was the rather scornful welcome he received. Naturally the feeble irony of this greeting was lost on him and he gave us a smiling "good-morning," with a "lovely day today" sort of expression, and our pleasure at renewing the acquaintance was as great as the surprise he had given us. We could scarcely believe our eyes, [117] but by this time we were getting used to this cat's "dropping in on us" how and when he liked. He was quite self-possessed, making what we considered a polite apology but no unusual fuss, ignoring this huge blank in his record and pretending it was but yesterday that he had stepped out to "look at things." His superb air of having no recollection and being so stolidly calm over it, and having no consciousness of anything to account for, was exasperatingly characteristic. But with all this, there seemed to be at first a questioning, wistful look in his wide-open eyes as they met ours. Not that he was at all humble; it was rather as if he were trying to fathom the depth of his depravity in our estimation: a guilty, uncertain, uneasy, self-conviction, as if feeling his way back into our goodness and esteem. Although he had made himself tidy, after the manner of cats, he looked as if this intervening year had not been entirely good to him. His disreputable appearance gave proof, that however gentle we had found him in peace, he must be terrible in war, for his glossy fur was soiled and shabby and in a pitiable state of rags and tatters, showing the scars of many a hard-fought battle, but honorable battles and honorable scars we were sure. Older now, and as one who had experienced hard, his calm eyes held in their dark depths the mystery of many a bandit night under the stars. He was like the "shabby genteel," doing his painful best to make the most of a decidedly disreputable appearance, ignoring all things that were [118] even suggestive of a blank page unaccounted for. He was still plucky and sublimely dignified in that impregnable reserve which even our kindness had never been able to penetrate, but there was something gone from his old-time militant buoyancy, and in its place a kind of desperate air, as of one who assumes a bravado of happiness he does not feel. This time he manifested a decided gratitude for all the good things that came to him. As his hollow skeleton filled out with good and regular food, and his relaxed sinews stiffened, we thought that at last the days of roving and the vagabondage of lusty youth were over and that he had come to a realizing sense of what a comfortable old age would mean. Surely now he would accept a trifling bondage for the sake of peace, rather than yield again to the vague uncertainty of irresponsible freedom and the disastrous results he had plainly experienced. The old love for the prodigal came back and he was reinstated with joy. But alas, the straight and narrow path seemed to have no charms for this incorrigible, and his case seemed hopeless. Just as his hollow curves were filling out into decent plumpness and his thick glossy coat beginning to look like an aristocrat's the symptoms of the inevitable "parting of our ways" were again apparent. It was the usual attack, violent and urgent, leading him to dare and defy all, even death, in following the beckoning call. It was mortifying to us that he should even occasionally prefer the low company of his alley [119] associates, and the shame of being a skulking gutter shadow, dodging abuse, but that he should have these periodical spells of the "inevitable interval," unconscious of any restraint, wandering and living as a tramp for months away from us, his ways and life entirely shrouded in mystery, was too exasperating even for our loving forbearance. In our wrath, we determined that if he went this time from our home, it should be forever. We had lost all patience with his delightful weakness and had at last made up our minds that if he could not be contented to remain this time, we would depose him everlastingly from our hospitality and erase him from our hearts, for we felt that we were wasting our affection and anxious sympathy on false pretenses. In our high estimation of him, we had given him credit for what was not there, and an appreciation far above what he had proven capable of. We were baffled and perplexed beyond endurance by this strange fascination which seduced him with such passionate persistence, driving him from our protection into great spaces in his life which were a sealed book to us. During all these years of our intermittent friendship, we were never able to solve this riddle. It was as if he heard some compelling challenge, like the sounding notes of the Pied Piper, calling and calling him from that far-off unknown, and try as he would to oppose it, his scandalous legs would eventually force their independence and get him there in spite of a hostile and honorable will. There was something so piteously appealing in the cat's evident [120] helplessness to combat these siren summons, which threw him into a white heat of daring, that it finally disarmed our antagonism. Resigned to what we had now found was inevitable we compassionately waited and watched, realizing the fierceness of the strife that was raging in his complex nature, and knowing that he was powerless to thwart it. This time the battle was a short one, for he had lost the shame of it, and had not the strength or desire to fight it. With no apology but with the steady, brooding look of a thousand defiant devils in his gray eyes, he soon made a hasty escape, the stiff hair lifting eagerly along the ridge of his back as he set out again on the long weary road that was forever drawing him from the narrow path of peace and rectitude. He had evidently sunk very low, even in his own estimation, for our last glimpse of him caught him adroitly dodging a shower of rocks well-aimed by the eternal small boy, ever on the lookout for such targets, as he disappeared over the alley fence. We gave him up surely this time and mourned him as dead, knowing that the pluck and endurance of youth was long past. His wandering irregular life had done its worst, weakening his one-time rugged frame that was wont to withstand so defiantly, the hardships and privations of a tramp life. <div class="figcenter"> <ANTIMG src="images/i-153.jpg" width-obs="350" height-obs="462" alt="" /> JIMINY CHRISTMAS, THE FREE SPIRIT Born Free, He Kept His Own Wanton Will Free from Enslavement to the End, Living His Own Life in Honor and Honesty in an Out-Doors All His Own </div> But he was not dead, and we were bound to see him once more from out the No-Where, and to have the satisfaction of knowing that this long trip was his last and his wandering days over. [121] It was during the wee small hours one silent, frosty night, that I was irresistibly drawn from my dreams and from my bed, and stepping to the window looked out on the sparkling space of what seemed to be the deserted roof, flooded in the unclouded light of the full moon. Quietly and with no sense of abruptness, came stealing on the heavy stillness of the night, a mournful, throaty wail of resignation from out the inky shadow made by the chimney. This desperate cry of the solitary cat sounded almost human, as if, seeing me standing there, and knowing that the icy doom had overtaken him, he just wanted to let me know the desolation of his helplessness. Peering into the shadow, I saw crouched there in a strangely pathetic manner, our wandering Ishmael, keeping a lonely night-watch and waiting patiently in the cold for—God knows what. He seemed dazed and terrified, crouching stiffly and staring about him with wide-open, frightened eyes. He must have known that the darkness was close upon him, for that one beseeching, throaty note, unspeakably human and forlorn, was all his uncomplaining wretchedness uttered. Answering to my coaxing, he straightened his fast stiffening limbs with an effort and dragged his poor weak body to my compassionate caress. He had changed pitifully during this stay away and was only a shadow of his former self physically. His pride and might were all gone, but he was a stoic still, enduring what he himself seemed to know was death, in silent, uncomplaining misery but with a green spark of terror blazing in his [122] fading eyes. I was glad that he had not crawled away to some secret place for the last great struggle alone, but had come to us and to our sympathy in his final need. I soon had a blazing fire and as he feebly felt its warmth, he made a pathetic effort to tidy his poor matted fur, in which he had always taken such pride, especially in our presence. But even a few licks of his tongue were too much for his failing strength, and he dropped limply to the rug. Once he turned his head wearily to me as if to express his gratitude and as if to say, "How glad I am to be here." Then his body relaxed, the terror faded from his eyes, and that was the end. He had answered the summons for his last journey and gone out into the darkness without even the grace of repentance. Only a cat! And one of the least commendable of all cats, and one that could not be called, even by his most ardent admirer, a worthy cat. Yet he possessed a personality, if not a soul, glowing with the great American burning impulse of liberty, and he has left a memory, not as a failure, but as one who made good. Born free, he kept his own free will to the end, living his own life in an out-doors all his own, free from enslavement and exultant in his freedom. He asked absolutely nothing of the world, but took what came his way with unassuming composure, rising above the temptation to yield his individuality in serving those he loved, cherishing somewhere in his plucky brain a pre-natal, God-implanted spirit of self-reliance to the end. [123] Is it against all religion that God might perhaps let such a pagan bundle of unrepentance into Somewhere? Suaviter in modo, fortiter in re. <div class="poetry-container"> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Is there aught of harm believing That some newer form receiving, They may find a wider sphere, Live a larger life than here? </div> <div class="stanza"> That the meek appealing eyes Haunted by strange mysteries, Find a more extended field, To new destinies unsealed? </div> </div></div> [124] <div class="blockquot"> HERE ENDS THE GREAT SMALL CAT, AND OTHERS, BEING A COLLECTION OF SEVEN TALES FOR CAT-LOVERS, BY MAY E. SOUTHWORTH, THE TYPOGRAPHICAL APPEARANCE DESIGNED BY JOHN SWART, PUBLISHED BY PAUL ELDER AND COMPANY AND PRINTED FOR THEM BY THE TOMOYE PRESS, SAN FRANCISCO, NINETEEN HUNDRED AND FOURTEEN. </div> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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