Read Ebook: The Cat by Hunt Violet Birkenruth Adolph Illustrator

Font size: 10 px 15 px 20 px 25 px 30 px 35 px

Background color: BlackWhiteGrayLight GrayDark GrayDim Gray

Text color: BlackWhiteGrayLight GrayDark GrayDim Gray

Apply/Save settings

Ebook has 742 lines and 51164 words, and 15 pages

BY ADOLPH BIRKENRUTH

Loki

The milk ran down the creases to the floor

She used to stand on her hind legs and look at the painting

Out of that dog's way, at any rate

Auntie May took me across her shoulder

I played with shavings for about an hour

A black cat brings good luck to a theatre

I did not want to see any one of them again

Mistigris used to lie in wait for me

'I believe we shall have to make up a bed on the stones,' she said

That boy was rough and played experiments with him

She married Mr. Fox in less than a month

THE CAT

THE NURSERY

The first sound that I heard--for I wasn't born deaf as well as blind--was the voice of Rosamond, a little girl who lives in our house sometimes, screeching at the top of her voice, 'Oh, Auntie, Auntie May! Petronilla has got her kittens! Hooray! Hooray!'

My mistress came running upstairs two steps at a time, and put her foot through her dress--I heard it rip. Then she leaned over us, for I felt her breath on my face, and said in a voice quite gurgly with pleasure, 'Brava, Petronilla!'

Then another voice--I learnt afterwards that it was the voice of the parlour-maid, a good soul and as fond of cats as Auntie May--said, 'They look just like so many grey boiled rags, don't they, Miss?'

'Oh, p-p-please, Auntie May,' began Rosamond, stuttering in her eagerness, 'mayn't I take one out to look at it?'

'Certainly not. How dare you propose such a thing! Go and do your health exercises. Petronilla is to be left entirely alone and not bothered.'

'Quite right, Miss Rosamond!' said Mary; 'I've heard say that if you watch her she'll do them a mischief. I knew a cat what ate all her kittens--'

'Ssh, Mary, I am sure Petronilla would not do such a thing. She isn't a common cat. But I tell you what she will certainly do if she thinks we are going to touch them or take them away from her--she will hide them. She knows it isn't good for them to be handled. You have no idea of the amount cats know, and though Petronilla is only four years old, she knows as much as the best nurse ever did. Now be off, all of you, and leave her alone!'

All very well, but Mary the maid simply couldn't keep away, and about three days after this she came in to dust the room ; and when she had done dusting, she bent down and took us all out one by one, and examined us till she was sure to know us again. Mother looked at her reproachfully, but did not lift a paw to her, for she knew Mary was a dear good creature, and, though silly, would sacrifice her life for a single grey hair off mother's head, or indeed a hair of anywhere off her, and she once said so. But when Mary had gone she took a decided line, and said that she was determined to make an end of all this fingering and pawing of young limbs, which would certainly prevent them from growing and developing properly.

There was a large press with low flat shelves in a corner of the room, full of Auntie May's clothes, that just suited her purpose. She took us all up, one by one, carefully, in her mouth, keeping her teeth back somehow or other not to hurt us, though she could not help making us most disagreeably wet, and carried us along to the cupboard, bumping us as little as she could help on the floor, but still she did bump us. Then with one of us in her mouth, she jumped up to the shelf she had chosen--having first opened the folding doors of the cupboard with her paws--and laid him or her carefully down in the corner, and so with us all.

When Auntie May came up to find her clothes for going out, she discovered us. Mother purred at once to disarm her, for it was known that Auntie May could not manage to be really cross with dear Pet for long, IF she purred.

And she took us all out quite gently, not hurting us half so much as mother did in bumping us along the floor, and put us back into our bed of fresh hay, that we have to lie in so as to make us smell sweet. Auntie May always says that very young infant kittens are like babies, and need beautiful accessories, such as blue bows, and green hay, and white powder puffs.

They fastened the wardrobe door very tight and strictly forbade Mary to touch us, and for many days after this we just lay still and ate--ate--ate! Mother, however greedy we were, never pushed us away. She was like a soft hill of wool that we had leave to lie up against and browse upon. Every now and then she spread out her paws, which were like silver streaks, wide and square, all over us, not heavily, so as to weigh us down, but lightly, like a sort of lattice that kept the cold draughts off us, and that we might fancy to be a wall or a hedge between us and the world if we liked.

It was the great advantage of mother's being a pet cat that she and her family lived in the house, not in a cattery, as they are called. Mother knew very well what a cattery was like--she had been in one before a man bought her and gave her to Auntie May as a present. She cost three guineas, she said. It was a very nice cattery, as catteries go--she admits that--and she will always look upon it with affection as being her first home, but still there was a lot of difference between it and Auntie May's house. A cattery has generally hard trodden-in earth for a floor, without a carpet, except for a few unhemmed bits spread here and there. There's generally an old chair--wooden--to scrape your claws on: now velvet, such as is kept here, mother says, is much more interesting and efficacious. The bed is inside, under cover--I grant you that--but only made out of a few old packing cases, and there is generally a horrid smelly oil-lamp to warm the whole place. Now Auntie May had us in her own bedroom for the first week of our lives, and when she did move us, it was only into her study. She was an authoress and had to have a study; at least her father, who was a distinguished painter and R.A., and adores his daughter, thought she had as much right as he to have a studio--same word as study. 'She sells her books, and I don't sell my pictures!' he said. Her study was quite nicely furnished and full of bureaus and manuscript cupboards and high things to perch on. Mother says it is advisable when choosing a perch to get as high as possible, because of the draughts that run along the floors of even the best rooms.

Mother told us many things as we lay there, but I can't say I took much notice of them till my eyes opened. It was just a nice sleepy sound she made that sent us off to bye-bye one after another. I suppose she slept herself, but I never remember being awake when she wasn't. She was a very good mother; she hardly ever left us. Of course she got out of the bed to eat her meals; she detested crumbs in the bed, and so on. If she went away she always came back with a kind sort of speech--Rosamond called it a mew--something like 'Here we are again!' or 'Well, how goes it, infants?' and then lay down right on the top of us. Rosamond used to scold her and pull her off us, thinking she would hurt us; she didn't know that we were always able to ooze away from under mother quite easily when once she had turned round three times and got settled.

Till my eyes opened I did not know how many brothers and sisters I had, except for mother's telling me. I fought them all without having the slightest idea of the sort of thing I was fighting. I knew it had claws, though. I knew that Fred B. Nicholson, as they called him afterwards, after Auntie May's American cousin, was a regular bully from the beginning, always putting himself forward, and shoving us away from the best places. After all, eating is everything in those first days, and mother was singularly weak where Fred was concerned, and let him batter us as much as he liked, and never took our side against him. She only said 'First come, first served!' and 'Heaven helps those that help themselves!' and certainly he did grow a great strong boy.

Perhaps that was the reason why his eyes opened first!

Rosamond gave us a great deal of attention when her own lessons were over, and before, and hung over us till she got all the blood to her head, she said. She called herself cat-maid. One day when she was leaning over our bed, she suddenly jumped up and screamed:

'Oh, Auntie May, one of them--I don't even know which, but I think it is Fred B. Nicholson--has got a tiny, tiny slit where his eyes ought to be! Do you suppose he can see?'

'I should be very sorry,' mother said, 'if any of you turned out to have green eyes. That would defeat all poor Auntie May's plans. I have green eyes myself, alas! and she is most good to overlook it in me, but your father has the most beautiful golden eyes in the world, or in any cat-show, and let us hope that you will have the luck to take after him!'

Fred began, the others followed. My eyes were the last to open. I suppose I had caught cold; I am sure I was not delicate. They took warm milk and mopped the place where the eyes ought to be. Mother licked me. They raced to cure me. Mother always said that she backed her licking, but I fancy the warm milk did it, myself. And pretty soon I saw. We all saw, and so when we quarrelled we managed to aim better.

'Poor child!' she said, 'he is taking up his burden early. They mostly don't expect recognition from us until we are older. Don't, don't purr too easily, my son; be chary of your gift: it is wiser.' But Rosamond buried her face in me and mother, so as to hear better, and presently she raised it and called out to Auntie May, who was sitting writing at her little table:

I purred till my throat was sore, and she stroked my back and tickled my stomach till I had to curl up and bring my hind legs and my head together. They think you do it because you like being tickled, not because you can't help it. I purred so much that day that I had to take a rest the next, and then They said I was sulky!

I knew mother never said a thing like that without being able to prove it, so I was a little surprised one day at what one of Auntie May's friends said. This man took Fred up and handled him as if he didn't know much about kittens. I watched him. His moonface had a queer little smile much too small for it--a sly smile.

'Touch of Persian about this cat, I should say!' he observed quietly.

After he had gone, mother boiled with rage.

'I won't stand this!' she exclaimed. 'Come along, my traduced darlings, with me, and we will hide you, lest you be again exposed to insolent criticism of that kind. Touch of Persian indeed! Perhaps he thinks Persians haven't claws! Perhaps he thinks we cannot resent injuries adequately! Come, my pure-bred doves! Come, my prize darlings, my pedigree'd angels!'

The door into Auntie May's bedroom next door was left open. Mother carried us in one by one and laid us on the ground under the famous cupboard we had been in before, while she leaned up and, with her paw, turned the handle of the cupboard door. Then she seized me and jumped with me on to the bottom shelf and stowed me in one corner, pulling the clothes and what not that was there all over me, so as to hide me completely. She then left me, recommending me to silence, or I should get 'what for' with her hind feet, and fetched the others one by one. She placed them all on different shelves--I saw her leap past me each time--and stayed herself with Fred, for I did not see her go past again. That was a long jump, for it took her right up to the fifth shelf.

All the afternoon we lay there, mother visiting us all in turn. Unfortunately, she had not been able to succeed in closing the wardrobe door after her. It yawned in the most suspicious manner, and so Auntie May thought when she came back from Pinner, where she had gone to dine and sleep, as soon as Mr. Blake had departed. About eleven o'clock the next morning she came bouncing in in her hat and jacket, and the moment her eye fell on the open door she cried out:

'Oh, my prophetic soul! Come here at once, Rosamond, or you will be sorry!'

She opened the door wider and looked in, but, naturally, could see nothing.

There were five of us, and, so far, only Fred B. Nicholson had been christened. Rosamond, who is a child who loves putting things into their right places and calling them by their proper names, pointed this out to her Aunt.

This was the first I heard of it. From that day the thought hung over me that our pleasant little party would have to be broken up. I wondered if I could possibly contrive to be the one They kept. I could not bear the idea of moving to a new home. But mother said it was the law of nature. Her motto was from a poem of Miss Jean Ingelow that Auntie May had once quoted--

She never worried--much, though she confessed at first it was rather trying, and that she caught herself wandering about looking into corners, searching for what she knew went away in a basket the day before. It was just a habit mothers got into, and when a few weeks had elapsed she just shook herself and thought no more of the kitten that had gone to make its mark on some one else's chair cushions. 'Dear me!' she used to say, 'I have on an average five kittens a year. What should I do with them all hanging about, getting in my way at every turn? I should become irritable, I should snap at them, I should positively hate them as soon as they became independent and I could do nothing for them. It is best as it is.'

After that speech of mother's, I was not so sure that I wanted to be the kitten They chose to keep, that is, if mother meant to turn round and bully me as soon as I could stand up for myself. It seemed strange to hear her talk like that, and yet one likes to be forewarned.

Rosamond gave us temporary names--reach-me-down names, she called them. Fred B. Nicholson was allowed to stand; the boy Auntie May called Admiral Togo, a Japanese name, I understand. The two girls were Zobeide and Blanch. I was called Loki, after the devil.

They did not know, but we all had one name already, a traditional one in our family. It was Pasht. Our ancestors lived at a place called Bubastis. For convenience' sake, however, we stuck to the names They gave us. They seemed to have an idea that we should answer to them and come when we were called, but mother told us on no account ever to do so, it would be false to every tradition of our class. We might go as far as to twitch an ear when we heard our name spoken pleasantly, but only on the very rarest occasions were we to stir a paw. Then, if we decided to go to Them, it was at least manners to stop half-way and scratch. If the name was spoken in an unfriendly tone, the thing to do was just to stare the impertinent creature down. At Bubastis, in the olden time, our ancestors had been worshipped and prayed to. In the studio downstairs, where mother had been a constant visitor in the days when she was free of domestic cares, there is one of our ancestors under a glass case just as he was buried when he died thousands of years ago. He is all wrapped in a sort of brown greased cloth, so mother says, many hundred folds of it, but still you can perfectly well see the original shape of our many-hundreds-of-times-over great-uncle. Nobody has ever unwrapped him; it would be very wicked to do it, and might bring misfortune on the house. Altogether he is treated with the greatest respect, and mother is quite content to have it so. We are taught to look on that room not as the studio as They do, but as the Family Tomb, and mother says that when we grow up and are permitted to sit there sometimes, we must all keep very quiet and behave seriously and do no romping.

Share on: WhatsApp @Hash Facebook Tweet