"Well, of course, I saw the kitten!" I answered, to her surprise; "but there is nothing very remarkable about a black kitten in the house."
"But we have no black kitten in the house, or anywhere on the premises. Where did it go to? You never saw it again? No; it was not an ordinary kitten, and I did not suppose till this moment that anyone had seen it but myself."
It was a fact that no one but Mrs Waverly and I had seen any kitten but the slate-coloured one already mentioned.
Thinking over this in the light of the sad news of my dear old friend's death, and noting the correspondence in time between her loss of consciousness and the appearance of the mysterious black kitten—seen only by Mrs Waverly and myself—it was impossible not to ask in the depths of my heart whether, perchance, the spirit of my faithful friend had been trying to send me some symbol of her approaching death.
It may be objected that black cats are generally connected with good luck. Well, I think my dear "London mother," as she called herself sometimes, would have explained this apparent contradiction very simply. She had lived through much sorrow, and was often oppressed by sore doubts of the Cosmic Love. I never knew any woman with such strong and passionate human sympathy, and to such fine spirits, the world, under present conditions, must always offer terrible problems. Her sympathies were sometimes too keen for that robust faith which can always say: "God's in His heaven! All's right with the world!" Yet her last words were: "I am so tired, and God will understand; and I am so glad to go."
To finish my chapter on a merrier note, I will mention an amusing episode connected with the evening of the black kitten's appearance.
Amongst the guests invited to that dinner-party was a clergyman-squire, a man of some means who had taken orders. A "squarson" is the "portmanteau name" for such a gentleman in Yorkshire, I believe; one who combines squire and parson.
This particular specimen of the genus was both a vegetarian and a celibate. The latter fact had been made clear to me by the many regrets expressed in the neighbourhood that he had remained a bachelor owing to religious scruples. The vegetarianism was equally certain, for I had heard orders given for special dishes to be prepared for this guest; and sitting next to him at the dinner-table, I knew that he had not touched either meat or game, although it was not a fast day.
After dinner, when the gentlemen had joined us in the drawing-room, the conversation turned upon psychic matters and my experiences in America of a few years before. This extreme High Churchman denounced all these, "lock, stock, and barrel."
He believed that everything might have happened as described, but was equally certain that the devil alone could have had a hand in "such goings on"! Perhaps it will be wise to explain that he did not make use of this latter expression!