Wedding went off very well. A number of strange people about. Naturally I watched with some interest to see what went into the dustbin. Rather disappointing. Servants are the deuce in a case like this. Can’t keep their hands off anything. Managed to get a tail of salmon myself, while they were hiding a few bottles of champagne. Secreted the salmon in the garden. It will come as a pleasant surprise to-night. Ethel cried when she started. My old ladies cried too. The man seemed pleased at what he’d managed. I’m afraid he’s a blackguard. My party begins about half-past eleven. There are about ten of us. The black girl with white paws is called “Tottie”—pretty name. Very shy and retiring. Pleasant voice. Jim and a grey cat, called “The Colonel,” have a rather unseemly row over an old tortoiseshell dowager. I wouldn’t have looked at her. No accounting for tastes. Music sets the dogs barking for miles. Our own dog chained up. Not that he would have interfered. Cook, or some other damned menial, flings a pot of pomatum into the very middle of the conversazione. Nobody hurt, thank God, but a good deal is said about it. Of course I make it clear that the fault is not mine. Fine moonlight. Hide-and-seek in the geraniums. Wish the gardener could see us. I seem very popular. Get a chat with Tottie, and take her off to where I hid the salmon. Gone! I had only mentioned it to Jim. So much for friendship. In another month I shall not be afraid to stand up to him. Then he’ll possibly wish he’d never been born. Party over at dawn. See Tottie home. She says that to meet a real gentleman is refreshing nowadays. True enough. They’re growing scarce.
Very cheap next morning, and my old ladies see I am. Unpleasant remarks and an inclination to withhold my saucer of milk. Some talk of giving me away. Giving me away! How insulting human beings are. And then they turn round and say we have no gratitude! Caught a young thrush in the afternoon. It was sitting with its back turned waiting for its mother. Mother came back with a worm, and when she saw what I’d been and done, she spoke her mind. Gardener noticed me too and seemed rather gratified than not. I shall go on catching young thrushes—not to please the gardener, but because I like them.
We are engaged. I sang to her for an hour in the moonlight. Henceforth we live for each other. Everybody is saying she angled for me and caught me. I am a catch and I know it; but, in a place like this, where there’s not another Persian within a radius of five hundred yards, we must do the best we can. And Tottie worships the wall I walk on. A very good, trustful, domesticated, little thing, and knows her luck. Am growing devilish handsome. My old ladies talk about sending me to the Crystal Palace Show next autumn. Had it out with Jim last night. He said I was ungrateful and never looked at him now that I was getting in with a better set. I knocked him out of a rain-shoot into a water-barrel; and when he came ashore we fought four rounds. He had some fur out of me certainly, but I took half his right ear off and hallmarked his nose for life. Now we pass on the same flower-bed and don’t know each other. A low-bred animal Jim, and blood will tell. After our difference my old ladies changed their mind about sending me for exhibition.
I am a father. Tottie has a fine family. Rather a bore. But of course there are no obligations. Two days later she meets me with a face as long as a chicken’s thigh-bone. The family has been drowned to a kitten before her eyes. Well, well, we must all die. Surprised to find how I bear this blow. Tottie hard to comfort. Of course, the murderers did not know that I was the father. Those kittens cannot have been worth less than five shillings each. I feel angry when I look at the matter from a business point of view. Tottie rather a nuisance about it. What’s the use of crying over dead kittens? I tell her not to try my patience too far. Females are so exacting. She is hurt. What does she expect? She surely doesn’t suppose that I am going to cry about it? She goes and gets one of her dead babes and lays it at my feet. Very harrowing, of course; but if the others were like this one, I am glad somebody drowned them. These mixed marriages are a mistake.
Ethel has come back to my old ladies. The dog and I were right about that man. Only been married six months, and he is tired of her, and has been brutal; and she must go through some legal business to be rid of him. What devils these men are to the weaker vessels! Tottie has gone off in appearance a good deal lately. Her spirit is broken. To see her crawl along a fence, you would think she was five years old. Her temper is soured too. There has come a blue French cat to the house next door but three. I introduced myself. She is young and attractive, and, thank Heaven, a lady of elegant extraction. Inclined to be extremely exclusive. Tell her she is right. Her name is “Sally B.” Pretty name. Has some English, but not much. Is teaching me French. Chic—very chic indeed. Had half a brickbat within two inches of me yesterday, next door but three. Her people are as exclusive as she is. Faint Persian never won fair French puss yet. Tottie growing quite impossible. Sorry, but had to speak. She fainted. You can only live your life once; therefore never let sentiment come between you and your ambitions. Sally B. says ours was a case of love at first sight. Very possibly. We are engaged, anyhow. Haven’t mentioned Tottie.