The Cat

by Violet Hunt

'What are you two mumbling together?' asked Beatrice pleasantly. 'I won't have any secrets. I want Loki's undivided allegiance, please.'

So I stayed with Beatrice all night, and the nurse most officiously stayed too. There was a sweet little dancing light on the mantelpiece that I could not take my eyes off, as it flickered over the edge of its silver dish. Beatrice never seemed to sleep. The nurse fed her twice—once it was cornflour, for they gave me the remainder of it. The nurse was kind on the whole, but rather contemptuous. I told mother about her afterwards, and mother said nurses always were contemptuous—that is, if they were any good. The coaxing, sweet-spoken ones never got any authority, and usually were changed in a month.

This one didn't mind showing that she thought Beatrice an utter fool to want to keep a grey kitten with her day and night, but she had seen so many invalids she was never surprised at anything. When she was not nursing Beatrice, she sat and made herself stiff white calico aprons, and broke a needle over every seam. She took me down to Auntie May for my meals, lifting me very gently, as if I had been a 'case'; but she hadn't the slightest idea where my bones came, as Auntie May did—I could tell that from the way she carried me.

I saw her having her meals once. She crooked her little finger over the handle of the teacup as she drank and stopped between each mouthful, and when the parlour-maid, who waited on her very crossly, asked her if she would have another helping of mutton, she answered, 'Thank you, I have sufficient,' and to the same question about her beer, she replied, 'Not any more, thank you!'

It was while I was in Beatrice's bedroom that I first saw myself in the glass. I thought it was another cat at first. I kissed it, and its mouth was very cold. Then I lifted my paw to shake paws with it, as it seemed so anxious to be friends. It did exactly what I did. This was unsatisfactory somehow. I got cross, and dabbed at its paw with mine; and then I got crosser still and dabbed just anywhere all over the place, and it seemed quite as furious as I was and dabbed too. I should have gone on for ever if Beatrice hadn't asked what that scratching, pattering noise was? The nurse answered, 'The cat sees himself in the glass, Madam,' in the little stiff voice she had.

So that was all, and I was very much hurt at having been made such a fool of, and what is more, I did not believe it. It was a ghost.

Some cats believe in ghosts, some don't, mother told me. She herself sees them. I longed to get home again and compare notes with mother. What I saw may have been the ghost of Great-Uncle Tomyris, whom I am supposed to resemble. I sometimes went and exposed myself to him again, but not too often; I had a shy feeling about him. I simply detested being held up to a glass to see him, as Auntie May sometimes chose to do, with great want of tact. I would not fight him, or even touch him; why should I? His nose was awfully cold, and sent a thrill through me, as of one who comes from another world.

Beatrice got slowly better, and I got ill. They did not feed me right, but brought me remains of sticky, greasy made dishes with queer flavours that would disagree with any cat. We like to live very simply, and I was little more than a kitten. But I had to eat something to keep body and fur together, and yet what I did eat did not nourish me, and only did me harm.

'His little stomach is like a drum,' Beatrice said sadly. 'He has got indigestion. What could you fancy, my pet, my sweet? I wish I could guess and I would give it you.'

I wanted a piece of plain lean beef, minced for preference, or shredded, but I knew cooks didn't like setting the mincing-machine in motion 'for a cat!' so I supposed I should not get it, though I knew Auntie May had ordered it for me. It is funny how people, inferior people, think a cat can eat anything. Auntie May always takes in the butcher by not allowing the cook at home to send for 'pieces for cats.' If you mention that it's for a cat, she says, the butcher or the fishmonger always wraps up the meat or fish in newspaper, she has noticed that particularly.