Brothers of Pity and Other Tales of Beasts and Men Part 11

and he threw me into her lap. But I sprang back to his shoulder with one leap.

"It's really most extraordinary," said one lady.

"And Toots never goes to strangers as a rule," added my mistress.

Everybody is proud of being _exceptionally_ favoured. It was this last stroke, I am convinced, that rubbed him the right way. A gratified blandness pervaded his countenance. He made no further attempts to dislodge me, and I settled myself into the angles of his shoulder and affected to go to sleep.

"What are you going to do with him?" he asked, crossing one long leg over the other with a convulsive abruptness very trying to my balance, and to the strength of the arm-chair.

Both the ladies began to mew. They were _so_ sorry to leave me behind, but it was _quite_ impossible to take me. They couldn't bear to think of my being unhappy, and didn't know where in the world to find me a home.

"I wish _you_ would take him!" said my mistress.

I listened breathlessly for the gentleman's reply.

"Pets are not in the least in my line," he said. "I am a bachelor, you know, of very tidy habits. I dislike trouble, and have a rooted objection to enc.u.mbrances."

"We hear you have a pet mouse, though," said my mistress. He laughed awkwardly.

"My dear young lady, I never said that my practice always squared with my principles. Helpless and troublesome creatures have sometimes an insinuating way with them, which forms an additional reason for avoiding them, especially if one is weak-minded. And----"

"And you _have_ a pet mouse?"

He sat suddenly upright with another jerk, which nearly shot me into the fire-place, and said,

"I'll tell you about it, for upon my word I wish you could see the little beggar. It was one afternoon when I came in from riding, that I found a mouse sitting on the fender. I could only see his back, with the tail twitching, and I noticed that a piece had been bitten out of his left ear. The little wretch must have heard me quite well, but he sat on as if the place belonged to him.

"'You're pretty cool!' I said; and being rather the reverse myself, I threw the Queen's Regulations at him, and he disappeared. But it bothered me, for I hate mice in one's quarters. You never know what mischief they mayn't be doing. You put valuable papers carefully away, and the next time you go to the cupboard, they are reduced to shreds.

The little brutes take the lining of your slippers to line their nests.

They keep you awake at night--in short, they're detestable. But I am not fond of killing things myself, though I've a sort of a conscience about knowing how it's done. I don't like leaving necessary executions to servants. As to mice, you know--poisoning is out of the question, on sanitary grounds. 'Catch-'em-alive' traps are like a policeman who catches a pickpocket--all the trouble of the prosecution is to come; and as to the traps with springs and spikes--my man set one in my bedroom once, and in the middle of the night the mouse was caught. For nearly an hour I doubt if I was much the happier of the two. Every moment I thought the poor wretch would stop screaming, for I had ordered the trap in the belief that death was instantaneous. At last I jumped up, and put the whole concern into my tub and held it under water. The poor beast was dead in six seconds. A catch-'em-alive trap and a tub of water is the most merciful death, I fancy; but I am rather in favour of letting one animal kill another. It seems more natural, and _fairer_. They have a run for their lives, so to speak."

"And who did you get to kill your mouse?"

"Well, I know a youngster who has a terrier. They are a perfect pair. As like as two peas, and equally keen about sport--they would go twenty miles to chase a bluebottle round an attic, sooner than not hunt something. So I told him there was a mouse _de trop_ in my rooms, and he promised to bring Nipper next morning. I was going out hunting myself.

"The meet was early, and my man got breakfast at seven o'clock for me in my own quarters; and the first thing I saw when I came out of my bedroom was the mouse sitting on the edge of my Indian silver sugar-basin. I knew him again by his ear. And there he sat all breakfast-time, twitching his tail, and nibbling little bits of sugar, and watching me with such a pair of eyes! Have you ever seen a mouse's eyes close? Upon my word, they are wonderfully beautiful, and it's uncommonly difficult to hurt a creature with fine eyes. I didn't touch it, and as I was going out I looked back, and _the mouse was looking after me_. I was a fool for looking back, for I can't stand a pitiful expression in man or beast, and it put an end to Nipper's sport, and left me with a mouse in my quarters--a thing I hate. I didn't like to say I'd changed my mind about killing the mouse, but I wrote to Nipper's master, and said I wouldn't trouble him to come up for such a trifling matter."

"So the mouse was safe?"

"Well, _I_ thought so. But the young fellow (who is very good-natured) wrote back to say it was no trouble whatever, and the letter lay on my mantel-piece till I came home and found that he and Nipper had broken a chair-leg, and two china plates."

"_Did_ they kill the mouse?"

"Well, no. But I nearly killed Nipper in saving him; and the little rascal has lived with me ever since."

The ladies seemed highly delighted with this anecdote, but, for my own part, I felt feverish to the tips of my claws, as I thought of the miserable creature who had usurped the place I wished to fill, and who might be the means of my having to fall back after all on the Deserted Cats' Fund. What bungling puss had had him under her paws, and allowed him to escape with a torn ear and the wariness of experience? Let me but once catch sight of that twitching tail!----

At this moment the gentleman got up, stretched his long----

But I will _not_ allude to them! It annoys me as much as the thought of that bungling cat, or of Nipper's baulked attempt. He put up his hands and lifted me from his shoulder, and my heart sank as he said, "If I am to catch my train, I fear I must say good-bye."

I believe that, in this hopeless crisis, my fur as usual was in my favour. He rubbed his cheek against mine before putting me down, and then said, "And you've not told me, after all, where poor Toots is really going."

"We have not found a home for him yet, I a.s.sure you," said my mistress.

"Our washerwoman wants him, and she is a most kind-hearted and respectable person, but she has got nine children, and----"

"Nine children!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed my friend, "My poor Toots, there will not be an inch of that magnificent tail of yours left at the end of a week.

What cruelty to animals! Upon my word, I'd almost rather take Toots myself, than think of him with a washerwoman and nine children. Eh, Toots! would you like to come?"

I was on the carpet, rubbing against his--yes, long or short, they were _his_, and he was kind to me!--rubbing, I say, against his legs. I could get no impetus for a spring, but I scrambled straight up him as one would scramble up a tree (my grandmother was a bird-catcher of the first talent, and I inherit her claws), and uttered one pitiful mew.

The gentleman gave a short laugh, and took me into his arms.

"Oh, _how_ good of you! Jones shall get a hamper," cried the ladies. But he shook his head.

"Three of the fourteen parcels I've got to pick up at the station are hampers. I wouldn't have another on my mind for a fortune. If Toots comes at all, he must come like a Christian and look after himself."

I will not dwell on our departure. It was a sadly flurried one, for a cat of my temperament. The ladies saw us off, and as my young mistress covered me with farewell kisses, I felt an unquestionable pang of regret. But one has to repress one's affections, and consider one's prospects in life, if one does not want to come upon the Deserted Cats'

Fund!

My master put his hat on the back of his head on the steps, and knocked it off in shouting through a hole in the roof of the cab that we were to drive like the wind, as we were late. At the last moment several things were thrown in after us. A parcel of books he had lent the young lady, and a pair of boots he had left behind on some former occasion. The books were very neatly packed, and addressed, but the boots came "like Christians, and looked after themselves." And through all, I clung fast, and blessed the inherited vigour of my grandmother's claws.

At the parcels office, I certainly risked nine lives among the fourteen parcels which were dragged and pitched, and turned over in every direction; but though he paid me no other attention, my master never forgot to put back a hand to help me when we moved on. Eventually we found ourselves alone in a very comfortable carriage, and I suppose the fourteen packages were safe too, thanks to the desperate struggles of five porters, who went off clutching their paws as if they were satisfied with the result.

After incommoding me for some time by rustling newspapers, and making spasmodic struggles to find a posture that suited him, my master found one at last and fell asleep, and I crept up to the velvet collar of his great-coat and followed his example.

CHAPTER III.

I like living with bachelors. They have comfortable chairs, and keep good fires. They don't put water into the tea-pot: they call the man-servant and send for more tea. They don't give you a table-spoonful of cream, fidgeting and looking round to see if anybody else wants it: one of them turns the jug upside-down into your saucer, and before another can lay hold of it and say, "Halloa! The milk's all gone,"--you have generally had time to lap it up under the table.

I prefer men's outsides, too, to women's in some respects. Why all human beings--since they have no coats of their own, and are obliged to buy them--do not buy handsomely marked furs whilst they are about it, is a puzzle to a cat. As to the miserable stuff ladies cover themselves with in an evening, there is about as much comfort and softness in it as in going to sleep on a duster. Men's coats are nothing to boast of, either to look at or to feel, but they _are_ thicker. If you happen to clutch a little with gratification or excitement, your claws don't go through; and they don't squeak like a mouse in a trap and call you treacherous because their own coats are thin.

I was very comfortable in my new home. My master was exceedingly kind to me, and he has a fearless and friendly way of tickling one's toes which is particularly agreeable, and not commonly to be met with.

Yes, my life was even more luxurious than before. It is so still. To eat, drink, and sleep, to keep oneself warm, and in good condition, and to pay proper attention to one's personal appearance; that is all one has to do in a life like mine in bachelors' quarters.

One has unpleasant dreams sometimes. I think my tea is occasionally too strong, though I have learned to prefer it to milk, and my master always gives it to me in his own saucer. If he has friends to tea, they give me some in their saucers. One can't refuse, but I fancy too much tea is injurious to the nerves.

The night before last, I positively dreamed that I was deserted. I fancied that I was chased along a housetop, and fell from the gutter.

Down--down--but I woke up on the bear-skin before the fire, as our man-servant was bringing in candles.

It made me wonder how Mrs. Tabby was getting on. I had never done anything further in that matter; but really when one's life goes in a certain groove, and everything one can wish for is provided in abundance, one never seems to have time for these things. It is wonderful how energetic some philanthropic people are. I dare say they like the fuss. (I can't endure fuss!) And Mrs. Tabby's appearance--excellent creature!--would probably make her feel ill-at-ease in bachelor quarters, if we could change places. Her fur is really almost mangy, and she has nothing to speak of in the way of a tail. But she is a worthy soul. And some day, when the Captain and I are going to town without much luggage--or if she should happen to be collecting in the country,--I will certainly _look up a few of my worst bones for the Fund_.

I really hesitate to approach the subject of my one source of discontent. It seems strange that there should be any crook in a lot so smooth as ours. Plenty to eat and drink, handsome coats, no enc.u.mbrances, and a temperament naturally inclined--at least, in my case--towards taking life easy. And yet, as I lay stretched full-length down one of my master's knees the other night, before a delicious fire, and after such a saucerful of creamy tea which he could not drink himself--I kept waking up with uncomfortable starts, fancying I saw on the edge of the fender--but I will tell the matter in proper order.