Part 2
Their first interview was certainly terrible. It was unpremeditated, a few days after, in the kitchen (a locality of irresistible attractions, where the cats of the same household, do what one can to prevent, will some day meet). The servants summoned me hastily and I ran to the battlefield, where, uttering unearthly yells, a shapeless package of fur and claws formed of their closely clinched little bodies, rolled and bounded,--shattering glasses, plates, and dishes, while tufts of white fur, gray fur, black fur, and fawn fur flew and floated everywhere. It was necessary to interfere energetically and instantly: to separate them I threw upon them a whole carafe of water. I was at my wits’ end.
(XI)
Breathless, scratched, and bleeding, her heart beating as if it must break, Pussy Gray was gathered to my breast, where she clung closely, growing more quiet in the consciousness of sweet security; then she became less and less rigid and as limp and inert as if dying, which is a way cats have of showing entire confidence in one who holds them. Pussy White, seated thoughtful and gloomy in a corner, looked at us with surprised eyes, and a deduction from the view was formed in her little jealous brain; that she, who from one year’s end to the other had driven from the neighboring walls all other cats, unwilling even to endure their presence, must acknowledge this ugly pagan as mine, since I held her so tenderly, so closely; then it became necessary that she, Pussy White, should tolerate her presence in the mansion and trouble her no more.
My surprise and admiration were great to see these two, an instant after, pass by each other, not merely with indifference but calmly, civilly,--and all was ended. During their lives they never quarreled again.
(XII)
The springtime of the following year! How pleasant my reminiscences of its sunny days.
Very short as all seasons now seem, it was the last which held a charm for me, like the mysterious enchantment of childhood’s days, passed in the same environment of verdure and bloom, in the midst of flowers blooming anew in their annual ranks, the same jasmines, the same roses. After my campaigns I joyfully returned there, to forget other continents and the immense seas; again, as in my infancy, I limited the exterior world to the old walls hung with vines and mosses, which bounded my rambles; the distant lands where I have since lived seeming unreal as those of which I dreamed, having never seen. The far horizons fade; they vanish imperceptibly and nothing is real to me save our mossy stones, our trees, our trellises, and our beloved white roses!
At that time, I had built in a corner of my mansion a Buddhist pagoda, the collected débris of original temples. From the large cases opened daily in the courtyard in the warm sunshine there arose that indefinable and mingled odor of China, from pedestals of columns, bas-reliefs of ceilings, carved altars, and mouldy old idols and vases. It was interesting and unique, this unpacking; to watch these grotesque objects reappearing one by one, arranging themselves, as it were, on the grass or the mossy pavement,--all this assembly of monsters of far Asia, bearing on their faces the same frowns and grimaces they had borne for ages. Occasionally my mother and Aunt Clara would come out to look at them, astonished at their overwhelming ugliness. Pussy Gray was the most interested spectator of these unpackings; recognizing her ocean surroundings, she sniffed all with confused memories of her native land; afterward, habituated to dwelling so long in semi-darkness, she would crawl into the boxes and hide herself in the empty spaces, under the exotic straw still smelling of sandal-wood and musk.
It was an exhilarating and beautiful springtime, bird songs filling the air; and Pussy Gray thought it marvelous. Poor little recluse, grown up in the stifling obscurity of my rolling home! Bright sunlight, balmy air, the vicinity of feline friends alike astonished and charmed her. She now made long and exhaustive explorations of the courtyard and garden, smelling every blade of grass, every new plant; in fact everything that sprang fresh and odorous from the awakened earth. These forms, these colors, old as the world, which plants unconsciously produce every succeeding spring, these immutable laws, perfectly and silently obeyed by unfolding leaf and bursting bud, were phenomena for her who had never known springtime or verdure. And Pussy White, formerly absolute and intolerant queen of the place, had deigned to share her domain with the forlorn stranger, leaving her to roam at will among the evergreens, the potted flowers, or along the promenade on the gray wall top under the pendent boughs. Pussy Chinese was especially impressed by a miniature lake, so closely interwoven with my infantile memories, which fascinated her for a long time. There, in the grass each day higher and more luxuriant, she crouched close to the earth, like a panther intent on his prey (doubtless inheriting this movement from her ancestors, Mongolian cats with uncultivated manners). She hid behind the lilliputian rocks, buried herself beneath the vines like a little tiger in a miniature virgin forest.
I found great pleasure in watching her goings and comings, her sudden haltings, her surprises; when she realized that I was watching her, she in turn watched me, posing in an attitude peculiarly her own;--very graceful, but very like a Chinese belle, with a paw extended as if holding a fan, just as I have seen one holding an article raise coquettishly the little finger; and her droll golden eyes grew infinitely expressive, “speaking” to mine. “Please permit me to amuse myself? Does it incommode you in the least? Look! I walk with lightness, I play with extreme carefulness, I go about with discretion among these beautiful green things that smell so sweetly, and this good air is so refreshing in this wide, free space! And these other strange objects that I see in turn high over us, ‘Things they call stars, that they call sun, and they call moon!’ Oh! how different from our trembling lodging on the ship and how delightful to be here together in this happy place!”
This home, so new to her, was equally for me the oldest, the most familiar of all places on the earth; whose least details, whose feeblest blade of grass were known to me since the earliest and most impressible days of my existence. So dear to me that I am bound to it with all my being, so dear that I love with a love akin to idolatry the old vines and shrubs which are there, the jasmine, the honeysuckles, and a certain dielytra rose, which every returning March unfolds its precocious leaves, gives the same April roses, fades in the June sun, then burns in August heat and seems to perish.
And while Pussy Gray abandons herself to the joy of youth and springtime, I, on the contrary, knowing that all this will pass away, feel for the first time in my life, shadows like those of evening stealing over my own life,--presages of the inexorable night, the morningless night of the final autumn,--never to be succeeded by spring.
And with profound sadness in this courtyard bright with sunshine, I gaze upon the two dear ones, their silvery hair, their mourning robes--my mother and Aunt Clara, going and coming, stooping down as has been their wont for many springs, to discover what flower seeds had come up, or raising their heads to see the buds of honeysuckles and rose-trees. And when their sombre robes vanished from my view, at the end of the green avenue, which is the vestibule of our family residence, I am forced to notice that their steps are slower and less firm. Oh, time, perhaps near, when in the unchanging green avenue I shall behold them no more. Can it be possible that time may arrive? If ever they shall be gone I have the illusion that it will not be an entire departure, so long as I remain there recalling their presence;--that in the quiet summer evenings I shall sometimes see their spirits glide beneath the jasmine; that something of their existence will still live in the plants they have tended, and breathe from the falling honeysuckle, the old dielytra rose.
(XIII)
Since her life in open air, my favorite flourished visibly. The bare and unsightly spots in her rabbit-colored coat were covered with new glossy fur; she was less thin, more careful of her little person, and bore no longer the appearance of a witch’s cat. My mother and Aunt Clara often stopped to speak to her, interested in her odd ways, her expressive eyes, and her soft responsive “Trr! trr! trr!” that she never failed to utter when addressed.
“Certainly,” they said, “this Chinese pussy seems very happy with us; no cat’s face could show greater content.”
A happy look, in fact; even a look of gratitude to me, who had brought her to her new home. And the happiness of young animals is perfect, perhaps because they have not, like us, forebodings of the inevitable future.
She passed deliciously dreamy days in most luxuriant idleness, extended on the warm tiles or the soft moss, enjoying the silence--somewhat depressing to me--of this abode where neither the contention of wind and wave or the terrible shock of cannon troubled her repose. She had reached the distant peaceful haven, the last port in her short life’s voyage, and rested happily unconscious of the end.
(XIV)
One fine day, without intervention, seized by some sudden whim, the indifference of Pussy White changed to a tender friendship. She came deliberately to Pussy Gray and rubbed her nose against her own affectionately, which is with her race the equivalent of a kiss. Sylvester, who was present at the performance, showed himself skeptical regarding its good intent. “Did you see,” said I, “the kiss of peace?” “Oh no, sir!” he replied, in that tone of accomplished connoisseur, assumed whenever any question arises concerning my cats, dogs, horses, or any other animals; “Oh no, sir! it is simply that Pussy White wishes to ascertain if Pussy Gray has been stealing her meat.”
He was mistaken for once nevertheless,--and from that hour they were fast friends. They could be seen sitting in the same chair, eating the same food, even from the same plate, and every morning running to exchange salutations, rubbing together the tips of their soft noses, one yellow, the other pink.
(XV)
After this we said, “The cats did this or that.” They were an intimate and inseparable pair, taking counsel together, following each other in the least and most trivial actions of their lives; and making their toilets together, licking each other with mutual interest.
Pussy White maintained her position as the special cat of Aunt Clara, while the Chinese continued my faithful little friend, holding fast to her old habits of following me with her speaking eyes, and replying in her expressive “Trr-trr-trr,” whenever I spoke to her. Scarcely would I be seated before a light paw rested on me, as in the old evenings on the ship; two questioning eyes sought mine, then a bound and she was on my knees,--slowly making her preparations for a nap; plying her fore paws alternately, turning herself round to the right, then to the left, and usually finding the right position by the time I was ready to depart.
What a mystery! A soul’s mystery perhaps, this constant affection of an animal and its unchanging gratitude.
(XVI)
They were much spoiled, the two cats; admitted to the dining-room at meal times; often seated one on my right and the other on my left; recalling to me, occasionally, their presence by a light stroke of the paw on my napkin, and watching for tit-bits that I fed them surreptitiously, like a guilty schoolboy, from the tip of my fork.
In recording this, I still farther darken my reputation, which, it seems, is already reputed incorrect and eccentric. I can however criticise a certain member of the Academy, who, having done me the honor of dining at my table, did not refrain from offering to our pussies, even in his own spoon, a little Chantilly cream.
(XVII)
The following summer was for Pussy Gray a period of absolutely delicious life. With her originality and her foreign air, she had grown almost beautiful, so finely reclad in glossy fawn color. All around, in the cat world, in the gardens and on the roofs, the news had circulated of the presence of this piquant stranger; and candidates for her smiles were numerous; they smirked and serenaded beneath her windows in the balmy nights filled with perfume of honeysuckle and rose.
During September, the two cats experienced, at almost the same time, the joy of motherhood.
Pussy White, it is needless to relate, was already a well known matron. As to Pussy Gray, when her first moments of surprise had passed, she tenderly licked the precious tiny gray kitten, spotted and mottled like a tiger,--her only son.
(XVIII)
The reciprocal attachment of the two families was touching; the comical little Chinese and the little Angora, round as a powder puff, frolicking together, and nourished, washed, and watched by one or the other mother with an almost equal solicitude.
(XIX)
In the winter season pussy becomes peculiarly the hearthstone guest, constant companion of the fireside, sharing with us, before the flickering flames, vague melancholies and endless reveries of the long twilights.
Since the first frost Pussy Gray had lost all roughness of her mottled coat, and Pussy White had donned a most imposing cravat, a boa of snowy whiteness that framed her face like a Medici ruff. It is well known that in winter the cat attains its fullest perfection of flesh and fur. Their attachment grew as they warmed themselves together by the fireside; they slept entire days in each other’s arms, on the cushions in the armchairs, rolled in a single ball where heads and tails were alike indistinguishable.
Pussy Gray could never get sufficiently close to her friend. Returning from some scamper in open air, if she perceived the Angora sleeping before the fire, she softly, very softly approached her, as if about to spring upon a mouse; the other, always nervous, whimsical, irritated at being disturbed, sometimes gave her a light cuff of disapproval. She never retaliated, the Chinese, but merely raising her little paw, as if quite ready to laugh, then saying to me from a corner of her eyes, “You must allow that she is rather cross! But I don’t mind it at all, you may be sure!” Then, with redoubled precaution, she always attained her desired purpose, which was to lay herself completely upon the other, her head sunk in the silky snow,--and before sleeping she said to me, from half-closed eyes: “This is all I wanted! Here I am!”
(XX)
Oh! our winter’s evenings of that time! In the most sheltered corner of the mansion, elsewhere closed and left silent and dark, was a small and warm parlor facing the sun, the courtyard, and the gardens, where my mother and Aunt Clara sat beneath their hanging lamp, in their usual places where so many past and similar winters had found them. And, usually, I was there also, that I might not lose an hour of their presence on earth and of my days at home near them. On the other side of the mansion, far from us, I abandoned my study, leaving it dark and fireless that I might simply pass my evenings in their dear company, within the cosy room, innermost sanctuary of our family life, the home dearest to us all. (No other spot has given me a fuller, a sweeter impression of a nest; nowhere have I warmed myself with more tranquil melancholy than before the blaze in its small fireplace.) The windows, whose blinds were never closed, so confident were we in our security, the glass door, almost too summer-like, opened upon the desolation of naked trees and vines, brown leaves, and despoiled trellises often silvered by pale moonlight. Not a sound reached us from the street, which was some rods distant,--and besides a very quiet one, its silence rarely broken save by the songs of sailors celebrating, at long intervals, their safe returns. No, we had rather the sounds of the country, whose nearness was felt beyond the gardens and old ramparts of the city;--in summer, immense concerts of frogs in the marshes which surrounded us smooth as steppes, and the intermittent flutelike note of the owl; in the winter evenings of which I write, the shrill cry of the marsh bird, and above all, the long wail of the west wind coming from the sea.
Upon the round table, covered with a gayly flowered cloth, which I have known all my life, my mother and aunt Clara placed their workbaskets, containing articles that I would fain designate “fondamentales,” if I dared employ that word which, in the present instance, will signify nothing save to myself; those trifles, now sacred relics, which hold in my eyes, in my memory, in my life, a supreme importance: embroidery scissors, heirlooms in the family, lent me rarely when a child, with manifold charges to carefulness, that I might amuse myself with paper cutting; winders for thread, in rare colonial woods, brought long years ago from over the oceans by sailors, and giving material for deep reveries; needlecases, thimbles, spectacles, and pocketbooks. How well I know and love every one of them, the trifles so precious, spread out every evening for so many years on the gay old tablecloth, by the hands of my mother and Aunt Clara; after each distant voyage with what tenderness I see them again and bid them my good-day of return! In writing of them I have used the word “fondamentale,” so inappropriate I confess, but can only explain it thus: if they were destroyed, if they ceased to appear in their unchanged positions, I should feel as if I had taken a long step nearer the annihilation of my being, towards dust and oblivion.
And when they shall be gone, my mother and Aunt Clara, it seems to me that these precious little objects, religiously treasured after their departure, will recall their presence, will perhaps prolong their stay in our midst.
The cats, naturally, remained usually in our common room,--sleeping together, a warm, soft ball, upon some taboret or cushioned chair, the nearest to the fire. And their sudden awakenings, their musings, their droll ways, cheered our somewhat monotonous evenings.
Once it was Pussy White who, seized by a desire to be in our closer company, leaped upon the table and sat gravely down upon the sewing work of Aunt Clara, turning her back upon her mistress, after unceremoniously sweeping her plumy tail over her face; afterwards remaining there, obstinately indiscreet, and gazing abstractedly at the flame of the lamp. Once in a night of tingling frost, so excitable to a cat’s nerves, we heard, in a near garden, an animated discussion: “Miaou! Miaraouraou!” Then from the mute fur ball, which slumbered so soundly, upsprang two heads, two pair of shining eyes. Again: “Miaraou! Miaraou!” The quarrel goes on! The Angora rose up resolutely, her fur bristling in anger, and ran from door to door, seeking an exit as if called outside by some imperative duty of great importance: “No, no, Pussy,” said Aunt Clara, “believe me, there is no necessity for your interference; they will settle their quarrel without your help!” And the Chinese, on the contrary, always calm and averse to perilous adventure, contented herself by glancing at me with a knowing air, evidently regarding her friend’s movements as ridiculous, and asking me, “Am I not right in keeping away from this fracas?”
A certain beatitude, profound and almost infantile, pervaded the silent little parlor where my mother and Aunt Clara sat at work. And if by turns I remembered, with a dull heart-throb, having possessed an oriental soul, an African soul, and a number of other souls, of having indulged, under divers suns, in numberless fantasies and dreams, all that appeared to me as far distant and forever finished. And this roving past led me more thoroughly to enjoy the present hour, the side-scene in this interlude of my life, which is so unknown, so unsuspected, which would astonish many people, and perhaps make them smile. In all sincerity of purpose, I said to myself that nothing could again take me from my home, that nothing could be so precious as the peace of dwelling there, and finding again part of my first soul; to feel around me, in this nest of my infancy, I know not what benignant protection against worthlessness and death; to picture to myself through the window, in all the obscurity of dying foliage, beneath the winter moon, this courtyard which once held my entire world, which has remained the same all these years past, with its vines, its mimic rocks, its old walls, and which may perhaps resume its importance in my eyes, its former greatness, and repeople itself with the same dreams. Above all, I resolved that nothing in the wide world was worth the gentle bliss of watching mother and Aunt Clara sewing at the round table, bending toward the bright flowered cloth their caps of black lace, their coils of silvery hair.
Oh! one evening I will recall. There was a scene, a drama among the cats! Even now I cannot recall it without laughter.
It was a frosty night about Christmas time. In the deep silence we had heard passing above the roofs, through cold and cloudless skies, a flock of wild geese, emigrating to other climates: a sound of harsh voices, very numerous, wailing not too harmoniously together and soon lost in the infinite regions of the sky. “Do you hear? Do you hear?” said Aunt Clara with a slight smile and an anxious look to banter me; recalling the fact that in my childhood I was greatly alarmed by these nocturnal flights of birds. To hear their voices one should have a keen ear and listen in an otherwise silent place.
Our room then resumed its calm,--a calm so profound that I heard the complaint of the blazing wood on the hearth, and the regular breathing of our cats seated in the chimney corner.
Suddenly, a certain large yellow gentleman cat, held in horror by Pussy White, but persistently pursuing her with his declarations, appeared behind a window pane, showing in full relief against the background of dark foliage, looking at her with an impertinent and excited air and uttering a formidable “Miaou” of provocation. Then she sprang up at the window like a panther, or a ball deftly thrown, and there, nose to nose, on each side of the pane, there was a useless battle, a volley of unpardonable insults poured out in shrill, coarse tones; blows of unsheathed claws given with emphasis, vain scratchings across the glass, which made great noise and did nothing. Oh! the fright of my mother and Aunt Clara, starting from their chairs at the first alarm,--then their hearty laugh afterward, the ridiculousness of all this impetuous racket breaking in upon the intense silence,--and above all the visage of the visitor, the yellow cat, discomfited and breathless, whose eyes blazed so drolly behind the glass!
“Putting the pussies to bed” was in those evenings, one of the important events,--“primordiales” shall I call it?--of our daily existence. They were never allowed, as are many other cats, to roam all night among the vines and flowers, beneath the stars, or contemplating the moon; we held opinions upon that subject from which we never departed and made no compromises.