GRIMALKIN

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 247, 6 July 1918, Page 8

GRIMALKIN

1 APROPOS OF CATS (By "Wi.") It is difficult to say "No" to a lady, but there cro occasions when one ran but try. We were drinking morning tea. "I want to go to the cat show," she said. "Oh!" said I, in a non-committal voice. "But one can't go alone," she pursued, | with meaning and fell intent. "Ono may pass," said I, also with meaning. "But it's a fair deal," she said, dimpl- . ing. "I don't like eats," said I, falling back , on a prepared position. "Why? I love cats!" said she. "Most women do," I said. "However, ; I don't like 'em—the cats. I mean. Jly [ disapproval is deep-seated, enduring, im- ' placable. They are deceitful, shifty, dis- . honest, cruel. They know too much. Their sense of telepathy is so highly dc- ■ veloped as to bo quite Satanic. A cat . always knows when you mean business. i When you want to give a cat a hiding, or drown it, or—or—that sort of thing, . and you proceed to give effect to your • intention, it—the cat, I menu—isn't ( there. Telepathy has been a.t work, and . tho victim has left for parts unknown." i She laughed. 'T believo you're right • about tho telepathy," she said. "Some . frionds of ours had a cat that they want- . Ed to send to the show. Ho was an I im—m—ense creature. Nearly as big as i n young sheep. Well, ihey brushed him t up every day, and fussed over him to . get him to look nice, and then they . bought some silk ribbon for hjs neck, . and then, what do you think?" ! "They hung him with it?" .. "Don't be silly. Of course, not. He , disappeared. . , "What did I tell you!" : ' "He must have known something was ( going to happen, don't you think?" ) "He did. His diagnosis was pessimisi tic, founded probably on conscience. It's . telepathy or intuition, one of the two. . "Women have it—intuition, I mean." s ''Which means, I suppose, that you s think they are cattish," she said, severe- ) iri Some of em, certainly," I said, rcck- , lessly. "Not 0.1 lof 'em, of course," I j added hastily, catching her eye. "Indeed!" r "Also," I continued boldly, "thev f scratch, metaphorically sneaking. Mind vou it's not we who say this. Tt' is they. T heard one woman srt of another (he other day: 'She's a little cat!' If women don't know their own sex, who does? I'knew one once, but that's another story." "Who was she?" she said, smiling again. "There speaks the Daughter of Eve. No, it's a horrible secret. But I want to tell you about, a certain cat for which I have planned something frightful and lingering, with boiling oil in it." "Cruel wretch!" "Let me tell you," I said. "I had > .some pigeons, nice tame things that used to. eat out of my hand, and all that ' sort of thing. Well, one night there was a frightful commotion in the dove-cot, ' When I went to investigate I found that jj a oat—tho cat for which I have planned e this lingering, and protracted purgatorial . agony—had killed one of the pigeons, car- .' Tied off anothor, and scared the lives out ~• of tho Test. Michael Doolan—my fox terrier, you know—slept right through all ;. the racket. 8 "How dreadful!" j "Quite so. If you can suggest something ~ more dreadful than boiling oil. I shall be obliged. However, a day or two after j, I happened to stop round the corner in the direction of the pigeon-hous°, and I saw a large grey cnt, about the size of a 6inall collie, staring up at the survivors with murder in his eye." "How horrible!" "What was more horrible was the fact ? that there was not a thing within reach , that I could throw at it. And the way t that cat lit out for the impenetrable forests convinced me that he had divined i my thoughts to the last drop tf, blood 0 Hint I had intended to spill if tho snec--3 ial Providence which perpetuates the cat tribe into the ninth life hadn't re--5 moved all the missiles from my vicinity. 3 Michael Doolan, of course, was fast " asleep. I woke him up, and took him " by the scruff of his fat neck to the exact 3 spot where bis catship had squatted be-- " low tho pigeon-house." 1 '"S-S-cat!" I said to him. • "How cruel!" she exclaimed. s "Fiddle-de-dee!" I said. "The cat was a murderer, Michael Doolan was Sher- " lock Holmes, and I was the Lord High 1 I" Executioner. Anyway, Michael Doolan T took ono sniff at the trail and vanished 1 into the bush with a frantic yelp, while 1 I went to look for something long and ■ 6harp." 1 "Was the murderer caught?" she a.'lred, in alarm. h "He was not. He got up a tree, and '" after a while Sherlock Holmes, having '< made a brilliant deduction that he'd ■" mi6s his dinner if he sat it out, camo 8 home." r "Perhaps he'll stay away, now you've ; " frightened him," she said, hopefully. "If he doesn't " I paused, and made I blood-thirsty passes with the butters knife. n She laughed. "But," she wheedled, I I "you'll take me to tho cat show, won't ;> ybu?" L' "I suppose so," I said. "Anyway, while you're going into transports over 6 the Persians I <#n bo studying the vulJ nerable portions of their anatomy." 11 And that's how we did the cat show. r The feline system of telepathy has probF 1 ably apprised my intended victim of the spirit in which I inspected his friends. a It will be well for him if it has. i • '