Kitty was now fully grown. She was a striking-looking Cat of the tiger
type. Her marks were black on a very pale gray, and the four
beauty-spots of white on nose, ears, and tail-tip lent a certain
distinction. She was very expert at getting a living, and yet she had
some days of starvation and failed in her ambition of catching a
Sparrow. She was quite alone, but a new force was coming into her life.
She was lying in the sun one August day, when a large Black Cat came
walking along the top of a wall in her direction. She recognized him at
once by his torn ear. She slunk into her box and hid. He picked his way
gingerly, bounded lightly to a shed that was at the end of the yard,
and was crossing the roof when a Yellow Cat rose up. The Black Torn
glared and growled, so did the Yellow Tom. Their tails lashed from side
to side. Strong throats growled and yowled. They approached each other
with ears laid back, with muscles a-tense.
"Yow-yow-ow!" said the Black One.
"Wow-w-w!" was the slightly deeper answer.
"Ya-wow-wow-wow!" said the Black One, edging up half an inch nearer.
"Yow-w-w!" was the Yellow answer, as the blond Cat rose to full height
and stepped with vast dignity a whole inch forward. "Yow-w!" and he
went another inch, while his tail went swish, thump, from one side to
the other.
"Ya-wow-yow-w!" screamed the Black in a rising tone, and he backed the
eighth of an inch, as he marked the broad, unshrinking breast before
him.
Windows opened all around, human voices were heard, but the Cat scene
went on.
"Yow-yow-ow!" rumbled the Yellow Peril, his voice deepening as the
other's rose.
"Yow!" and he advanced another step.
Now their noses were but three inches apart; they stood sidewise, both
ready to clinch, but each waiting for the other. They glared for three
minutes in silence and like statues, except that each tail-tip was
twisting.
The Yellow began again. "Yow-ow-ow!" in deep tone.
"Ya-a-a--a-a!" screamed the Black, with intent to strike terror by his
yell; but he retreated one sixteenth of an inch. The Yellow walked up a
long half-inch; their whiskers were mixing now; another advance, and
their noses almost touched.
"Yo-w-w!" said Yellow, like a deep moan.
"Y-a-a-a-a-a-a!" screamed the Black, but he retreated a thirty-second
of an inch, and the Yellow Warrior closed and clinched like a demon.
Oh, how they rolled and bit and tore, especially the Yellow One!
How they pitched and gripped and hugged, but especially the Yellow One!
Over and over, sometimes one on top, sometimes another, but mostly the
Yellow One; and farther till they rolled off the roof, amid cheers from
all the windows. They lost not a second in that fall to the junk-yard;
they tore and clawed all the way down, but especially the Yellow One.
And when they struck the ground, still fighting, the one on top was
chiefly the Yellow One; and before they separated both had had as much
as they wanted, especially the Black One! He scaled a wall and,
bleeding and growling, disappeared, while the news was passed from
window to window that Cayley's Nig had been licked at last by Orange
Billy.
Either the Yellow Cat was a very clever seeker, or else Slum Kitty did
not hide very hard; but he discovered her among the boxes, and she made
no attempt to get away, probably because she had witnessed the fight.
There is nothing like success in warfare to win the female heart, and
thereafter the Yellow Tom and Kitty became very good friends, not
sharing each other's lives or food,--Cats do not do that way much,--but
recognizing each other as entitled to special friendly privileges.
V
September had gone. October's shortening days were on when an event
took place in the old cracker-box. If Orange Billy had come he would
have seen five little Kittens curled up in the embrace of their mother,
the little Slum Cat. It was a wonderful thing for her. She felt all the
elation an animal mother can feel, all the delight, and she loved them
and licked them with a tenderness that must have been a surprise to
herself, had she had the power to think of such things.
She had added a joy to her joyless life, but she had also added a care
and a heavy weight to her heavy load. All her strength was taken now to
find food. The burden increased as the offspring grew up big enough to
scramble about the boxes, which they did daily during her absence after
they were six weeks old. That troubles go in flocks and luck in
streaks, is well known in Slumland. Kitty had had three encounters with
Dogs, and had been stoned by Malee's negro during a two days' starve.
Then the tide turned. The very next morning she found a full milk-can
without a lid, successfully robbed a barrow pensioner, and found a big
fish-head, all within two hours. She had just returned with that
perfect peace which comes only of a full stomach, when she saw a little
brown creature in her junk-yard. Hunting memories came back in
strength; she didn't know what it was, but she had killed and eaten
several Mice, and this was evidently a big Mouse with bob-tail and
large ears. Kitty stalked it with elaborate but unnecessary caution;
the little Rabbit simply sat up and looked faintly amused. He did not
try to run, and Kitty sprang on him and bore him off. As she was not
hungry, she carried him to the cracker-box and dropped him among the
Kittens. He was not much hurt. He got over his fright, and since he
could not get out of the box, he snuggled among the Kittens, and when
they began to take their evening meal he very soon decided to join
them. The old Cat was puzzled. The hunter instinct had been dominant,
but absence of hunger had saved the Rabbit and given the maternal
instinct a chance to appear. The result was that the Rabbit became a
member of the family, and was thenceforth guarded and fed with the
Kittens.
Two weeks went by. The Kittens romped much among the boxes during their
mother's absence. The Rabbit could not get out of the box. Jap Malee,
seeing the Kittens about the back yard, told the negro to shoot them.
This he was doing one morning with a 22-calibre rifle. He had shot one
after another and seen them drop from sight into the crannies of the
lumber-pile, when the old Cat came running along the wall from the
dock, carrying a small Wharf Rat. He had been ready to shoot her, too,
but the sight of that Rat changed his plans: a rat-catching Cat was
worthy to live. It happened to be the very first one she had ever
caught, but it saved her life. She threaded the lumber-maze to the
cracker-box and was probably puzzled to find that there were no Kittens
to come at her call, and the Rabbit would not partake of the Rat. Pussy
curled up to nurse the Rabbit, but she called from time to time to
summon the Kittens. Guided by that call, the negro crawled quietly to
the place, and peering down into the cracker-box, saw, to his intense
surprise, that it contained the old Cat, a live Rabbit, and a dead Rat.
The mother Cat laid back her ears and snarled. The negro withdrew, but
a minute later a board was dropped on the opening of the cracker-box,
and the den with its tenants, dead and alive, was lifted into the
bird-cellar.
"Say, boss, look a-hyar--hyar's where de little Rabbit got to wot we
lost. Yo' sho t'ought Ah stoled him for de 'tater-bake."
Kitty and Bunny were carefully put in a large wire cage and exhibited
as a happy family till a few days later, when the Rabbit took sick and
died.
Pussy had never been happy in the cage. She had enough to eat and
drink, but she craved her freedom--would likely have gotten 'death or
liberty' now, but that during the four days' captivity she had so
cleaned and slicked her fur that her unusual coloring was seen, and Jap
decided to keep her.