BARKS AND PURRS
BY
COLETTE WILLY
TRANSLATED BY
MAIRE KELLY
CONTENTS
PREFACE
SENTIMENTALITIES
ON THE TRAIN
DINNER IS LATE
SHE IS ILL
THE FIRST FIRE
THE STORM
A CALLER
PREFACE
_Madame_:
_There are moments when one seems to come to life. One looks about and
distinguishes a creature whose foot-print closely resembles the ace of
spades. The thing says: bow-wow. It is a dog. One looks again. The ace
of spades is now an ace of clubs. The thing says: pffffffff--and it is a
cat._
_This is the history of the visible world and in particular, that of my
god-children, Toby-Dog and Kiki-the-Demure. They are so natural--I use
the word in the sense in which it is applicable to the savages of
Oceania--that all their acts conspire to make of life, a very simple
proposition. These are animals in the fullest sense of the
word--animos--if I may employ the original orthography, capable of
exclaiming with those of Faust_: "The fool knows it not! He knows not
the pot, He knows not the kettle."
* * * * *
_And as such, Madame, you have placed them exactly where they should be:
their earthly Paradise is the apartment of Monsieur Willy. In your
salon, the probable palm and rubber-plant give the impression of
luxuriant Edenic flora, relatively speaking, and illustrate the
transmogrification which is to allow M. Gaston Deschamps--critic of a_
"Temps" _plus-que-passé--to announce to the wilderness (where he speaks
familiarly of Chateaubriand), and to the Collège de France, how well he
can admire and understand a true poet_.
* * * * *
_For you are a true poet and I will declare it freely, not concerning
myself more with the legends Parisians have the habit of weaving about
every celebrity. They admire Gauguin and Verlaine, not so much for their
originality, as for their eccentricities. And so it happens that certain
persons, unacquainted with the nameless sentiment, the order and purity,
the thousand interior virtues which guide you, persist in saying that
you wear your hair short and that Willy is bald._
_Must I then--living at Orthez--tell_ Tout-Paris _who you are, present
you to all who know you--I who have never seen you_?
* * * * *
_I will say then, that Madame Colette Willy never had short hair, that
she does not wear masculine attire; that her cat does not accompany her
when she goes to a concert, that her friend's dog does not drink from a
tumbler. It is inexact to say that Mme. Colette Willy works in a
squirrel's cage, or performs upon trapeze and flying rings, and can
reach with her toe the nape of her neck. Madame Colette Willy has never
ceased to be the_ plain woman _par excellence, who rises at dawn to give
oats to the horse, maize to the chickens, cabbage to the rabbits,
groundsel to the canaries, snails to the ducks and bran-water to the
pigs. At eight o'clock, summer and winter, she prepares the café au lait
for her maid--and herself. Scarcely a day passes that she does not
meditate upon this admirable book_:
A LADY'S COUNTRY-HOUSE
BY
MME. MILLET ROBINET.
_Orchard, kitchen-garden, stable, poultry-yard, bee-hive and hot-house,
have no further mysteries for Madame Colette Willy. They say, she
refused to divulge her secret for the destruction of mole-crickets to "a
great statesman, who prayed her on his knees."_
* * * * *
_Madame Colette Willy is in no way different from the description I have
just given of her. I am aware that certain folk, having met her in
society, insist upon making her very complex. A little more, and they
would have ascribed to her the tastes of the mustiest symbolists--and
one knows how far from pleasing are those Muses' robes, how odious the
yellow bandeaux above faces expressionless as eggs. Robes and bandeaux
are to-day relegated to drawers in the Capitol at Toulouse, from which
they will never be taken more, except when occasion calls for the
howling of official alexandrines in honor of M. Gaston Deschamps,
Jaurès, or Vercingétorix._
_Madame Colette Willy rises to-day on the world of Letters as the
poetess--at last!--who, with the tip of her slipper sends all the
painted, laureled, cothurnèd, lyre-carrying Muses--that, from Monselet
to Renan, have roused the aspirations of classes in Rhetoric--rolling,
from the top to the bottom of Parnassus._
_How charming she is thus--presenting her bull-dog and her cat with as
much assurance as Diana would her hound, or a Bacchante her tiger._
_See her apple-cheeks, her eyes like blue myosotis, her
lips--poppy-petals, and her ivy-like grace! Tell me if this way of
leaning against the green barrier of her garden-close, or of lying under
the murmurous arbor of mid-Summer, is not worth the starched manner,
that old magistrate de Vigny--with his neckcloth wound three times
around, and rigid in his trousers' straps--imposed upon his goddesses?
Madame Colette Willy is a live woman, a real woman, who has dared to be
natural and who resembles a little village bride far more than a
perverse woman of letters_.
* * * * *
_Read her book and you shall see how accurate are my assertions. It has
pleased Madame Colette Willy to embody in a couple of delightful
animals, the aroma of gardens, the freshness of the field, the heat of
state-roads,--the passions of men.... For through this girlish laughter
ringing in the forest, I tell you, I hear the sobbing of a well-spring.
One does not stoop to a poodle or tom-cat, without feeling the heart
wrung with dumb anguish. One is sensible, in comparing ourselves to
them, of all that separates and of all that unites us_.
* * * * *
_A dog's eyes hold the sorrow of having, since the earliest days of
creation, licked the whip of his incorrigible persecutor in vain. For
nothing has mollified man--not the prey brought him by a famishing
spaniel, nor the humble guilelessness of the shepherd-dog, guarding the
peace of the shadowy flocks under the stars_.
_A tragic fear shines in the cat's eyes. "What are you going to do to me
now?" it seems to ask, lying on a rubbish-heap, a prey to mange and
hunger--and feverishly it waits the new torture that will shatter its
nervous system_.
_But have no fear ... Madame Colette Willy is very kind. She quickly
dispels the hereditary dread of Toby-Dog and Kiki-the-Demure. She
meliorates the race, so that dogs and cats will learn in the end that it
is less dull to frequent a poet than an unhappy Collège de France
candidate--had this candidate proven more copiously still, that the
author of "Mémoires d'Outre-Tombe" had topsyturvily described the
jawbone of the Crocodile_.
* * * * *
_Toby-Dog and Kiki-the-Demure well
know that their mistress is a lady who
would do no harm--neither to a piece of
sugar nor to a mouse; a lady who, for our
delight, jumps a rope she has woven of
flower-words which she never bruises, and
with which she perfumes us; a lady who sings,
with the voice of a clear French rivulet, that
wistful tenderness which makes the hearts of
animals beat so fast_.
FRANCIS JAMMES.
* * * * *
DRAMATIS PERSONAE
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, A Maltese cat.
TOBY-DOG, A French bull-dog.
HE, }
SHE,} Master and Mistress (of minor importance).
SENTIMENTALITIES
_The sunny porch_. TOBY-DOG _and_ KIKI-THE-DEMURE _sprawl on the hot
stone-flags, taking their after luncheon nap. The silence of Sunday
prevails, yet_ TOBY-DOG _is not asleep: the flies and a heavy luncheon
torment him. Hind-quarters flattened out frog-fashion, he drags himself
on his belly up to_ KIKI-THE-DEMURE _whose striped body is perfectly
quiet_.
TOBY-DOG
Are you asleep?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_purrs feebly_)
TOBY-DOG
Are you even alive? You're so flat! You look like the empty skin of a
cat.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_in faltering tones_)
L-e-t--m-e--a-l-o-n-e....
TOBY-DOG
Not sick, are you?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
No.... Let me alone. I'm asleep. I'm not even conscious of my body. What
torment to live with you! I've eaten, it's two o'clock, let's sleep.
TOBY-DOG
I can't. Something's made a ball in my stomach. It means to go down I
guess, but very slowly. And then,--these _flies_, these _flies_! The
eyes start out of my head at the sight of one of them. I'm all jaws,
bristling with terrible teeth (just hear them snap), yet the infernal
things escape me. Oh! my ears! Oh! my poor, sensitive, brown belly! My
feverish nose! There! ... you see?... right on my nose! _What_ shall I
do? I squint all I can ... two of them now?... No ... only one ... no,
two!... I toss them up like bits of sugar and it's the empty air I
snap.... I'm worn out. I detest the sun, and the flies, and
everything!...
(_He wails_.)
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_sitting up, his eyes pale from the light and
sleepiness_)
Well, you've succeeded in waking me. That's all you wanted, isn't it? My
dreams are gone! These flies that you're pursuing--I hardly felt their
little teasing feet through my thick fur. The merest touch, like a
caress, now and then thrilled along the silky sloping hairs which clothe
me.... But then you never act with any discretion. Your vulgar gayety is
a nuisance, and when sad you howl like a low comedian.
TOBY-DOG, (_bitterly)
_ If you woke up just to tell me _that_--
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_correcting_)
Of course you'll remember 'twas _you_ woke me.
TOBY-DOG
I was so uncomfortable, I wanted someone to help me, to give me a word
of encouragement....
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
_I_ don't know any digestive words.
(_Pause_.)
Fancy their giving _me_ a bad character when ... Just examine your
conscience a bit and compare us. Hunger and heat wear you out and drive
you mad; cold makes your blood curdle....
TOBY-DOG, (_vexed_)
Mine is a sensitive nature.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
A demoniacal nature, you mean!
TOBY-DOG
No, I don't mean that. You--you're a monstrous egoist.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
Perhaps.... You and the Two-Paws don't understand what you're pleased to
call a cat's egoism.... Our instinct of self-preservation, our dignity,
our modest reserve, our attitude of weary renunciation (which comes of
the hopelessness of ever being understood by them), they dub, in
haphazard fashion, egoism. You're not a very discriminating dog, but at
least you're free from prejudice. Will _you_ understand me better? A cat
is a guest in the house, not a plaything. Truly these are strange times
we're living in! The Two-Paws, He and She, have _they_ alone the right
to be sad or joyful, to lick plates, to scold, or to go about the house
indulging their capricious humors? I too have _my_ whims, _my_ sorrows,
_my_ irregular appetite, _my_ hours of reverie when I wish to be
alone....
TOBY-DOG, (_attentive and conscientious_)
I'm listening, but I can hardly follow what you say. It's so
complicated--a bit over my head, you know. But you astonish me! Are they
in the habit of hindering you in your changeful moods? You mew, and they
open the door. You lie on the paper--the sacred paper He's scratching
on--He moves away, marvelous condescension!--and leaves you his soiled
page. You meander up and down his scratching table, obviously in quest
of mischief, your nose wrinkled up, your tail giving quick little jerks
back and forth like a pendulum. She watches you laughing, while He
announces "the promenade of devastation." How then, can you accuse
Them--
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_insincere_)
I don't accuse Them. After all, psychological subtleties are not in your
line.
TOBY-DOG
Don't speak so fast. I need time to understand. It seems to me--
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_slyly_)
Pray, don't hurry! Your digestion might suffer in consequence.
TOBY-DOG, (_unconscious of the irony_)
You're right! I've some trouble in expressing myself to-day.--Well, here
goes: it seems to me that of the two of us it's you they make the most
of, and yet _you_ do all the grumbling.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
A dog's logic, that! The more one gives the more I demand.
TOBY-DOG
That's wrong. It's indiscreet.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
Not at all. I have a right to everything.
TOBY-DOG
To everything? And I?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
I don't imagine you lack anything, do you?
TOBY-DOG
Ah, I don't know. Sometimes in my very happiest moments, I feel like
crying. My eyes grow dim, my heart seems to choke me. I would like to be
sure, in such times of anguish, that everybody loves me; that there is
nowhere in the world a sad dog behind a closed door, that no evil will
ever come....
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_jeering_)
And _then_ what dreadful thing happens?
TOBY-DOG
You know very well! Inevitably, at that moment She appears, carrying a
bottle with horrible yellow stuff floating in it--Castor Oil! Wilful and
unfeeling, she holds me between her strong knees, opens my jaws--
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
Close them tighter!
TOBY-DOG
But I'm afraid of hurting her--and my tongue, horrified, tastes the
slimy mawkish stuff. I choke and spit, my poor face is convulsed and the
end of this torture is long in coming.... You've seen me afterwards
dragging myself around, melancholy, my head hanging, listening to the
unwholesome glouglou the oil makes in my stomach....
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
Once when I was little She tried to give _me_ castor oil. I scratched
and bit her so, she never tried again. Ha! She must have thought she
held the devil between her knees. I squirmed, blew fire through my
nostrils, multiplied my twenty claws by a hundred, my teeth by one
thousand, and finally--disappeared as if by magic.
TOBY-DOG
I wouldn't dare do that. You see, I love her. I love her enough to
forgive her even the torture of the bath.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_interested_)
You do? Tell me how it feels. It makes me shiver all over, just to see
her putting you in the water.
TOBY-DOG
Alas.... Listen then, and pity me. Sometimes, when She's come out of her
tub with nothing on her but her skin, her soft hairless skin that I lick
respectfully,--She spills out more warm water, throws in a brown brick
which smells of tar, and calls, "Toby!" That's enough! The soul quits
my body; my legs shake under me. Something shines on the water--the
picture of a window all twisted out of shape--it dances about and blinds
me. She seizes me, poor swooning thing that I am, and plunges me in....
Ye Gods! From that time on I'm lost.... My one hope is in her. My eyes
fasten themselves on hers, while a close warmth sticks to me like
another skin on top of mine.... The brick's all foamy now ... I smell
tar ... my eyes and nostrils smart ... there are storms in my ears. She
grows excited, breathes loud and fast, laughs, and scrubs me
light-heartedly. At last She rescues me, fishing me out by the nape of
my neck, I paw the air, begging for life; then comes the rough towel and
the warm coverlet where, exhausted, I relish my convalescence....
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_deeply impressed_)
Calm yourself.
TOBY-DOG
Jove! The telling it alone!... But--you old sly-boots--didn't I see her
one day armed with a sponge standing over _you,_ holding _you_ down on
the toilet table?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_quite embarrassed, lashing his tail_)
An old story! The long, fluffy hairs on my legs (which give them the
outline of a Zouave's) had somehow gotten dirty. She insisted upon
washing me. I persuaded her that I suffered atrociously under the
sponge....
TOBY-DOG
What a fibber you are! Did She believe you?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
'Um ... at first. It was my own fault tho' when She didn't. Turned over
on my back, I proffered the candid belly, the terrified and forgiving
eyes of a lamb about to be sacrificed. I felt a slight coolness, nothing
more. A fear that my sensibilities might be destroyed, took possession
of me. My rhythmical wailings increased, then subsided, then went up
again like the noise of the sea (you know the strength of my voice). I
imitated the calf, the whipped child, the cat in the night, the wind
under the door. Little by little I grew enraptured with my own song, so
that long after She had finished soiling me with cold water I continued
wailing, my eyes fixed on the ceiling. Then She laughed tactlessly and
cried out, "You're as untruthful as a woman!"
TOBY-DOG, (_with conviction_)
That _was_ annoying.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
I was angry with her the entire afternoon.
TOBY-DOG
Oh, as to sulking, you do your share! _I_ never can. I forget injuries.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_dryly_)
You lick the hand that chastens you. Oh it's well known!
TOBY-DOG, (_gullible_)
I lick the hand that--yes, that's it exactly.--An awfully pretty
expression.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
Not mine.... Dignity doesn't trouble _you_ any! My word! I'm often
ashamed for you. You love everybody. You take all sorts of rebuffs
without even raising your back. You're as pleasant and as banal as a
public garden.
TOBY-DOG Don't you believe it, you ill-bred cat! You think you know
everything and you don't understand simple politeness. Frankly now,
would you have me snarl at His or Her friends' heels,--well-dressed
people who know my name (lots of people _I_ don't know know my name) and
good-naturedly pull my ears?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
I hate new faces.
TOBY-DOG
I don't love them either--whatever you say. I love--Her and Him.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
And I, Him--and Her.
TOBY-DOG
Oh, I guessed _your_ preference long ago. There's a sort of secret
understanding between you two--
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_smiling mysteriously and abandoning himself to his
reverie_)
An understanding, yes--secret and profound. He rarely speaks but makes a
noise like a mouse, scratching his paper. It's for Him I've treasured up
my little heart, my precious cat's heart, and He, without words, has
given me his. This exchange makes me happy and reserved. Now and then
with that pretty, wayward, ruling instinct which makes us cats rivals of
women, I try my power over him. When we are alone, I point my ears
forward devilishly as a sign that I'm about to spring upon his
scratching paper. The tap, tap, tap of my paws straight through pens and
letters and everything scattered about, is addressed to him as well as
the insistent miauling when I beg for liberty. "Hymn to the Door-Knob,"
He laughingly calls it, or "The Plaint of the Sequestered Cat." The
tender contemplation of my inspiring eyes is for him alone; they weigh
on his bent head, until the look I'm calling searches and meets mine in
a shock of souls, so foreseen and so sweet, that I must needs close my
lids to hide the exquisite shyness I feel.
As for Her, she flutters about too much, often jostles me, holds my paws
together and rocks me in the air, pets me in excited fashion, laughs
aloud at me, imitates my voice too well--
TOBY-DOG, (_moved with indignation_)
You're very hard to please! I certainly love Him; he's good and pretends
not to see my faults, so that he won't have to scold, but She's the most
beautiful thing in the world to me, the dearest and--the most difficult
to understand. The sound of her step enchants me, her changeful eyes
dispense happiness--and trouble. She's like Destiny itself, she never
hesitates. Even torture from her hands--you know how She teases me?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE Cruelly.
TOBY-DOG
No, not cruelly, but artfully. I never can tell what's coming next. This
morning She bent down as if to speak to me, lifted one of my "tiny
elephant's ears," as She calls them, and sent a sharp cry into it, which
went to the very back of my brain.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
Horrors!
TOBY-DOG
Was it right or wrong? I can't decide even now. It started waves of
nervousness running madly through me. Then, She has a fancy for making
me do tricks. Almost every day I must--"Do the Fish, Toby dear." She
lifts me in her arms and squeezes me until I gasp. My poor dumb mouth
opens as a carp's does when they're drowning it in air....
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
That's _just_ like Her!
TOBY-DOG
Suddenly I find myself free--and still alive, miraculously saved by the
power of her will. How beautiful life seems to me then! How fondly I
lick the hand hanging at her side, the hem of her dress!
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_contemptuously_)
A pretty thing to do!
TOBY-DOG
All good and all evil come to me from Her. She is my worst torment and
my one sure refuge. When I run to her, my heart sick with fear, how soft
her arms are and how sweet her hair, falling in my face! I'm her
"black-baby," her "Toby-Dog," her "little bit o' love." She sits on the
ground to reassure me, making herself little like me--lies down
altogether and I go wild with delight at the sight of her face under
mine, thrown back in her fragrant hair. My feelings overflow, I can't
resist such a chance for a jolly good game. I rummage and fumble about,
excitedly poking my nose everywhere, till I find the crispy tip of a
pink ear--Her ear. I nibble it just enough to tickle her--to make her
cry out: "Stop, Toby! That's awful! Help! Help! This dog's devouring
me!"
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
H'm! Simple, homely, wholesome joys! ... And then, off you go to make
friends with the cook.
TOBY-DOG And you,--with the cat at the farm.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_coldly_)
Enough I pray, that concerns no one but myself ... and the little cat.
TOBY-DOG
A pretty conquest! It should make you blush--a seven-months-old kitten!
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_roused_)
For me she has all the charm of forbidden fruit and no one dare steal
her from me. She is slim as a bean-pole....
TOBY-DOG, (_aside_)
You old rascal! KIKI-THE-DEMURE
... and long; poised on long legs she walks with the uncertain step
common to all young things. She hunts field-mice, shrew-mice--even
partridge, and this hard work in the fields has toughened her young
muscles and given a rather gloomy expression to her kitten-face.
TOBY-DOG
She's ugly.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
No, not ugly, but odd-looking. Her muzzle with its very pink nostrils
strongly resembles that of a goat, her large ears remind one of a
peasant's coif, her eyes the color of old gold are set slant-wise, and
their naturally keen expression is varied by an occasional piquant
squint.
With what a will does she fly me confounding modesty with fear! I pass
slowly by (one would think me quite uninterested), draped in my splendid
coat. She's struck by its stripes. Oh, she'll come back, a little
love-sick kitten, and putting aside all constraint she'll throw herself
at my feet--like a supple white scarf--
TOBY-DOG
I've no objection, you know.... I'm comparatively indifferent to all
that concerns love. Here my time's so completely filled ... physical
exercise ... my cares of watch-dog, I ... hardly give a thought to the
bagatelle.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_aside)
Bagatelle!... He indulges in the persiflage of a traveling salesman!
TOBY-DOG
I love--Her and Him devotedly, with a love that lifts me up to them. It
suffices to occupy my time and heart.
The hour of our siesta is passing, my scornful friend. Do you know, I
like you in spite of your scorn and you like me, too. Don't turn your
head away, your peculiar modesty would hide what you call frailty and
what I call love. Do you think me blind? How often, on coming back to
the house with Her, have I seen your little triangular face at the
window, light up and smile at my approach,--the time to open the door
and you'd already put on your cat's mask--your pretty Japanesy mask,
with its narrow eyes.... Isn't it so?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_resolved not to hear_)
The hour of the siesta is passing. The cone-shaped shadows of the pear
trees grow long on the gravel path. We've talked away our sleepiness.
You've forgotten the flies, your uneasy stomach, and the heat which
dances in waves on the meadows. The beautiful, sultry day is dying.
Already there's a breeze bringing perfume from the pines. Their trunks
are melting into bright tears....
TOBY-DOG
Here She is! She's left her wicker chair, stretched her lovely arms and,
judging from the movement of her dress, I think we're going to take a
walk. See her behind the rosebushes? Now, with her nails she breaks a
leaf from the lemon tree; she's crumpling it up and smelling it. Ah ...
I belong to Her, soul and body. With my eyes closed I can divine her
presence.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
Yes, I see Her. She is quiet and gentle for the time being. He'll leave
his paper now to follow her. He'll come out calling, "Where are you?"
and sit on the bench, tired out. For _him_, I shall rise politely, and
go "do my nails" along the leg of his trousers. Silent, happy
companions, we'll listen for the day's departing footsteps. The perfume
of the lindens will become sickeningly sweet at the same hour that my
seer's eyes grow big and black and read mysterious Signs in the air....
Later on a calm fire will be lit down there, behind the pointed
mountain--a circle of glistening rose-color in the gray-blue of the
night--a sort of luminous cocoon from which will burst the dazzling edge
of the moon. She will sail along, cleaving the clouds.... Then, it will
be time to go to rest. He'll carry me in on his shoulder and I'll sleep
close to his feet, which are ever mindful of my repose.... Dawn will
find me shivering but rejuvenated, sitting face to the sun, in a silvery
halo of incense, offered me by the dew. Thus, I am a perfect picture of
the god I was in the old, old days.
ON THE TRAIN
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, TOBY-DOG, SHE _and_ HE, _have taken their places in a
first-class compartment. The train rolls along towards distant
mountains, and the freedom of Summer-time_. TOBY, _on a leash, lifts an
inquiring nose to the window_. HE _has strewn the carriage with
newspapers_: KIKI-THE-DEMURE, _silent and invisible in a closed basket,
is under his immediate protection_. SHE, _leaning back against the dusty
cushions, dreams of the mountain she loves best and of the low house on
it, weighted down with jasmine and virginia-creeper_.
TOBY-DOG
How fast this carriage goes! It can't be our regular coachman. I haven't
seen the horses, but they smell very bad and make black smoke. Oh,
Silent Dreamer, look at me and tell me--shall we arrive soon?
(_No response_. TOBY _gets fidgety and blows through his nostrils_.)
SHE
Hush! Toby, hush!
TOBY-DOG
I've hardly said a word.... Shall we arrive soon?
(_He turns towards his master, who is reading, and puts a discreet paw
on the edge of his knee_.)
HE
'Sh!...
TOBY-DOG, (_resigned_)
Hard luck! No one wants to talk to me. I'm bored and what's more, I
don't know this carriage well enough. I'm tired out. They woke me very
early this morning. I amused myself by running all over the house. They
had hidden the chairs under sheets, wrapped up the lamps, rolled up the
rugs. Things were white and changed and awful. There was a horrid smell
of camphor everywhere. My eyes filled with water, I sneezed under the
chairs and slid on the bare floor in my haste to follow the maids' white
aprons. They bustled about among trunks with such unwonted zeal, that I
was sure something exceptional was going to happen. At the last minute
just as She came in, calling: "Toby's collar and the cat's basket!
Quick! put the cat in his basket!"--just as she was saying that, my chum
disappeared. It was indescribable! He, terrible to see, swore by all the
gods, and struck the floor with his cane, furious because they had
allowed his Kiki to get away. She called "Kiki!" at first
supplicatingly, then in threatening tones, and the maids brought empty
plates, meant to deceive, and yellow paper from the butcher's. I really
thought my chum had left this world, when suddenly--there he was perched
on top of the book-case, looking down on us with an expression of
contempt in his green eyes. She put up her arms: "Kiki _will_ you come
down immediately! You are going to make us lose the train!" But he
didn't come down and it made me dizzy--though I was on the ground--to
see him way up there walking and turning about and miauling shrilly to
tell us how impossible he found it to obey. He was about frantic and
kept saying: "Heavens, he's going to fall." But She smiled skeptically,
went out of the room and came back armed with the whip. The whip said,
"crack!" twice only; then a miracle happened I think, 'cause the cat
leaped to the floor, softer and more bouncey than our plaything, the
ball of wool. _I_ would have broken to pieces falling like that!... He
has been in this basket ever since.... (TOBY _goes to the basket_.) Ah!
here's a little peek-hole.... I see his whiskers ... they're like white
needles. Whew! What eyes! (_He jumps back_.) I'm rather afraid. One
can't really shut a cat up; he always manages to get out somehow. ... He
must suffer, poor fellow! Perhaps if I speak kindly to him ... (_he
calls very politely_) Cat!
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_spitting furiously_)
Khhh!...
TOBY-DOG, (_jumping back_)
Oh, you said a bad word! You look awful! Have you a pain anywhere?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
Go away! I'm a martyr.... Go away I tell you, or I'll blow fire at you!
TOBY-DOG, (_ingenuous_)
But why?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
Why!--Because you're free, because I'm in this basket, because the
basket's in a foul carriage which is shaking me to pieces, and because
the serenity of those two exasperates me.
TOBY-DOG
Would you like me to look out and tell you what one sees from the
carriage window?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
Everything is equally odious to me.
TOBY-DOG, (_having looked out, comes back_)
I haven't seen anything....
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_bitterly_)
Thanks just the same.
TOBY-DOG
I mean I haven't seen anything that's easy to describe. Some green
things which pass right close to us--so close and so fast that they give
one a slap in the eye. A flat field turning 'round and 'round and over
there, a little pointed steeple--it's running as fast as the carriage.
Another field all red with blossoming clover has just given me another
slap in the eye--a red slap. The earth is sinking in--or else we're
going up, I'm not sure which. I see way off, _far_ away, some green
lawns dotted with white daisies--perhaps they're cows.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_with sarcasm_)
Or wafers, for sealing letters--or anything you like.
TOBY-DOG
Aren't you the least little bit amused? KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_with a
sinister laugh_)
Ha! Ask of the damned ...
TOBY-DOG
Of whom?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_more and more melodramatic, but without conviction_)
... of the damned in his vat of boiling oil, if anything amuses him!
Mine is not physical torment. I suffer imprisonment, humiliation,
darkness, neglect--
(_The train stops. A conductor on the platform cries "Aw-ll a-bor!!...
awl aborr!!"_)
TOBY-DOG, (_bewildered_)
Someone's crying out! There's an accident!! Let's run!!!
(_He throws himself against the carriage door and scratches madly at
it_.) SHE, (_half asleep_)
Toby dear, you're a nuisance!
TOBY-DOG, (_distracted_)
Oh, you inexplicable person! How can you sit there quietly? Don't you
hear those cries? They're stopping now--the accident has gone away. Wish
I'd known ...
(_The train starts again_.)
HE, (_throwing down his paper_)
The poor beast is hungry.
SHE, (_now very wide awake_)
You think so? Well, I am too. But Toby is to eat very little.
HE, (_anxiously_)
And Kiki-the-Demure?
SHE, (_peremptorily_) Kiki sulks, and he hid this morning, so he'll
have even less than Toby.
HE
He isn't making a sound. Aren't you afraid he's sick?
SHE
No, he's simply vexed.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_as soon as there's question of himself_)
Me-ow!
HE, (_tenderly and eagerly_)
Come my beautiful Kiki, my imprisoned one, come. You shall have cold
roast-beef and some breast of chicken ...
(_He opens the prison basket and_ KIKI _puts forth his_ _head, flattened
on top like that of a serpent; then his long, striped body, cautiously,
and so very slowly that one begins to think it's coming out by the
yard_.)
TOBY-DOG, (_pleasantly)
Ah, there you are, cat! Well, now, proclaim your freedom!
(KIKI, _without replying, smoothes his ruffled fur_.)
TOBY-DOG
Proclaim your freedom I tell you! It's the custom. Whenever a door is
opened one must run, jump, twist oneself into half circles and cry out.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
_One_? Who's one, pray?
TOBY-DOG
We dogs.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_seated and very dignified_)
Would you have me _bark_, too?... We have never followed the same rules
of conduct, that I know of.
TOBY-DOG, (_vexed_)
Oh very well, I don't insist. How do you like this carriage?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_sniffing fastidiously_)
It's frightful.--However, the cushions are rather good for one's nails.
(_He suits the action to the word_.)
TOBY-DOG, (_aside_)
Now if _I_ did that ...
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_continuing to scratch the upholstery_)
Hon! May this spongy, gray cloth soothe my rage!... Since morning, the
whole universe has been in a state of monstrous revolt. He whom I love,
and who venerates me, made not the least effort to defend me. I've
submitted to humiliating contacts, been jolted to death, piercing
whistles have shot through my head from ear to ear. Ho, ho, how good it
is to relax the nerves and to imagine that, with gleeful claws, one
tears the enemies' flesh in bloody shreds! Ho, ho! S-c-r-a-t-c-h, and
lift the paws on high! Lift them high as possible! It's a supremely
insolent gesture....
SHE
I say, Kiki, when are you going to stop that?
HE, (_Indulgent and admiring_)
Let him alone. He's doing his nails.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
He has spoken for me. I forgive him. But since it's allowed, I don't
care any more about tearing the cushions ... When will I get out of
this? Not that I'm afraid; they are both there, and the dog too, with
their everyday faces ... I've twinges in my stomach.
(_He yawns. The train stops. A conductor on the platform cries, "Aw-ll
a-bor! Aw-ll a-b-o-r-r!!"_)
TOBY-DOG, (_excited_)
Screaming again! Another accident?!--Let's run!...
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
Heavens, what a tiresome dog! What does it matter to him, if there _is_
an accident?
I don't believe in it moreover. It's the cry of a man, and men cry out
for the pleasure of hearing their own voices.
TOBY-DOG, (_calm again_)
I'm hungry. Can't we hope to eat soon, my mistress? I don't know what
time it is in this strange country, but it seems to me....
SHE
Come now, we'll all have our luncheon.
(_She takes the things out of the basket, crumples up some tissue paper
and breaks a crisp brown roll_.)
TOBY-DOG, (_chewing_)
What She gave me then must have been very good indeed to seem such a
tiny bit. It melted in my mouth, there's not even the memory of it
left....
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_chewing_)
Breast of chicken! Purr-rr ... Goodness me! I was purring without
knowing it! That won't do. They'll think me resigned to this journey. I
must eat slowly, grim, and undeceived, eat for the sole purpose of
keeping myself alive ...
SHE, (_to the dog and cat_)
Allow me to have _my_ luncheon now, if you please. _I_ too, like cold
chicken and the hearts of lettuce, dipped in salt....
HE, (_anxiously_)
What _shall_ we do to make this cat go into his basket again?
SHE
I don't know. We'll see presently ...
TOBY-DOG
Finished already? I could swallow three times that much. I say Cat,
you're eating rather well for a martyr.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_fibbing_)
Trouble digs a hole in one's interior. Move away please, I want to sleep
now ... if I can. Perhaps a merciful dream will take me back to the
house I've left, to the flowered cushion He gave me.... Home! sweet
home! Rugs of bright colors for the delight of my eyes, a palm with
nice shoots for me to eat, deep arm-chairs, under which I hide my woolen
ball as a future surprise for myself--ah, and the cork hanging by a
string to the door-latch! the tables covered with bibelots! I thread my
way in and out among them and occasionally it amuses me to break some
brittle thing. The dining-room is a temple! The vestibule, full of
mystery; there unseen, I can watch those who come and go ... Oh narrow
back-stairway, where the step of the milkman rings out for me like a
morning angelus--farewell! farewell! my destiny carries me on, and who
knows if ever ... But this is _too_ sad! All the pretty things I've been
saying have really begun to make me feel badly!!
(_He begins a minute and mournful toilet. The train stops. A conductor
on the platform cries, "Aw-ll-a-borr-a-borr!!"_)
TOBY-DOG
There it is again! An acci--Oh bother, I've had enough of that!
HE, (_anxiously_)
We're going to change trains in ten minutes. How about the cat? He'll
never allow us to shut him up ...
SHE
We'll see ... Suppose we put some meat in his basket?
HE
Or perhaps petting would ...
(_They approach the redoubtable_ KIKI _and both speak together_.)
HE
Kiki, my beautiful Kiki, come jump on my knee, or on my shoulder. You
like that as a rule. You'll doze there and then I'll put you gently into
the basket. After all, it's open-work and has a comfortable cushion to
protect you from the rough wicker. Come, my dear....
SHE
Listen, Kiki. You must learn to act properly and to take life as it is.
You can't stay there like that. We're going to change trains and a
horrible guard will appear and say insulting things of you and your
race. Besides you'd better obey, because if you don't, I--I'll give you
a good whipping.
(_But before she can lift her hand against his sacred fur, Kiki gets up,
stretches himself, arches his back, yawns,--to show the rosy lining of
his mouth, and then walks to the open basket where he lies down with an
admirable air of quiet insolence. He and She exchange eloquent
glances_.)
DINNER IS LATE
_A parlor, in the country, at the close of a long summer's day_.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE _and_ TOBY-DOG _doze; ears twitching and eyelids
obstinately shut. Now_ KIKI'S _lids part in a narrow slit, and disclose
eyes the color of purple grapes. He yawns, with the ferocious
expression of a small dragon._
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_haughtily_)
You're snoring!
TOBY-DOG, (_who was not really asleep_)
I'm not; it's you.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
Impossible! I don't snore, I purr.
TOBY-DOG
Same thing.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_not condescending to a discussion_)
Thank heaven, it isn't! (_A silence_.)
I'm hungry. One doesn't hear the noise of plates in the next room. Isn't
it dinner time?
TOBY-DOG, (_gets up, slowly stretches his forepaws and yawns, darting
forth a heraldic tongue with curly end_) I don't know ... I'm hungry.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
Where is She? How is it you're not at her heels?
TOBY-DOG, (_embarrassed, nibbling his nails_)
She's in the garden I believe, picking up plums.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
Those yellow balls that rain about one's ears? I know them. You've seen
her then? I bet She scolded you ... What have you been doing now?
TOBY-DOG, (_self-conscious, turning away his wrinkled, toad-like face_)
She told me to return to the house because--because I too, was eating
plums.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
She did well! You have depraved tastes--the tastes of men.
TOBY-DOG, (_offended_)
Say--no one ever sees me eating bad fish! And never, _never_ will I
understand how you can go into such fits over a dead frog, or that herb.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
Valerian.
TOBY-DOG
That's it, I guess ... An herb--is medicine, isn't it?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
Medicine, indeed! Valerian ... but no _you_, can't understand ... I've
seen Her laugh and go on, as I do over the valerian, after having
emptied a glass of fetid wine that jumped dangerously too. As for the
dead frog--so dead that it seems a bit of dry russia leather in the form
of a frog--it's a sachet, impregnated with rare musk, with which I wish
to scent my fur.
TOBY-DOG
Oh, you talk very well--but She always scolds and says that you smell
bad after it, and He says the same thing.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
They're nothing but Two-Paws, both of them. You, poor thing, belittle
yourself by seeking to imitate them. You stand on your hind legs, wear a
coat when it rains, eat plums--for shame!--and those big green balls,
the malicious trees let fall sometimes, when I'm passing underneath.
TOBY-DOG
Apples?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
Very likely. She picks one up and throws it down the path, crying:
"Apple, Toby, apple," and you rush after, in unseemly fashion, gasping
for breath, looking like a fool, your tongue and your eyes sticking
out....
TOBY-DOG, (_scowling, head resting on his paws_)
One takes one's pleasures where one finds them.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_yawning, shows his pointed teeth and his palate of
pink velvet_)
I'm hungry. Dinner is surely late tonight. Suppose you look for Her?
TOBY-DOG
I daren't. She forbade it. She is down there in the hollow, with a big
basket. The dew is falling and wetting her feet and the sun's going
away. But you know how She is. She sits on the damp ground, looking
ahead of her, as if She were asleep--or lies flat on her stomach,
whistling and watching an ant in the grass ... She tears up a handful of
wild thyme and smells it, or calls the tomtits and the jays--who never
come to her by any chance. She takes a heavy watering pot and--ugh! it
gives me the shivers--pours thousands of icy, silvery threads over the
roses or into the hollows of those little stone troughs, 'way back in
the woods. I always look in to see the head of a brindle-bull who comes
to meet me and to drink up the pictures of the leaves, but She pulls me
back by the collar with: "Toby, Toby, _that_ water is for the birds."
... Then She takes out her knife and opens nuts, fifty, a _hundred_
nuts, and forgets the time ... There's no end to the things She does.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_slyly_)
And what do you do all that time?
TOBY-DOG
I--well--I just wait for her.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
I admire you!
TOBY-DOG
Once in a while, squatting down, She eagerly scratches the earth, toils
and sweats over it; then I jump 'round her, delighted to see her at
something so useful and so familiar. But her feeble scent deceives her.
_I_ never smell mole, or shrew-mouse-of-the-rosy-paws, in the holes
_She_ digs. And how explain her utter lack of purpose? Presently,
falling back on her haunches, She brandishes a hairy-rooted herb and
cries: "I have it, the jade!" I lie in the damp grass and tremble, or
dig my nose (She calls it my snout) into the earth to get the
complicated odors of it. ... When there are three or four scents all
blended, all mixed together, can you distinguish that of the mole from
that of the hare which passed quickly, or the bird which rested there?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
Certainly I can. My nose is highly educated. It's small, regular, wide
between my eyes, delicate at the chamois-skin end of my nostrils; the
lightest touch of a blade of grass, the shadow of smoke tickles and
makes it sneeze. It doesn't bother about distinguishing the scent of
moles from that of--hares, did you say? But it delights in the trace
left by a cat in a hedge ... I've a charming nose. She calls it, "his
pretty little nose of cotton velvet." Since my eyes opened on this world
I've not known the day that someone has not uttered a truthful flattery
on the subject of my nose. Now yours--is a rough-grained truffle. What
makes you move it so ridiculously? At this very moment.
TOBY-DOG
I'm hungry and I don't hear the plates.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
... your truffle of a nose works up and down and makes another wrinkle
in your irregular mug.
TOBY-DOG
She always says, "his square muzzle, his wrinkled truffle," so tenderly
and so lovingly!
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
... And you think of nothing but eating.
TOBY-DOG
It's _your_ empty stomach that scolds and complains and wants to quarrel
with me.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
I've a charming stomach.
TOBY-DOG
But no, it's your nose that's charming. You just said so.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
My stomach too. There's none more fastidious, more whimsical, stronger
and at the same time more delicate. It digests the bones of sole, but
meat that's the least bit tainted literally turns it.
TOBY-DOG
Literally's the word. You have _active_ indigestion.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
Yes, the whole house is affected by it. From the very first qualms I'm
in terrible distress; the earth gives way under me, my eyes dilate, I
hurriedly swallow quantities of salty saliva; involuntary, ventriloquial
cries escape me, my sides bulge out--
TOBY-DOG, (_disgusted_)
I say, if it's all the same to you, tell me the rest after dinner.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
I'm hungry. Where can He be?
TOBY-DOG
He's there, in his study, scratching paper.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
He's always doing that. It's a game. Two-Paws play at the same thing for
hours and hours. I've often tried to scratch paper gently, as He does,
but the pleasure doesn't last long. I prefer newspapers torn into shreds
that rustle and fly ... There is a little pot of dark-violet, muddy
water on his table. I never sniff it without horror, since the day a
rather foolish curiosity made me dip my paw into it. This very paw, so
strong and aristocratic, (the tufts of useless hair you see between my
toes proclaim the purity of my race) this very paw bore a bluish stain
for eight days and the degrading odor of rusty steel clung to it a long
time after ...
TOBY-DOG
What's the little pot for?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
He drinks from it doubtless.
(_Silence_.)
TOBY-DOG
She's not back yet! Heaven grant She isn't lost, as I was one day in the
streets of Paris!
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
I'm hungry!
TOBY-DOG
I'm hungry! What are we going to eat this evening?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
I saw a chicken. It made a silly noise and dropped red blood on the
kitchen floor, soiling it far more than I ever did, or you either--yet
no one whipped it. But Emily put it in the fire, to teach it a lesson. I
licked up some of the blood ...
TOBY-DOG, (_yawns_)
Chicken ... it makes my mouth water. She'll say: "Here Toby, bones!" and
throw me the carcass.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
How badly you speak! He says: "Little chicken bones, Kiki, little
chicken bones!"
TOBY-DOG, (_surprised_)
But no _really_ it's, "Here, Toby, bones!" that She says.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
He speaks better than She does.
TOBY-DOG, (_incompetent_)
Ah?... Tell me, do birds taste anything like chicken?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_whose eyes light up suddenly_)
No ... they're far better, they're alive. Ha, the quivering bird, the
warm feathers, the delicious little brain ... you feel it all crackling
between your teeth!
TOBY-DOG
Oh, you make me sick! It always worries me to see tiny animals like that
flutter about ... and birds are dear, good little things.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_dryly_)
Don't you believe it, they're only good to eat. They're noisy, stupid
creatures, infatuated with themselves, _made_ to be eaten. ... You know
the two jays?
TOBY-DOG
Not very well.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE They live in the little wood. When I walk by they laugh
a sardonic "tiac, tiac," because I wear a bell at my neck. In vain do I
hold my head very stiffly and put my paws down _very_ gently, my bell
tinkles and the two creatures scream from the top of the fir-tree. Just
let me get hold of them, one of these days!...
(_He lays back his ears and raises the hair along his back_.)
TOBY-DOG, (_pensive_) Positively, Cat, there are times when I don't know
you. We are talking quietly and suddenly you bristle like a
bottle-brush; or we happen to be playing amicably together and I bark
behind your back--bow, wow-wow!--just for fun; then,--one doesn't know
why, perhaps because my nose has grazed the long hairs on your legs
you're so proud of--you become all at once a savage beast, spitting
fire, and charging at me like a strange dog. Don't you think that shows
a bad character?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_mysterious, eyes half-closed_)
Not at all. It's character, simply. A Cat's character. In such moments
of irritability, I'm keenly alive to the humiliation of my present
state, and that of my race.
I can remember a time when priests in long, linen tunics, bending low,
spoke to us and humbly tried to comprehend our chanted utterance. Know,
dog, that it is not _we_ who have changed! It may be, there are days
when I'm more myself, when everything offends me, and justly; a brusque
gesture, a vulgar laugh, the banging of a door, your odor, your
inconceivable impudence when you touch me, or encircle me, jumping and
yelping ...
TOBY-DOG, (_patiently, to himself_)
He's having one of his attacks.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_with a start_)
Did you hear?
TOBY-DOG
Yes, the kitchen door, and the door into the dining-room ... and now the
drawer where the spoons are kept. At last! At last! aaah! (_He yawns_.)
I can't stand this any longer. _Where_ is She? I don't hear the gravel
creaking ... night's coming on!
KIKI-THE-DEMURE, (_ironically_)
Go find her.
TOBY-DOG
And how about Him? He usually worries, and comes in asking, "Where is
She?" But He's scratching still. He must have drunk up all the
violet-colored water in the muddy little pot by this time. (TOBY
_carefully stretches his legs_.) Ah! I feel lively ... and empty. We're
going to eat soon! Just smell the good kitchen-smells that come under
the door!... Let's play!
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
No.
TOBY-DOG
Run, I'll chase, without touching you.
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
No.
TOBY-DOG
Why not?
KIKI-THE-DEMURE
I don't want to.
TOBY-DOG