"YOU'RE THE NEW DOG, AREN'T YOU?"
It was an autumn evening, or rather afternoon, for the sun was still
high over the blue hills of the West. The sky was clear too, and
twilight would last long.
The trees, however, were already casting longer shadows on the grass,
and the breeze that swayed their brandies, cast, playfully, ever and
anon, handfuls of brown leaves towards the earth.
Shireen was coming slowly across the road towards Uncle Ben's bungalow.
Uncle Ben was an old sea captain, and had been in India for some years
of his life. This was the reason why he called his home a bungalow. It
really was a sturdy stone-built cottage, a verandah in front to which in
June and July the roses clung, with two gables embowered in the greenery
of ivy, one of which had a large casement window in it, with steps
leading down to the lawn, where, under the trees in the sweet
summer-time Ben was often to be found smoking a pipe in his grass
hammock.
The whole place was a sort of arboretum, however, and the very most the
sun could ever do was to shine down upon the grass in patches. Once
inside the railing that surrounded it. Shireen knew she would be safe,
so there was no need to hurry. Besides, it had been raining, and the
road was not only wet, but the water lay here and there in little pools.
These pools Shireen took care to avoid, for she was a very dainty cat
indeed. Every time she took a step she lifted her paw as high as she
could and shook it. She tried also to elevate that tail of hers so as
to keep it unsoiled, but it was so big and bushy that in this she was
only partially successful.
The bungalow lay or stood in the outskirts or suburbs of the village,
and not a long way from the sea either, for old Ben would have slept but
poorly could he not have gone to sleep every night--that is every still
night--with the whisper of the waves singing a kind of lullaby to him as
they broke lazily on the yellow sands. But if a breeze blew off the
shore or down from the hills to the nor'ard and cast, then Ben went to
sleep with the half-formed idea in his mind that he was at sea; an idea
that ere long commingled with his dreams. The wind would seem to be
roaring through rigging and shrouds, and not through the oaks and elms
and rustling pine trees; but sail was shortened, the ship was snug, and
it was the mate's watch on deck. What more could any sailor desire?
Ben had no wife; only a little old woman came and charred for him, and a
tall ungainly Portuguese lad, who had been cook's mate with him on board
the _Alibi_, and could make an excellent curry, officiated as Ben's
factotum and valet. Then there was the cockatoo. Perhaps it may be
said that cockatoos don't count as members of a household, but Cockie
was no ordinary cockatoo, I can assure you. She came originally from
the bush or jungle of Western Australia. Ben used to nod his head at
Cockie in a semi-solemn kind of way when anyone put a question to him
concerning the bird.
She came into my possession in a queer kind of way. Some of these days
I may tell you the story. Haven't told it to anybody yet except to
Pussy Shireen. Some day?--Yes, some day--perhaps.
The little old woman who charred for Ben only came once a week, and that
was on a Friday. Then Ben would clear out, get away to the hills, or
off in a boat, with bread and cheese in his coat-tail pocket, and not
come home till evening.
Fridays were called by this sailor "wash-and-scrub-deck-days," and there
wasn't a deal of comfort in them. Besides, Ben dreaded a woman's
tongue.
"And old Sally's tongue," he would tell his friends, "is about the
waggingest thing out. Just set the old creature agoing, and she'll go
on without a hitch for a two hours' spell as steady's the trade wind."
So he was always glad when Sally finished her tea in the kitchen,
received her well-earned two shillings, and took her departure. Then,
and not until then, would Ben sink into his rocking-chair with a sigh of
relief and satisfaction, and light his very largest meerschaum pipe.
Ben never boasted about Sally, but he was willing enough to talk about
Pedro, or the cockatoo.
"He is a faithful creature, a faithful creature, and I don't care who
knows it. And the curry he makes! Ah!" It will be noted that Ben
would be alluding thus to Pedro, not to Cockie the cockatoo. "Yes, that
curry, why, the very flavour of it takes ten years off my life at least.
Calls me as regular of a morning as a bo's'n's pipe. Eight bells, and
there I am; clothes all brushed and folded; bath waiting for me; clean
white shirt laid out, and never a button missing off my waistcoat.
Breakfast served nice and comfortable soon's I go down; letters
alongside my plate, and Cockie's cage as sweet as nuts. A faithful
creature indeed, although he isn't much to look at!"
No. Ben spoke the truth, for certainly Pedro was not much to look at;
not much to admire. He wore the same dress apparently winter and
summer; a very short blue-cloth sailor's jacket, under this a checked
shirt, no necktie, no collar, no waistcoat. The continuations of his
dress downwards did not reach to his low-heeled shoes by inches, so he
always showed a goodly amount of blue-ribbed stocking, but his shoes
were always nicely polished, and his long lean hands were clean. In
complexion Pedro was sallow, almost saffron-hued, and his eyes were like
this jet; while his hair, which was black, of course, was scarcely
half-an-inch long all over, and stood on end like the bristles of a
blacking brush. People used to say that at some period of his life
Pedro must have seen a ghost, and that his hair had never fallen flat
again.
"But he is good to the birds," Ben would have told you.
"God's birds, I mean," he would have added. "The birds that cheer us
and charm us in the sweet spring-time, you know, and all the summer
through.
"`All thro' the sultry hours of June,
From morning blithe to golden noon,
And till the star of evening climbs
The grey-blue zest, a world too soon,
There sings a thrush among the limes.'
"Ay, and that bird, and our blackbirds with their mellow music, and bold
lilting chaffie and tender-songed cock-robin know Pedro, and when the
winter snows are on the lawn they will almost feed out of his hand.
They know me, too, and they know Cockie, and they know Colonel
Clarkson's cat Shireen."
And that, reader, is the very cat that is now slowly and wearily
crossing the road towards the good old sailor's bungalow. Shireen, it
will therefore be observed, did not belong to Ben. She was simply an
occasional visitor, for cats very soon find out who loves them and who
does not.
But Ben's bungalow was not the only place to which Shireen was in the
habit of paying a visit. No, not by very many. Indeed, everybody knew
Shireen, and there were few houses in the village that this strange cat
did not walk into now and then. Very coolly, too; but always with a
little fond cry or expression of friendliness and goodwill to the
inmates.
She was always welcome, and many a saucerful of creamy milk was put down
to her on these occasions. Not that Shireen paid the visit for sake of
being fed, for often she would not touch the milk-offering. But she had
formed this wandering habit somehow. The fact is, Shireen, like her
owner, the Colonel, was a very far-travelling cat, and cats, like old
soldiers and old sailors who have been here and there in many lands,
find it difficult to settle in one place or one home.
If ever a cat was a village favourite, this droll puss Shireen was.
It must not be supposed, however, that she was anybody's cat, for a
cupful of milk, as the saying is. For there were people that Shireen
liked better than others, and some she did not like at all; while there
were men and women that she would fly from, and houses in the village
that she gave a wide berth to.
Sometimes she would take it into her head to pay a visit to the girls'
school during working hours. The young lady teachers did not object,
because she did not interfere with the duties; but here again she
evinced likes and dislikes. Pretty Matty Loraine, for example, she
quietly ignored, and never responded to her caresses, but to everybody's
astonishment she seemed greatly attached to Emily Stoddart, although
Emily was considered somewhat plain in appearance, and not very clever.
Besides, she had red hair; but she had soft blue eyes, and perhaps
Shireen had found out down in their hidden depths a gentle nature dwelt.
Everybody said that when Matty grew up she would be very beautiful
indeed, and might possibly marry the squire's son, but a wealthy
marriage was never prophesied for poor Emily. There were stonemasons
and hedgers or ditchers for girls like her. However, prophecies did not
seem to trouble Emily, though the evident preference that Shireen showed
for her pleased her not a little. Perhaps cats are students of human
character, and in very truth they need to be if they are to enjoy life
at all, and give themselves a chance of securing the allotted span of
eighteen or twenty years which Providence has decreed as the extent of
poor persecuted pussy's existence--in this world at all events.
Singularly enough, Shireen evinced not the slightest fear of dogs. As a
rule, I mean, though every rule has its exceptions. But puss could have
told you the idiosyncrasies of all the dogs in the village downwards,
from the doctor's great good-natured Newfoundland, on whose broad back
all the children in the place had ridden when very young. _He_ wouldn't
touch a cat. He was too noble by far. Nor would the saddler's
bull-dog, ferocious-looking and ugly to a degree though he was; nor
Squire Blythe's mastiff; nor Miss Ponsonby's collie, with his long
shaggy coat, his beautiful face and gentle eyes.
Whenever a new dog came to the village Shireen set out to meet him and
make friends with him. She would come trotting up to the fresh arrival
with her tail in the air, and purring nearly as loud as a turtle dove,
and some such conversation as the following might be supposed to take
place between the two.
Shireen (_loquitur_): "Oh, you're the new dog, aren't you? What's your
name, and what's your breed? I'm simply delighted to see a new face!"
Fresh Arrival (_looking astonished_): "My name is Cracker. My breed is
the Airedale terrier. I come from Yorkshire. I have fought and slain
an otter single-handed. I'm a terrible fellow when I'm put out. My
duty is to kill rats, and--listen--sometimes even _cats_!"
Shireen (_purring louder than ever_): "Oh, I daresay and, indeed,
Cracker, some cats deserve to be killed. But I'm Shireen. Nobody ever
kills me. What a nice good-natured face you have! Just let me rub my
back against your chest. So--and--so! I'm sure we shall be tremendous
friends, and you might do me a favour if you care to."