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Toots And Boots
by
The gentleman gave a short laugh, and took me into his arms.
“Oh, how good of you! Jones shall get a hamper,” cried the ladies. But he shook his head.
“Three of the fourteen parcels I’ve got to pick up at the station are hampers. I wouldn’t have another on my mind for a fortune. If Toots comes at all, he must come like a Christian and look after himself.”
I will not dwell on our departure. It was a sadly flurried one, for a cat of my temperament. The ladies saw us off, and as my young mistress covered me with farewell kisses, I felt an unquestionable pang of regret. But one has to repress one’s affections, and consider one’s prospects in life, if one does not want to come upon the Deserted Cats’ Fund!
My master put his hat on the back of his head on the steps, and knocked it off in shouting through a hole in the roof of the cab that we were to drive like the wind, as we were late. At the last moment several things were thrown in after us. A parcel of books he had lent the young lady, and a pair of boots he had left behind on some former occasion. The books were very neatly packed, and addressed, but the boots came “like Christians, and looked after themselves.” And through all, I clung fast, and blessed the inherited vigour of my grandmother’s claws.
At the parcels office, I certainly risked nine lives among the fourteen parcels which were dragged and pitched, and turned over in every direction; but though he paid me no other attention, my master never forgot to put back a hand to help me when we moved on. Eventually we found ourselves alone in a very comfortable carriage, and I suppose the fourteen packages were safe too, thanks to the desperate struggles of five porters, who went off clutching their paws as if they were satisfied with the result.
After incommoding me for some time by rustling newspapers, and making spasmodic struggles to find a posture that suited him, my master found one at last and fell asleep, and I crept up to the velvet collar of his great-coat and followed his example.
CHAPTER III.
I like living with bachelors. They have comfortable chairs, and keep good fires. They don’t put water into the tea-pot: they call the man-servant and send for more tea. They don’t give you a table-spoonful of cream, fidgeting and looking round to see if anybody else wants it: one of them turns the jug upside-down into your saucer, and before another can lay hold of it and say, “Halloa! The milk’s all gone,”–you have generally had time to lap it up under the table.
I prefer men’s outsides, too, to women’s in some respects. Why all human beings–since they have no coats of their own, and are obliged to buy them–do not buy handsomely marked furs whilst they are about it, is a puzzle to a cat. As to the miserable stuff ladies cover themselves with in an evening, there is about as much comfort and softness in it as in going to sleep on a duster. Men’s coats are nothing to boast of, either to look at or to feel, but they are thicker. If you happen to clutch a little with gratification or excitement, your claws don’t go through; and they don’t squeak like a mouse in a trap and call you treacherous because their own coats are thin.
I was very comfortable in my new home. My master was exceedingly kind to me, and he has a fearless and friendly way of tickling one’s toes which is particularly agreeable, and not commonly to be met with.
Yes, my life was even more luxurious than before. It is so still. To eat, drink, and sleep, to keep oneself warm, and in good condition, and to pay proper attention to one’s personal appearance; that is all one has to do in a life like mine in bachelors’ quarters.