Taking Cat home had been
just a passing thought, but right now I decide I'll really go to the mat
with Pop about this. He can have his memories of good old Jeff and rabbit
hunts, but I'm going to have me a tiger.

Aunt Kate gives me a can of cat food and a box of litter, so Cat can stay
in my room, because I remember Mom probably gets asthma from animals, too.
Cat and I go home.

Pop does a lot of shouting and sputtering when we get home, but I just put
Cat down in my room, and I try not to argue with him, so I won't lose my
temper. I promise I'll keep him in my room and sweep up the cat hairs so
Mom won't have to.

As a final blast Pop says, "I suppose you'll get your exercise mouse
hunting now. What are you going to name the noble animal?"

"Look, Pop," I explain, "I know he's a cat, he knows he's a cat, and his
name is Cat. And even if you call him Honorable John Fitzgerald Kennedy,
he won't come when you call, and he won't lick your hand, see?"

"He'd better not! And it's not my hand that's going to get licked around
here in a minute," Pop snaps.

"All right, all right."

Actually, my pop sometimes jaws so long it'd be a relief if he did haul
off and hit me, but he never does.

We call it a draw for that day, and I have Cat.

2

[Illustration: Dave looking at Cat locked in cage.]

CAT AND THE UNDERWORLD

Cat makes himself at home in my room pretty easily. Mostly he likes to be
up on top of something, so I put an old sweater on the bureau beside my
bed, and he sleeps up there. When he wants me to wake up in the morning,
he jumps and lands in the middle of my stomach. Believe me, cats don't
always land lightly--only when they want to. Anything a cat does, he does
only when he wants to. I like that.

When I'm combing my hair in the morning, sometimes he sits up there and
looks down his nose at my reflection in the mirror. He appears to be
taking inventory: "Hmm, buckteeth; sandy hair, smooth in front, cowlick in
back; brown eyes, can't see in the dark worth a nickel; hickeys on the
chin. Too bad."

I look back at him in the mirror and say, "O.K., black face, yellow eyes,
and one white whisker. Where'd you get that one white whisker?"

He catches sight of himself in the mirror, and his tail twitches
momentarily. He seems to know it's not really anothe