and drops easily down
off the bed and walks away. He still limps a little, but otherwise he acts
like nothing had happened. He just wants to know what's for breakfast.

"You better watch out. One day you'll run into a cat that's bigger and
meaner than you," I tell him.

Cat continues to wait for breakfast. He is not impressed.

But I'm worried. Suppose some big old cat chews him up and he's hurt too
bad to get home? After breakfast I take him out in the backyard for a bit,
and then I shut him in my room and go over to consult Aunt Kate.

She sets me up with the usual iced tea and dish of cottage cheese.

"I had breakfast already. What do I need with cottage cheese?"

"Eat it. It's good for you."

So I eat it, and then I start telling her about Cat. "He came home all
chewed up night before last. I'm afraid some night he's not going to make
it."

"Right," says Kate. She's not very talky, but I'm sort of surprised. I
expected she'd tell me to quit worrying, Cat can take care of himself. She
starts pulling Susan's latest kittens out from under the sofa and sorting
them out as if they were ribbons: one gray, two tiger, one yellow, one
calico.

"So what you going to do?" she shoots at me, shoveling the kittens back to
Susan.

"I--uh--I dunno. I thought maybe I ought to try to keep him in nights."

"Huh. Don't know much, do you?" she says. "Well, so I'll tell you. Your
Cat has probably fathered a few dozen kittens by now, and once a cat's
been out and mated, you can't keep him in. You got to get him altered.
Then he won't want to go out so much."

"Altered?"

"Fixed. Castrated is the technical word. It's a two-minute operation. Cost
you three dollars. Take him to Speyer Hospital--big new building up on
First Avenue."

"You mean get him fixed so he's not a real tomcat any more? The heck with
that! I don't want him turned into a fat old cushion cat!"

"He won't be," she says. "But if it makes you happier, let him get killed
in a cat fight. He's tough. He'll last a year or two. Suit yourself."

"Ah, you're screwy! You and your cottage cheese!" Even as I say it I feel
a little guilty. But I feel mad and mixed up, and I fling out the door.
It's the first time I ever left Kate's mad. Usually I leave _our_ house
mad and go to Kate.

Now I got nowhere to go. I walk along, cussing and fuming and kicking
pebbles. I come to an air-conditioned movie and go up to the window.

The phony blonde in the booth looks at m