There was one fluffy white cat who was different. She was young, I could tell, but she didn’t frolic with the other kittens. She sat on an elevated ledge in the sun—very calm and aloof, like a princess on a throne.
I was standing at the fence, sketching her, when a young man walked over and looked at my drawings.“You’re very good,” he said. “Are you from one of the art galleries?”
“No,” I told him. “I’ve just started to work at the advertising agency. Iadore this fence. It’s such a clever idea.”
“Thank you,” he said. “My firm designed it. I’m an architect.” He was a nice young man, and I thought architects wereterribly glamorous. He was taking snapshots of the Canyon with one of those little box cameras that sold for a dollar. And for your information, my dear, they took better pictures than some of today’s complicated contrivances.
The young man said:“I never get tired of looking at the abstract architecture of this excavation—the planes and angles and massing and elevations and depressions. It’s like a miniature medieval city—two cities, really, with a battlefield in between.”
He told me how the cats on one side of the hole never mingled with those on the other side, except at night. When the moon was in a certain phase, the two tribes met on the concrete slab in the middle and engaged inhorrendous battles.
The cats on the other side were rather drab—mostly gray—but on our side there were orange, black, calico, gray-and-white, all kinds of mixtures. The architect—his name was Paul—called them the Grays and the Motleys.
He said:“If you come here often enough, you can figure out who is the king of each principality, and which cats are his warriors. The king of the Motleys is that fierce-looking black-and-white tomcat.”
Then I said:“That little white one sitting on a ledge is a princess. She never does anything common—like chasing butterflies or wrestling with the other kittens. She just sits on her throne and thinks beautiful thoughts. Whenever she steps down, she walks slowly in a regal way.”
And now, my dear, here comes our tea … . Thank you, Marie … . I hope the cookies are chocolate-chip … . Yes, they are! We didn’t have this delicacy in the twenties.
What did the cats do for food?
Food? Oh, they climbed out of the Canyon and begged at the back doors of the restaurants. I’m sure they caught rodents in the alleys and explored garbage pails. And, of course, they shared the lunches of visitors at the viewing fence. I saw cats gobbling doughnuts, grapes, olives, peanut butter sandwiches, hard-cooked eggs—everything anyone would offer them.
Sometimes they made friends with visitors and were taken home. I wanted to adopt the white kitten, but my landlord was atyrant, and he simply would not allow pets. The Princess hadheavenly blue eyes! I discovered that one day when I took my opera glasses to the fence. When I mentioned it to Paul, he said he liked females with blue eyes. You see, my dear,my eyes were a pronounced blue when I was young. They have faded with age, I’m afraid.
What did the cats do in bad weather?
There were nooks and crannies where they could shelter, and in winter the city delivered bales of hay to the Canyon, which provided some protection. They were hardy animals.
But let me tell you about the nurse!
The second time I met Paul at the viewing fence, we were chatting about my favorite movie star. Did you ever hear of Francis X. Bushman? He was called the handsomest man in the world. Well, we were talking about his performance inBen Hur, when a strange character got off the streetcar, carrying two large bags of something. Her clothes were drab and shapeless, and she wore men’s sneakers. She looked like awitch.
“Here comes the nurse,” Paul said. “She comes almost every day.”
Although the fence was posted with Keep Out signs, the woman squeezed between the railings and climbed down into the Canyon. Then she started examining the cats. One was limping, and she pulled something out of his paw with tweezers. She did things with eye drops and cotton swabs. If a cat looked listless, she popped a pill down his throat. Finally she approached the Princess and gave her something to eat. I assumed it was a tidbit worthy of royalty, like roast breast of pheasant. Whatever it was, the little white cat devoured it eagerly.
Was the nurse on the city payroll?
No, she was a self-appointed custodian—very professional and unemotional. Also verymysterious. Paul said there had been a newspaper story about her, but it didn’t reveal much. She lived on a farm near the city limits, and if she found a dead cat in the Canyon, she took it home on the streetcar and buried it. Some persons believed she was an eccentric millionaire; you know how rumors spread. Some said she had been a hospital nurse, accused of a mercy killing. Othersswore she was a doctor’s wife who had shot her husband for infidelity and had served a prison term. We never knew the actual truth.
After the nurse finished treating the Motleys, she crossed the battlefield and did the same for the Grays. Then she climbed out of the hole and circled the fence, holding out a tin can saying:“Pennies for medicine? Pennies for the kitties?” Her voice was surprisingly well modulated.
One day I asked her about the little white cat. Why was she so different? So reserved? So aloof?
The nurse looked surprised.“The white one?” she repeated. “Why, she’s blind.”
I was stunned.“How did she get here?” I asked.
“Some son-of-a-bootlegger dumped her,” the nurse said, and she walked away, shaking the tin can and asking for pennies.
There was something about that poor blind animal that tugged at my heart. I pleaded with the landlord to let me bring her home, but he wasadamant. At the office my drawing board was in a north window overlooking the Canyon, and whenever I glanced up from my work to rest my eyes, I automatically looked for a ball of white fur contrasted with the gray and green of concrete and weeds.
One day I witnessed a beautiful incident. A young cat from the Grays walked boldly across the battlefield in broad daylight. I knew he was young, because he was lean and muscular—a handsome fellow with perky ears and a definite swagger. He spotted the Princess sitting on a sunny ledge and ventured very close to her. Of course she couldn’t see him, but I know she sensed his presence. He stayed for a minute and then bolted back to his own camp as if he had been shot.
I saw Prince Charming come visiting frequently after that, and one day I saw him touch noses with the Princess. It was so romantic and so sad—I wanted to cry.
I imagine I was in a sentimental mood because Paul and I were“going out,” as they said in those days, and our friendship had reached the moonstruck stage.
What did people do on dates when you were young?
Oh, Paul and I might have dinner at a nice restaurant—five courses for a dollar! Then go to a jazz club or a motion picture. The movie palaces were verygrand, but the movies were silent and black-and-white, and the actors looked as if they were powdered with flour. Sometimes Paul would come to my apartment, and I would prepare chicken? la king in a chafing dish. Then we would listen to a symphony concert on the radio—with alive orchestra! Radio was quite different then.
Were you and Paul having a relationship?
Not what you young people mean by that term! We were enjoying an old-fashionedcourtship. Flappers were supposed to be cynical about love, but I was a hopeless romantic.
Now I’m losing the thread of my story … .
The gray cat was touching noses with the blind kitten.
Yes, such a poignant gesture! It was early October, and the days were getting cool. The leaves were falling, and I had an ominous feeling that it was theend of something. Paul had gone to Chicago on business for a few days, driving his automobile instead of taking the train. I watched him chug away in his Model T, and I felt very lonely.