Just a cat, a very normal cat, asking to be let out of the house.
Almost too normal, Doc thought, for a cat that had hidden from him for so long yesterday. He sat down on the bottom step of the staircase and stared at it, still at the front door, still wanting out. “Miaouw,” it said.
Doc shook his head. “Not just yet, Cat. I’ll let you out later, I guess, but I want to have a little talk with you first. And how about breakfast? I’m going to have some myself.”
He got up and went into the kitchen, not looking behind him until he was at the refrigerator.
The cat had followed him, but not closely at his heels. Now it was sitting staring at him. Then, as though it had a sudden idea, it went past him—but, he noticed, circling far enough to keep out of his reach—and to the kitchen door. It scratched at that, miaouwed again, and looked back at him. It was saying “Let me out, please” as clearly as a cat can say it. An ordinary cat, that is.
Doc shook his head firmly. “No, Cat. Later, but not now. I want to think it over first.”
He got milk from the refrigerator and put a bowl of it down on the floor. The cat didn’t approach it; it stayed at the door while he got his own breakfast, frying himself a couple of eggs and boiling water for instant coffee.
When he took his breakfast across the room and sat down at the big table with it, the cat left the door and went to the bowl of milk. It started lapping hungrily.
“Nice kitty,” Doc said through a bite of egg. “How’d you like to stay around and visit me a while?”
The cat didn’t answer, but, staring at it, Doc decided he hadn’t really been kidding. It would be pleasant to have a cat around, something to talk to. And if there was really anything strange about the cat, it would give him a chance to watch it for a while.
Of course he couldn’t keep it shut up indefinitely, not without suffocating himself on hot days. Or could he, by buying some half-screens, the kind you could fit into a window opened halfway? There seemed to be so few flies around that the owner of the house had never bothered to screen it. Yes, Doc thought, he could go even further than that and have a carpenter come out from town and fit him a full set of screens. He’d been wanting to add some small improvement to the house as a token of gratitude for being allowed to use it. And after all there were some flies, and moths at night unless you closed the windows when you put on the lights. A set of screens would be just about right as a contribution. Maybe he’d have them put on, cat or no cat.
Of course he didn’t want to steal anyone’s cat, if its owner really wanted it back. He could take care of that by asking around town. If he found an owner, the man would probably gladly sell it to him for a few dollars, unless it was a child’s particular pet. Cats are plentiful and cheap around a farming community, and they breed so fast that the supply always exceeds the demand.
When he left to go back to M. I. T. to resume his teaching, he’d have to find a home for it before leaving, but that shouldn’t be too difficult if he was willing to subsidize the deal by offering a slight bonus along with the cat. Feeding one more cat wouldn’t matter much to a farmer who already had several, and even the most domesticated cats largely earn their own living in this kind of country by keeping down the field mice.
“Cat,” he said, “speaking seriously, how would you like to live here a while? Oh, and by the way what’s your name?” The cat, still lapping milk, didn’t answer.
“All right, you won’t tell me,” Doc said. “In that case you’re all set with a brand new name, the one I’ve been calling you. Cat. It’s appropriate… I hope.”
The cat had drunk only about half of the milk, but that was all right; he’d probably given it much too much for a cat its size to drink, and it was back sitting at the door again.
“Miaouw,” it said.
“I understand, Cat,” Doc said. “A call of nature, and that’s not surprising considering how long you’ve been here. But the very fact that you want out so badly proves that you’re housebroken. I’ll take care of things.”
He’d finished eating by then and went across to the door that led to the basement stairs, went down them. Someone who had stayed here, luckily, had done a lot of sawing for something or other; there was a fairish pile of dry sawdust in one corner of the basement. He found a shallow carton of about the proper dimensions and filled it with sawdust, took it up to the kitchen and put it in a corner.
“You’ll have to use that, Cat,” he said. “I’m afraid you’re not going out for a few days.”
The cat looked at the box of sawdust but stayed at the door. “Miaouw,” it said. Very plaintively.
“You’re an outdoor cat, maybe, and never used a sawdust box?” Doc asked it. “Well, you’ll learn, when the pressure gets high enough.”
He took his breakfast dishes to the sink and started washing them.
“Tell you what, Cat,” he said over his shoulder. “Let’s give it a try together, for a few days. For that length of time, I’ll clean up if you don’t figure out how to use the sawdust.
“And if you turn out to like me and I turn out to like you, then I’ll give you your choice—you can go out, and come back if you wish or never darken my doorway again. Fair enough?”
The cat didn’t answer, except possibly by not answering; it stayed by the door.
Doc decided to go about the things he had to do and pay no more attention to it for a while, to see what it did.
The mind thing, helpless in the cat-body of which it could not rid itself without giving away more than it already had, stayed by the door. The bladder- and bowel-pressure were considerable by now. And Staunton obviously wasn’t going to let him out of the house. He didn’t feel, except in the objective sense of being aware of, the pain of the body he was in; but that was not the problem. Staunton expected to keep him shut up for several days. He had to let this body evacuate itself before then or the very fact that it had not would he an additional cause for suspicion. Staunton had more than enough already. The question then was whether to use the floor or the box. If he pretended to be strictly an outdoor cat, unused to using a sawdust box, and dirtied the floor now and as often as he could, would that disgust Staunton and cause his release earlier than if he pretended to be housebroken to the extent of using the box?
He watched Staunton emotionlessly—not hating him, because the emotion of hatred was as alien to him as the feeling of mercy—except, in both cases, toward his own kind.
Suddenly a thought came to him. Staunton, with his suspicions already aroused, might well make an attempt to find out where the cat he was using had come from, who had owned it, how and when it had disappeared. And other facts about it—including the degree of its being housebroken. Any discrepancy would make Staunton still more suspicious. The mind thing knew he should examine the mind of his current host and let his actions as a cat correspond with what that particular cat would do under given circumstances, and guide his actions accordingly.
It took him only a second to locate that particular memory in the cat’s brain. He walked over to the sawdust box.
Staunton, at the sink, glanced down casually. “Attaboy,” he said. “Nice kitty.”
Yes, the mind thing knew that this was what he should have done all along, examined the mind of his particular host and acted as the host would have acted under the same circumstances, any time he was under observation. Had he only done that yesterday when the woman had that seen him in the hallway—walked out into the kitchen and looked at the two of them calmly, instead of hiding…