The next day, the phone was ringing off the hook again: my owner kept using vulgar language on the phone and telling dirty jokes. He seemed a changed man, but except for the phone calls, he was still treating me well. He found time for housework and seemed in good spirits. I thought I’d better get used to his new ways. I should make an effort to observe his train of thought and catch up with it. In the afternoon, the black man asked someone to phone and tell him to go to the office (I figured this out from my owner’s expression). When he heard this, he took off immediately, beside himself with agitation. After these two times, I finally got it: it was the black man’s idea that my owner should mingle with the others in the cesspool!
That evening, he brought two ugly guys back with him. Each one sat on the sofa, crossed his legs, chain-smoked, and spat on the floor. Before they’d been here even a minute, they began talking about the old clerk, hinting that he was a sycophant. I knew that my owner and the clerk were on very good terms, and that they agreed about everything in their work. I couldn’t understand why he was letting these people slander him. He sat there listening gravely and nodding his head slightly, indicating that he sided with them. Thus encouraged, the older one was emboldened to suggest that my owner tell the old clerk “to get another line of work” and give his position to someone else. As the old guy was talking, the door creaked and opened: the black man was standing there. In the light from the corridor, his face looked ashen and was etched with deep grief. Pea-sized beads of perspiration rolled down from his forehead. He was shaking badly. The old guy stopped talking, and everyone stared at the black man outside the door. Suddenly, it was as if the black man had been shot in the neck: all at once, his head drooped. An invisible force was dragging him back, all the way to the elevator door. As soon as the door opened, he tumbled into the elevator, and it slid swiftly down.
“He’s a guy who really means well and always has to be in the thick of things, even if they’re none of his business.” The ugly old guy sighed, “If he knew that someone as dishonest as the old clerk was mixed up with us, he’d want you to get rid of him, too. What do you say?”
“I guess you’re right. I guess so.”
My owner was agreeing absent-mindedly, but he was still staring at the elevator, as though the black man would suddenly step out of it. I was not pleased with my owner’s behavior. It had never crossed my mind that he could change so much. Sometimes he looked almost like a “scoundrel.” But why on earth was the black man grieving so deeply? It also occurred to me that since my owner was able to get along with people now, perhaps he no longer needed me. I had always thought he did. When I was alone with him, it was the two of us against the world. I reveled in this. Now that this defiance was gone, would he kick me out? After all, he’d agreed to get rid of the old clerk, hadn’t he? The more I thought about this, the more I despaired. If he kicked me out, all I could do was hang out on the stairs, because I couldn’t be so heartless as to abandon him. Someday, he would need me.
I was most repelled by the younger visitor. He didn’t talk, but he was constantly drumming his feet, jiggling the table so much that the soft drinks fell to the floor and made a mess of the rug. You have to remember that this rug was my bed. I really wanted to bite his leg, but this guy was as agile as an acrobat. And so I not only didn’t succeed in biting him, but I also landed on the floor, unable to move, when he kicked me in the back.
My owner said, “My cat always has to get the best of others.”
This infuriated me.
My owner was probably afraid the guy would hurt me again, so he carried me to his bedroom, put me on the wooden bed, and then closed the door. I fell asleep and didn’t even know when those people left.
I woke up at midnight and saw my owner scribbling excitedly at the table, his inspiration gushing like a spring. From behind, he looked like a lunatic. I didn’t understand the things he wrote — newspapers were out of my element — but I did know that this time my owner had climbed to a very high plane and was more exhilarated than other people could ever be. I was happy for him. You have to remember that only a few hours earlier I was worried that he had become a “scoundrel.” His rapid change was beyond my comprehension.
Seeing that I was awake, he walked over and sat next to me, sighing as he talked.
“Old Cat, why did you have to offend my colleagues? You really should stop being so self-righteous. See, you learned a painful lesson this time. I also know that you purposely took the phone off the hook so that my colleagues couldn’t get through. Why did you bother? You must realize that even if they can’t get through on the phone, they can think of other ways to get in touch with me. No one can keep them away. Even though you’re one smart cat, you’d better understand that my thoughts are a lot more profound than yours. For example, these colleagues of mine: you think they’re too vulgar for words, and so you scorn them. I don’t see it that way. They truly care about me; otherwise, they wouldn’t come so far to see me. You mustn’t be hostile toward them; you should think of them as friends. That would be a big help to me. Old Cat, you have to believe me. If even you don’t believe me, what meaning would my life have?”
By the end, he was talking quite tearfully. Although I didn’t appreciate his words one bit, his affection moved me. So I also cried. Both of us wept.
After I had cried for a while, my back also felt much better. I had no reason not to believe my owner. No matter what kind of person he was, I had to believe him, come hell or high water. I made up my mind: even if he sometimes got fed up with being a person of integrity and wanted to be a “scoundrel,” I would still be loyal to him. As he said, he was much more profound than I was, so I’d better not judge his behavior on the basis of superficial things.
After I had thought this through, my back pain vanished. I stood up, climbed onto his lap, and snuggled at his chest. The two of us wept silently again. I wasn’t too sure why I was crying. Was I touched? Was it a mix of sadness and happiness? Or was it a certain regret? Or a certain sympathy? My owner’s tears must have meant something even more complex. Since I couldn’t figure it out, I would just muddle along and stick with him. My owner, who had been so excited in the daytime, was now shedding so many tears that my hair was all wet. He kept repeating in a hoarse voice, “Ai, Old Cat — ai, Old Cat. ”
After this, we went to the kitchen for a great meal of sausage, smoked fish, and milk. While we were eating this wonderful midnight repast, I suddenly felt much closer to my owner. As he had in the past, he raised a glass of beer, and then his hand stopped for a couple of seconds in midair before he finally brought the glass slowly to his lips. He didn’t drink the beer in one gulp, but sipped a mouthful and held it in his mouth, shilly-shallying for a long time before swallowing it. I had long been used to this habit of his, and hadn’t paid much attention to it, but tonight I felt there was something new about it. As I stared at him, I realized that he needed me to understand him thoroughly.
My owner grew uneasy under my gaze. Setting his glass down, he asked, “Does anyone in this world feel an affection that’s deeper than our affection for each other?”
Even so, when all is said and done, I didn’t completely understand him. Perhaps the only thing I could do was wait patiently, wait until everything cleared up of its own accord, wait until the black man who came and went without a trace met up with him again, and divulged even more about the mystery of life.
A Village in the Big City