Dodge City times. [volume] (Dodge City, Kan.) 1876-1892, 1878-01-05
Muggridger's Cat, and the Trouble II
Brought TO Mr.. MilIikens.

MI. Nl1liiAenS nau Just got II cleaned
and fixed up in time for the welcome
showers which filed it with an album
dance of nice pure water. And the next
morning Mr.. Nillikens delivered his
family a touching lecture on the bless
ings of water, and in mis- beautiful and
vivid imagery, he quite surpassed the
Davidson fountain. And then when he
stopped the car at Maple Street night
before last and walked rapidly to his
happy home, how do You suppose he
felt when his staring children met him
at the gate and yelled in excited chorus:
sob pa, pa, pa, Mrs. Muggridger's
cat went and fell down our cistern and
drowned"
Mr. Millikens always did hate that
cat of the Muggridgers'. A great brin-
died monster. with only one eve and the
hair scalded off its tail, il had killed
more chickens in the Millikens' coops
than there are rats in Iowa, and many
a time and oft, she had found her way
into the Millikens' cellar and filled her
bloated form with cream and sirloin
steaks. And Mr.. Millikens could not
remember the number of times he had
sprained his arm and nearly threw his
shoulder out Of joint in hurting bricks
at that cat, which would sit on the back
fence, singing psalms and winking pla-
cidlv at him with its lone eve,
and wondering what all the racket was
about That cat had been the chairman
of the Anti-Midnight District Central
committee for three years and had at
tended more caucuses, and called more
conventions, in Milliken's back yard
than it had hairs on its back. 1t had
made the summer nights a burden to
Milikens all its life, and now it had
drowned itself in his cistern 1t was a
piece of demoniacal spite work. You
couldn't make Millikins believe other
wise: there was terrible, fiendish in
telligence in that cat, and its desire to
torment Milikins had been greater than
its love of life. Ever since Alillikins
had scalded the hair off its tail he had
been expecting something like this.
If it had been decent kind of cat.
he said, as he pulled on his coat, tucked
his trousers in his. boots and began the
painful labor OF employing the cistern
with bucket, he might have stood it to
get the cat out and go on using the
water, but that one-eyed, rat-tailed,
hideous, psaln-singer screecher, faugh!
The disgusting thing; he would never
use the cistern again, he would fill It up
as soon as he got the water out, and
would dig another one. Dog-gone the
eat, he said. He toiled painfully on,
and the water grew low with terrible
slowness He felt the bucket strike the
body of the floating cat several times,
but he hadn't hauled it up yet. He
kept on Juggling at the bucket-rope till
his arms ached. And his back. And
his legs. And his head.
No, he snappishly told Mrs. Milli-
kens, in answer to her tenth summons,
that he wasn't coming to supper till he
had emptied this cistern. He didn't
care if it was spelling. What2 Well,
let the flies eat every thing up, he didn't
care; he could eat the flies, he reckon
ed, sarcastically, couldn't he? Hey?l
Well, he didn't care if it did take him a
week, he was going to keep at it till it
was emptied. Dog-gone the cat, he
wished it was Muggridger himself that
was in the cistern. Blast a cat, any
how.
How he did haul water and splash his
clothes and sweat and swear, and how
the neighbours wives hung over the front
fence and talked glibly to Mrs. Milli-
kens about the catastrophe, and how he
wished they were all in with the cat.
And Mrs. Muggridger came and hung
over the fence and wept and told Won
derful stories of that cats sagacity and
its affection for children. "Affection
for my Chickens" Millikens muttered.
And the women talked and jabbered
and pitied Mrs. Muggridger more than
if it had been one of the children that
had been drowned. Millikens toiled
on, his face very hot at being made the
focus of SO many eyes. Dog-gone the
aos-sonr,. cat ~ thunder, No ss,ia, with