Evening star., 1940-10-20
Il Short Story Complete on This Page

w moment she appeared, tiny ball OF
concentrated fury, on our sun porch.
From various caterwaulings l had guessed
that there was half-wild cat in the thick
prickly pear bushes behind our vacation home
At first she had been only dark furtive
shadow, heard but scarcely glimpsed. Recently
she had been followed by smaller darker,
even more furtive shadows whose every move
ment epitomized distrust of the human kind
Spitfre was presumably the naturalization
of one of these smaller shadows - an ugly
little black kitten with chip-on- the shoulder
disposition and genius for attack which
would have gone over big in Europe.
Her first onslaught came Immediately and
was directed against Pogo, our huge and nor
mally lionhearted police dog He had ambled
onto the porch for an inquistive sniff at the
intruder when the kitten hurled herself at
him, teeth barred. splitting and scratching with
all the fury of all women, scorned or un-
scorned Pogo retreated without any too much
| dignity and with an obvious disgust for the
feline amenities.
That would have been Spitfires first and
last outburst in our house if it hadn't been for
Susie My daughter found the performance
diverting She promptly pumped for the
kitten.
And whatever Susie wanted was law that
winter For although Myra and l wouldn' t
admit it even to ourselves, Susie was the real
reason for our vacationing in Desert Hills.
We pretended it was the golf. the riding and
other over privileged advantages which we
couldn't normally afford Actually it was the
suspected spot on Susies lung which had
brought us and which. the doctor said. needed
sun. sun and more sun.
So Susie got Spitfire: and though it cost us
numerous scratches and came expensive in
mercurochrome, no one really regretted it.
Spitfre lived up to her name and spent
her days in swift sudden assaults. She par
ticularly resented long cylindrical objects such
as golf bags, broOmsticks and curtain rods.
Advancing on them with startling savagery,
she would deal a lightning blow and then
Jump away high in the air, half sideways, like
an animated crab. When the golf bag showed
trying ferociously to worry the unresponsive
object into some sort of reaction. Failing
finally. she would dash madly off to attack
elsewhere, never giving up and never giving
quarter.
Some cynic i think it was Frenchman
- has said that the movements of cat are
one of the very few beautiful and graceful
things left in modern civilization. That's
bunk, of course. know of many beautiful and
graceful things There's Susie's sudden smile;
there's Myra's swing with a mashie, and
there's the swaying of the eucalyptus trees
against the desert moon.
But Spitfires motions had grace and
beauty of their own We loved to watch her
fying attacks and headlong retreats. And
they proved especially entertaining to Susie,
since the poor kid had to lie still for hours
on the sun porch with no other form of
amusement
Long drowsy days they were too, particu-
larly the afternoons, when everything seemed
to be caught up in the desert stiffness and
too usually found myself drifting away into a
middle-aged nap.
! WAS caught mapping on the day it hap
pened. Every detail of that afternoon is etched
on nv mind in sharpest relief. could hear
Myra tapping out duty letters in the living
room. From my chair on the porch | could
lust see the edge of Susie's low canvas cot,