I Am a Cat (22 page)

 
VOLUME II
 

 
I

I
T HAS become my usual practice to I sneak into the Goldfields’ mansion. I won’t expand upon the meaning of my use of “usual,” which is merely a word expressing the square of “often.” What one does once, one wants to do again, and things tried twice invite a third experience. This sense of enquiry is not confined to humanity, and I must ask you to accept that every cat born into this world is endowed with this psychological peculiarity. Just as in the human case, so with cats: once we’ve done a thing more than three times over, the act becomes a habit and its performance a necessity of our daily life. If you should happen to wonder why I so often visit the Goldfield place, let me first address a modest enquiry to mankind. Why do human beings breathe smoke in through the mouth and then expel it through the nose? Since such shameless inhalation and exhalation can do little to ease the belly’s hunger and less to cure giddiness, I do not see why a race of habitual smokers should dare to offer criticism of my calls on the Goldfields. That house is my tobacco.

To say that I “sneak in” gives a misleading impression: it sounds vaguely reprehensible, a term to be used for the self-insinuations of thieves and clandestine lovers. Though it is true that I am not an invited guest, I do not go to the Goldfields’ in order to snitch a slice of bonito or for a cozy chat with that disgusting lapdog whose eyes and nose are convulsively agglomerated in the center of its face. Hardly! Or are you suggesting that I visit there for the sheer love of snooping? Me, a detective?

You must be out of your mind! Among the several most degrading occupations in this world, there are, in my opinion, none more grubby than those of the detective and the money-lender. It is true that once, for Coldmoon’s sake, I displayed a chivalrous spirit unbecoming in a cat and kept an indirectly watchful eye on the Goldfields’ goings on. It was but once that I acted with such ill-placed kind-heartedness, and since that isolated occasion I have done nothing whatsoever that could bring a twinge to the conscience of the most pernickety cat. In which case, you may ask, why did I describe my own actions with such an unpleasantly suggestive phrase as “to sneak in?” I have my own good reasons, but their explanation involves analysis in depth.

In the first place it is my opinion that the sky was made to shelter all creation, and that the earth was made so that all things created that were able to stand might have something to stand on. Even those human beings who love argument for the arguing’s sake could surely not deny this fact. Next we may ask to what extent did human effort contribute to the creation of heaven and earth, and the answer is that it contributed nothing. What right, then, do human beings hold to decide that things not of their own creation nevertheless belong to them? Of course the absence of right need not prevent such creatures from making that decision, but surely there can be no possible justification for them prohibiting others from innocent passage in and out of so-called human property. If it be accepted that Mr. So-and-so may set up stakes, fence off sections of this boundless earth, and register that area as his own, what is to prevent such persons from roping off blue sky, from staking claims on heaven, an enclosure of the air? If natural law permitted proprietorial parceling-out of the land and its sale and purchase at so much the square foot, then it would also permit partition of the air we breathe at so much the cubic unit and its three-dimensional sale. If, however, it is not proper to trade in sky, if enclosure of the empyrean is not regarded as just in natural law, then surely it must follow that all land-ownership is unnatural and irrational. That, in fact, is my conviction, therefore I enter wherever I like. Naturally, I do not go anywhere where I do not want to go: but, provided they are in the direction I fancy, all places are alike to me. I slope along as it suits me, and feel no inhibition about entering the properties of people like the Goldfields if I happen to want to. However, the sad fact is that, being no more than a cat, I cannot match mankind in the crude matter of simple physical strength. In this real world the saying that “might is right” has very real force; so much so that no matter how sound my arguments may be, the logic of cats will not command respect. Were I to press the argument too far, I should be answered, like Rickshaw Blacky, with a swipe from a fishmonger’s pole. In situations where reason and brute force are opposed and one may choose either to submit by a perversion of reason or to achieve one’s reasonable ends by outwitting the opposition, I would, of course, adopt the latter course. If one is not to be maimed with bamboo poles, one must put up with things: one must press on. Thus, since the concept of trespass is irrational, and since “sneaking in” is only a form of “pressing on,” I am prepared to describe my visits as sneaking in.

Though I have no wish whatsoever to spy upon the Goldfields, inevitably, as the number of my visits mount, I get to know things about that family which I’d rather not have known and I see happenings which, willy-nilly, I cannot purge from my memory. I am, for instance, regretfully aware that when Madam Conk dabs water on her face she wipes her nose with inordinate care; that Miss Opula persistently gluts herself on rice-cakes dusted with bean-flour; and that old man Goldfield, in striking contrast with his wife, has a nose as flat as a pancake. Indeed, not just his nose, but his whole face is flat. It is a face so leveled one suspects that when he was a lad he must have got into a fight with the strong boy of some children’s gang who, grabbing him by the scruff of the neck, rammed his face so hard against a plaster wall that even now, forty years on, his squashed and crumpled features are a living memento of that unlucky day. Though it is certainly an extremely peaceful, even a harmless, face, it is somewhat lacking in variety. However much that face becomes infuriated, still it stays flat. I came to learn, moreover, that old man Goldfield likes tuna fish, sliced and raw, and that whenever he eats that delicacy, he pats himself on his own bald pate with a plashy, pattering sound. Further, because his body is as squat as his face is flat, he affects tall hats and high-stepped wooden clogs; facts which his personal rickshawman finds so vastly entertaining that he’s always yattering on about them to the houseboy who, for his part, finds such sharp accuracy of observation impressively remarkable. I could go on forever with such details of the Goldfields’ goings-on.

It has become my practice to enter the garden by the back-gate and to survey the lie of the land from the cover of a small artificial mound helpfully constructed there for decorative purposes. Having made sure that everything is quiet and that all the paper-windows are slid shut, I gingerly creep forward and hop up onto the veranda. But if I hear lively voices or consider there’s a risk that I might be seen from within, I mosey off eastward around the pond, nip past the lavatory and finish up, safe and unobserved, under the veranda. My conscience is in no way troubled, I’ve nothing to hide and no reason to be scared of anything whatsoever, but I’ve learnt what to expect if one should have the vile ill-luck to run up against one of those lawless and disorderly bipeds. Were the human world cram-jammed with robber-toughs as violent as that long-departed villain, Kumasaka Chōhan, then even the most illustrious and virtuous of men would act as cautiously as I do. Inasmuch, as old man Goldfield is a dignified sort of businessman, I wouldn’t expect him to come after me with any such dirty great sword, five feet, three inches of it they tell me, as Kumasaka was wont to brandish. However, from what I’ve seen and heard, Goldfield has his own unpleasant quirks and is certainly not disposed to accept that a man’s a man for a’ that. If Goldfield is overbearing with his fellowmen, how would he treat a cat? A cat, as I keep on saying, is also a cat for a’ that, but given Goldfield’s nature, even a feline of the most upright virtues would be wise to adopt a low posture and a very cautious attitude once inside the Goldfield premises.

This very need to be constantly on the
qui vive
is, I find, delightful, and my taste for danger explains why I make these frequent risky visits. I will give further and careful thought to this fascinating point and, when I have completed my analysis of cat-mentality, I will publish the results.

What’s up today, I wonder, as I settle my chin against the grass on top of the garden-hillock and survey the prospect spread below me. The doors of their ample drawing room are open wide to the full spring day and I can see, inside, the Goldfields busily engaged in conversation with a guest. I am somewhat daunted by the fact that Madam Conk’s proboscis is pointed directly in my direction: it glares across the pond straight at my unprotected forehead. This is my first experience of being glared at by a nose. Facing his guest, old man Goldfield presents himself to my gaze in full profile. My eyes are spared one half of his flattened features but, for the same profilic reason, the location of his nose is indeterminable, and it is only because one can see where his grayish-white moustache sprouts raggedly from the flesh that one can deduce that the vent-holes of his nostrils must be gaping closely thereabove. I amuse myself with the reflection that the light spring breeze might well blow on forever if it encountered no more formidable obstruction than that jutless physiognomy. Of the three, the Goldfields’ guest has the most normal features but, precisely because of their regularity, there’s no facial peculiarity I see reason to point out. For anything to be regular suggests that the thing’s all right, but regularity can be so utterly regular as to become, by its very ulteriority, mediocre and of no account, which is extremely pitiable.

I wonder who he is, this unfortunate fellow fated to be born in this glorious reign behind so meaningless a phiz. My curiosity can’t be satisfied unless I crawl more close and, in my accustomed manner, establish myself underneath the veranda and listen to what is said. So under it I go.

“. . .and my wife actually took the trouble to call on the man to ask for information.”As usual, old man Goldfield speaks in an arrogant manner. The manner is certainly prideful, but his voice contains no hint of sharpness. It gives, like his face, an impression of massive flatness.

“I see. So he’s the fellow who used to teach your Mr. Avalon Coldmoon. I see, I see. Yes, yours is a good idea. . . Indeed, I see.” This guest is positively overflowing with “I see’s.”

“But somehow my wife’s approaches all proved pretty pointless.”

“No wonder. Sneaze is not strong on point. Even in the days when he and I shared digs and looked after ourselves, his lack of point, his lack of resolution, were painfully extreme. You must,” he said, turning to Madam Conk, “have had a difficult time.”

“Difficult! That’s hardly the word. Never in my life have I made a visit and been so badly treated.” As is her ugly custom, Madam Conk snorts storm-winds down her snout.

“Did he say anything rude to you? He’s always been obstinate, a real old stick-in-the-mud. He’s been teaching that English Reader for years without a break, so you can imagine. . .” With what charm and tact this guest is making himself agreeable.

“He is beyond help. I understand that every time my wife asked a question, she received a blunt rebuff.”

“What impudence! As I see it, persons of some small education tend to grow conceited and, if they happen also to be poor, their characters become as bitter as sour grapes. Indeed, some people in that condition turn truly quite absurd. For no reason at all, they flare up at persons of wealth as if unconscious of their own total ineffectiveness. It’s quite astonishing how they behave; as if the rich had robbed them personally of things they never owned.”The guest’s laughter rang out affectedly, but he certainly seems delighted with himself.

“Scandalous behavior! It’s because they know nothing of the world that they carry on so outrageously. So I thought I’d have him taken down a peg or two. It’s time he learned how many beans make six.”

“I see. Splendid. That should have shaken him up a bit. Done him no end of good.” Goldfield is smothered in his guest’s congratulations, even though that sycophant still lacks the least idea of the kind of rod which Goldfield’s put in pickle for poor Sneeze.

“But really, Mr. Suzuki, Sneaze is impossible. D’you know,” said Madam Conk, “down at his school he won’t exchange two words with our friend, Mr. Fukuchi? Nor, come to think of it, with Mr. Tsuki either.

We’d thought he’d learnt his lesson and was keeping quiet because he knew he’s been sat on, but, would you believe it, only the other day we heard he’d been chasing after our harmless houseboy with a walking stick!