CHAPTER XI
PETER
Sally and Oxford felt just alike about Peter. They could neither of them bear him. He was a fine-looking brown tiger cat with large stripes and a large white shirt-front and four white paws. He had once been a valued house-cat, but was now without a home. They suspected that Elvira sometimes gave him meals on their piazza, for they now felt the back porch belonged to them. When kittens have lived for more than a year and a half in a place and have grown into young cats, the place seems to belong to them, so Oxford stalked around as if he were a police-cat on duty, keeping out intruders.
‘Of course the back yard is mine,’ he said. ‘Indeed, I feel that I own the place more than Miss Winifred does.’
‘But her father left it to her,’ Sally reminded him.
‘I suppose she has a certain claim to it, but he never knew us,’ said Oxford. ‘I am sure he would have loved us if he had known us. Don’t you remember the story that has come down to us, of how he held our great-grandfather, William Furbush-Tailby, on his knee? Anyway, we get a great deal more good out of the place than Miss Winifred. I have never seen her climb a tree, and we can climb one any time and get away from a dog, and she never goes into the Wild Wood, and she does not know all our little hiding-places, and she could not get into them, anyway.’
‘I do feel as if we were more important,’ said Sally. ‘Many a time I’ve heard Elvira say, “I’ll come to you in a few minutes, Miss Winifred, but Oxford has just come in. I must give him his supper, for he won’t understand being kept waiting.”’
But whoever the true owner of the house might be, it certainly did not belong to Peter, and Oxford had told him so on more than one occasion. He had chased him off the place several times, but Peter, although he seemed gentle, was a persistent soul, and as he was fond of the bread and canned salmon that kind Elvira put out on the back piazza for him, he came back over and over again.
‘If I ever really get my paw on him, I’ll give him such a thrashing that he’ll remember it all his life,’ Oxford said to Sally.
Now it just darted through Sally’s mind, that it might be the other way around, for Peter, although he was mild in his demeanor, was larger than Oxford, and at least two years older, but being wise beyond her months, she merely said, ‘It will be grand, Oxford, if you can thrash him.’
‘Of course I can,’ said her brother, swelling with pride. ‘Don’t you remember the tradition about the first Furbush, Martha’s ancestor, how he would get the better of every cat in a fight and earned the name of William the Conqueror?’
‘Yes,’ said Sally, ‘I remember, but he was a full-grown cat.’
‘I don’t expect to get hurt, and it is certainly best to get rid of that vagabond at once, before Elvira gets fond of him.’
The fight came off one bright November day. Sally was looking out of the kitchen window, and Oxford was sunning himself in the back yard. There was a plate of canned salmon mixed with bread on the back piazza. That could not be for Oxford, for both he and she had grown so dainty that they liked stew meat and haddock better than canned salmon. Elvira must be leaving it out there for some cat. She saw Peter coming through a place in the fence that was made for small animals to get through. She hoped to attract Oxford’s attention and ran around to the kitchen door, but it was closed. Jumping up on the window-sill again, she saw Peter quickly run up the steps and begin to taste the food. Oxford flew up the steps and began to fight Peter. He flew at Oxford and put his claws in his fur. Oxford grappled with him, and the two cats went rolling down the steps.
Sally, from her perch on the window-sill, saw that it was as she had feared. After a long fight, Peter went swiftly away in fine condition, while Oxford came haltingly up the steps with a lame paw—a sadder and a wiser cat. Although he respected Peter more, his dislike of him increased, and he was determined to drive him off the place.
‘If I had advised him not to fight, he wouldn’t have liked it,’ thought Sally. ‘He would have just said, “Sally, you never do brace up.”’
After this, Oxford and Sally saw no more of Peter for some weeks. Sometimes they saw a plate of canned salmon and bread on the back piazza and lay in wait for him, but Oxford never caught him. Twice they saw at dusk a shadowy form vanishing into the Wild Wood.
One evening there was a great snowstorm and Oxford had not come home. Miss Winifred seemed the most worried, and this was strange, as she had not wanted him in the beginning.
‘Poor little pussy, hasn’t he come back yet?’ she asked Elvira after supper.
‘No, Miss Winifred, and I’ve called until I’m hoarse.’
‘It is a wild storm,’ said Miss Winifred.
‘I am sure Oxford is safe and warm somewhere,’ said Elvira; ‘he’s a cat who knows how to look out for himself.’
‘Yes,’ said Miss Harvey, ‘if it was my little Sally, I should be terribly worried.’
Sally was sitting on Miss Harvey’s knee at the time, and at these words she put her furry paws around her neck and rubbed her face against hers. ‘I am sure he is all right,’ she said in her cat language that people could not understand. ‘He always comes back.’
‘Of course he always has come back,’ said Miss Winifred, as if she had understood, ‘but there comes a time—some of your pets have gone away and never come back, Elvira.’
Then Sally thought of her grandmother and of her brave father, the mighty hunter, and of her mother, so cozy and so kind. How terrible it would be if Oxford should disappear as they had done!
‘I will go and call him,’ said Miss Winifred. ‘Maybe he will come in for me.’
‘For you?’ said Elvira. ‘You and he have never been great friends.’
Miss Winifred went to the front door and stepped into the piazza that was glassed in for winter. The storm was raging outside. She opened the glass door of the piazza and the wind blew the snow into her face. It was deep on the steps.
‘Oxford Gray, Oxford Gray, Oxford Gray, Junior!’ she called. ‘Darling pussy, do come!’
She had never called him ‘darling pussy’ before, but our friends grow very dear to us if we fear losing them.
‘Oxford, Oxford Gray, Junior!’ she called again.
Something furry brushed against her feet. She stooped and patted the fur coat all crusted over with snow.
‘How friendly you are! You were never so friendly before. Walk in, darling pussy,’ she said, as she opened the hall door.
The hungry and cold cat rubbed against her feet once more as if in gratitude. She walked along the front hall to the door at the back that led into the kitchen.
‘Here he is! Here is Oxford Gray, Junior, himself,’ she said. ‘He came for me. He knew my voice.’
Elvira was greatly surprised. ‘He just happened to come along at that time,’ she said; then, as she started to brush the casing of snow from the cat, she said, ‘This isn’t Oxford Gray, Junior. This is Peter.’
‘Peter!’ gasped Miss Winifred. ‘Who on earth is Peter?’
‘Somebody’s house-cat; somebody’s pet that has been left to make his own way in the world.’
‘How did he happen to come here? Is he one of your friends who takes his meals at your cafeteria on the piazza?’
‘He’s had a few meals,’ Elvira admitted. ‘And he will have as many more as he likes. I’d rather spend my money feeding cats than going to the movies. It’s more amusing to me.’
‘Of course we must keep him for the night,’ said Miss Winifred, ‘and he must have a good meal, but I really can’t keep him permanently, Elvira; two cats are quite enough.’
‘Oxford agrees with you,’ said Elvira. ‘You’ll have no trouble once he gets home.’
The next morning the sun shone, and Oxford came back as unconcernedly as if he had caused no anxiety. No one knew his adventures except Sally, but he looked so prosperous and seemed so little to desire food that the family were sure he had been housed somewhere.
As he went out for a stroll later in the morning, he met Peter coming out of the cellar door.
‘What have you been doing in my house?’ he demanded sternly.
For once the silent Peter found his tongue. ‘It is my house now,’ he said proudly. ‘Miss Winifred asked me in herself.’
‘She didn’t!’ Oxford exclaimed.
‘She did! She said, “Walk in, darling pussy,” so I walked in.’