A Tabby-cat's Tale by Hang Dong Read Free Book Online Page A

really a human and could one day revert to human form, what would he be like? Thoughtful, sensitive, reclusive, timid, pale and handsome . . .
    I told Xulu about all these fantasies, and she said: ‘Aren’t you describing yourself? Apart from the fact you’re not so handsome, of course.’
    â€˜The difference is he’s not pale-skinned, he’s black and white,’ Xulu went on. ‘Otherwise you’re spot on. He’s grown to resemble your family! You know the way husbands and wives start to look like each other?’
    This didn’t sound like praise for my family. On the contrary, her comments seemed calculated to be disparaging, sarcastic and disdainful. After all, Tabby was not a normal, healthy and energetic cat, but a weird, unfortunate old nuisance. Xulu seemed to be hinting that I was a weird eccentric too.
    But I didn’t take her words to heart. In fact, I shared some fellow feeling with Tabby. I often wondered how I would behave if I were in a cat’s body. Probably not much different from Tabby. And how would he behave in a human’s body? Doubtless so similar to me that we would be at loggerheads and unable to live under the same roof. It was a good thing Tabby was a cat and we could live together in harmonious tranquillity. I had no way of knowing how Tabby felt about me, but what I felt towards him was an increasing sympathy.
    These feelings made me decide to take Tabby on a Grand Tour. Of course, there was nothing grand about it when judged by human standards. I put on a mackintosh and gloves and picked Tabby up. By this time, Tabby and I knew each other pretty well and it was possible to hold him, even if he struggled a bit. The mackintosh was both to keep Tabby’s fleas at bay and to stop him from scratching me. Leaving the ground seemed to make Tabby extremely nervous. It was as if he were being launched into space. He dug his claws right through the rubber lining and into my skin. He trembled violently and pissed and shat all over me. Carrying this terrified creature, I advanced into the flat and did a circuit of the room, rocking him gently on my shoulder as if he were an infant. I talked soothingly: ‘This is where your mum and dad used to sleep.’ (I meant my brother and sister-in-law.) ‘And now it’s your uncle and auntie’s bedroom.’ (That meant Xulu and me.) ‘This is your dad’s study, and this is the room your granny used to have.’ (That was my mother.) ‘This is the sitting room, this is the kitchen, and next door is the bathroom.’ Tabby seemed to recognize that I meant him no harm, and he began to calm down. He still had his claws embedded in my clothing, but as he looked around, his eyes expressed a delighted curiosity.
    He seemed to enjoy his Grand Tour, but putting on protective clothing and painstakingly cleaning the flat of all vestiges of his visit was a nuisance and I only did it once every few months. However, Tabby seemed to have acquired a taste for it: even when I had no intention of taking him on a tour, he would leap onto my shoulder or my back and crouch there motionless, and when he did this he was almost impossible to remove. I was usually not dressed for it and, inevitably, the fleas slipped under my defences. Besides, Tabby wasn’t being affectionate, he was just using me as a means of transport. Once I’d realized this, I no longer felt such enthusiasm for the Grand Tour. The odd thing was that, even when we left the balcony door open all day, it never seemed to occur to Tabby to use his own four paws as locomotion and make his own tour. He wanted to do it on my shoulders. It wasn’t that he was too idle to walk; it was that, in his mind, the pleasure of the journey and the means of transport were inextricably linked. So I carried Tabby once more around that desperately familiar flat, spouting all sorts of fantastic nonsense: ‘This is your America . . . This is your