World without Cats by Bonham Richards Read Free Book Online Page A

the practice with another fellow whom I’m training. He’s fresh out of vet school. How about you?”
    “Yeah, here I am too.”
    “No, professor, your history. How did you get into your field? What’s a nice guy like you doing creating Frankenstein monsters in the laboratory?”
    “Well, let’s see. Born in Los Angeles of mixed WASP and Jewish parentage. Followed a pre-med curriculum at UCLA. B.A in 2012 but couldn’t get into med school—wrong race, wrong sex, wrong ethnic background. Maybe my B average had something to do with it too.” Vera’s incipient reproach dissolved into a smile.
    Noah went on, “I wasn’t really turned on academically until I got to grad school. Earned a PhD in molecular biology at Berkeley in 2015. Spent two years as a post-doc at the University of Massachusetts, honing my recombinant DNA techniques. Met my wife there and got married in 2016.”
    Vera was nonplussed. “Oh! I didn’t … “
    “Divorced,” Noah droned on. “Final decree this February.”
    Vera smiled wanly. “Any kids?”
    “No, thank God. That would have made it messier.”
    “Was it messy?”
    “For a while. It’s okay now.”
    Vera nodded. “What is she like?”
    “Myra? Oh, intelligent, witty … like you, I guess. She wasn’t content to live the rest of her life as a faculty wife.”
    “I don’t blame her.” Vera stared at Noah over her wine glass. “What did you mean, like me?”
    “Huh?”
    “You said your wife, Myra, was like me. You don’t even know me.”
    “I don’t know what I … forget it.”
    He changed the subject. “Have you been to the Ojai Shakespeare festival?”
    “No. I’ve been meaning to go. It’s in the summer, right?”
    “Yes,” Noah replied. “Late July and early August. Perhaps we can go together next summer.”
    “That would be wonderful,” Vera exclaimed. “I went up to Ashland a year ago. They put on an unusual production of Midsummer Night’s Dream. Sort of a surrealistic staging with a laser light show.”
    “Yeah, I read about that. How did you like it?”
    “I didn’t, really,” Vera said. “I guess I’m too much of a traditionalist.
    “There’s another local festival in the summer,” she continued, “I can’t recall … oh, it’s sponsored by Cal-Lutheran … The Kingsmen Shakespeare Festival.”
    “There must be many Shakespeare lovers in the area.”
    Vera raised her wineglass. “To Shakespeare.”
    Noah clinked his glass to hers. “To lovers,” he said.
    Vera smiled. “To lovers.”
    The waitress reappeared out of the gloom. “Care for dessert?”
    “No thanks,” said Vera. Not anything on the menu, anyway.
    Noah shook his head. The woman scratched on her pad and deposited the check in front of Noah. He reached for it. “Wait a minute, Noah, I’ll pay the check,” Vera protested. “I asked you to dinner, remember?”
    “Please let me. I don’t mind.”
    “Dr. Chamberlin,” she said feigning formality, “our incomes are probably comparable. Can you give me one good reason why, considering that it was I who initiated this evening, you should pay the check?”
    “How about each of us paying our own?”
    “Well, all right,” Vera responded. “Look, Noah, I’m sorry I shot off like that. I don’t want us to get off on the wrong foot. But I’m kind of sensitive about … well …”
    “I understand, but I am a product of my upbringing.” This was said with such obvious sincerity that Vera, in spite of herself, was suddenly overwhelmed by a feeling of affection. She reached out and silently touched his hand.
    Noah let it linger. “I guess we should leave,” he suggested at last.
    As they departed the restaurant, Noah said, “Say, I just got a videochip of Branagh’s Much Ado About Nothing. It was made back in 1993. Would you be interested in watching it with me?”
    “Now there’s an approach. What, no etchings?”
    “Well, I do have some etchings. A book collection too. I just thought you might enjoy