‘And after that Father Lanshee threw you out of the altar boys, is that right?’
‘That’s right. I think he doesn’t want to take a chance of letting someone who might have a devil inside him get on the altar.’
That’s when Dad starts laughing and I know it’s going to be all right.
‘Don’t you worry, Dickie; you don’t have any devils in you. Don’t you worry about it.
‘You know, your grandfather, my father, has the same trouble with nails in his mouth. They’d get so wet they’d almost be rusty before he could drive them into the wood, and there would be a little puddle of spit around the top of each nail when it was pounded in.’
I stare at him, hoping he’ll go on. I love to hear stories about my grandfather.
‘You eat your egg and bacon now, Dickie. I guess there isn’t much chance of your going to communion anyhow. But you’d better get to that eleven-o’clock mass. It’s going to be a high mass and could last almost two hours. I guess that’ll pay off to God for you missing the nine-o’clock today.’
He pushes the last of his egg into his mouth, takes the final crust of his bread and scoops out his plate; pushes the bread into the side of his mouth.
‘One thing, Dickie. Don’t ever let anyone, I don’t care who it is, throw any erasers or anything at you again. You just walk out of there and when I come home, you tell me. I’ll take care of it. In fact I’m half tempted to go in and talk to that Sister Anastasia and Father Lanshee myself right now, but I’ve already got enough trouble to think about.’
Over the next week I go every day to see the kittens. I never see the mother again. The third day I go, there are only four kittens; the black-and-white one is gone. All that’s left is one ear, the little paws with tiny claws and most of the tail.
I figure a tomcat came in and ate it. Or maybe it could even be the mother. Jimmy Malony told me once how when cats are born in May the mother will eat them sometimes, but this is September. I can’t think of a way to keep tomcats out without keeping the mother away too.
I start sitting across the alley in the areaway to see if I can catch the mother going in or out so I’ll know she’s feeding them, but she must only go in at night or during the day, when I’m at school. Or maybe she sees me hiding across the way and won’t go in while I’m there.
Two days later, one of the striped cats is gone, all except two paws. The other kittens are starting to get their eyes open. This is the day Dad came home beaten up by goons the second time.
He’d had to work overtime and they were waiting for him. Luckily he had his monkey wrench because he broke away, ran, got on a trolley car, where they couldn’t get to him.
This time my mom is really crying. She wants Dad to stop being shop steward, to just do his job.
Dad’s white and his hands shake while he’s reading the newspaper. He keeps making knots in his jaw, tight, the way he does when he chews, but he isn’t eating.
I want to ask about the kittens disappearing and what I can do, but I’m afraid. He looks so strange. I don’t think of my father as somebody who gets scared, and it scares me seeing him this way.
It’s Thursday of the second week after I found my kittens, when I go in and there’s only one left, the little brown one without a tail. I watch all the weekend, even eating lunch out there in the alley, but I never do see the mother cat go through that broken window; no other cat climbs through either.
When I go in the garage he’s nuzzling in the mess at the bottom of the nest. By now, all the cloths are blood-soaked and there are pieces of kitten smashed into the cloth. As soon as that kitten sees me, he rears up on his hind legs and backs into the corner of the garage behind the nest. He’s standing up there with his claws out and his eyes fastened on me like a lion or a bear. I sit down on the garage floor in a part where there isn’t any grease and watch him. I also get to really look at him.
He’s definitely like a burnt tiger except for not having a tail. There are darker stripes coming down between his ears, across his forehead, and between his eyes. There are also stripes going out from each of his eyes, almost like a raccoon, and there are dark drips coming down from the inside of his eyes right next to his nose. I can’t tell for sure if these are real marks or only something like sleep that gets caught in the corner of your eyes.
His nose is pink on the end mostly but with some black parts on the top and outside. The bottom of his nose has a little slit in it to match his mouth and he has no lips. Whenever I move too fast, he opens his jaws wide and makes a hissing sound.
I keep calling this cat ‘him’ but I don’t really know. The kids in the neighborhood say it’s hard to tell a boy cat from a girl cat till they’re grown up; then it’s easy. The tomcats have big nuts and the females a round pink hole under the tail.
This one has little sharp white teeth and the inside of his mouth is pink in the front, the way you would expect, then it gets darker, almost blue or purple at the back of his tongue. When he opens his mouth to snarl, he tucks his tongue back away from his teeth; I never noticed that about cats before. But then I never really noticed much about cats; I don’t think I even really like cats. I know they eat rats and mice but they also catch all the pigeons and sparrows. There are practically no birds in the alleys, only at the front, and then it’s mostly starlings.
But I’m beginning to like this cat and I’m becoming more and more convinced he ate his brothers and sisters. I figure he’d wait till they were all asleep then kill one by biting it on the neck or something and draining the blood. Probably the other kittens, when they were still alive, helped him eat them, too. Four would eat one, then three ate one, then two ate one, then this one ate the last other kitten, the black one that’s only one paw and a tail now. It must have been awful to see. I wonder if they ate the meat and milk I brought or some other cat came in and ate it. I don’t know for sure whether it’s true he ate his brothers and sisters but I decide to name him Cannibal.
I sit there a long time, watching, not thinking much, and then he begins to fall down. He isn’t coming down on his four feet, he’s falling over sideways. He does this twice, then just lies there on his side, his thin stomach going in and out. His eyes are closed so I can sneak up on him. I wonder if I could pick him up now without getting bitten. Actually I’ve been too afraid to put my hand near him the last week, even though he isn’t much bigger than a mouse. He’s really like a miniature wildcat, not like a kitten at all, except he’s so tiny. I don’t think he’s actually grown much since the first time I saw him. Only he’s opened his eyes, learned to growl and stand up. I haven’t ever seen him walk. He just huddles in that bloody, messy nest or rears up in the corner behind it.
So, carefully, I put my hand under his tiny body and pick him up. He’s limp and doesn’t move. I see he’s unconscious and I get scared. I tuck him against my stomach and run out from the garage, up the alley to our place.
I go in the cellar and make a little bed for him with one of my dad’s clean paint rags, then sneak up the stairs. Mom must be upstairs in the bedrooms and I don’t see Laurel. I open the icebox and get some milk. I pour this from the bottle into the lid of a mayonnaise jar Mom has stored under the sink, then I add a bit of water to the milk bottle and put it back. I dash down into the cellar.’
He’s still breathing but sort of shudders at the end of each breath. His eyes are still closed.
There he was, standing up, trying to fight me, and dying right in front of my eyes. I hold him over the mayonnaise jar lid and try sticking his pink nose into the milk. He doesn’t open his mouth, doesn’t try to lick the milk. What happens is he breathes in some of it with his nostrils and sneezes. He shakes his head, sneezes again, but doesn’t brush off his face the way cats do.
Now he’s limp in my hand again. I keep trying but he’s too far gone to drink. He’s dying for sure. After all his struggle trying