Clear and high above the sound of the storm came an imperious “Me-ow!”

“It’s a cat,” said Harlan. “You don’t suppose the poor thing is shut up anywhere, do you?”

“If it had been, we’d have found it. We’ve opened every door in the house, I’m sure. It must be outside.”

“Me-ow! Me-ow! Me-ow!” The voice was not pleading; it was rather a command, a challenge.

“Kitty, kitty, kitty,” she called. “Where are you, kitty?” 15

15

Harlan opened the outside door, and in rushed a huge black cat, with the air of one returning home after a long absence.

“Poor kitty,” said Dorothy, kindly, stooping to stroke the sable visitor, who instinctively dodged the caress, and then scratched her hand.

“The ugly brute!” she exclaimed. “Don’t touch him, Harlan.”

Throughout the meal the cat sat at a respectful distance, with his greenish yellow eyes fixed unwaveringly upon them. He was entirely black, save for a white patch under his chin, which, in the half-light, carried with it an uncanny suggestion of a shirt front. Dorothy at length became restless under the calm scrutiny.

“I don’t like him,” she said. “Put him out.”

“Thought you liked cats,” remarked Harlan, reaching for another sandwich.

“I do, but I don’t like this one. Please put him out.”

“What, in all this storm? He’ll get wet.”

“He wasn’t wet when he came in,” objected Dorothy. “He must have some warm, dry place of his own outside.”

“Come, kitty,” said Harlan, pleasantly. 16

16

“Kitty” merely blinked, and Harlan rose.

“Come, kitty.”

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