The Parchment Papers: Notes Between Cat Lovers, Letter 6

From the Correspondence of

Lady Farah Guinivere von Einstein Katz and

Caesar Lancelot Sellars vander Cloar Cat, Esquire.

Translated from the Meowish. Found on slips of

Parchment Paper after I'd baked cookies.

Morning at Jones Farm

30 March 2006

Farah,

        Did you happen to get a glimpse of that bird Dos brought to me for a present at dawn?  I heard him wrestling with it in Cook's pantry, where he must have brought it through his personal door from outside, and there were tiny feathers everywhere.  I can’t quite get used to the barbarisms of the countryside, though roast duckling like we had at Oxford is, of course, another matter entirely. 

It was so kind of Dos to try to celebrate my homecoming from the hospital.  So that he wouldn’t have his feelings hurt, I woke up Madame and led her to the pantry while Dos was out on morning patrol.  She picked up the dead bird by its feet, shielding her hand with a handkerchief, and discreetly bagged the bird and disposed of it, so that Dos would assume I had enjoyed it to its fullest. 

It was one of those industrious, portly wrens.  Such a pity, though their songs aren’t the best.  (Dos told me wrens have particular medicinal properties.)  At first I was alarmed, thinking Dos had caught a Mockingbird. I suppose the great range of string and percussion music performances outdoors were first inspired by Mockingbirds, copying songs for their friends all day, but at Oxford similar varieties are known as Universal Translators, and they are quite valuable.  Their repertoire is astounding, no matter what their purpose, though my favorite birds, of course, are the perennially lovesick cooing doves who remind me of my feelings for you.

                                                 

             Yours, Caesar