in the box. We had to go to the city, and I was in despair - we will return only in the evening and Saji will burst by then.

When we got home, the box was still unattended and Saji sat on the floor and didn't move. No, she didn't burst, but she didn't want to move. As we ate dinner, we were anxiously considering whether to call the veterinarian, and then it dawned on Charles.

“But what,” he said, “if she doesn’t like sand?”

The rain hadn't stopped yet, and we offered her sawdust. She didn't like them either. In a panic, we gave up on Old Man Adams's theory, stuffed a box with damp earth from the garden, and placed it in front of her. And a miracle happened. With a short shriek, Saji found herself in the box and filled it to the brim. Forgetting supper, Charles dashed into the garden at top speed, changed the soil, and placed the crate in front of her again. Saji wasn't being coy. She jumped into the box again, lifted up her ponytail, and was soon sitting on the floor, thanking the heavens at the top of her voice that we were finally smart enough to understand the simplest thing: Mommy explained to her that using anything other than the Earth is Dirty and Ugly.

This is how the crisis was overcome. But there was much more to come. For example, the first time she went out into the garden. The path left much to be desired - she grumbled all the time that walking on pebbles hurt, but when we lowered her onto the lawn and the cut grass suddenly pricked her paws, she squealed and flew up my leg, swearing that someone had bitten her. She did the same thing when she first saw the dog, only for greater safety she climbed on my head in my face and from her tower yelled at him: let him try to climb here after her!

It didn't bode well. Blondin, frightened, did the same. One of my old acquaintances almost took a vow of sobriety when, one evening after the pub closed, he met me on the road and saw a squirrel that was vilifying him with the last words, sitting on my head under fluffy tail, which even a fox would envy. And when I assured him that it was indeed a squirrel and not a symptom of delirium tremens, he - no, to thank me! - went around the whole village, informing everyone he met that I was not myself. Thinking about what the neighbors would say when they heard me walking around with a screaming cat on my head, I was afraid to think.

When Saji's legs got stronger and she began to walk on her own, new troubles began. The first time she went out into the garden unaccompanied, she climbed onto the roof of the garage, rolled down the slope and landed in a rain barrel. She got out of it on her own, stalked home on legs stiff with indignation, and burst into such a jeremiad, while green, musty water flowed down her tail onto our ill-fated Indian carpet, that Charles fled and immediately knocked a lid on a barrel. Unfortunately, the next time she entered the bathroom and saw Charles soaking in the bath, she remembered how she had narrowly escaped death, and with a scream of horror she rushed to save him. And Charles squinted his eyes, and when Saji flopped down on his stomach, howling like a demon, he got so scared that he jumped out of the bath and almost crushed his skull on the first-aid kit that we hung there so that Blondin could not get to it.

After that, Saji fell into the bathtub so often trying to save us that we started tying a sign to the faucet reminding us to lock the door before turning on the water. And Saji, apparently because she had to dry all the time, made a habit of talking with us, standing with her back to the electric fireplace almost very close. Twice she singed the tip of her tail, although she was so busy with the next lecture that she did not even notice it. Both times Charles flew across the room in a dive that would have made even the most eminent rugby player jealous, and put out the fire before she could burn her skin. But he said that at his age it was bad for the heart, and it wasn't good for my heart either. In the end, we had to purchase fine mesh screens, which hopelessly spoil the look of any room, and tie them with strings to all the electric fireplaces in the house.

However, the worst was the food. While she lived with Anna, Saji seemed to obediently and meekly eat her two cereal dishes, two meat dishes and four yeast tablets a day. On the second day, barely recognizing in us a couple of suckers who can be twirled like If you want, she flatly refused the cereal dish. When we ate liver, which she was allowed no more than once a week, or fried bacon, which she was not allowed to eat at all, she sat on the table in anyone's presence and drooled like Oliver Twist. True, she continued to eat the rabbit, which was good for her and - in those days - very cheap (the butcher's face took on an offended expression if I took less than a pound), but only when a special verse was found on her, and therefore I business threw out the rejected meat dish over the gate for destitute kittens. Of course, as soon as the destitute kittens appeared, Saji went out the gate, broke through the crowd and killed the rabbit with such pleasure that one sweet old woman literally trampled a depression along the entire length of the path, stopping by to warn us that our cute little kitty was eating up some kind of food on the road. dregs, and don't we think we might be starving her a little?

Sometimes she condescended to eat a little steak, but on the condition that it was thrown to her in pieces and so that the piece fell right under her nose. If he was even an inch beyond her reach, she did not notice him, but as soon as he even touched her fur, she would run upstairs and crawl under the bed, yelling that we were beating her. If we put a bowl full of food in front of her, whenever this happened, she gracefully scraped a little with her hind paw (a gesture by which she indicated that she had finished using the box of earth) and walked away, her ears flattened in horror at our vulgarity..

She loved milk - but only if she was allowed to drink it right on the table from the milk jug. We got out of the situation by leaving the milkman at her complete disposal, and secretly poured milk for ourselves (so as not to hurt her feelings) from a bottle that was hidden behind a bookcase. We were told that we were acting stupid - we should teach her to drink from a saucer, but these well-wishers did not know Saji. She was a living embodiment of an iron hand in a blue clawed glove. From the saucer she deigned to drink only coffee - but only because her muzzle did not fit into a narrow coffee cup.

Well, and yeast tablets ... Apparently, Anna indelibly impressed on her how important it is to eat these tablets regularly if she wants to grow up to be a big and strong cat and command people, but she ate them extremely unappetizingly - wrinkling her muzzle, opening her mouth, spitting out the half-chewed pill on the carpet, each time more swollen and disgusting, so that in the end every evening we laid out four tablets in front of her, and ourselves ran to the kitchen, just not to look.

Chapter Three
HELP! KIDNAPPED!
About a month after Saji moved in with us, I returned home one evening and said that my firm was sending me to Liverpool. I will have to spend the night there. Charles looked at me in horror.

"Who," he inquired, "will look after the cat?"

-You! I answered cheerfully. - Sheer rubbish. You give her minced rabbit meat for dinner, making sure not a bone gets into the bowl. There will be fish for breakfast: pull out every single bone and make sure that the water does not splash out on the stove; in the morning and in the evening, change the earth in the box, and if she starts yelling with an expression of impatience on her face, then the earth must be changed again; wipe it off if it gets wet; make sure she doesn't play with Mimi (she had an ambitious dream of being the only Siamese in the village, and therefore tried to kill Saji when no one was watching); make sure she ate the yeast tablets; see that she does not go out when it gets dark; make sure she...

There was a loud splash, and then a scream. Saji, who had been looking for other places to show herself since being banned from the bathroom, flopped into the toilet. She could not choose a worse minute for this. If there was any hope in my mind that Charles would agree to look after her, there was no point in thinking about it now. He watched me pull her out of the