I Am a Cat

by Sōseki Natsume

  Mr. the-late-and-sainted Natural Man. Infinity.” At this moment Waverhouse drifts into the room in his usual casual fashion. He appears to make no distinction between his own and other people’s houses; unannounced and unceremoniously, he enters any house and, what’s more, will sometimes float in unexpectedly through a kitchen door. He is one of those who, from the moment of their birth, discaul themselves of all such tiresome things as worry, reserve, scruple, and concern.

  “‘Giant Gravitation again?’” asks Waverhouse still standing.

  “How could I be always writing only about ‘Giant Gravitation?’ I’m trying to compose an epitaph for the tombstone of Mr. the-late-and-sainted Natural Man,” replied my master with considerable exaggeration.

  “Is that some sort of posthumous Buddhist name like Accidental Child?” inquires Waverhouse in his usual irrelevant style.

  “Is there then someone called Accidental Child?”

  “No, of course there isn’t, but I take it that you’re working on something like that.”

  “I don’t think Accidental Child is anyone I know. But Mr. the-late-and-sainted Natural Man is a person of your own acquaintance.”

  “Who on earth could get a name like that?”

  “It’s Sorosaki. After he graduated from the University, he took a post-graduate course involving study of the ‘theory of infinity.’ But he over-worked, got peritonitis, and died of it. Sorosaki happened to be a very close friend of mine.”

  “All right, so he was your very close friend. I’m far from criticizing that fact. But who was responsible for converting Sorosaki into Mr. the-late-and-sainted Natural Man?”

  “Me. I created that name. For there is really nothing more philistine than the posthumous names conferred by Buddhist priests.” My master boasts as if his nomination of Natural Man were a feat of artistry.

  “Anyway, let’s see the epitaph,” says Waverhouse laughingly. He picks up my master’s manuscript and reads it out aloud. “Eh . . .‘Born into infinity, studied infinity, and died into infinity. Mr. the-late-and-sainted Natural Man. Infinity.’ I see. This is fine. Quite appropriate for poor old Sorosaki.”

  “Good, isn’t it?” says my master obviously very pleased.

  “You should have this epitaph engraved on a weight-stone for pickles and then leave it at the back of the main hall of some temple for the practice-benefit of passing weight lifters. It’s good. It’s most artistic. Mr. the-late-and-sainted may now well rest in peace.”

  “Actually, I’m thinking of doing just that,” answers my master quite seriously. “But you’ll have to excuse me,” he went on, “I won’t be long.

  Just play with the cat. Don’t go away.” And my master departed like the wind without even waiting for Waverhouse to answer.

  Being thus unexpectedly required to entertain the culture-vulture Waverhouse, I cannot very well maintain my sour attitude. Accordingly, I mew at him encouragingly and sidle up on to his knees. “Hello,” says Waverhouse, “you’ve grown distinctly chubby. Let’s take a look at you.”

  Grabbing me impolitely by the scruff of my neck he hangs me up in midair. “Cats like you that let their hind legs dangle are cats that catch no mice. . . Tell me,” he said, turning to my master’s wife in the next room, “has he ever caught anything?”

  “Far from catching so much as a single mouse, he eats rice-cakes and then dances.” The lady of the house unexpectedly probes my old wound, which embarrassed me. Especially when Waverhouse still held me in midair like a circus-performer.

  “Indeed, with such a face, it’s not surprising that he dances. Do you know, this cat possesses a truly insidious physionomy. He looks like one of those goblin-cats illustrated in the old storybooks.” Waverhouse, babbling whatever comes into his head, tries to make conversation with the mistress. She reluctantly interrupts her sewing and comes into the room.

  “I do apologize. You must be bored. He won’t be long now.” And she poured fresh tea for him.

  “I wonder where he’s gone.”

  “Heaven only knows. He never explains where he’s going. Probably to see his doctor.”

  “You mean Dr. Amaki? What a misfortune for Amaki to be involved with such a patient.”

  Perhaps finding this comment difficult to answer, she answers briefly:

  “Well, yes.”

  Waverhouse takes not the slightest notice, but goes on to ask, “How is he lately? Is his weak stomach any better?”

  “It’s impossible to say whether it’s better or worse. However carefully Dr. Amaki may look after him, I don’t see how his health can ever improve if he continues to consume such vast quantities of jam.” She thus works off on Waverhouse her earlier grumblings to my master.

  “Does he eat all that much jam? It sounds like a child.”

  “And not just jam. He’s recently taken to guzzling grated radish on the grounds that it’s a sovereign cure for dyspepsia.”

  “You surprise me,” marvels Waverhouse.

  “It all began when he read in some rag that grated radish contains diastase.”

  “I see. I suppose he reckons that grated radish will repair the ravages of jam. It’s certainly an ingenious equation.” Waverhouse seems vastly diverted by her recital of complaint.

  “Then only the other day he forced some on the baby.”

  “He made the baby eat jam?”

  “No, grated radish! Would you believe it? He said, ‘Come here, my little babykin, father’ll give you something good. . .’Whenever, once in a rare while, he shows affection for the children, he always does remarkably silly things. A few days ago he put our second daughter on top of a chest of drawers.”

  “What ingenious scheme was that?” Waverhouse looks to discover ingenuities in everything.

  “There was no question of any ingenious scheme. He just wanted the child to make the jump when it’s quite obvious that a little girl of three or four is incapable of such tomboy feats.”

  “I see. Yes, that proposal does indeed seem somewhat lacking in ingenuity. Still, he’s a good man without an ill wish in his heart.”

  “Do you think that I could bear it if, on top of everything else, he were ill-natured?” She seems in uncommonly high spirits.

  “Surely you don’t have cause for such vehement complaint? To be as comfortably off as you are is, after all, the best way to be. Your husband neither leads the fast life nor squanders money on dandified clothing.

  He’s a born family man of quiet taste.”Waverhouse fairly lets himself go in unaccustomed laud of an unknown way of life.

  “On the contrary, he’s not at all like that. . .”

  “Indeed? So he has secret vices? Well, one cannot be too careful in this world.” Waverhouse offers a nonchalantly fluffy comment.

  “He has no secret vices, but he is totally abandoned in the way he buys book after book, never to read a single one. I wouldn’t mind if he used his head and bought in moderation, but no. Whenever the mood takes him, he ambles off to the biggest bookshop in the city and brings back home as many books as chance to catch his fancy. Then, at the end of the month, he adopts an attitude of complete detachment. At the end of last year, for instance, I had a terrible time coping with the bill that had been accumulating month after month.”

  “It doesn’t matter that he should bring home however many books he may like. If, when the bill collector comes, you just say that you’ll pay some other time, he’ll go away.”

  “But one cannot put things off indefinitely.” She looks cast down.

  “Then you should explain the matter to your husband and ask him to cut down expenditure on books.”

  “And do you really believe he would listen to me? Why, only the other day, he said,‘You are so unlike a scholar’s wife: you lack the least understanding of the value of books. Listen carefully to this story from ancient Rome. It will give you beneficial guidance for your future conduct.’”

  “That sounds interesting. What sort of story was it?” Waverhouse becomes enth
usiastic, though he appears less sympathetic to her predicament than prompted by sheer curiosity.

  “It seems there was in ancient Rome a king named Tarukin.”

  “Tarukin? That sounds odd in Japanese.”

  “I can never remember the names of foreigners. It’s all too difficult. Maybe he was a barrel of gold. He was, at any rate, the seventh king of Rome.”

  “Really? The seventh barrel of gold certainly sounds queer. But, tell me, what then happened to this seventh Tarukin.”

  “You mustn’t tease me like that. You quite embarrass me. If you know this king’s true name, you should teach me it. Your attitude,” she snaps at him, “is really most unkind.”

  “I tease you? I wouldn’t dream of doing such an unkind thing. It was simply that the seventh barrel of gold sounded so wonderful. Let’s see.

  . . a Roman, the seventh king. . . I can’t be absolutely certain but I rather think it must have been Tarquinius Superbus,Tarquin the Proud. Well, it doesn’t really matter who it was. What did this monarch do?”

  “I understand that some woman, Sibyl by name, went to this king with nine books and invited him to buy them.”

  “I see.”

  “When the king asked her how much she wanted, she stated a very high price, so high that the king asked for a modest reduction. Whereupon the woman threw three of the nine books into the fire where they were quickly burnt to ashes.”

  “What a pity!”

  “The books were said to contain prophecies, predictions, things like that of which there was no other record anywhere.”

  “Really?”

  “The king, believing that six books were bound to be cheaper than nine, asked the price of the remaining volumes. The price proved to be exactly the same; not one penny less. When the king complained of this outrageous development, the women threw another three books into the fire. The king apparently still hankered for the books and he accordingly asked the price of the last three left. The woman again demanded the same price as she had asked for the original nine. Nine books had shrunk to six, and then to three, but the price remained unaltered even by a farthing.

  Suspecting that any attempt to bargain would merely lead the woman to pitch the last three volumes into the flames, the king bought them at the original staggering price. My husband appeared confident that, having heard this story, I would begin to appreciate the value of books, but I don’t at all see what it is that I’m supposed to have learnt to appreciate.”

  Having thus stated her own position, she as good as challenges Waverhouse to contravert her. Even the resourceful Waverhouse seems to be at a loss. He draws a handkerchief from the sleeve of his kimono and tempts me to play with it. Then, in a loud voice as if an idea had suddenly struck him, he remarked, “But you know, Mrs. Sneaze, it is precisely because your husband buys so many books and fills his head with wild notions that he is occasionally mentioned as a scholar, or something of that sort. Only the other day a comment on your husband appeared in a literary magazine.”

  “Really?” She turns around. After all, it’s only natural that his wife should feel anxiety about comments on my master.

  “What did it say?”

  “Oh, only a few lines. It said that Mr. Sneaze’s prose was like a cloud that passes in the sky, like water flowing in a stream.”

  “Is that,” she asks smiling, “all that it said?”

  “Well, it also said ‘it vanishes as soon as it appears and, when it vanishes, it is forever forgetful to return.’”

  The lady of the house looks puzzled and asks anxiously “Was that praise?”

  “Well, yes, praise of a sort,” says Waverhouse coolly as he jiggles his handkerchief in front of me.

  “Since books are essential to his work, I suppose one shouldn’t complain, but his eccentricity is so pronounced that. . .”

  Waverhouse assumes that she’s adopting a new line of attack. “True,” he interrupts, “he is a little eccentric, but any man who pursues learning tends to get like that.” His answer, excellently noncommittal, contrives to combine ingratiation and special pleading.

  “The other day, when he had to go somewhere soon after he got home from school, he found it too troublesome to change his clothes.

  So do you know, he sat down on his low desk without even taking off his overcoat and ate his dinner just as he was. He had his tray put on the footwarmer while I sat on the floor holding the rice container. It was really very funny. . .”

  “It sounds like the old-time custom when generals sat down to identify the severed heads of enemies killed in battle. But that would be quite typical of Mr. Sneaze. At any rate he’s never boringly conventional.”

  Waverhouse offers a somewhat strained compliment.

  “A woman cannot say what’s conventional or unconventional, but I do think his conduct is often unduly odd.”

  “Still, that’s better than being conventional.” As Waverhouse moves firmly to the support of my master, her dissatisfaction deepens.

  “People are always saying this or that is conventional, but would you please tell what makes a thing conventional?” Adopting a defiant attitude, she demands a definition of conventionality.

  “Conventional? When one says something is conventional. . . It’s a bit difficult to explain. . .”

  “If it’s so vague a thing, surely there’s nothing wrong with being conventional.” She begins to corner Waverhouse with typically feminine logic.

  “No, it isn’t vague, it’s perfectly clear-cut. But it’s hard to explain.”

  “I expect you call everything you don’t like conventional.” Though totally uncalculated, her words land smack on target. Waverhouse is now indeed cornered and can no longer dodge defining the conventional.

  “I’ll give you an example. A conventional man is one who would yearn after a girl of sixteen or eighteen but, sunk in silence, never do anything about it; a man who, whenever the weather’s fine, would do no more than stroll along the banks of the Sumida taking, of course, a flask of saké with him.”

  “Are there really such people?” Since she cannot make heads or tails of the twaddle vouchsafed by Waverhouse, she begins to abandon her position, which she finally surrenders by saying, “It’s all so complicated that it’s really quite beyond me.”

  “You think that complicated? Imagine fitting the head of Major Pendennis onto Bakin’s torso, wrapping it up and leaving it all for one or two years exposed to European air.”

  “Would that produce a conventional man?” Waverhouse offers no reply but merely laughs.

  “In fact it could be produced without going to quite so much trouble.

  If you added a shop assistant from a leading store to any middle school student and divided that sum by two, then indeed you’d have a fine example of a conventional man.”

  “Do you really think so?” She looks puzzled but certainly unconvinced.

  “Are you still here?” My master sits himself down on the floor beside Waverhouse. We had not noticed his return.

  “ ‘Still here’ is a bit hard. You said you wouldn’t be long and you yourself invited me to wait for you.”

  “You see, he’s always like that,” remarks the lady of the house leaning toward Waverhouse.

  “While you were away I heard all sorts of tales about you.”

  “The trouble with women is that they talk too much. It would be good if human beings would keep as silent as this cat.” And the master strokes my head.

  “I hear you’ve been cramming grated radish into the baby.”

  “Hum,” says my master and laughs. He then added “Talking of the baby, modern babies are quite intelligent. Since that time when I gave our baby grated radish, if you ask him ‘where is the hot place?’ he invariably sticks out his tongue. Isn’t it strange?”

  “You sound as if you were teaching tricks to a dog. It’s positively cruel. By the way, Coldmoon ought to have arrived by now.”

  “Is Coldmoon coming?” asks my master in a puzzled voic
e.

  “Yes. I sent him a postcard telling him to be here not later than one o’clock.”

  “How very like you! Without even asking us if it happened to be convenient. What’s the idea of asking Coldmoon here?”

  “It’s not really my idea, but Coldmoon’s own request. It seems he is going to give a lecture to the Society of Physical Science. He said he needed to rehearse his speech and asked me to listen to it. Well, I thought it would be obliging to let you hear it, too. Accordingly, I suggested he should come to your house. Which should be quite convenient since you are a man of leisure. I know you never have any engagements.

  You’d do well to listen.” Waverhouse thinks he knows how to handle the situation.

  “I wouldn’t understand a lecture on physical science,” says my master in a voice betraying his vexation at his friend’s high-handed action.

  “On the contrary, his subject is no such dry-as-dust matter as, for example, the magnetized nozzle. The transcendentally extraordinary subject of his discourse is ‘The Mechanics of Hanging.’Which should be worth listening to.”

  “Inasmuch as you once only just failed to hang yourself, I can understand your interest in the subject, but I’m. . .”

  “. . . The man who got cold shivers over going to the theatre, so you cannot expect not to listen to it.” Waverhouse interjects one of his usual flippant remarks and Mrs. Sneaze laughs. Glancing back at her husband, she goes off into the next room. My master, keeping silent, strokes my head. This time, for once, he stroked me with delicious gentleness.