CATS OR DOGS?

“Cats”, said Pammie.

“Dogs”, I said.

“Cats are a lot better than dogs”, she replied.

This may look like the beginning of a Mulliner story in which a girl and a boy were arguing about the relative merits of cats and dogs and it need not be mentioned that the girl won the dispute hands down.

I was visiting my niece Pammie, who had lately taken a fancy to cats. She had not less than a dozen of them living in her house. Reminds me of the Wodehouse story of Bertie Wooster finding 23 cats in his bedroom. She had a dog, Rover, a few years back and I reminded how fond of the animals she was.

“Ah”, she said, “Rover was one in a million and you won’t find another like him.”

The argument went on for quite some time. I said, “I like dogs because they show their affection for you in their eyes, wag their tails when you come home and try to clamber over you. Cats only stretch out more luxuriously on the sofa and do not even acknowledge the fact that you are back home. One cat looks like any other cat, while dogs have their individual good looks.”

“But cats are intellectually superior to dogs”

“Do you mean cats have more academic degrees than dogs?”

“The owners of cats have more academic qualifications than the owners of dogs, a study has revealed.”

That must be true, because Pammie had more academic degrees than she could count, while I was the possessor of a scrap of paper that had no value. The owners have an advantage that cats need very little attention – just a feeding in the morning and in the evening, while dogs have to be brushed, taken for walks, given baths regularly. Obviously, cat owners have more time to study and get higher degrees than the dog owners.

Just then an enormous orange feline entered the room, grinned at me and went on to rub himself on Pammie’s legs.

“Hey, watch out! Is this a creature a Bobcat, Caracal, Clouded leopard, Lynx, Margay, Ocelot, Puma, Serval or something from the underworld?”, I asked her.

“He is Lal Kishen, the leader of the gang here”, she replied in a dignified way. “I named him so because he has a close resemblance to a senior political leader.”

I knew and with the silvery whiskers he had, there was a striking resemblance to the person she referred to.

“Now tell me, are you for the cats or for the dogs? If you say ‘dogs’ I will ask Lal Kishen to make faces at you.”

“I will make a secret vote and the result will come out after a month like the Indian elections. By then I will be far away from you and Lal Kishen,”