The Story of My Cats 



innocent air. He comes back. Victory ! The 

 Tom-cat will not run away. 



Next morning: 



"Puss! Puss!" 



Not a sign of him! We hunt, we call. 

 Nothing, Oh, the hypocrite, the hypocrite ! 

 How he has tricked us! He has gone, he is 

 at Orange. None of those about me can be- 

 lieve in this venturesome pilgrimage. I de- 

 clare that the deserter is at this moment at 

 Orange mewing outside the empty house. 



Aglae and Claire went to Orange. They 

 found the Cat, as I said they would, and 

 brought him back in a hamper. His paws 

 and belly were covered with red clay; and yet 

 the weather was dry, there was no mud. The 

 Cat, therefore, must have got wet crossing 

 the Aygues torrent; and the moist fur had 

 kept the red earth of the fields through which 

 he had passed. The distance from Serignan 

 to Orange, in a straight line, is four and a 

 half miles. There are two bridges over the 

 Aygues, one above and one below that line, 

 some distance away. The Cat took neither 

 the one nor the other: his instinct told him 

 the shortest road and he followed that road, 

 as his belly, covered with red mud, proved. 

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