Tobermory by Saki

It was a chill, rain-washed afternoon of a late August day, that
indefinite season when partridges are still in security or cold
storage, and there is nothing to hunt--unless one is bounded on the
north by the Bristol Channel, in which case one may lawfully gallop
after fat red stags. Lady Blemley's house-party was not bounded on the
north by the Bristol Channel, hence there was a full gathering of her
guests round the tea-table on this particular afternoon. And, in spite
of the blankness of the season and the triteness of the occasion, there
was no trace in the company of that fatigued restlessness which means a
dread of the pianola and a subdued hankering for auction bridge. The
undisguised openmouthed attention of the entire party was fixed on the
homely negative personality of Mr. Cornelius Appin. Of all her guests,
he was the one who had come to Lady Blemley with the vaguest
reputation. Some one had said he was "clever," and he had got his
invitation in the moderate expectation, on the part of his hostess,
that some portion at least of his cleverness would be contributed to
the general entertainment. Until tea-time that day she had been unable
to discover in what direction, if any, his cleverness lay. He was
neither a wit nor a croquet champion, a hypnotic force nor a begetter
of amateur theatricals. Neither did his exterior suggest the sort of
man in whom women are willing to pardon a generous measure of mental
deficiency. He had subsided into mere Mr. Appin, and the Cornelius
seemed a piece of transparent baptismal bluff. And now he was claiming
to have launched on the world a discovery beside which the invention of
gunpowder, of the printing-press, and of steam locomotion were
inconsiderable trifles. Science had made bewildering strides in many
directions during recent decades, but this thing seemed to belong to
the domain of miracle rather than to scientific achievement.

"And do you really ask us to believe," Sir Wilfrid was saying, "that
you have discovered a means for instructing animals in the art of human
speech, and that dear old Tobermory has proved your first successful
pupil?"

"It is a problem at which I have worked for the last seventeen years,"
said Mr. Appin, "but only during the last eight or nine months have I
been rewarded with glimmerings of success. Of course I have
experimented with thousands of animals, but latterly only with cats,
those wonderful creatures which have assimilated themselves so
marvellously with our civilization while retaining all their highly
developed feral instincts. Here and there among cats one comes across
an outstanding superior intellect, just as one does among the ruck of
human beings, and when I made the acquaintance of Tobermory a week ago
I saw at once that I was in contact with a 'Beyond-cat' of
extraordinary intelligence. I had gone far along the road to success
in recent experiments; with Tobermory, as you call him, I have reached
the goal."

Mr. Appin concluded his remarkable statement in a voice which he strove
to divest of a triumphant inflection. No one said "Rats," though
Clovis's lips moved in a monosyllabic contortion which probably invoked
those rodents of disbelief.

"And do you mean to say," asked Miss Resker, after a slight pause,
"that you have taught Tobermory to say and understand easy sentences of
one syllable?"

"My dear Miss Resker," said the wonderworker patiently, "one teaches
little children and savages and backward adults in that piecemeal
fashion; when one has once solved the problem of making a beginning
with an animal of highly developed intelligence one has no need for
those halting methods. Tobermory can speak our language with perfect
correctness."

This time Clovis very distinctly said, "Beyond-rats!" Sir Wilfrid was
more polite, but equally sceptical.

"Hadn't we better have the cat in and judge for ourselves?" suggested
Lady Blemley.

Sir Wilfrid went in search of the animal, and the company settled
themselves down to the languid expectation of witnessing some more or
less adroit drawing-room ventriloquism.

In a minute Sir Wilfrid was back in the room, his face white beneath
its tan and his eyes dilated with excitement.

"By Gad, it's true!"

His agitation was unmistakably genuine, and his hearers started forward
in a thrill of awakened interest.

Collapsing into an armchair he continued breathlessly: "I found him
dozing in the smoking-room, and called out to him to come for his tea.
He blinked at me in his usual way, and I said, 'Come on, Toby; don't
keep us waiting;' and, by Gad! he drawled out in a most horribly
natural voice that he'd come when he dashed well pleased! I nearly
jumped out of my skin!"

Appin had preached to absolutely incredulous hearers; Sir Wilfrid's
statement carried instant conviction. A Babel-like chorus of startled
exclamation arose, amid which the scientist sat mutely enjoying the
first fruit of his stupendous discovery.

In the midst of the clamour Tobermory entered the room and made his way
with velvet tread and studied unconcern across to the group seated
round the tea-table.

A sudden hush of awkwardness and constraint fell on the company.
Somehow there seemed an element of embarrassment in addressing on equal
terms a domestic cat of acknowledged dental ability.

"Will you have some milk, Tobermory?" asked Lady Blemley in a rather
strained voice.

"I don't mind if I do," was the response, couched in a tone of even
indifference. A shiver of suppressed excitement went through the
listeners, and Lady Blemley might be excused for pouring out the
saucerful of milk rather unsteadily.

"I'm afraid I've spilt a good deal of it," she said apologetically.

"After all, it's not my Axminster," was Tobermory's rejoinder.

Another silence fell on the group, and then Miss Resker, in her best
district-visitor manner, asked if the human language had been difficult
to learn. Tobermory looked squarely at her for a moment and then fixed
his gaze serenely on the middle distance. It was obvious that boring
questions lay outside his scheme of life.

"What do you think of human intelligence?" asked Mavis Pellington
lamely.

"Of whose intelligence in particular?" asked Tobermory coldly.

"Oh, well, mine for instance," said Mavis, with a feeble laugh.

"You put me in an embarrassing position," said Tobermory, whose tone
and attitude certainly did not suggest a shred of embarrassment. "When
your inclusion in this house-party was suggested Sir Wilfrid protested
that you were the most brainless woman of his acquaintance, and that
there was a wide distinction between hospitality and the care of the
feeble-minded. Lady Blemley replied that your lack of brain-power was
the precise quality which had earned you your invitation, as you were
the only person she could think of who might be idiotic enough to buy
their old car. You know, the one they call 'The Envy of Sisyphus,'
because it goes quite nicely up-hill if you push it."

Lady Blemley's protestations would have had greater effect if she had
not casually suggested to Mavis only that morning that the car in
question would be just the thing for her down at her Devonshire home.

Major Barfield plunged in heavily to effect a diversion.

"How about your carryings-on with the tortoiseshell puss up at the
stables, eh?"

The moment he had said it every one realized the blunder.

"One does not usually discuss these matters in public," said Tobermory
frigidly. "From a slight observation of your ways since you've been in
this house I should imagine you'd find it inconvenient if I were to
shift the conversation on to your own little affairs."

The panic which ensued was not confined to the Major.

"Would you like to go and see if cook has got your dinner ready?"
suggested Lady Blemley hurriedly, affecting to ignore the fact that it
wanted at least two hours to Tobermory's dinner-time.

"Thanks," said Tobermory, "not quite so soon after my tea. I don't
want to die of indigestion."

"Cats have nine lives, you know," said Sir Wilfrid heartily.

"Possibly," answered Tobermory; "but only one liver."

"Adelaide!" said Mrs. Cornett, "do you mean to encourage that cat to go
out and gossip about us in the servants' hall?"

The panic had indeed become general. A narrow ornamental balustrade
ran in front of most of the bedroom windows at the Towers, and it was
recalled with dismay that this had formed a favourite promenade for
Tobermory at all hours, whence he could watch the pigeons--and heaven
knew what else besides. If he intended to become reminiscent in his
present outspoken strain the effect would be something more than
disconcerting. Mrs. Cornett, who spent much time at her toilet table,
and whose complexion was reputed to be of a nomadic though punctual
disposition, looked as ill at ease as the Major. Miss Scrawen, who
wrote fiercely sensuous poetry and led a blameless life, merely
displayed irritation; if you are methodical and virtuous in private you
don't necessarily want every one to know it. Bertie van Tahn, who was
so depraved at seventeen that he had long ago given up trying to be any
worse, turned a dull shade of gardenia white, but he did not commit the
error of dashing out of the room like Odo Finsberry, a young gentleman
who was understood to be reading for the Church and who was possibly
disturbed at the thought of scandals he might hear concerning other
people. Clovis had the presence of mind to maintain a composed
exterior; privately he was calculating how long it would take to
procure a box of fancy mice through the agency of the EXCHANGE AND MART
as a species of hush-money.

Even in a delicate situation like the present, Agnes Resker could not
endure to remain too long in the background.

"Why did I ever come down here?" she asked dramatically.

Tobermory immediately accepted the opening.

"Judging by what you said to Mrs. Cornett on the croquet-lawn
yesterday, you were out for food. You described the Blemleys as the
dullest people to stay with that you knew, but said they were clever
enough to employ a first-rate cook; otherwise they'd find it difficult
to get anyone to come down a second time."

"There's not a word of truth in it! I appeal to Mrs. Cornett--"
exclaimed the discomfited Agnes.

"Mrs. Cornett repeated your remark afterwards to Bertie van Tahn,"
continued Tobermory, "and said, 'That woman is a regular Hunger
Marcher; she'd go anywhere for four square meals a day,' and Bertie van
Tahn said--"

At this point the chronicle mercifully ceased. Tobermory had caught a
glimpse of the big yellow Tom from the Rectory working his way through
the shrubbery towards the stable wing. In a flash he had vanished
through the open French window.

With the disappearance of his too brilliant pupil Cornelius Appin found
himself beset by a hurricane of bitter upbraiding, anxious inquiry, and
frightened entreaty. The responsibility for the situation lay with
him, and he must prevent matters from becoming worse. Could Tobermory
impart his dangerous gift to other cats? was the first question he had
to answer. It was possible, he replied, that he might have initiated
his intimate friend the stable puss into his new accomplishment, but it
was unlikely that his teaching could have taken a wider range as yet.

"Then," said Mrs. Cornett, "Tobermory may be a valuable cat and a great
pet; but I'm sure you'll agree, Adelaide, that both he and the stable
cat must be done away with without delay."

"You don't suppose I've enjoyed the last quarter of an hour, do you?"
said Lady Blemley bitterly. "My husband and I are very fond of
Tobermory--at least, we were before this horrible accomplishment was
infused into him; but now, of course, the only thing is to have him
destroyed as soon as possible."

"We can put some strychnine in the scraps he always gets at
dinner-time," said Sir Wilfrid, "and I will go and drown the stable cat
myself. The coachman will be very sore at losing his pet, but I'll say
a very catching form of mange has broken out in both cats and we're
afraid of it spreading to the kennels."

"But my great discovery!" expostulated Mr. Appin; "after all my years
of research and experiment--"

"You can go and experiment on the shorthorns at the farm, who are under
proper control," said Mrs. Cornett, "or the elephants at the Zoological
Gardens. They're said to be highly intelligent, and they have this
recommendation, that they don't come creeping about our bedrooms and
under chairs, and so forth."

An archangel ecstatically proclaiming the Millennium, and then finding
that it clashed unpardonably with Henley and would have to be
indefinitely postponed, could hardly have felt more crestfallen than
Cornelius Appin at the reception of his wonderful achievement. Public
opinion, however, was against him--in fact, had the general voice been
consulted on the subject it is probable that a strong minority vote
would have been in favour of including him in the strychnine diet.

Defective train arrangements and a nervous desire to see matters
brought to a finish prevented an immediate dispersal of the party, but
dinner that evening was not a social success. Sir Wilfrid had had
rather a trying time with the stable cat and subsequently with the
coachman. Agnes Resker ostentatiously limited her repast to a morsel
of dry toast, which she bit as though it were a personal enemy; while
Mavis Pellington maintained a vindictive silence throughout the meal.
Lady Blemley kept up a flow of what she hoped was conversation, but her
attention was fixed on the doorway. A plateful of carefully dosed fish
scraps was in readiness on the sideboard, but sweets and savoury and
dessert went their way, and no Tobermory appeared either in the
dining-room or kitchen.

The sepulchral dinner was cheerful compared with the subsequent vigil
in the smoking-room. Eating and drinking had at least supplied a
distraction and cloak to the prevailing embarrassment. Bridge was out
of the question in the general tension of nerves and tempers, and after
Odo Finsberry had given a lugubrious rendering of "Melisande in the
Wood" to a frigid audience, music was tacitly avoided. At eleven the
servants went to bed, announcing that the small window in the pantry
had been left open as usual for Tobermory's private use. The guests
read steadily through the current batch of magazines, and fell back
gradually, on the "Badminton Library" and bound volumes of PUNCH. Lady
Blemley made periodic visits to the pantry, returning each time with an
expression of listless depression which forestalled questioning.

At two o'clock Clovis broke the dominating silence.

"He won't turn up to-night. He's probably in the local newspaper
office at the present moment, dictating the first instalment of his
reminiscences. Lady What's-her-name's book won't be in it. It will be
the event of the day."

Having made this contribution to the general cheerfulness, Clovis went
to bed. At long intervals the various members of the house-party
followed his example.

The servants taking round the early tea made a uniform announcement in
reply to a uniform question. Tobermory had not returned.

Breakfast was, if anything, a more unpleasant function than dinner had
been, but before its conclusion the situation was relieved. Tobermory's
corpse was brought in from the shrubbery, where a gardener had just
discovered it. From the bites on his throat and the yellow fur which
coated his claws it was evident that he had fallen in unequal combat
with the big Tom from the Rectory.

By midday most of the guests had quitted the Towers, and after lunch
Lady Blemley had sufficiently recovered her spirits to write an
extremely nasty letter to the Rectory about the loss of her valuable
pet.

Tobermory had been Appin's one successful pupil, and he was destined to
have no successor. A few weeks later an elephant in the Dresden
Zoological Garden, which had shown no previous signs of irritability,
broke loose and killed an Englishman who had apparently been teasing
it. The victim's name was variously reported in the papers as Oppin
and Eppelin, but his front name was faithfully rendered Cornelius.

"If he was trying German irregular verbs on the poor beast," said
Clovis, "he deserved all he got."