Evening Republican, Volume 20, Number 233, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 September 1916 — “CAT-FEAR” VICTIM [ARTICLE]

“CAT-FEAR” VICTIM

HERE 18 INDIVIDUAL WITH REAL TALE OF WOE. Many Who Have Suffered Under Like Circumstances Will Extend Bym- - pathy. Since “Honey Boys” Are Quite Numerous.

Can anyone tell me at what age on* la likely to become subject to catfear? I wasn’t born with it, for I have vivid recollections of being foolishly fond of a homely, spotted old cat, bearing the musical name of Molly Cottontail, asserts a writer in the Indianapolis News. Maybe catfear, like honors, comes to the individual in various ways. If this should prove to be true, then I’m under the Impression that it was thrust on me. Strange to say, all cats do not affect me unfavorably. I can even see a scrawny black cat shoot across my path without feeling a qualm, and I’ve been known to warm a saucer of milk to cheer some stray cat on Its backalley pilgrimage. If there’s any harder lot than that of stray cats I don’t want to hear about it, and I’m glad I’ve helped some of them a bit It’s the fine, family pet that brings on my attacks. Two people in the upper flat have an Angora, an im'mense black and clay-colored chump that gets on my nerves. It seems that this upper flat was rented primarily> for Honey Boy. The two people occupy any chair, couch or bed that his majesty is not using. If he kept strictly to his own rented apartment it wouldn’t be so hard, but he takes privileges with the whole building and surrounding grounds. He is partial to the downstairs front porch, and sprawling his long-haired self out on one of the posts at the side of the front steps, he waits, fondly expecting every passer-by to exclaim over his catshlp. And a lot of them do it —more’s the pity! He also has his favorite , lounging places in the downstairs library, one of them being the top of the book shelves, near a much-prized vase, but he has his uneasy moments when I fix ray eye on him and mutter through clenched teeth: “You old lowbrow!* He knows it has a different ring compared with the pet names he gets upstairs. The two people up there call him Honey Boy, and Boo’ful Sing, and Child! He presumes that the back yard belongs exclusively to the upper flat, so he takes his morning airings down there, and bne wakens to musical sounds like this: “Honey Boys Honey Boy 1 Oh, *oo boo’ful sing! Is you wollin’ in de gwass? Des a wollln’ In de gwass, des a wollin’ in de gwass!” Wouldn’t that be enough to counteract the effect of even a good nightis rest? At noon a gentle voice calls down the back stairway: “Honey Boy, come wight upstairs and det some ice cold milk for *oo lunch.” He seems to have a hankering after iced drinks, for once when I had placed a pitcher of Ice water on the table for my own especial enjoyment during the afternoon, Honey Boy sprang up lightly and lapped his fill out of it. The members of my family told me afterward that they feared I was going to have apoplexy or hydrophobia, but it was really an attack of my cat-fear. Sometimes the gentle voice calls persuasively: “Come upstairs this minute, Honey Boy, to *oo mother." Gee 1 before I'd call myself mother to a disreputable bunch like that I’d make the rounds of all the orphan asylums in the city. But going back to my cat-fear—-It’s different from any I’ve ever heard of. I’m trying hard to keep It well under control, but every* day the fear grows stronger, that some time I’ll mistake Boo’ful Sing for the splotchy mop he resembles, and with tense nerves and set teeth either mop up the front porch or the back yard with him. That would hurt his pampered feelin’s and worse still, it would hurt the feelin’s of his mistress —and there’d be strained relations between the upper and lower flatters. No, I’m not afraid of the upper flatters reading this outburst of suppressed cat-fear. They don’t find any time to read —they’re too busy caring for Honey Boy.