Elephi Read online

  At about noon the next day the snow finally stopped, and Elephi grew even more restless, waiting for Whitey’s horrid guardian to come and dig him out. He was afraid that the bearded giant would give the car a scolding, but all the same would take him home to his warm garage.

  Hours passed.

  Nobody came.

  Pedestrians made their way around Whitey and laughed at him. A policeman came and pushed away just enough snow to put a ticket on his windshield and when Madella saw this, she said to Mrs. Cuckoo, “There’s one car that’ll wind up in the car pound and that’s for sure.”

  Car pound! Elephi had heard about the dog pound which he gathered was a kind of reform school, and he supposed a car pound was much the same thing. It seemed highly unfair since Whitey had done nothing criminal—he had simply been too tired and cold to carry that big fat drip with the whiskers one more step.

  There must be a way to save Whitey from the car pound. But though Elephi, who had a very high I.Q., thought and thought, he could not make a plan.

  Several days passed. It was sunny and the snow glittered like precious gems and it was wickedly cold. The Presbyterian children made a snow man in the church yard, and the older boys of the neighborhood had terrific snowball fights. Gradually some of the cars were dug out and warmed up and coaxed away.

  Not Whitey. His cap of snow grew dirty but it did not melt. He was encased in such tight-packed snow that the snowball fighters climbed on top of him and slid down and probably did not even know that there was a car inside that great hump.

  Elephi, the Compassionate Cat, lost his appetite. He slept less than twenty hours out of each twenty four. He grew careless in his personal appearance and seldom laundered his gloves. When company came to see the Cuckoos, he was polite, but after he had been introduced, he begged to be excused and returned to his bay window. Madella, seeing that this was now his favorite spot, put a bright red cushion on the window seat and here he sat, like a king on a throne, hour after hour, thinking and thinking of a way to rescue Whitey.

  On one of these cold, sparkling days, the smart cat had an idea. Whitey was so small that he could easily be brought into the building and into the back elevator. The Cuckoos’ back door was rather narrow, but with a little juggling and jiggling, it could be managed to get the car through and into the room at the end of the hall where the ironing board and brooms were kept. Here Whitey could stay and Well Known could take care of him. He probably needed a good bath by this time. But above all, he needed warmth and friendship.

  The Former Kitten began to plot. His problem was a tough one and a less clever cat would have thrown up his paws in dismay. But not Elephi Moneypenny. He put on his thinking cap and thought so hard that Mrs. Cuckoo had to speak to him three times before he realized that she was inviting him to have a snack of chicken.

  A big box had come for the Cuckoos several days before and there was a tag on it that gave their name and address and the warning DO NOT OPEN UNTIL CHRISTMAS. It was a matter of only half an hour or so before Elephi had untied the tag and hidden it in his office under the sofa. (The office contained his many safe-deposit boxes where he kept cellophane, corks and perforated cigarettes.)

  After hiding the tag, Elephi lay down on his regal red cushion in the window seat. Although he appeared to be asleep, he was really waiting for his chance to get out to the street, across it, and onto the car. He knew exactly what he was going to do if he had any kind of luck.

  And he did have luck. Absolutely marvelous luck. Lady Luck her very own self smiled on Elephi II. Both door bells rang at once. Madella went to the back door and Mrs. Cuckoo went to the front door and just as she opened it, the telephone rang. She said to the delivery man, “Come in. Just let me get the telephone and I’ll be with you in a minute.”

  The delivery man had several parcels and he propped the door open with one of them while he went to get the others from the elevator. Before you could say, “Electric eel!” Elephi had picked up his DO NOT OPEN sign in his teeth and had run out the door.

  “Hey!” called the delivery man. “Hey! Hey, ma’am, is it all right if your cat gets out?”

  Elephi, running down the stairs as fast as he could, heard Mrs. Cuckoo cry, “What? What about my cat?”

  “It got out,” said the delivery man. (It, indeed!)

  “Oh, no!” Mrs. Cuckoo shrieked. “Madella! Elephi got out! Call Walter! Run and get your snow boots on and I will too!”

  Walter, the superintendent, was a nice man but he was big and fat and slow on his feet and Elephi knew that he could easily outrun him.

  For one moment, the Cat Formerly Kitten paused, feeling sorry for Mrs. Cuckoo. There was no way of telling the old dear that he was coming right back, so he ran on, and in no time he was in the lobby. A great many people were coming in and going out and Elephi had no trouble slipping through the two heavy outer doors.

  Now, for the first time in his life, he found himself on the street.

  How huge the world was! And how noisy! And how cold! He had been wondering for some time now what snow felt like, and to his surprise and delight, he found it quite similar to a pillow. It was more slippery and, of course, much colder, but it had a kind of bounciness about it that he liked. And if he had not had business to attend to, he might have tried a sample nap on a mound of it at the curb.

  But he was a cat with a purpose and he went directly across the street, crossing with the green light (since he had spent so much time watching the traffic, he knew all the laws) and he leaped nimbly onto the top of Whitey’s head. He put down his tag for a minute while he removed the policeman’s rude one and buried it in the snow cap. Then, using his teeth and his claws and all his strength and his high I.Q. (if Elephi had been a boy, he probably would have been rated “genius”), he put his own tag on the windshield under the windshield wiper.

  The brilliant cat then sat down to wait for the rescue party to come and rescue him.

  Walter came charging out of the apartment house like a fireman, moving faster than Elephi ever dreamed he could. Big as he was (his hands were like roasts of beef) he was ever so gentle and with the softest voice in the world, he called, “Kitty, kitty, here, kitty, here Mis’ Moneypenny’s black kitty!” Elephi would have liked to tease Walter by hiding, and he rather wished his clothes were white so that he wouldn’t show up so clearly against the snow. But he wanted to get Whitey into the house as soon as possible and to do this, he had to make Walter look at the tag. So he stayed where he was and Walter spotted him at once.

  “Now why’d you want to go and do a thing like that for?” said Walter, reaching up one of his big hands to grab the runaway. “Who you think gonna give you fish and fixins if you go turn into a common low-class bum. Scarin’ your missus. The idea! You come along home now, hear?”

  Elephi moved just out of Walter’s reach and then, when one white-gloved paw was dangling over the DO NOT OPEN tag, he let Walter pick him up.

  “Le’s see,” said Walter. “Le’s see, what’s this?” and he looked at the tag. “Now what kind of a monkeyshine is this here?” he said, puzzled. “It sure says Moneypenny.”

  Elephi mewed. He was afraid Mrs. Cuckoo would come out of the house and discover the tag and catch him red-handed in his trick. So he mewed again more loudly.

  “Okay, Mister,” said Walter. “I’ll get you safe back in your house and then I’ll come and take a look at this other matter.”

  Just as they crossed the street, Mrs. Cuckoo came flying down the steps with one foot in a snow boot and the other in a bedroom slipper. Elephi changed hands and Mrs. Cuckoo said, “Walter, how can I thank you? I don’t know what I’d do if anything happened to this ungrateful party!” To Elephi she said, “You’re about as bad as a cat can be and still be a cat.”

  Walter pushed his cap back and scratched his forehead and he said, “Something mighty funny over yonder ...”

  But he did not have a chance to finish because Elephi began to squirm and Mrs. Cuckoo said, “I’ll
see you later, Walter. Right now I want to get this animal under lock and key.”

  His mission was accomplished and Elephi lay quietly in Mrs. Cuckoo’s arms and purred as she took him up in the elevator. Madella, wearing boots and a scarf around her head, was coming out the door and Elephi mewed a friendly hello to her.

  “Well!” she said. “You just wanted to go and do your Christmas shopping, didn’t you, Your Highness? What were you going to get me?”

  “Don’t be nice to him, Madella,” said Mrs. Cuckoo. “His sole solitary purpose in running away was to scare the living daylights out of me.”

  If Elephi had known how to laugh, he would have laughed his head off thinking about the success of his project. But since he couldn’t laugh, he purred and this he did with so much power that Madella said he sounded like the BMT subway.

  As soon as the ladies finished petting him and observing to each other that he was the best but the most bothersome of cats, Elephi went to his window. Sure enough, Walter was back across the street, brushing snow off Whitey’s windshield. Now and again he would stop and scratch his head and shrug his shoulders as if to say, “It sure beats me.” After a while, he came back to the building and soon went out again carrying a shovel. Elephi’s heart thumped and bumbled like a June-bug.

  Walter began to dig. First he dug out the wheels and then he started on the top. The snow had turned to ice and he had to chip it away with a trowel. Elephi was sorry that Walter had such a tiresome job to do. Still, somebody had to do it and Elephi knew that he, personally, could not. His claws were long and strong (the Cuckoos’ furniture showed evidence of that) but they were not that long and strong.

  Walter would stop for a bit to rest. Sometimes he came back across the street and vanished into the building and Elephi imagined that he was getting a cup of hot coffee to warm him up.

  Madella put away the vacuum cleaner and dried the last dish and went home. And soon after that, Mrs. Cuckoo went out, telling Elephi that she was going to the dentist. There—that was one more fine thing about being a cat: you didn’t have to go to the dentist. Poor cuckoo old Mrs. Cuckoo, she was forever and a day going to the dentist. She would come home from a session with him and vow that she would never go back again. And Mr. Cuckoo would tell her that he didn’t want to see her wearing store-teeth quite yet. “But it hurts,” she would complain. Nevertheless, she always kept her appointment and when she came home from it, she would lay her cheek on Elephi’s flank and say, “A cat is a peerless poultice.”

  Before leaving, Mrs. Cuckoo hemmed and hawed. “Why don’t I call and tell him my cat’s sick?” she said and started to the telephone. But she already had on her coat and her boots and she thought the better of it and said, “Okay, Dr. Dreado, just this one more time.” And she left.

  Now Elephi was alone. But, he thought joyfully, not for long.

  A good deal of Whitey had become visible and Elephi could see that he was truly so small that he looked rather like a large toy. Walter worked away: dig, shovel, chip. Sam, the handyman, who was shorter and thinner than Walter and somewhat resembled a kindly mouse, came to help with another shovel and long before the sun went down and long before the Cuckoos came home, Whitey, the Orphan of the Storm, was rid of his winter overcoat of dirty snow.

  Not only that! Whitey was actually in the Cuckoos’ apartment! In the back room where the ironing board and brooms were! Walter and Sam had put him on a dolly (not the kind of dolly that girls make dresses and aprons for but the kind the Red Cap puts your foot locker and suitcases on when you’re catching a train) and wheeled him across Fifth Avenue.

  Elephi went to the back door and listened and soon he heard the service elevator coming up with the groan it always made as if it were much too old to do such hard work. He heard Sam say, “Easy, now, easy! Right-o, there we are. I’ve got the master key right here.”

  The Well-Known Cat trotted back to the living room, got on his red throne and pretended to be asleep. He heard the two men put Whitey in the back room and he heard Sam say, “I wouldn’t mind if somebody gave me a little outfit like this for Christmas.”

  Walter said, “I’d rather have me a Cadillac,” and both of them laughed.

  “I’ll take a look at the plants while I’m here,” said Sam and he and Walter came into the living room. Sam and Mrs. Cuckoo often had long conversations about the care and feeding of house plants, and now he felt the leaves of the rubber tree and he prodded the soil in the fern’s pot, he pulled a yellow leaf off the pothos and he admired the flaming red blossoms on the amaryllis that had just come into bloom.

  Elephi liked both Walter and Sam but today he wished they would go away.

  “That’s a good-looking cat the Moneypennies got there,” said Sam and rolled Elephi over and scratched his stomach. Elephi refused to respond and kept his eyes shut tight.

  “You know that big old cat of mine?” said Walter. “Well, I’m gonna get him a monkey to keep him company. I got this squirrel monkey all picked out at the pet store.”

  How thoughtful of Walter! Why didn’t the Cuckoos show their affection for Elephi in the same way? A monkey would be grand.

  Sam laughed. “If you’re gonna get a monkey to keep your cat company, you better start looking for a new wife to keep you company.”

  “No sir,” said Walter. “Bella likes animals. We got the cat and we got the two doves and the dog and the hamsters. She’d like to have a mouse or two.”

  “Then if you got all them, what do you want with a monkey?” asked Sam.

  “Like I said, to keep the cat company. The cat don’t like the dog and the doves don’t like the cat and the hamsters don’t like nobody. The cat’s been looking peaked lately and acting mopey, so I figure he needs a friend.”

  Although Elephi was interested in big, slow Walter’s generosity to his cat, he did wish they’d go. Finally, when at last they did, he jumped down immediately and ran like a race horse to the back room.

  He stood in the doorway for a few minutes and purred soothingly and when he spoke, it was in a soft voice so that he would not startle Whitey. He said, “Hello, Car. I’m Elephi.”

  The car shook and from somewhere deep inside it came a shrill, terrified voice. “An elephant! For Pete’s sake, go away. I’ve had enough trouble as it is without being stepped on by a great lout of an elephant.”

  “No, no, I’m not an elephant. I’m a cat,” said Elephi.

  “Then why didn’t you say so in the first place? What’s the big idea of making a fellow think he was going to have to bunk with an elephant?” said Whitey crossly. “Come around here and let me see if you’re telling the truth.”

  “Where do you want me to stand?” asked Elephi because he was not sure where the car did its looking from.

  “In front of my eyes, of course, stupid,” said Whitey.

  Never before in his life had Elephi been called stupid and he didn’t like it in the least. Maybe Whitey was not going to be fun after all.

  All the same, he went nearer to the car. At first he stood in front of the head-lights, but this was the wrong place, for Whitey said, “What are you waiting for? I’ll bet you’re not a cat.”

  Good heavens, what a peevish car! But Elephi supposed that he would be out of sorts too if he’d been left in the cold snow all that time. He jumped up onto Whitey’s hood and stood before the windshield.

  This was the right place. Whitey said, “So you are a cat. You’re taller than the one at home. And black. The one at home is yellow. Goes by the name of Dandy Lion, King of Beasts.”

  “I’m Elephi,” said Elephi.

  “Oh, go on,” said Whitey. “If you’re an elephant, I’m a Fifth Avenue bus.”

  “I didn’t say I was an elephant,” said Elephi. “I said my name is Elephi”

  “Elephi,” said Whitey and thought the news over for a while. “I’ve heard some strange ones in my time but Elephi is a new one to me. What does it mean?”

  “I don’t think it means anything,”
said Elephi Pelephi W.K. Cat. “Any more than Susan or Adam or What-you-may-call-it means anything. I’m named for a famous Greek cat of Delphi. The Cuckoos, who pay rent here, tell me that Elephi of Delphi is one of the most important cats in the Mediterranean.”

  “Never heard of him,” said Whitey. Then, in a much friendlier voice, he said, “By the way, Elephi, do you happen to know what language we’re speaking? It can’t be my native Fiat Italian because you wouldn’t understand it, would you?”

  “I was wondering about that myself,” Elephi replied. “I thought I was speaking American Short-Hair Catese as I usually do, but you wouldn’t understand that either, would you?”

  “I picked up a few words of Catese from Dandy Lion,” said Whitey. “But not much more than ‘How do you do?’ and ‘Move over, please.’ Dandy doesn’t talk much for the simple reason that he doesn’t have much to say. He’s nice enough, but between you and me, he hasn’t got the brains of a potato.”

  “It is well known that I have a very high I.Q.,” said Elephi.

  “So have I!” said Whitey enthusiastically. “You know what I think? I think we’re so smart that we have invented an international language without even trying.”

  “I think you’re probably right,” said Elephi. “And if that’s true, we’re smart enough to do anything we want. We could go to the moon if we chose.”

  “It might be cold at this time of year,” said Whitey.

  “Yes, I daresay it would be cold right now,” said Elephi. “But perhaps we could go in the spring. Listen, Whitey . . .”

  “How did you know my name was Whitey?” asked the car.

  “It’s painted all over you,” said Elephi and grinned at his joke.

  “If I had a hat, I’d take it off to you,” said the little Italian and he sang a song he had just made up.

  “I’d doff my hat

  To the I.Q. cat.

  If I knew Greek, I’d shriek in Greek:

  Hurrah for Elephi!”