But she couldn't keep it up for very long. She did really care what had become of Admiral Togo, and she hung her head and dropped her tail and tried to get behind the door. 'Poor Petronilla! You seem very much distressed!' observed Auntie May, coming in just then, and kindly lifting mother up, and putting her back with us. 'But you are a sensible cat--I never knew a sensibler--and you have been through this kind of thing before. Cheer up! You have three left.' 'And I wonder how long I shall have them?' mother muttered. 'You are making pretty quick work with them. You have killed one, and now you have sold the other--' Her bitterness made her unjust, because Auntie May didn't kill Blanch, though she certainly had sold Admiral Togo, for what Rosamond said next showed it. 'May I go and see Togo?' 'You may. I am sure Mrs. Dillon will have no objection, but don't imagine for a moment that Togo will be glad to see _you_. Cats have hardly any memories, and kittens none at all. And a good thing too, for treated as chattels as they are they would have wretched lives of it. _They_ don't listen to the rain upon the roof and think of other days, or have tears come into their eyes when they look at sunsets because they feel so ancient--' 'Why, Auntie May, you are talking like an old cat, while you are only a young woman. You aren't _very_ old--not _more_ than thirty, are you?' 'That is just the most miserable age,' said Auntie May; 'when I am forty I shall be as cheerful as--old boots!' She actually wiped a tear away as she spoke. 'Good gracious me, Pet is simply murdering Freddy! Drop it--drop it!' 'Please don't interfere!' mother said, as well as she could speak with her mouth full of Freddy. 'If you only knew what he had been up to this afternoon you would be obliged to me, I can tell you! You will miss It presently, and wonder where it has got to. But I'll make the boy tell me where it is, and put it back too, before I have done with him!' She gave it to Fred well, but she spared his pride and never told _us_ where he had put Auntie May's opera-glasses. She hit very hard herself, but she never allowed us to lay a paw on each other, except in kindness. She was so afraid of our hurting each other, like Uncle Tomyris, who pulled out Uncle Ra's left eye once in a cattery brawl. 'They got Professor Hobday to come and fit him with an artificial one. They really did, word of an honest cat!' mother said. She told us some other things that the Professor did, such as bandaging a cat's broken arm and putting it in splints, also false teeth, but that was a dog, I think, and it was worth about three hundred pounds. No cat that ever was born was worth that, mother says, but it is They who settle what we are all to cost, and They might be mistaken. They have agreed that cats are inferior to dogs; you may be as silly as you like about a dog, and even believe he has got a soul if you like, but a cat!--'My dear, it's too absurd!'