The cats were very odd about catnip. Boise, Willy, Goats, Friendless’s Brother, Littless, Furhouse, and Taskforce were all addicts. Princessa, which was the name the servants had given Baby, the blue Persian, would never touch catnip; neither would Uncle Woolfie, the gray Persian. With Uncle Woolfie, who was as stupid as he was beautiful, it could have been stupidity or insularity. Uncle Woolfie would never try anything new and would sniff cautiously at any new food until the other cats had taken it all and he was left with nothing. But Princessa, who was the grandmother of all the cats and was intelligent, delicate, high-principled, aristocratic, and most loving, was afraid of the odor of catnip and fled from it as though it were a vice. Princessa was such a delicate and aristocratic cat, smoke gray, with golden eyes and beautiful manners, and such a great dignity that her periods of being in heat were like an introduction to, and explanation and finally exposition of, all the scandals of royal houses. Since he had seen Princessa in heat, not the first tragic time, but after she was grown and beautiful, and so suddenly changed from all her dignity and poise into wantonness, Thomas Hudson knew that he did not want to die without having made love to a princess as lovely as Princessa.
She must be as grave and as delicate and as beautiful as Princessa before they were in love and made the love and then be as shameless and as wanton in their bed as Princessa was. He dreamed about this princess sometimes in the nights and nothing that could ever happen could be any better than the dreams were but he wanted it actually and truly and he was quite sure he would have it if there were any such princess.
The trouble was that the only princess that he had ever made love to outside of Italian princesses, who did not count, was quite a plain girl with thickish ankles and not very good legs. She had a lovely northern skin, though, and shining well-brushed hair and he liked her face and her eyes and he liked her and her hand felt good in his hand when they stood by the rail going through the Canal coming up onto the lights of Ismailia. They liked each other very much and they were already close to being in love; close enough so that she had to be careful about the tone of their voices when they were with other people; and close enough so that, now, when they were holding each other’s hands in the dark against the rail he could feel what there was between them with no doubt about it at all. Feeling this and being sure, he had spoken to her about it and had asked her something since they made a great thing about being completely frank with each other about everything.
“I would like to very much,” she said. “As you know. But I cannot. As you know.”
“But there is some way,” Thomas Hudson had said. “There’s always some way.”
“You mean in a lifeboat?” she said. “I wouldn’t want it in a lifeboat.”
“Look,” he said and he put his hand on her breast and felt it rise, alive, against his fingers.
“That is nice,” she interrupted. “There are two of them you know.”
“I know.”
“That’s very nice,” she said. “You know I love you, Hudson. I just found out today.”
“How?”
“Oh I just found out. It wasn’t terribly difficult. Didn’t you find out anything?”
“I didn’t have to find out anything,” he lied.
“That’s good,” she said. “But the lifeboat is no good. Your cabin is no good. My cabin is no good.”
“We could go to the Baron’s cabin.”
“There’s someone always in the Baron’s cabin. The wicked Baron. Isn’t it nice to have a wicked Baron just as in olden times?”
“Yes,” he said. “But I could make sure there would be no one there.”
“No. That’s no good. Just love me very hard now just the way you are. Feel that you love me all you can and do what you are doing.”
He did and then he did something else.