See You My Bowl’s Empty.
“Just had a bit of a scare, Sweetboy. Let’s have a drink.”
Sweetboy made a profoundly enthusiastic remark and lost all dignity in
industriously rubbing both Ahdio’s legs while the big man lighted an oil-lamp.
Moving to a table on which rested a small keg, he twisted out the bung: This was
good Maeder’s brew he had re-bunged last night after close of business. He had
done a good job of it, too, he saw when he poured: Head foamed up high and rich.
Ahdio bent and gave himself a white mustache to keep it from flowing over, then
set it aside while he drew another cup.
Watching, Sweetboy reared up to clap both paws to the table-leg and stretch,
meanwhile purring loud enough to vibrate the table.
“Uh-huh. Soon’s the head settles down. True beer-lovers know you need to raise
the foam and wait for it to lapse, Sweetboy ole Tige. Remember that.”
The cat, jet with an odd strawberry- or heart-shaped white patch on its face and
one white paw, made an urgent remark.
Picking up the first cup, Ahdio squatted to the floor beside a cut-down mug of
wide diameter, with a handle. “Wait,” he said, in a particular voice, and poured
Red Gold into the cat’s bowl. Sweetboy waited, staring, saying nothing but
expressing his impatience with a lashing of the stub of his tail.
That sight was disconcerting to everyone but Ahdio. Any cat expressed itself or
at least acknowledged noises or its name with movements of its tail, often
merely the tip. A tailless cat, if not a cripple, was at least the equivalent of