So far there was no actual fear in his manner, but
he was uneasy and anxious, and nothing would induce him to go within
touching distance of the walking cat. Once he made a complete circuit,
but always carefully out of reach; and in the end he returned to his
master’s legs and rubbed vigorously against him. Flame did not like the
performance at all: that much was quite clear. For several minutes John Silence watched the performance of the cat
with profound attention and without interfering. Then he called to the
animal by name. “Smoke, you mysterious beastie, what in the world are you about?” he
said, in a coaxing tone. The cat looked up at him for a moment, smiling in its ecstasy, blinking
its eyes, but too happy to pause. He spoke to it again. He called to it
several times, and each time it turned upon him its blazing eyes, drunk
with inner delight, opening and shutting its lips, its body large and
rigid with excitement. Yet it never for one instant paused in its short
journeys to and fro. He noted exactly what it did: it walked, he saw, the same number of
paces each time, some six or seven steps, and then it turned sharply
and retraced them. By the pattern of the great roses in the carpet
he measured it. It kept to the same direction and the same line. It
behaved precisely as though it were rubbing against something solid. Undoubtedly, there was something standing there on that strip of
carpet, something invisible to the doctor, something that alarmed the
dog, yet caused the cat unspeakable pleasure. “Smokie!” he called again, “Smokie, you black mystery, what is it
excites you so?”

Again the cat looked up at him for a brief second, and then continued
its sentry-walk, blissfully happy, intensely preoccupied. And, for an
instant, as he watched it, the doctor was aware that a faint uneasiness
stirred in the depths of his own being, focusing itself for the moment
upon this curious behaviour of the uncanny creature before him. There rose in him quite a new realisation of the mystery connected
with the whole feline tribe, but especially with that common member
of it, the domestic cat--their hidden lives, their strange aloofness,
their incalculable subtlety. How utterly remote from anything that
human beings understood lay the sources of their elusive activities. As he watched the indescribable bearing of the little creature mincing
along the strip of carpet under his eyes, coquetting with the powers
of darkness, welcoming, maybe, some fearsome visitor, there stirred in
his heart a feeling strangely akin to awe. Its indifference to human
kind, its serene superiority to the obvious, struck him forcibly with
fresh meaning; so remote, so inaccessible seemed the secret purposes of
its real life, so alien to the blundering honesty of other animals. Its absolute poise of bearing brought into his mind the opium-eater’s
words that “no dignity is perfect which does not at some point ally
itself with the mysterious”; and he became suddenly aware that the
presence of the dog in this foggy, haunted room on the top of Putney
Hill was uncommonly welcome to him. He was glad to feel that Flame’s
dependable personality was with him. The savage growling at his heels
was a pleasant sound. He was glad to hear it. That marching cat made
him uneasy. Finding that Smoke paid no further attention to his words, the doctor
decided upon action. Would it rub against his leg, too? He would take
it by surprise and see. He stepped quickly forward and placed himself upon the exact strip of
carpet where it walked. But no cat is ever taken by surprise! The moment he occupied the space
of the Intruder, setting his feet on the woven roses midway in the line
of travel, Smoke suddenly stopped purring and sat down. It lifted up
its face with the most innocent stare imaginable of its green eyes. He
could have sworn it laughed. It was a perfect child again. In a single
second it had resumed its simple, domestic manner; and it gazed at him
in such a way that he almost felt Smoke was the normal being, and _his_
was the eccentric behaviour that was being watched. It was consummate,
the manner in which it brought about this change so easily and so
quickly. “Superb little actor!” he laughed in spite of himself, and stooped to
stroke the shining black back. But, in a flash, as he touched its fur,
the cat turned and spat at him viciously, striking at his hand with
one paw. Then, with a hurried scutter of feet, it shot like a shadow
across the floor and a moment later was calmly sitting over by the
window-curtains washing its face as though nothing interested it in the
whole world but the cleanness of its cheeks and whiskers. John Silence straightened himself up and drew a long breath. He
realised that the performance was temporarily at an end. The
collie, meanwhile, who had watched the whole proceeding with marked
disapproval, had now lain down again upon the mat by the fire, no
longer growling. It seemed to the doctor just as though something that
had entered the room while he slept, alarming the dog, yet bringing
happiness to the cat, had now gone out again, leaving all as it was
before. Whatever it was that excited its blissful attentions had
retreated for the moment. He realised this intuitively. Smoke evidently realised it, too, for
presently he deigned to march back to the fireplace and jump upon his
master’s knees. Dr. Silence, patient and determined, settled down once
more to his book. The animals soon slept; the fire blazed cheerfully;
and the cold fog from outside poured into the room through every
available chink and cranny. For a long time silence and peace reigned in the room and Dr. Silence
availed himself of the quietness to make careful notes of what had
happened. He entered for future use in other cases an exhaustive
analysis of what he had observed, especially with regard to the
effect upon the two animals. It is impossible here, nor would it be
intelligible to the reader unversed in the knowledge of the region
known to a scientifically trained psychic like Dr. Silence, to
detail these observations. But to him it was clear, up to a certain
point--and for the rest he must still wait and watch. So far, at least,
he realised that while he slept in the chair--that is, while his will
was dormant--the room had suffered intrusion from what he recognised
as an intensely active Force, and might later be forced to acknowledge
as something more than merely a blind force, namely, a distinct
personality. So far it had affected himself scarcely at all, but had acted directly
upon the simpler organisms of the animals. It stimulated keenly the
centres of the cat’s psychic being, inducing a state of instant
happiness (intensifying its consciousness probably in the same way
a drug or stimulant intensifies that of a human being); whereas it
alarmed the less sensitive dog, causing it to feel a vague apprehension
and distress.