Written by Munir Ahmed Badini

Translated by Fazal Baloch

Not long after we moved into our newly rented house, a cat started turning up there. Every night when we sat down to dinner, we heard meowings through the air vent of the room, coming from a hungry cat on the veranda. Drawn by the smell of food, coming from who knows what house, she would scratch on the veranda with her paws, put her head in front of the vent with its mosquito net, and start meowing. Her eyes sparkled like a lamp; she moved her whiskers and meowed loudly, and then, having lost hope of getting a bone and a piece of food, she would stroll back to her unknown home, meowing…

Perhaps she had already given up on getting anything from us. Whenever I wanted to throw a piece of food to her, my wife would say, “Never feed her or she’ll make a habit of coming all the time.” I tried to convince her that this poor cat is hungry. When we eat, she can smell it, and she comes to our air vent and gazes in expectantly. Then she loses hope and goes away meowing… What difference does it make if I dip a piece of bread in the stew and throw it to her? But my wife didn’t agree. I don’t know why she loathed that cat so much that she wouldn’t even let me throw her a single piece of food…

The cat kept coming and meowing at our vent at dinnertime. One day I told my wife that I could not take this animal’s disappointment any longer. “I’m going to throw a piece of food to her. Let this poor creature fill her stomach.” If she did make a habit of coming every day, it would actually be a blessing because I knew our house was infested with rats. If the cat began hanging around here, that would be the end of them. But when I broke off a piece of bread to throw, my wife grabbed my hand and said, “To hell with her! I hate her meows, and you want to feed her… I won’t let you. Damn her! Every night she comes to the vent, sticks her nose in, and spoils our meal… And again and again your mercy is awakened, and every night you forget about eating and listen to that cat’s meowing. I won’t let you. To hell with her!” She waved her hands in the air to scare the cat away. “Get lost, you filthy animal!”

The poor cat, still meowing at the air vent, had to watch and listen to my quarrel with my wife. When she saw me stand up, she stopped meowing. It seems she got her hopes up that this was the time when I finally would give her something to eat… But my wife grabbed my hand, and the cat lost hope again, seeing that we were still arguing about feeding her. She started meowing again, really loudly. I looked at her for a long time. Then I said to my wife: “You don’t know anything about the pangs of hunger. Ask this poor cat about it.”

“Alright. If you insist, then go ahead. I’m not going to stop you.” At last, she felt some empathy for the poor cat. I threw some pieces of food on the veranda, and the cat leapt towards them and ate them. Before leaving, she appeared again at the vent, uttered another meow, and set off. In response to this cheeky behavior of the cat, I turned to my wife and said, “Look what a great favor you did for the cat. Now she’s thanking you.”

The cat came back every night, ate her fill at our house, and went away. We began expecting her, and if she was late, we would save her a share of the food. When we heard her meowing, we would throw the food onto the veranda. One night, we were having dinner, but the cat didn’t appear. We knew that she sometimes came late. We waited for her and kept looking up towards the vent, expecting to see her weary eyes at any moment, hoping that she would come, but so far, there was no sign of her.

In the meanwhile, someone began knocking on the front gate, and I got up to open it. In the glow of the streetlight, I saw a beggar standing outside—a frail, white-bearded man at our gate: “I haven’t eaten anything for the last two days. If there is any morsel of food, please…” I saw that it was an old beggar with a cane who had made his way to our gate, limping with the help of the cane. From his rapid breathing and wheezing, I assumed he had come a long way. When I saw his white beard and how weak he looked, I felt compassion for him. I came back in and gave this old man whatever food was left. The old man was very happy and went his way.

I came back in and had only just sat down in the room when I heard the sound of the cat. But I had given all the food to the old man. While giving food to a hungry man, I completely forgot that another hungry creature was also supposed to come. I was at a loss what to do. Not even a single piece of bread was left in the house. My wife and I were distressed and felt embarrassed hearing the cat’s meowing, but there was no food left to give her that night. So we retired from the dining room and went to the other room, leaving the cat to meow. She continued for quite a long time. The sound of her meows echoed in my ears. I felt sorry for her. Today she remained hungry.

I wish that the cat had understood my language. Then I would have told her that there was no food left for her today. That I would definitely keep some for her tomorrow evening and that an old and sick man took her share today. He too was hungry like herself. The cat stood at the vent, meowing for a long time. After she gave up hope, I heard her scratching on the veranda. “This time she left disappointed,” I thought.

The next night, we waited for her, but she didn’t come. Nor did she turn up on the third or fourth night. We didn’t have a clue whether she was alive or dead.

A slightly different version of this translation was published in Daily Times, 12 November 2018. https://dailytimes.com.pk/320983/thecat-and-the-old-man/amp/ (retrieved 2 February 2022).