Chapter 44

When the girls returned home, things got a bit amusing. First of all, we all agreed — that’s Mom and Dad, Kris and me, Liz, Tina, and even their younger sisters, Kim and Judy — that it would have been better if the girls had gone out to the Coast or the guys had come East. As it was, Little Bit and Ann seemed perpetually to have satellite phones in their ears. And with the usage charges at our end alone it would have been cheaper if I had bought the dumb satellite! They were yakking with their guys constantly, day and night, regardless of where they might be. Oh, well...

The other new thing at the Harris compound was the presence of four tigers. Tony and Paul agreed that if they had taken either pair back to California with them they would never get them back. Their younger siblings would have appropriated them permanently. Anyway, all four were living with us because John Taylor and Caitie Fitzpatrick agreed that their pair — Ziggy and Hilde — would be far happier roaming our Westchester estate than they would be housed in an apartment in New York City.

That was funny, too. When Tony and Paul returned home and told their families about the tigers, the result was that two newly-mated pairs were shipped down to Orange County. Although the edge of the desert wasn’t very close to being a jungle, it was warm at least. And — no surprise — the tigers loved it. And they loved the small children, who, in turn, thought the tigers were the neatest things on four feet.

And the tigresses wasted no time in becoming pregnant. Little Bit told us of the Bobbie Williams painting of the two tiger cubs with their mother, assuring us that the babies would make ideal playmates for ours.

And then there were the tigresses — and their mates — with our baby, Billy, and my baby sister, Karen. It took a good deal of coaxing on the parts of Little Bit and Ann to persuade Kris that Billy would be safe with Sheba. Safe? You should have seen it! There’s Sheba lying on her back when Kris, with great trepidation, put our infant on Sheba’s chest. The little guy just cooed, while Sheba began that very low-pitched rumbling, her purr. Billy loved it! He grabbed handfuls of her very soft white chest fur and then put his head down. With exquisite care, Sheba very lightly covered him with her forepaws. Meanwhile, Gus was in his house-cat pose sitting beside his mate while looking around the area. Clearly, he was prepared to guard our baby with his life.

Mom had been watching the proceedings with great interest, too. When she saw what had happened, having just finished nursing baby Karen and then changing her, she put the baby on Brunhilde’s chest. It was the loveliest thing. In minutes, the two tigresses were asleep with the infants on their chests while their mates stood guard.

Protection? The only greater protection would have been from an armored division, but the babies wouldn’t have slept nearly so well.

Security? Ah, yes ... As I’ve said, for years my parents lived in isolated splendor, but then after Kris came, things changed. We built our house, and then there were new homes for Tina and Liz, too. We had quite a little compound, and it seemed that the new construction was seen as being attractive targets to our neighborhood professional burglars. Fortunately for us, the new interest of the burglars coincided with the arrival of the four tigers. In all honesty, though, while it was fortunate for us, it was significantly less so for the burglars.

The arrival of the great cats caused some modifications to be made in our houses. Special electrically-operated doors were built that were activated by tiny radio transmitters the great cats wore on their collars. They just approached one of the doors from either direction and it would open for them. The result was that they had easy access in both directions without having to bother anyone to open a door.

From our perspective, it was pretty good, too. It’s fair to say that the tigers lovemaking became somewhat ... violent ... at times. Far better outside than inside. Finally, being the very intelligent creatures that they are, it took only a few minutes for us to show them the boundaries of our combined properties. The entire property was posted with No Trespassing signs.

But this didn’t discourage our neighborhood burglars. Or it didn’t at first.

The first one was ... interesting. I guess I was the one who found the guy. I had gone to the front door to retrieve that morning’s New York Times, when I found him. It is fair to say, I suppose, that he was scared speechless. First of all, he was naked. His clothing — what was left of it — was in pieces all over the front yard.

You’ve heard by now about the tigers and their depilatory skills. It seems that after stripping off the poor man’s clothing, the tigers had removed every speck of hair from his body. I must say, he wasn’t in very good physical condition for a burglar. He was definitely carrying too much weight. Moreover, from the whiteness of his skin, it was clear he didn’t get much sun either.

Anyway, it appeared that the tigers had been using him as their “board” for tic-tac-toe games. And the tigers deserve high marks for neatness, too. In order to maximize the number of games, they very carefully drew small matrices on the burglar’s body. When I emerged, they had rolled him on his side and had begun a game high on the inside of his left thigh. And careful? You would hardly believe it. The X’s and O’s were drawn so neatly! And really, there was very little blood flowing. The tigers figured — correctly, in my humble opinion — that if their claws went too deep, the blood flow might obscure their marks.

Having determined what had happened, I said, “That’s okay, guys. Don’t let me interfere with your game. But if it’s okay with you, I guess I should call the police to haul away your game board when you’re finished.”

The four tigers cocked their heads and appeared to think about the prospect for a few moments. Then they nodded in unison and went back to their game.

I called the police on their regular phone number. After all, 911 is for emergency calls and this certainly was no emergency; the tigers had matters well in hand. A patrol car appeared and the officers found a canvas carryall loaded with burglar tools. I introduced the tigers to them, and they behaved like the true ladies and gentlemen that they are. The tigers shook hands, while the tigresses curtsied and then extended their right paws. And you know what? They had all been very careful to lick the blood off their paws before offering them to the officers, too.

A brief look around convinced the policemen that it would be a futile exercise to try to get the felon dressed. Initially, they thought they would just take him back to the station in their cruiser but found that the man was catatonic. He was literally frozen in position. That resulted in their calling for an ambulance to carry the burglar away.

And since their “game board” was going to be with them awhile longer, the tigers went back to their tic-tac-toe, to the great interest of the officers. “They’re really smart, aren’t they?” one commented.

I just shook my head. “They’re going to have to get a new game. If you look over the boards, all you’ll see is a large collection of tie games.”

“Maybe ‘Hangman’ the next time?” the other officer suggested.

I quickly explained Hangman to the great cats and the tigers let out happy, but very quiet roars. It was still pretty early in the morning, and they didn’t want to disturb any late sleepers.

Anyway, Sheba and Hilde decided to play a game. Although they could communicate mentally, we didn’t think it was wise to advertise that ability. I went in and made a chart with the alphabet on it. The tigresses were delighted. Hilde was the challenger, and she would point to a letter. Sheba would either carefully draw the letter or she would draw a body part for a wrong answer. Sheba won. When Hilde challenged, Sheba filled in the missing letter. And you know what? Throughout the whole game their “board” didn’t move a muscle. Of course, later we were told that movement on his part had become physically impossible. Oh, well...

The second burglary was attempted by a black man. That had its humorous element as well. It seems that the tigresses wouldn’t give their mates a turn at Hangman. There were two reasons for this: First of all, the females pointed out, they had to clean off the playing surface all by themselves with no help from their mates. Besides, they added, they were both pregnant with their mates’ cubs, and they needed something to “distract them from the discomfort of their pregnancies.”

Yeah, right... ! They were just as uncomfortable as Little Bit and Ann were. And those two were totally unaware of being pregnant at least 99% of the time. But that is what they said.

I must say the two females were very neat. I was particularly impressed with the almost-complete stick figure in a noose right in the center of the perpetrator’s scalp. Much later, we learned that the man had had dread locks of which he had been very proud. Indeed, a good deal of his income went to support their maintenance. We only learned this when we saw a photograph of the man taken after an earlier arrest.