CHAPTER 7If Capitol Hill were being demolished in an air raid, I’d still get my sleep. Unless, of course, the neighbors had left a cat out; and this night one of them had. I woke up gradually in the pitch dark, a faint “Meow, meow, meow” seeping through into my conscious mind. I turned over and resolutely closed my eyes. It still went on. Mrs. Harris didn’t yowl, she merely moaned.
I muttered savagely, for all the world like Lilac, “Why doesn’t that blasted Karen take her cat in?” I don’t know what it is about a low pitiful noise that makes it so unbearable. At last I sat up in Stygian darkness, thinking that of course the animal must be half frozen, and turned on the light. Then I thought it must be entirely frozen. It was after five; o’clock. Mrs. Harris still mewed, so close as to soun
