Nobody Does Contempt Like A Cat

I haven't heard a sound, not a car door or a voice or a cat's call outside the window, but out of nowhere the small brown dog begins to howl and whine and dance frantically on the bed behind me.  It takes only seconds for the black dog to join in and then the little dachshund is anxiously snatching at my cuffs and pulling, gently but insistently.

Outside? I ask and all three immediately head for the back door in a whirl of wiggling little butts and jangling dog tags.  The kitten raises her head, judges it's nothing that merits her attention, and curls back up on her new sleeping loft, the one that doubles as dog steps.  Whatever the dogs have heard, she hasn't, or she just doesn't care - I rather suspect the latter - and since if you've seen one dog frenzy, you've seen 'em all, none of the other cats display the slightest interest in all the commotion.  If it doesn't involve a bluejay in the crepe myrtle, a squirrel chattering from atop one of the fence posts, or a trespassing stray cat in the front yard, the sunshine on the window sill is as close as they want to be to the outside world.  They are cats, after all, and they have an image to maintain.  It most assuredly does not involve begging for attention or treats, following the crowd, or behaving as if their home was in a tree.  They leave the mania of dog-dom to what I'm sure they see as their empty headed canine counterparts.

Meanwhile in the back yard, the chorus has begun.  The pack of coyotes on the other side of the fence are howling up a storm.  I can see their long, lean bodies running along the fence line, pacing anxiously and pawing at the boards while their owner screeches out a routine stream of exasperated warnings, some at the very top of her lungs as if there isn't already ample noise.

 MAX! BINGO! FRED! I hear and cringe. SHUT THE HELL UP! FRITZ! GET YOUR SCRAWNY, SORRY ASS IN THIS HOUSE!  REBEL, GET AWAY FROM THAT DAMN FENCE! 

The Maltese next door adds his voice, a high pitched and ear splitting yelp.

The doberman two doors down puts in his two cents, a sharp and if you didn't know him better, ferocious sound, unnerving and large.

The two mutts across the street protest in unison, throwing themselves against the chain link fence that confines them.

DON'T MAKE ME COME OUT THERE!  I hear my neighbor shout, I'LL SWAT YOU ALL INTO NEXT WEEK!

My own dogs, answering each and every call in voices I can distinguish without even trying, seem pleased with what they've started and obediently trot back when I summon them.  The mayhem eventually recedes with even the yapping little Maltese settling down and the last word left to Bob, the broken down old Basset Hound from down the street with the Dumbo ears and the bloodshot eyes.  He gives a final, mournful, drawn out woof, it echos like a yodel in the late afternoon air, and then dies.

Law and order is restored.

The streets are peaceful and quiet again.

And only the cats are left to shake their heads and wonder at this foolish expenditure of energy, this extravagant waste of voice.  Like untrained, awkward little ballerinas, the dogs dance around me begging for a reward while the cats look on - faintly amused but reserved, detached but slightly scornful - in a word, unimpressed.

Nobody does contempt like a cat.