Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: MONDAY, March 6, 1995                   TAG: 9503080018
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-7   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: MONTY S. LEITCH
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

WILL HE COME IN? NEVERMORE!

My office is a renovated toolshed up the hill from our house. Underneath is an old root cellar, home now to spiders, 'possums and mice; above, squirrels nest in the attic.

The office part, however - the room inside the old shed - is snug and tight, verminless, bright, sometimes neat and always warm. So why won't the cat come in?

I've invited him. I've shown him the little sofa and the comfortable chair. I've promised him I'll take breaks to rub his ears. I've even wheedled, saying, ``Cats are known to inspire writers. I feed you, I pet you, I take you to the vet. Can't you do this one little thing for me?''

He stares at me from the doorstep. ``Me? Do something for you? You're kidding, right,'' he says.

No, the doorstep is where he stays. Sometimes for the whole day. Sometimes only for breaks between visits from birdfeeder to barn and back.

Now, however, as I said, he's taken to scratching the door. I go to see what he wants. He bounds off the doorstep and stands in the grass, looking back at me, switching his tail.

``What is it?'' I ask.

Switch, switch, switch goes that tail.

``Do you want to come in?''

Switch, switch, switch.

``You come out,'' he finally demands.

I close the door. And he sits on the doorstep again.

Now, I've had this office for several years. Three cats' worth of years, in fact. And none of my cats would come in here with me. I don't understand why.

At first, when the office was new, I thought it was because they found the smell of fresh paint and plaster annoying.

Well, all right. I didn't much like those smells either.

But they've long since dissipated. And still, the cat won't come in. So what accounts for his reluctance now?

It must be that the toolshed is haunted.

Which presents, I think, an interesting dilemma. What kind of haints would discourage a cat?

Could this very building once have been the clandestine abode of psychopathic dogs? Wild-eyed, wicked things who lured cats into their quarters, only to taunt them with mice and catnip, before chomping down on their heads?

Or do the unsettled spirits of bad little boys still prick up the hairs on the back of wary cats' necks? Do cats peer inside and see, not books and desks, but piles of old socks, ready to cover cats' heads? Firecrackers? Rubber bands? Buckets filled with water?

Maybe some great patriarch tom once ruled this domain so mightily, so dictatorially, that even now another cat crossing his boundaries can whiff his terrible strength.

Whatever, if the office is haunted, then perhaps I should take my current cat's sudden scratchings as some kind of warning. Perhaps I should refrain from working here late at night. Perhaps I should tie garlic wreaths around the windows or have the place exorcised.

Perhaps I should get my cat a half-dozen cans of ``Fancy Feast'' as reward for his fearless vigilance on my behalf.

Oh.

Wait a minute. Now, I get it. So, that's what he's up to, the charlatan!

Well, no mere cat can fool me! I may be slow, but I'm no idiot.

Monty S. Leitch is a Roanoke Times & World-News columnist.