THE GHOST WAS A CAT

Once there lived a man who was a teacher. He lived on his own, in a small flat. The man in the next flat was a good friend. One day the friend asked the man, "Why have you never married ?"

The man said, "I do not like women."

The friend said, "You must be very lonely. Why don't you have a pet ? A dog makes a good friend."

"I don't like animals," said the man.

The man was a teacher at the local school. One day he came home, and saw a cat on his doorstep. He shouted, "Shooo", at the cat, and kicked it away, and then he went inside his flat. Next morning he opened his door, to go to his school, but the cat was still there. He said, "Shooo, cat", and the cat ran away.

It was snowing when the man came home at night. The cat was sitting on the doorstep again. The man looked at the hair on the cat's back. He could see snow on the cat's fur, and he felt sorry for the cat. He called the cat saying, "Come on, Puss, you had better come inside, and get warm."  

The man went to bed early, because it was so cold, but he forgot about the cat. When the man was asleep, the cat went quietly into the bedroom, jumped on the bed, and sat on the man, to keep warm. However, the man did not wake up. Then the cat went, "meow," and then louder, "MEOW," and then like a ghost, "MEOO, MEOOO, MEOOO." Then the cat said, "You must remember me, you must remember me, me, ME, MEOW, Meow, meow."  

The man woke up suddenly, and the cat ran out of the room. The man shouted, "Aagh, there is a ghost in here." He was very frightened, and he quickly went under the blankets to the end of the bed. He could not sleep. He kept thinking, "Was that a real ghost or just a bad dream ? Whatever it was, it said "you must remember me", I wonder why, and who must I remember ?"

Next day when the man came home, it was still snowing, and the cat was sitting on the doorstep again. The man said, "Come inside, Puss", and he gave the cat some milk. The cat seemed very pleased, but the cat kept quiet. The man went to bed early again, and the cat sat on the bed. When the man was asleep the cat went, "Meow, Meow, Meoo, Meooo," again, and said, "You must remember me, you must remember me. Remember the day I waited for my husband to come home. Remember. MEOOO, MEOW, meow, meow." The man woke up, and thought that he was having another bad dream. The cat had run out of the room again, so the man did not know that the cat had been there.

"What a terrible dream !" the man said. "I dreamed I worked deep under the ground, to get coal, for people to burn on their fires. I was a miner in a coal mine. I was in the mine one day, when the roof started to fall down. We all tried to run, but the lights went out, and we could not find our way in the dark. It was horrible, and then the roof fell a bit more, and we could not move, aaAAAAAH ! I am glad I am a teacher, and not a coal miner."

Next day the man went to his school, and it was snowing again on his way home. He thought about the cat, and he noticed some fish for sale in a shop, so he bought it. He thought, "I expect the cat will be there again this evening." The cat was waiting for him when he got home, so the man let the cat into the flat, and gave it the fish to eat. The cat seemed very pleased, and made a loud purring sound. That night the cat jumped onto the man's bed again, and went, "Meow, Meooo, you must remember me. Think what happened to me after my husband died. He did not come home to our family. I had to work. It was difficult to earn enough money, for me and my three children. One day I saw some money, which someone had left in a shop. I stole it to buy some new clothes for myself. But I was caught and I had to go to prison. There was no-one to look after my children, and they all died. People said it was my fault, because I stole the money for myself. You must remember me. Meooo Meoo meow." The cat jumped down from the bed, and ran out of the bedroom.

The man woke up and said, "What a terrible dream, and what a horrible thing to happen to those poor children. These dreams I have seem so real, and there is always that ghost noise going Meooo, Meooo."

Next day the man told his friend about the cat. His friend said, "I am surprised that you feed a cat. Once you told me that you do not like animals. Can I see your cat ?" They went back to the man's flat, and the man said, "The cat seems to be getting bigger since I have been feeding it."

His friend laughed and said, "Do you know why ? This cat will soon have some baby kittens, and your flat will be full of cats. You should just leave one kitten with the cat, and take the others to the pet shop."

Later the cat had three kittens. The man found a box for them to live in, and then he thought about what his friend had said. He left one kitten with its mother, and picked up the other two kittens and put them into a bag. The kittens eyes were still closed, so they could not see what was happening, but the cat could see. The cat meowed very loudly, and sounded angry. Then the man thought, "Why does this cat like to stay here ? I never met this cat before, or did I ? Perhaps she is a cat I knew in a previous life." The cat purred. The man asked the cat, "Did I know you in a previous life ?" The cat purred more loudly. "Ah," said the man, "perhaps you are a cat in this life, but you were a person in your previous life. In the previous life you must have done something very bad, and so you must live this life as an animal."

"I know !", shouted the man, "You are the woman in the dreams I have." He looked closely at the cat. "It must have been you, and it must have been you who had the three children. Your husband worked in a coal mine, and he died in an accident. Then you could not get enough money to live, so you stole some money, but you had to go to prison, and your children died."  

The cat looked sad.

"But in the dreams," said the man, "I kept hearing the ghost say, "you must remember me". Why is it me who has to remember ?" Then the man thought, "Perhaps in the previous life I was your husband, and I died in the coal mine, and so I never knew what happened to you, or our children. Now you have come to tell me". The cat purred again. "So you were my wife in the previous life, and now you must be a cat in this life, because you stole the money and our children died, and that is why you have come to find me." Then the man opened the bag and looked at the kittens, and he said, "I cannot take these kittens to the pet shop now. These kittens are our children."

The cat purred loudly, and rubbed herself on the man's legs.