Free Born to Bark by Stanley Coren

loving.
    Unfortunately, Fu turned out to be too dumb to even learn the preliminary tasks needed for her to be tested. Charlie became rather despondent about how the experiment was going, and Leon was annoyed at the lack of progress. Since Charlie was following the procedures exactly as specified, Leon’s displeasure focused on the cat, and he decided to end the testing and have her put down.
    I felt sorry for Fu, since she had at least partly filled the need that I had for a pet over the past 8 or 9 months. So when I heard his plans to terminate her life, I offered to take her. Leon was sufficiently frustrated and angry that he openly expressed a strong desire to see the animal dead and had already arranged tohave her euthanized later that afternoon. With the limited time left I made the best pitch that I could think of.
    “Look, Leon, you have some affection for your own cat, Max, don’t you?” Max was a tailless Manx cat.
    “What difference does that make?” he grumbled as he reached into his pocket to take out a cigarette. This was a good sign, since it meant that he was not so upset that he had forgotten to smoke.
    “Well, maybe you can understand how I feel about Fu. I know what we paid for her, and I am willing to buy her from you.”
    “Buy her? Where the hell are you going to get the money to buy her given your bountiful salary?” I was earning $235 a month and we would have starved if it was not for the fact that Mossy was working as an X-ray technician. Fu would cost nearly half a month’s wages if I paid her full price, an amount we really couldn’t afford. “Furthermore, I don’t give a damn about the money,” Leon grumbled. “I just want her destroyed today so I can put her out of my misery.”
    He took a deep puff on his cigarette, looked at the ceiling, and exhaled. After a moment, he looked back at me and asked, “Is she really that important to you?”
    I nodded.
    “All right, simply on behalf of my feelings for Max, you can have her, and it won’t cost you anything. However, there are two conditions. First, you get that cat out of the lab immediately. I never want to see it again. Second, I want you to promise me that you will never tell me that the cat is happy in its new home. I don’t want to even know where its new home is, and I don’t want you to say another word about her in my presence. Her name should have been Phooey! Now get that cat out of my lab before I change my mind.”
    I dashed over to Charlie’s office and told him to cancel the euthanasia request, then raced down to the workshop and withthe help of the shop technician, cobbled together an ugly but usable kennel crate, using a wooden packing box from some recently received equipment. With this in hand I went to Charlie’s lab and removed Fu.

    Since there was no place else to leave her, I smuggled the cat into our apartment. In two days Mossy and I would be driving back to Philadelphia for a visit, since classes had ended for the Christmas holiday. This meant that the likelihood that the cat would be discovered was low.
    As I sat with Fu in my lap later that evening, I found that I wanted to talk to her as I had talked to Penny. So I said, “You know that you are very lucky. If Leon had delayed his decision to kill you by just a day or two, I would have been on my way to Philadelphia and would have missed the opportunity to save your life. Instead, you are going to become our Christmas gift to my parents.”
    Fu did not answer, and I did not expect her to. Although I felt comfortable talking to her, I had no desire to give her a voice or engage in any real interactive conversation with her—after all, she was only a cat.

    By the time I had finished my doctoral research, a number of changes had occurred in my life. Surrounded by many brilliant minds in Stanford’s psychology department, and its intense focus on scientific investigation, I had become virtually addicted to my research and writing. Mossy was supportive