Testament [antikvár]

It was the last morning the four of them would ever be together: the man and his wife, his daughter and his son. The son was just a baby, the daughter still in grade school. That didn't matter. In time, nothing did. It came upon them almost comically - the man sat at the breakfast table, his bare feet on the cold hardwood floor, and glancing over by the stove, he saw the cat slump into her bowl of milk. She was a very stupid Siamese. She liked to sleep on the television when the set was warm, but she kept rolling in her sleep and often fell oflF the back, pinned against the wall, her claws scraping to get up again, her blue eyes peering over the top in confusion. She was so fascinated by flames that she sometimes sniffed too close to lighted candles and set fire to her whiskers. Now she didn't even know how to drink milk any more. He felt embarrassed for her, almost laughed when she tried to raise herself out of the milk, flapping her wet jowls. Ahnost. Her front legs buckled, she fell into the milk again, and suddenly all four legs were stiff, drumming.Slowly they relaxed.He frowned, walked over and looked down at her. She lay un-moving in a puddle from the upturned bowl. He picked her up; the bowl, released from her weight, wobbled hollowly upright. She was strangely limp and heavy, head dangling, eyes open. His hands were wet beneath her sodden fur. Milk dripped into the puddle.'My God,' he said.Claire hadn't noticed, too busy putting the baby in his high-chair and heating his bottle. Now she mmed, looked puzzled a moment and frowned just as he had. 'But she was all right when I let her out this morning.''Daddy? What's vnrong with Samantha?' Sarah asked. He glanced at her, and she was peering over the back of her chair, still in her pyjamas, her head cocked slightly to one side. 'Is she sick? What's the matter with her?' She said it slowly, calmly, but she was squinting the way she did when she was worried-