Guero was a night person. As soon as it was dark and the night smells arose, he became a part of the Privada again by climbing down the stone wall. Even though he was a white long-haired cat, he disappeared instantly, melting into his original surroundings, oozing into his primeval roots, the Privada. At dawn he climbed up again, leaving his kill on the cold cement floor of the service terrace, to greet Maria in the morning. I got to dispose of it on Sundays.

During the day, Guero slept with one eye open, batting at alacranes that bumped into him and checking out the house grounds at intervals, our watchman. Guero had trained himself to point out alacranes to us as they were transparent, the worst kind, and he had sense enough to realize that we couldn't see them. When they stung Maria, they died. She had been born and brought up in Durango, and had been stung in her time by the monster alacranes there. She was not only immune to the relatively puny scorpions of Morelos, she was deadly to them. To this day, I and my sons all bang our shoes upside-down before we put them on. Later, when Ashkash and Bonnie came to live with us, Guero moved to the top of the piano to get some sleep, daytimes. Nightimes, all three slept with me on the other side of my double bed , Guero always coming in rather late.

Probably thirty generations of Guero's ancestors had been raised by Don Amando and his ancestors, in the Privada. Guero's siblings and cousins ranged freely over Las Palmas and Palmira and as far away as Temixco, and not one of them, in all the generations, had ever been known to be white or long-haired.

They were a tribe of tigers, killer tabbies, all having been brought up on chicken entrails. All of Don Armando's family and friends were illicit back-room chicken farmers and all of them had thrust generations of these kittens upon each other. for many years. Guero was different, we paid three pesos for him, about 36 cents, when he started life as a runty, dirty, flearidden grey kitten . We were as surprised as everyone else when his blue eyes didn't change with puberty and he emerged into adult cathood looking like a snooty prize Persian, as white as snow. In the Privada, his birthplace, he was considered as having turned Gringo and he was quite a celebrity. Not everyone can do that.

Everybody called him "Guero" [Whitey] but us, his family. His name was actually "Footytat", the closest that Federico, then eighteen months old, could come to saying "Puttytat", a la Sylvester. I can still hear myself screaming "Foooootytat!" out the garden door. The kids in the Privada would all scream "Fooootytat" and hoot and laugh, an echo. Guero would show up shortly, looking disinterested, but he was embarrassed, you could tell.

Guero slept what was left of his nights with me, always washing off his kill and sprucing up first. Our bedmates were first, Ashkash, a foul- tempered mut, and later, a loving but brainless Hungarian Cocker Spaniel, named Bonnie after her Best Of Show mother. The last to join us was Mutzi, who had been found screaming one morning before the sun was up, firmly stuck in our new cement floor in the garage. It took about three months before the last of the cement fell off and we found we had a nice looking orange adolescent male cat.

Guero brought up all of our animals, even Alicia, the Easter present duckling, who grew into a huge amiable white duck who lived in our pool and thought she was a cat. Guero was never neutered, it never occurred to me to do such a thing to him.

He was the father of most of the new generations of kittens in the Privada and everywhere else, even Temixco. Not one of them was white, or even grey. Although he often vibrated with happiness, Guero never purred. I suppose it was beneath him. Anyone could see that he was pleased with himself, us, and life in general. It's a shame none of his progeny was a snooty white Persian with long hair, but that's just a Gringa talking, I guess.