One morning a few months after our first cat died I opened the door and there was a dirty, tailless cat with a long hairless scar running over his hips and wearing a blue bowtie. He put one paw up on the stoop, looked up at me and very politely asked, “Mrow?” So of course I said “Come in Sir”

Turned out his name was in fact Sir, and he’d fled from the kittens he’d sired. He was our little deadbeat baby.