Thanks to the progress in modern technology, it gives us great pleasure to reproduce here, a letter that we have just received.

Dear Mouching,

Proud to be one of your most loyal readers and this since forever. Allow me to add my grain of salt to the flood of information that inundates your marvelous blog.

Having lived for more than 60 long years in the environment of Montelimar (26) I live in perfect harmony with my neighbors, who are all of deeply rooted French stock.

Unfortunately, in the springtime of last year a family of loud Italians moved into a house a couple of doors from me. I can’t begin to tell you the racket that they make with their savage music! They play the mandolin and they bang on their tambourins until all hours of the night.

I say it’s a shame for our beautiful country!

And to crown it off, they have a cat, a persian or maybe a burmese or a norwegian of the woods or maybe a chartreux… possibly a scottish fold? Hard to say. In any case this thing vocalizes, her too, all through the night, regularly bothering my sleep. (At our age a good night’s sleep is essential!)

Well, I came up with a strategy that will enchant you; you who are always ready to defend fly fishing.

Surreptitiously, in my garage, I created a sort of a cat fly that I would like to share with you (perhaps I am not the only one to be annoyed by foreign cats).

It took me a few hours to think about the essential question: what do these filthy beasts eat? The response is relatively simple: birds of all sorts, mice and canned cat food. Based on that, I created a fly and will share with you my method for mounting the fly.

I have to say to cast such a fly I had to use a #12 rod and the appropriate silk!

Anyway, on my second cast into the garden of these unwelcome neighbors, I felt a violent pull on my line. The filthy feline took my lure. The combat was violent but in the end I brought in the cat and scooped it up into my net. What followed, you’ll see, was high comedy.

That night I invited the neighbor to dinner and as the “plat de resistance” I offered him, boiled and dressed like a pheasant on a platter with raw potatoes, his cat.

Upon seeing that vision the poor man had a heart attack, you can just imagine my undisguised joy!

Dear friends, my question is the following: what do I do with the cadaver of this neighbor? The garbage can? Meat for the cats?

I await your response with impatience.

Signature: illegible.

Dear Reader,

Vilmo, as his name indicates, happens to be Italian (from an old family of neapolitan grave diggers) and he just flew out of our offices with a Beretta in his pocket to get on the first Paris/Montelimar train.

 The response to your question won’t be long in arriving.

Patience.