Among the many reasons to take out a Quadrant subscription is the wealth of poems and short stories that linger behind our paywall. Lin van Hek's charming story of the cat that deigned to grace a small family with its independent presence makes the point rather well. Published in 2017, it is now made free to all as a taste of what subscribers enjoy

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I don’t know whether it actually happened. I have checked the internet and can find no evidence of it. Perhaps the records were destroyed, as the Selous Scouts and SAS ones were at independence. It was forty-eight years ago while I was at Salisbury University, and seemed an easy way to make some money. Someone […]

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“It’s a lawsuit. From Bullington’s attorneys. Accusing you, and us, of defamation.” John Bedoun, the paper’s editor, holding the Service of Notice, glared at Clare Rodgers. “You assured me your source was genuine.” “He touched her up during the South Carolina primary. When she objected, he called her the C-word,” said Clare. “Well, he denies […]

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I did not notice him at first. My nerves, after a difficult lunch with a Korean delegation, were not at their elastic best. I wanted to get out, away from difficult questions, far from work. Of course that was not possible. I would return to my office. Lunch tomorrow would be much the same. The […]

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Mikel was born on Christmas Day. To the villagers of his remote mountain region he was treated as something of a miracle. His parents were very old, way past the age of respectable child bearing. On the day of his birth, the villagers carried this mother and child along the one dirt track in the […]

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A cardboard packet on the kitchen table had an illustration of a little farmhouse and a stockman on a galloping horse. Giovanni opened it and one by one counted five twenty-two-calibre bullets into the black metal magazine of his Stirling rifle, and clicked the magazine into place. He stood with the rifle and drew the […]

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She remembers the exact moment she agreed to go to the mid-winter yoga retreat. Her friend Vivian had been there before and told her she would come back a new person. Transformed. According to the brochure, The gentle trilling from an orchestra of insects interspersed with the croaking of frogs and the occasional haunting cries […]

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“Mother, I want a dog,” says Julián. “We already have a dog,” his mother replies. Julián is standing by the kitchen window. His mother is at the kitchen bench grinding saffron threads in her dark green mortar to add to Saturday’s beef stew. “It is Father’s dog.” “It is our dog, like our cows, our […]

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When I first worked for the accountants after leaving school, one of the main tasks for me and the other trainee, Jimmy Patel, was to go out and do audits. This was generally very routine stuff: checking bank statements against chequebooks, going through petty cash slips, that sort of thing. We had just come back […]

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Francis walked towards me as I sat at a table outside my favourite cafe. I was reading the newspaper when I looked up and saw him approaching. He walked like he was always on the cusp of falling forwards. I put the paper down as he drew near. He was weird but I enjoyed his […]

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