In her first official act, she sends Matilda-the-tenacious-heeler a'waltzing. "You are hereafter banished from Haybarn along with all other dogs!" the calico dictator hisses. "And that bumbling Percheron friend of yours too!"

Matilda mutters as she trots up to the ranch house, "I shall miss my soft straw day bed." Then as an afterthought, she barks over her shoulder, "You, Madame, are fortunate that I don't consider your unfriendly kittens to be hors d'oeuvres."

Sometimes, in the wee hours of a clear black night, when the moon is nearly full, you can hear the bourgeis feline autocrat and her progeny frolicking about in the hay, giggling, laughing hysterically, holding their flea-bitten sides as if they are about to burst.

Matilda scratches, wriggles, woofs, rrrrrruuuuffffs, from her cushy, fleece-lined bed beneath the big open window in the master bedroom, "Damn barn cats."