Azzie

Azzie, the cat at Rivington House, is a quiet but suggestive presence in the scene surrounding Eleanor Ouellette’s final evening. To Dan Torrance, the cat’s attendance marks a change in an otherwise ordinary hospice visit: Azzie is present when Eleanor is near death, and Dan wonders whether the animal notices what he cannot.

Place in the Hospice

Azzie belongs to the daily life of Rivington House, where Dan works with residents approaching death. Eleanor is sitting up in bed and stroking him when Dan enters. His presence is familiar enough that she treats him as part of the visit, not as a stranger or an intrusion. The cat later jumps down and slips out of the room, as if his work for the evening is done.

Dan draws a boundary around Azzie’s status: the cat is not Eleanor’s, he says, but belongs to the house. Eleanor answers that he belongs to Dan. Her reply is brief and carries the intimacy of her familiarity with both of them; the passage does not settle literal ownership, leaving the difference between the institutional fact and Eleanor’s personal claim intact.

Azzie and Eleanor

Eleanor says that she has had many visitors and that they made Azzie nervous, but that he stayed until Dan came. Dan doubts that anyone else has visited her that night, or even during the preceding week, month, or year. He considers her profoundly alone, despite her claim of relatives in Montreal and the occasional former visits of her accountant. In this contrast, Azzie’s presence is one of the few kinds of company Dan can imagine she has actually received.

The cat’s staying until Dan arrives gives Eleanor’s account an emotional weight beyond a tally of visitors. Azzie is not described as offering any special comfort or action; rather, his continued presence makes him part of the small company available to her. When he leaves, the scene returns to Dan and Eleanor’s conversation, with the cat’s departure quietly closing his part in the visit.

Dan’s Reading of the Cat

Dan has already noticed that Azzie’s attendance distinguishes this night from Eleanor’s long decline. She has looked gravely ill for years, but Dan believes the cat’s presence signals that her death is now close. Azzie therefore functions as a cue in Dan’s understanding of the hospice: not a diagnosis, but a sign he has learned to take seriously.

Afterward, Dan wonders why he has never seen flies on a Rivington House resident’s face. He considers whether he simply does not need to see them because he has Azzie, and whether the cat’s wise green eyes perceive something. These are Dan’s questions, not confirmed facts about the animal’s abilities. The passage keeps Azzie’s significance at that uncertain edge between an ordinary hospice cat and a possible witness to what Dan senses about death.

Narrative Significance

Azzie’s role is small in action but important in the scene’s pattern of attention. Dan notices who is present, who leaves, and what the cat’s attendance may mean; Eleanor, meanwhile, turns an institutional animal into someone who has chosen to remain with her. The tension between Dan’s practical correction and Eleanor’s personal claim lets Azzie stand at once for the shared life of the hospice and for the companionship she says she has received. His perception remains unresolved, but his presence sharpens Dan’s awareness that this evening is different.