There was a time when I honestly believed that neither man nor cat existed.

“He’s out on Turner Street right now,” somebody would write me. “His cat is wearing an elf suit!”

“I just saw him!” another would announce a day or two later. “The cat is sporting a cowboy hat!”

The next day, the cat would be wearing a beanie. A week later, they’d tell me he was clad in a Santa suit, a pretty sweater or some other wild fashion accessory one could just not imagine on a respectable cat.

And so I’d fly over to Turner Street in Auburn, looking for a panhandler with a cat perched obediently on his shoulder. And day after day, I’d find no man and no cat and it got to the point where I came to suspect that I was the butt of some grand practical joke.

An attired cat that will sit on a man’s shoulder even as busy traffic roars around him? Ha! I don’t think so.

But then, just as my skepticism was reaching its zenith, there he was: this burly man with a long, red beard and — I repent for all my doubts — a sagacious cat perched upon his shoulder; a cat that looked ever so happy to be wearing that full Santa suit on such a cold day.

The man’s name is Bryan Vincent, as it happens, and the cat goes by Buddy. Together, the pair can be found most days where two streams of traffic merge at Turner and Union streets.

While Bryan waits for tips of loose change or dollar bills, Buddy is there to entertain the masses, and to perhaps soften the hearts of those who might otherwise stare straight ahead and keep on driving.

“I’ve got nothing but good things from people,” Bryan says. “One older lady knit me a sweater and then she crocheted Buddy a sweater, too. He had a hat and mittens and everything.”

Bryan is 45 years old and grew up in New Hampshire. He came up to Maine when he was about 18 and at some point, he found himself down on his luck.

Presently, he’s staying in the basement of a home occupied by a couple young ladies who have seven cats of their own. They help Bryan, Bryan helps them, and Buddy has seven companions to play with when he’s not working the gig on Turner Street.

How a cat can work that gig is still a marvel to me. In my experience, cats are skittish by nature, and will take off scrambling at 30 mph at even the slightest noise.

But not Buddy. Buddy is as cool as can be and remains undaunted by the calamity of traffic roaring all around him.

“I hold my sign in one hand and his paw in the other,” Bryan explains, “and he’s comfortable. If I’m not holding his paw, he’ll meow at me.”

As foretold by all those prophets who wrote me about this duo, Buddy has an extensive wardrobe that includes a cowboy hat, a beanie, an elf suit and other fancy garb he wears with aplomb.

“He has more clothes than me,” Bryan tells me. “The cowboy hat is his favorite. The beanie, he just started wearing. He doesn’t usually like things over his ears, but when it’s cold out, I think he realizes it will keep him warm.”

Buddy’s lineage is half coon and half tabby. He’s got a heart-shaped patch on his nose and if the sun is shining brightly upon him, one can see the orange tint in his fur.

And while that is all very interesting, what I wanted to know the most is how Bryan ever coached such a notoriously independent and fickle animal as a cat into staying atop his shoulder.

But there was no coaching necessary, Bryan says. He and Buddy simply understand one another and they have from the very start.

“I was there when his mom gave birth to him,” Bryan says. “He smelled me on that first day and so we had that bond immediately. He’s all about me, and it’s been that way since day one.”

When people approach the pair out on Turner Street, they want to know more about Buddy. They want to pet his head and hear about his day. One might say that the real story is this cat who just happens to have a human man beneath him.

“Most people know more about him than they know about me,” Bryan says.

Some of the people who stop to chat will bring coffee for Bryan, cat food for Buddy. They hand over loose change and dollar bills and tend to stay longer than most people do when interacting with panhandlers.

It’s all around a cozy and well-established setup, and so when my quest to locate the pair began earlier in the fall, it was a source of great amusement for many that I couldn’t manage to find them.

No fewer than two high-ranking police officials wrote me at various points to tell me that Bryan and Buddy were out there at that very moment.

I got text messages, phone calls and Facebook messages from people who claimed to have eyes on both man and cat. It got to feeling like I was working for TMZ and trying to pin down a high-caliber celebrity.

Which, in a way, I suppose I was.

Bryan is working on getting an apartment of his own and someday may not feel the need to wander onto the cold streets to ask strangers for help.

But for now, the grind is the grind and the pair will likely be out there at least through the early part of winter.

In honor of the holiday, Buddy will continue wearing the Santa suit through the remainder of December.

For a cat with this level of fashion sense, would you expect anything less?

Searching for more LaFlamme? Check out his mini column, “Cherchez LaFlamme,” which runs in both the Auburn Now and Lewiston Now newsletters. Click here to read his earlier Auburn Now column on the cat-friendly panhandler.