Charlie the Kitten Who Saved a Life

Another thing I missed was playing. It probably sounds strange, but feral cats don’t play, not once they’ve grown out of their kittenhood, anyway. Their lives are too dangerous, too hard, and they have enough to do, trying to get food and keep safe from predators. Ah, don’t cry for them, Tabitha. They don’t know any different, remember. They’ve never had humans getting down on a nice soft carpet with them and rolling balls to them or tickling them, never had presents of toy mice filled with catnip … All right, I’m making you all upset now, I can see, so I’ll move on. But, you see, I missed it. I missed just having the freedom to leap around in the sunshine, chasing my tail or my shadow or some fluttery butterflies. After all, I was still only half grown. Now you know what I meant at the beginning of my story when I said I’d had to grow up fast.

Walking the streets day after day with one or more of the gang, trying to find the part of town where I’d been staying with my family, I was getting more and more dispirited. I knew I needed to find the holiday cottage before they moved back to Little Broomford, otherwise how on earth would I ever find them again? But I had no idea how much time had passed, and whether in fact they might have gone back already. Even if Caroline hadn’t forgotten about me, I hated to think of her missing me as much as I was missing her. And what if all the worries had proved true, about her being ill again? Or what if they hadn’t been able to make her head better at the hospital? I meowed to myself in distress at the thought of poor Caroline lying in bed, sick or in pain, without me there to cuddle up to her. Even if my family had left Mudditon now, I couldn’t give up searching for the cottage – it was my only link with them here. What else could I do?

‘I’m beginning to forget what my holiday home looked like,’ I admitted sadly one day to Big. ‘I’m not sure I’d know it now, if I saw it.’

‘Well, you know you’re welcome to stay with us permanently,’ he said. ‘You’ve fitted in really well. I’d never have thought it, when we first met. You’re almost one of us now.’

He was being kind, and I rubbed my face against his to show I appreciated it, but I don’t think he really meant it. I was doing my best, but I’d never quite be able to embrace their lifestyle. I was too fastidious, my accent still too genteel, and I couldn’t share their obsessive interest in female cats. And more to the point, however kind he was, and however much I could feel myself gradually changing, becoming more like my new friends and less like the little kitten I’d been before, staying with the feral cats permanently was obviously not what I wanted. I wanted to go home. I wanted my old life back. I just didn’t know how to make it happen.

But to pay them back for their friendship, I continued to act as their Human language translator, and I was able to report to them that there was a lot more talk around the town about our campaign against the seagulls. On one occasion, when I managed to sneak back to see my two human friends outside the café again, I found the one called Shirley reading a newspaper.

‘Look at this in the local paper, Jean,’ she said suddenly. ‘Wild cats chase seagulls off Mudditon beach. “They saved our toddler from attack” says local mum Claire, 32. “The feral cats are doing a good job. Let them stay!”’

‘You see?’ said Shirley. ‘I told you the cats were helpful in their way. Good for them. I’m glad people are taking notice. I never liked seeing those poor starving cats being persecuted.’

I’d been listening from behind the fence up till then, but now I decided it was time to join them again.

‘Talking of poor starving cats,’ said Jean when I trotted towards them, ‘here’s our little tabby friend again, Shirley.’

‘Ah, he seems to have adopted us!’ Shirley said as I rubbed against her legs, purring.

‘Yes. He certainly seems too friendly to be a feral.’

‘But he isn’t wearing a collar, Jean.’

I was only half listening at this point, as I’d found a little bit of cake that someone had dropped under the table, and was intent on gobbling it up.

‘Look at him eating those crumbs, though!’ Jean said. ‘He must be absolutely starving, poor thing. Is there any milk left in the jug?’

At the mention of milk, as you can imagine, I let out a huge meow and, throwing caution to the wind, jumped straight up onto Jean’s lap.

‘Oh!’ she said, making a surprised noise that turned into a laugh. ‘He must have smelt it!’

She was pouring milk from a little white jug into a saucer. I tried to get my head under her arm so that I could drink it, but she held me back, saying ‘Careful, little cat! You’ll spill it!’ and she put the saucer down on the ground instead.

‘There you go, boy,’ she said, as I jumped off her lap again and began gulping up the milk furiously.