Shirley Murphy - Cat Breaking Free

Swiftly she led the ferals out the window and into the next oak tree, and the next and the next until at last far away they scrambled down to a distant yard. And they ran.

Maybe Joe and Dulcie didn't hear us, Kit thought. When they go up in the tree house-which they would surely do- maybe they won't smell us. The ferals, coming through the village gardens, had rubbed against and rolled on every strongly scented bush they could find, to hide their own scent that was so strong and ugly after that stinking cage. So maybe Joe and Dulcie would discover only a windy miasma of garden smells that could easily have blown in from the surrounding yards, and no smell at all of cats.

Maybe.

But now they were safely away, hiding among the far houses, and Kit looked back to her treetop.

There was Dulcie looking out.

But with the tree house empty, surely they would leave soon. She thought she would make up to them later, for their useless search.

And it was there in her heart, what she meant to do. The thrill had been there all along, waiting inside her. The wild free days from her kittenhood. Forgetting all the hunger and cold and pain of that time, she remembered only that unfettered running, traveling on and on across the empty hills running with the ferals. Those wild and giddy feelings filled her right up; and with her little entourage, Kit leaped away through the dark gardens mad with pleasure, heading for the far hills.

In the treehouse, though Joe and Dulcie could smell the medley of scents the cats had collected on their fur, those aromas did not hide completely the sour stink of caged cats. They could smell, too, that Kit had led the cats here by way of Jolly's alley, could detect a faint but delectable melange of salmon and fine cheeses. Dulcie, looking down into the dark gardens, felt incredibly hurt. "Why did she leave? Why did she lead them away?" She looked at Joe, sad and worried.

"They'll be watching us," Joe said.

"But why…?"

"Kit doesn't want to be found, Dulcie. Kit is having a lark."

"But she knows we would worry."

"Best thing we can do is leave her alone, let those cats get on with their escape and their own lives. Then," he said, "Kit will come home." He wished he believed that.

"Will she? She isn't… She won't…"

"The kit," Joe said, "will do exactly what she wants to do. We can't change her. She's crazy with the excitement of the rescue, she feels big and powerful, invincible. These are her old clowder mates, Dulcie." His yellow eyes burned. "We can't run her life. Let her be, and she'll come home." But he looked away and licked his paw, hoping he was right.

"If she doesn't…" Dulcie said miserably, "if she goes off with them…"

Joe just looked at her. "There is nothing we can do. The kit must decide this for herself." And he turned away and left the tree house, backing swiftly down the oak with clinging claws and leaping into Clyde's car.

Reluctantly Dulcie followed, silent and worrying. What would they tell Lucinda, tell Pedric? That Kit had been there and gone again, that she didn't want to be found? What could they tell the old couple that would not break their hearts?

Dulcie knew that Joe was right. Kit had a powerful wild streak, a crazy headlong hunger for freedom, and they could only let her be.

But Kit had chosen to live with Lucinda and Pedric because she loved them. Now, would she at last return to them?

I'm worrying too soon. She isn't gone yet, not for good. She's only leading the ferals through the village, showing them the best way, how to avoid heavy traffic. If Joe and I try to force her back now, we would only bully her. We can't force her to be safe and loved, we can only trust in her judgment. And miserably Dulcie curled up on the cold seat of the car, ignoring Joe and Clyde. She remained lost and sad as Clyde carried her into Wilma's house and put her in Wilma's arms.

For a long time after Dulcie went to sleep beside Wilma, beneath the flowered quilt, Wilma lay in the warm glow from the bedroom fire, not reading the book she held but seeing the ferals and Kit racing away through the chill wind.

"Something in Kit's eyes," Dulcie had said. "When Clyde freed us and Kit went out that window, when she turned and looked back at me, something so wild-that look she gets…" And Dulcie had sighed, and hidden her face in the crook of Wilma's elbow. Then later, just before she slept, Dulcie had roused and looked up at her. "I would miss her so. I don't want her to go back." And long after Dulcie did sleep, long after Wilma put her book on the night table and switched off the lamp and curled up around Dulcie, still she kept seeing Kit out there running in the night beside those untamed, joyous cats.

When Clyde and Dulcie and Joe had gone, the car gone, the street empty and the night silent again, Kit and the ferals returned to the tree house. There the ferals curled up once more, deep within the pile of oak leaves, and they slept. They needed to rest, needed to heal, before they made that last frenzied dash up into the open hills. For the first time in weeks they truly did rest; no crowding against each other and into a dirty sandbox, no shouting human voices to alarm them, no bars, no padlock. It was well past midnight when they left Kit's sanctuary, moving swiftly through the village shying away from the glow of shop windows, the fleeing cats no more than shadows. Above them behind reflecting glass golden light illuminated worlds of human artifacts, Gucci handbags, Western boots, red satin nighties and candied cactus, items of which these cats knew nothing. With the cats' shadows flashing across pale walls like the ghosts of long-dead cougars, Kit led them on a circuitous route avoiding the brighter streets. Surely Luis and Tommie wouldn't come looking, but still she was nervous. She guided them up to the rooftops among the chimneys and penthouses where they glanced into high windows and down through skylights into strange human worlds. They left the roofs at the little park that crossed over Highway One.

Racing up through tame residential gardens, they at last fled beneath fences into pastures where cattle slept. The full moon was setting when they bolted across Highway One and into the tall forests of grass that blew across Hellhag Hill.

Up through the windy grass racing and leaping, the ferals knew their way here; but still they followed Kit. They heard no threatening sounds, and no swift shadows paced them. Above them the sky grew darker as the moon set, and far below, the silver sea darkened. They were back in their own wild world, and still Kit ran with them. No one asked her why. Cotton, white as a ghost in the dark night, bolted ahead of the others wild for the far, empty reaches. Coyote waited for Willow; his long ears and encircled eyes, in the darkness, making him look indeed like a strange and uncatlike predator. It was Willow who kept glancing at Kit, wondering. Wondering if Kit meant to stay with them or go back. Willow thought that even Kit didn't know the answer. High on Hellhag Hill, the four cats paused.

Below them gleamed the endless sea with its drowned mountains. Kit said, "Does the sea run on to eternity? Humans don't think so. What is eternity?" But then she looked up at Hellhag Cave, looming black, high above them. If that was eternity, she didn't want any part of it. Cotton and Coyote were staring as if they wanted to go in there, but Kit pushed quickly on. "I don't like it there, it's all elder there." She made a flehmen face and they galloped away to a happier verge where they rolled on gentler turf and groomed themselves. There Kit curled up to rest against a boulder watching the others, her thoughts teeming with daydreams and uncertainties.

We could have our own clowder, we don't have to go back to Stone Eye. The four of us, off on our own. We don't need Stone Eye.