Кейт Мур - Full Steam Ahead, Felix

But still she didn’t hear the sound that she was waiting for.

Voices carried easily at the station. She could hear the conductors riding on the trains calling out to the platform staff and vice versa, and the occasional burst of laughter of friends travelling together. Her twitching ears processed each and every sound. So, when Felix suddenly heard a woman’s voice, flavoured with a Yorkshire burr, call out to her in a jolly tone, ‘Morning, gorgeous!’ she was more than ready. As if responding to a cue, Felix jauntily poked her head up from between the bikes. Then she sprang from her hiding place, as though released from starting blocks, and rushed to greet one of her favourite people on the planet: team leader Angie Hunte.

Angie had been central in bringing Felix to the station and had mothered her ever since with love and care. Even though the cat was now five years old and fully grown, Angie still called Felix her ‘baby girl’. A big-hearted, fun-loving woman of Barbadian heritage, Angie had worked at Huddersfield station for more than two decades and was very much its undisputed reigning matriarch (second only to Queen Felix, of course, to whom everyone took second billing). Felix’s special greeting for her made her morning every day, and Angie chattered away happily to her as Felix bounded up to her feet. Instantly, the fluffy black-and-white cat weaved affectionately in and out of Angie’s legs. She made her presence felt with a series of insistent demands for Angie’s attention now .

‘Come on then,’ said Angie cheerily, as she gave in and scratched the cat firmly behind her ears. Felix’s tail flicked back and forth in appreciation. ‘Are you coming with me, then?’ Angie continued.

Felix didn’t need asking twice. As Angie headed to the customer-information point and entered the back offices through the door in the little lobby, the cat followed in her footsteps. Angie held the door open for her and Felix shot inside, before looking back over her shoulder anxiously to ensure that Angie was following, not wanting them to be separated. The two girls companionably entered the team leaders’ office, which the six team leaders shared on rotation, as each took responsibility for the running of the station on their shift.

Angie was immediately hard at work, printing off passenger lists and preparing for her handover with the team leader who had preceded her on duty. Somewhat uncharacteristically, Felix watched everything patiently from the floor, her eyes following Angie’s every move and her ears attuned to every word cast her way, as Angie chatted to her as she went about her work. In the end, Felix’s patience was rewarded.

‘Come on then,’ Angie said to the little cat at last. ‘I have to go out in a minute for the security checks. Now’s your chance.’

That was all the instruction Felix needed. In an instant she was up on the desk, not wanting to miss her opportunity for a cuddle before her mum went out on to the platforms again.

‘Gizza hug,’ Angie said affectionately, with a cheeky smile. She sat behind the desk, her chair pulled in, and jutted out her chin. Felix, knowing this dance of old, stepped forward on the desk to join Angie, her snow-capped paws treading confidently. The cat got very, very close to Angie’s face, until her big green eyes were only millimetres away from Angie’s brown ones. Then the two leaned forward, so that their foreheads gently touched. Felix pressed lovingly with hers, rubbing her head against Angie’s over and over again. The purr that began motoring inside that cat was loud enough for all to hear. It came from deep within Felix like a heartbeat, happy and contented and full of pleasure.

Unfortunately for Felix, all too soon Angie had to break away. Well, she did have other duties, despite what Felix might have thought. She wasn’t actually employed to be at the cat’s beck and call all day. Angie pulled on her smart navy jacket and her yellow hi-vis vest, and turned to the cat, now ready to head outside. Very often, Felix would join her, but today the cat had stretched out across the desk like a supersized queen on a golden throne, taking up all the space. It was just as well Angie didn’t need to use the computer!

‘Someone’s looking relaxed!’ the team leader quipped. She bent down and looked into Felix’s eyes somewhat jealously. ‘Shall we swap?’

But the station cat, for the time being, had had enough of work. Huddersfield station is staffed 24/7, and Felix had kept up her usual routine of manning the night shift the previous evening. Though Angie was heading out on security checks, Felix’s rota told her that it was time to take a catnap. The sun might have been rising and shining outside but inside the office Felix’s eyes were beginning to shut. Giving her a final stroke, Angie let her be and bade her a tender farewell, gently closing the door behind her.

Left alone in the office, Felix’s ears twitched every now and then, as she listened sleepily to the distant sounds of her colleagues clocking on or to the rumble of the cars starting up in the taxi rank outside. Every now and again, as regular as clockwork, a station announcement could be heard, proclaiming the coming or going of yet another train service. The station was going about its business, unstoppable as the sunrise that had so recently blessed the day, but for the time being the station had to cope without its cat. She had much more important things to do. As the regular announcements acted as a lullaby, Felix the cat fell fast asleep.

Which was just the way she liked it.

2. A Rosemary by Any Other Name

Felix’s head jerked sharply to the right. Something had caught her attention: something very, very interesting indeed. Out on the platforms, she leant forward, her head and neck outstretched, her eyes fixed and unblinking, the better to see. She inched further forward and peered in the direction of the King’s Head pub at the southern end of platform one. Then she was suddenly up on her feet and trotting fast on a mission of discovery.

Rumble, rumble, rumble! went the sound that had caught her attention. Rumble, rumble, rumble! As she neared the source of the sound, she was excited to see that it was being caused by some people dressed in yellow hi-vis jackets – the costume that her beloved TPE colleagues always wore when they were out on the platforms. With increasing enthusiasm, she bounded up to them and cast her eyes skywards, expecting to see one of her favourites looking back. When, instead, a young man with strawberry-blond hair greeted her expectant eyes, she stopped running abruptly – and with rather cutting disappointment. Oh , her sudden halt seemed to say, you’re not the one I want .

The young man was called Adam Taylor. Just as Felix had identified in her clever little way, he was not a member of the TPE team. In fact, Adam was a volunteer with the Friends of Huddersfield Station, a volunteer group who staffed the local information desk on the concourse and who also took responsibility for maintaining the many plants that were dotted about the platforms in blue pots. Adam and his fellow volunteers had to don the yellow jackets whenever they gardened on the platforms – thus accounting for the very confused look that now crossed the little cat’s face.

Despite Felix’s evident disappointment, however, she certainly hadn’t lost her curiosity in what Adam was up to. As he turned and walked away from her, that intriguing rumble rumble rumble sound started up again. Felix prowled after him enquiringly, her head on one side, assessing the situation.

Aha! She had it. Adam and his fellow volunteers were dragging a large blue-and-white water butt with them as they trudged round the pots to water them, and its black wheels – which could pull up to 80 litres of water – were making a right racket on the concrete platforms. Every now and then, Adam would bend down to the bottom of it, where a little tap projected, and fill up his bright red watering can.