You Can Take the Cat Out of Slough

by Chris Pascoe

‘No . . . he’s just OK.’

  Although (understandably, I suppose) she’s had much the same sort of conversation about me. ‘Mummy, you’re beautiful, aren’t you?’ (Pronounced more like bewley-sul, but we knew what she meant).

  ‘Yes, I am [Lorraine doesn’t mess when it comes to self-promotion]. And you’re beautiful too.’

  ‘Thank you, Mummy . . . Mummy?’

  ‘Yes, Maya.’

  ‘Where did we get Daddy?’

  Charming.

  And although this story centres on the utterly stupid premise that Maya would do away with her feline friend, I must admit for a horrible moment that it looked as if my fears were well founded.

  Maya came running to me one day, her eyes full of tears, and blurted out the shocking words:

  ‘I really sorry to Brum. I got him dead. I really sorry.’

  ‘What, Brum, dead, now, how?’ I blurted back.

  ‘I was hitting Piglet with him, and he got dead.’

  Avoiding the urge to correct her grammar and explain she had in fact been hitting Brum with Piglet and not the other way round, I followed her into the living room to find Brum crumpled in a heap in the corner. Piglet’s legs were poking out from under his midriff.

  I have no idea how Brum came to be on top, and the evidence did seem to point to Maya’s grammar being correct after all, but he looked to be in urgent need of medical assistance. Predictably, when I tried to offer some, he bit me.

  So, I don’t know what happened in that room, but if it was a murder attempt it failed – Piglet is still very much with us. As is Brum.

  And I’d always thought Maya wouldn’t want to hurt anyone! She says she likes everybody, you see (another clever toddler ruse?). Absolutely everybody. No matter who they are and no matter how they behave, Maya says she likes them. She’s diplomacy personified. But if you’re really astute and learn to read between the lines a little, you very occasionally discover her true feelings about a person. Not surprisingly, I’ve only achieved this feat once, and it concerned Maya’s cousin Anna. Anna became jealous about Maya dancing with her little brother at a family party and didn’t behave in a friendly way towards her at all.

  On the way home in the car, Maya composed and performed a song in honour of Anna that could be taken either way:

  I like you Anna

  Come on, dance with me

  I like you Anna

  Come on, dance with me

  You’re as clever as mouse’s feet

  And you don’t scare dogs away.

  A few months later, I asked how clever mouse’s feet are.

  ‘Not very clever at all,’ Maya replied.

  Epilogue

  ‘The hard part of being a bartender is figuring out who is drunk and who is just stupid.’

  Richard Braunstein

  And in the winter, Brum died.

  We buried him beneath the bramble bush he used to tangle himself in, and stood at his graveside as the first sprinkling of snow settled on the grass.

  Lorraine and Maya went inside and I stared at the fresh earth for a long time.

  Eventually, as the evening grew cold, I whispered a quiet thank you for that last summer, and followed them in . . .

  . . . or at least, I would have done. Had he been dead.

  No, he hasn’t died at all. Sorry about that. It would’ve made a poignant ending to the book, but the above is merely the lead-in to a fantasy chat-with-the-cat.

  So, Brum’s funeral has just taken place, we’ll carry on from there . . .

  I follow them in, but slip on the icy steps, do two somersaults and go straight over the twenty-foot wall . . .

  The setting: a weird ‘afterlife’-style foggy, surreal room that looks remarkably like a pub lounge bar.

  CP: Good evening, Brum.

  BRUM: Well, I wasn’t expecting to see you here.

  CP: No. Well, you would have to go and pop your cork on the first ‘icy-steps’ day of the year, wouldn’t you.

  BRUM: Well, I’m sorry if my dying has inconvenienced you in some way.

  CP: Inconvenienced me? Inconvenienced me? It killed me!

  BRUM: Ah well, that’s life. You never get out of it alive, do you?

  CP: Hmm, anyway, it’s nice to be able to talk to you. Gives us a chance to catch up on all the old gossip and that.

  BRUM: Couldn’t you have devised some cat-speak microchip? Killing us for a chinwag at the end of every book you write is a bit drastic, don’t you think?

  CP: Why do you always do that?

  BRUM: What?

  CP: Criticise everything I say and do?

  BRUM: What are you talking about? I’m a cat. How on earth have I been ‘criticising’ you?

  CP: I’ve seen those condescending looks. You spent half your life sitting around looking at me in that smug way of yours.

  BRUM: Oh, that! I had to do that. Cat rule number two – always stare condescendingly at humans and yawn in a bored kind of way if they attempt conversation with you.

  CP: What’s rule number one?

  BRUM: Vomit on their bed.

  CP: Are there many cat rules?

  BRUM: Oh yes, loads. Four, in fact.

  CP: Four? What are the other two?

  BRUM: Rule three states that a cat must always behave with extreme poise, elegance and dignity in every undertaking.

  CP: Had trouble with that one, did you?

  BRUM: Not really.

  CP: Slipping off roofs and half drowning in paddling pools is dignified, is it?

  BRUM: Rule four is to never, absolutely never, do anything anybody ever tells you to do.

  CP: So?

  BRUM: I applied it to rule three.

  CP: Ah, well done, smart thinking. So, rule four explains why cats won’t allow themselves to be trained like dogs, does it?

  BRUM: Sort of. But that’s as much to do with dogs being big slobbery crawlers who’ll do anything for a filthy old bone and a rub behind the ear.

  CP: Bitter little fur-ball, aren’t you? You’d never see a cat helping out the human race like dogs do, though. You don’t see cats guiding blind people. You’d be more likely to trip them.

  BRUM: True. Where is this place, anyway?

  CP: It’s a pub.

  BRUM: A pub?

  CP: Yes . . . you know . . . a pub.

  BRUM: What, as in the place you were always going to or coming back from? So this is a pub. Why are we in a pub?

  CP: Well, one thing I’d have really liked to have done during our lifetimes was go down the pub and have a few pints with you.

  BRUM: Why?

  CP: Well . . . I don’t know . . . pub with your mates. It’s a sociable thing to do, really.

  BRUM: No, no. Why a few pints? I don’t drink ‘pints’. I drink in sips . . .

  CP: Slurps.

  BRUM: Slurps?

  CP: You drink in slurps. Not sips. You’re a disgusting drinker.

  BRUM: Me! At least I don’t guzzle down whole ‘pints’. What stupid creature other than a human would drink its own blood volume in one sitting? It’s a good job you people stand on two legs. Your bellies would hit the floor if you had to walk on all fours.

  CP: Maybe that’s it, Brum! Maybe that’s why we ended up bipedal . . .

  BRUM: So you could drink more beer?

  CP: Yes!

  BRUM: You live in your own little world, don’t you?

  CP: Well, yes, I suppose I do. But everyone knows me here.

  BRUM: Actually, thinking about it, you end up on all fours after a few beers anyway – I had to nudge your face out of my food bowl once. That rather blows your theory, doesn’t it?

  CP: Alright, alright. Cats don’t drink pints. Humans drink too much. Fine. But I’d have liked to have had a beer with you. That’s all.

  BRUM: And I repeat . . . why?

  CP: Because you seemed half cut your whole life anyway. I wanted to see if beer would make the blindest bit of difference.

  BRUM: But I didn’t like beer. You made
me try it, and I hated it.

  CP: I didn’t make you. I offered you a sip of mine.

  BRUM: I think you’ll find you shoved my head in the glass.

  CP: I was just trying to get you to sniff it. As I remember it, you got pretty vicious about the whole thing.

  BRUM: So would you if someone shoved your head in something foul – my cat food, for instance. Anyway, beer is stupid. It’s just another human frailty. I wouldn’t touch a drop of the stuff if my whole life depended on it.

  CP: You’re dead. Would you like a beer?

  BRUM: Yes please.

  CP: Pint?

  BRUM: Yes please.

  A ghostly dog barman delivers the drinks.

  BRUM: (whispers) Why’s the barman a dog?

  CP: I don’t know.

  BRUM: What?! This is your fantasy. Surely you have some idea, some tiny little inkling, why the barman would be an upright dog in a waistcoat and bow tie?

  Both stare across at the ghostly dog, who is now busily cleaning glasses.

  CP: I really don’t know, Brum. I don’t remember thinking that character up at all.

  BRUM: Well . . . have you ever been in a pub and been served by a dog? Ever?

  CP: No . . . oh, hang on, I think I see where that came from. Better drop the subject.

  BRUM: Do you think he heard my ‘big slobbery crawler’ remark?

  CP: Don’t think so. But I’d keep your voice down if I were you.

  BRUM: HE’S GOT BIG HORRIBLE YELLOW TEETH, HASN’T HE?

  CP: Just drink your pint and keep quiet.

  BRUM: SLURP! SLURP! SLURP! BELCH! PURRR!

  CP: You’re putting that beer back fast, boy.

  BRUM: SLURP! Stop watching me like that. You’re always watching me and writing things on your little notepads. Don’t think I haven’t noticed. Weirdo.

  CP: Brilliant. Now my cat’s calling me a weirdo. Criticism, criticism, critiscism.

  BRUM: YOUR cat? Here we go again. I’m ‘yours’, am I?

  CP: Well . . . yes.

  BRUM: Who went out to work and who lay in bed all day? Who provided food and who ate it? I’m not yours . . . you’re mine! SLURP!

  CP: Slow down with the beer.

  BRUM: And another thing . . . I still don’t see why you have to kill me off at the end. You’ve written two books and I end up dead in both of them. That’s not nice, is it?

  CP: It’s not personal.

  BRUM: Killing someone once could be deemed accidental. Killing them twice is personal. How did I die, anyway?

  CP: In a terrible fireball accident.

  BRUM: Bloody Nora. That’s a bit much, isn’t it? Couldn’t I just have passed away quietly in my sleep?

  CP: No.

  BRUM: No?

  CP: No. All summer I waited for you to self-immolate. You used to do it all the time. I had my notebook in my pocket for four months, and not once did you bother catching fire. I was determined we’d have a combusting-cat incident at some stage in this book . . . so now we have one.

  BRUM: But a ball of fire! What a terrible way to go. I hope you’ll reconsider this.

  CP: I can’t. It’s already written.

  BRUM: What, written in the stars or something?

  CP: No. I wrote it just then. A few lines back.

  BRUM: BURP HAH!

  CP: Another beer?

  BRUM: Yes please. Don’t be so stupid. Just edit it out.

  CP: I can’t. I’m dead. It’s out of my hands. Ghostly dog delivers new drinks. Brum shifts uneasily on his seat.

  BRUM: (whispers) I still don’t understand why it has to be a bloody dog? Why do I have to put up with all this nonsense? I’m writing to Tabby Rights, or the RAC or whatever it’s called. They’ll have something to say about you fireballing me to death and sending me to a dog-pub.

  CP: RSPCA.

  BRUM: Yes, them. I’m writing to them . . . I think . . . What does RSPCA stand for? The white cat speaks highly of them.

  CP: Respecting Spontaneously Pyromaniacal Cat Accidents.

  BRUM: What?

  CP: It does!

  BRUM: Really?

  CP: No.

  BRUM: (ears-back frown).

  CP: Anyway, you know why we’re here, so let’s get started.

  BRUM: We’re here because we’re dead, owner o’mine. Not a good time to be starting anything much . . . You know, I like beer. Beer is my friend.

  CP: Now come on, I wanted to talk about the summer we’ve just spent together. I’d like your views and opinions, all that old rubbish.

  BRUM: My views and opinions are rubbish, are they?

  CP: Yes. No. I mean, I don’t know yet. I expect so.

  BRUM: OK. Let’s get on with it. Go ahead, punk, make my day.

  CP: I was a punk, funnily enough.

  BRUM: (silence).

  CP: Way back before you were a twinkle in your moggy mother’s eye, I was strutting about in ripped-up bin-liner tops and listening to the Clash and the Pistols at full blast on my first hi-fi system.

  BRUM: (silence).

  CP: I was only twelve years old. I knew all the swear words and I . . .

  BRUM: Is all this by way of telling me you’re an idiot?

  CP: You were a bit of a punk when you were a kitten.

  BRUM: I was a punk?

  CP: Yep. I was still playing the music when you moved in. You used to sit with your head touching the speaker and purring. You loved it.

  BRUM: I don’t remember liking your music at all. Are you sure I wasn’t trying to deafen myself?

  CP: You did like it! And you danced. You were a right headbanger.

  BRUM: Really?

  CP: I’m not sure, actually. You certainly seemed to love head-banging . . . although a lot of that was forgetting to duck when you walked under coffee tables.

  BRUM: You wanted to talk about the summer?

  CP: Yes. First of all, how well do you feel you’ve coped with the . . .

  BRUM: BURP HAH PURRR.

  CP: (Sigh) Another one? Brum silently waves glass.

  CP: I knew you’d be good at drinking.

  BRUM: Why?

  CP: I don’t know really . . . alcohol made me look like a pillock so many times in my life. Beer offers this sort of scope for disaster that’s almost impossible to match. Looking back, I think you’d have to be a complete moron to drink to excess, so . . . I suppose I’m amazed you weren’t an alcoholic.

  BRUM: HIC!

  CP: Now I’m dead, I wonder why I was as fond of the beer as I was.

  BRUM: Ish bloody great.

  CP: Hmm, OK. Anyway, back to my question. How well do you feel you coped with the little’un this summer?

  BRUM: Oh, really, really well. It’s taken a long while, but we’re almost friends now. I think she’s great, and I think she likes me . . . it’s hard to say because she’s always hitting me.

  CP: That’s really nice, I thought you two got on OK. I know she got upset about the bedroom and the paddling pool and that, but mainly you got on fine, didn’t you?

  BRUM: Bedroom? Paddling pool? No problems with those as far as I remember. No, we got on well. Even went out for walks together, that sort of thing.

  CP: Out for walks? No you didn’t.

  BRUM: Yes we did, loads of times. HICCUP.

  CP: Brum, I was with her the whole time. You didn’t, absolutely didn’t, go out for ‘loads of walks’ together.

  BRUM: You were with her the whole time? Don’t be so stupid. She doesn’t even like you.

  CP: Now, Brum, that’s a cruel thing to say. She’s my daughter so she has to like me. That’s the law.

  BRUM: But it’s true. And we did go for walks. We even hunted together . . . hang on . . . WHAT! The white cat’s your daughter? How on earth did that happen?

  CP: Not Sammy! I’m talking about Maya. Since when has Sammy been ‘the little’un’? She’s not even slightly little!

  BRUM: She’s smaller than me.

  CP: No she’s not! She’s huge. Just
how big do you think you are?

  BRUM: I was sure I was bigger than her . . . it must be because I see me closer up.

  CP: Oh dear. So, you got on well with Sammy, then? How about Maya?

  BRUM: Maya, yes, the big-headed one. She’s OK. Bit bad tempered, but OK.

  CP: You know, talking of offspring brings to mind a question I’ve always wanted to ask you, something that I’ve never known. Did you ever have any kittens?

  BRUM: SPISHHHHPLAT.

  CP: Oh, for pity’s sake! Have you been sick? That’s gone all down my bloody shirt.

  BRUM: No, no, cough, sorry, cough, hang on . . . cough, I’ll be alright in a minute.

  CP: You just spat your beer all over me. Why did you do that, Brum?

  BRUM: Cough. Sorry. The question just caught me by surprishe.

  CP: What – did you ever have any kittens? Why? And are you slurring?

  BRUM: No, I’m not. And (giggles) I thought you knew I was a tomcat.

  CP: What? Of course I knew . . . oh, grow up, will you. Did you ever father any kittens?

  BRUM: I think so. Back at the flat, before . . .

  CP: Before . . . ?

  BRUM: I still reshent that, you know?

  CP: (grimacing) Oh. That. I can understand that, Brum. Sorry. If someone had taken me down the vet’s and . . . anyway, let’s just say I’d be a bit more than resentful.

  BRUM: That Commissioner Herbert (emits involuntary hiss), was it . . . him?

  CP: Yes, it was. You obviously didn’t like him either, then?

  BRUM: Well, I certainly don’t now.

  CP: No.

  BRUM: Yes, well. Before . . . that, I think I fathered thousands.

  CP: Thousands?

  BRUM: Thousands. There were a lot of cats around those flats, and I was a bit of a shtud in those days.

  CP: No more beer, OK? No more boasting, beer-fuelled, super-stud nonsense. Did you have any kittens?

  BRUM: One litter, I reckon. The boy looked a lot like me.

  CP: Just one definite kitten, then. I wonder what happened to him.

  BRUM: No, five kittens. It was a litter. HIC.

  CP: Ah, but their mother was super-fecund. Didn’t you know that?

  BRUM: How dare you suggest she was shuperfu, shuperf, shupe . . . does that mean what I think it means?

  CP: No, no, it’s not a nasty word at all. It just means that she could have been with any number of men and she . . .

  BRUM: WHAT!