The Old Cat and the Kitten

by Mary E. Little

“No—I mean—I wanted to ask you if you’d take in a cat, and a kitten.”

  “Oh. Well—we’re terribly crowded right now. I’m afraid we wouldn’t be able to keep the cat very long. We might be able to keep the kitten a little longer—kittens have a better chance of being adopted, you know. But we’re really awfully full—”

  “What do you do . . . when you . . . when you get too full?”

  “Well, of course, when there’s no more room, when we simply can’t keep them any longer, we have no choice. We have to put them to sleep. But we do keep them just as long as we possibly can.”

  “Miss, I want to know how. How you put them to sleep.”

  “Oh we use the very latest method. It’s quick, painless—it’s the method used by many animal shelters and humane societies all over the country.”

  “But how—what is it?”

  “You mean, how does it work?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, it’s called a decompression chamber, and the animals are put—yes? Yes? Are you on the line?”

  Joel thought of Old Cat in that death trap. He broke out in perspiration and dropped the receiver back on the cradle.

  He’d have to let him go. He’d just have to leave Old Cat to take his chances, to fend for himself and struggle again for his own survival. Anything was better than that chamber.

  Old Cat would have to be abandoned again.

  And Joel would never know how Old Cat made out, whether or not he survived, or how. Or whether somebody would take pity on him and give him a home. That would not be easy; it would be more trouble and effort than most people were willing to spend, especially on a cat, an old cat, a cat with a disfigured face and one eye going blind. And Joel would never know if he got picked up and ended up in that chamber after all—or had to be put in twice.

  Joel was throwing up in the bathroom when the telephone rang. By the time he reached it, the ringing had stopped. He waited a few minutes, then dialed the number of the beauty parlor where his mother worked.

  “Mom? Did you call a little while ago? No, I was . . . I was in the bathroom.”

  “Listen carefully, Joel. And write down this name and address on a piece of paper. Ready?”

  “Wait a sec, Mom. The Fiends must have got hold of that pad again—OK, I got it.”

  “Mrs. Avery Grant.” She spelled it all out. “Two fourteen Laurel Road, Apartment Three C. Got it? You know where Laurel Road is—it’s just one block west of the library, and Mrs. Grant lives in that apartment house two blocks south of there. She’s just moved in and her phone isn’t in yet so you’ll have to bicycle over there. Why? My customer says Mrs. Grant just might take the kitten. She’s my customer’s sister-in-law—no! Not Old Cat, just the kitten. She’s just sold her home and moved in there and she’ll be living all by herself. She’s always had a cat ’til her old cat died awhile back. Well, anyway—don’t take the kitten ’til we know, but get on over there and see her right away. Tell her Mrs. Carney—Mrs. Blanche Carney sent you. You got it? You got everything straight? OK, I’ll see you later.”

  Joel put the slip of paper in his back pocket and went out the back door. Old Cat uncurled himself and stretched and yawned and came over to Joel. He did his old trick of pressing his tail end against Joel’s leg with his forehead on Joel’s instep until he fell over on his back, feet in the air. Joel rarely picked him up, but now he gathered Old Cat up in his arms and buried his face in the cat’s neck.

  “What I gonna do with you, Old Cat? What I gonna do? And how you gonna understand I mean well for you? I don’t want you hurt no more. I just don’t know what to do; I just don’t know.”

  THE SMALL APARTMENT HOUSE WAS NEATLY set on a tidy lawn with well trimmed hedges and a few flowering shrubs.

  Joel found Mrs. Grant’s name and apartment number over a button which he pressed. There was a crackling noise and a voice which seemed to sputter, “Who’s there? Who is it?” He spoke into a small, round thing.

  “Joel—Joel Dennison. Mrs. Blanche Carney sent me. I come to see you about a kitten.”

  “Blanche? Kitten? Did you say kitten?”

  “Yes, a kitten.”

  “Come on up—third floor.”

  When Joel reached the third floor he stood for a moment wondering which of the six doors belonged to 3C. The one nearest the elevator opened and a woman looked out.

  “Oh—I thought you sounded like a boy. Come in, young man, come in.”

  Chapter Five

  JOEL ENTERED A LARGE ROOM THAT seemed beautiful to him, although several cartons stood around on the floor and pictures, mostly in heavy frames, were not hung, but stacked against the wall. A piano stood against one wall and the furniture had a solid, rich, comfortable look. Mrs. Grant had been hanging her drapes, which were heavy and full.

  “Would you like to give me a hand? I’m not as good a climber as I used to be.”

  Joel stood up on a stepstool and fastened the hooks onto the rod. She pulled the cord and the drapes opened and closed gracefully. She pulled them open again as Joel stepped down.

  “Thank you—that’s just great. What did you say your name is?”

  Joel told her his name again and explained about his mother’s call from the beauty parlor.

  “Sit down, Joel, and tell me all about this kitten,” Mrs. Grant said as she went into the kitchen. She returned with cans of soda, glasses and cookies on a tray, which she set down on the coffee table. She poured the soda into the tall glasses and handed one to Joel with a little napkin. He sat on the sofa and she sat on a small chair facing him.

  She was a small woman, rather plump, with blue-white hair cut short and straight, and she was wearing a light blouse over slacks. Her eyes, large and deep blue, were fixed on Joel as he described the kitten.

  “She’s black with a few little white hairs on her shoulder, just like Old Cat . . .” He stopped and looked down into his glass.

  “How old is she?”

  “I don’t really know,” Joel looked up again. “I guess she’s about two, maybe three months. She was maybe six-seven weeks old when Old Cat brought her to me, half-dead. I don’t know where Old Cat brought her from, but I’m sure she’s his child—they’re just exactly alike.”

  “His?”

  “Yes. Old Cat is a tom. He’s the lovingest cat! He was wild at first, scared and starving. He used to hiss and talk back—sounded just like he was swearing.”

  He set his glass down and leaned forward.

  “Mrs. Grant—please—can’t you, please will you give Old Cat a home, too?”

  “Oh, Joel,” she answered. “I wish I could—I really do! But, Joel, you know I could never keep an old wild tom in an apartment house. He’d go crazy if I tried to keep him indoors. I can take the kitten—she’s young enough to learn to become a house cat and get used to living indoors. But never an old tom. But tell me more—I want to hear all about that old cat and the kitten. Start at the beginning, when you first found Old Cat—or when he found you.”

  In spite of the hurt inside him, Joel began to tell about Old Cat, and as he talked he found comfort in the telling, in reliving the joy of Old Cat’s love, his amazing behavior with the kitten.

  “I just don’t know what to do. Nobody wants Old Cat. My mother and my stepfather won’t let me take him when we move—Dad’s allergic to cats. Looks like I’ll just have to go off and leave him. I think he was abandoned before, and now he’ll have to hunt and fight and steal to survive again. And he’s getting older and one of his eyes is going blind. He had a great big cut over it when I found him. Everybody says cats can take care of themselves, but I think it must be awful hard for them. He sure was in bad shape and so was the kitten. I just can’t stand to think of him like that again. And how’s he gonna think of me—”

  He pressed his lips together and shook his head.

  “You do love that
cat, don’t you,” Mrs. Grant said. “I do wish I could help. I agree with you about abandoned cats. It’s cruel, downright cruel. I have several friends who love cats and who might take another. But an old tom who has never lived inside could be a real problem. And the shelter isn’t the answer, is it? They try, but there are always too many stray pets and too little money, too little space. In other places they do better, but not here, not yet anyway. Joel,” she leaned toward him and put her hand on his knee. “Joel, have you thought about having Old Cat put to sleep?”

  “I can’t! I just can’t do it. I’ve thought and thought, but I can’t let them do that to Old Cat.”

  Mrs. Grant rose from her chair and went over to the stack of pictures leaning against the wall. She tipped them each forward until she came to the fourth one which was a long panel with three large full-color photographs.

  “Come here and help me get this out,” she said. “We’ll set it on the sofa for the time being. I want you to see these pictures of my old cat.”

  Joel helped her draw the panel out and set it on the sofa.

  “I had these made from snapshots. Oh, I loved that cat the way you love your old cat. His name was, Barney and was he smart! Do you know, that cat could open doors? And drawers?”

  The photographs showed a big gray-striped tabby with beautiful dark markings and enormous gray-green eyes. The center picture was like a portrait, with the cat sitting, looking into the camera, sleek, superior and dignified. One picture showed him admiring himself in a mirror. The third showed him looking up into a lamp as though he were examining the light socket.

  “I had to have that fixture changed,” she told Joel. “Barney used to pull the chain to make the light go on and off. After he tilted the whole thing over on himself I had the chain removed and a button put there. He never could understand that the chain was really gone. The button defeated him, but he never gave up looking for that chain.”

  “He sure a good-looking cat,” Joel said. “He must have been mighty smart, too.”

  “Yes,” she pulled up another small chair and they both sat down again and looked at the pictures on the sofa. “He was a great cat. We lived in a house in the city and I never let him prowl the neighborhood. He was an ‘inside’ cat, but I had a leash for him and took him outside now and then. He used to open the drawer and pull the leash out of it and drag it to me when he wanted to go out on the lawn. I’ll do the same with the kitten. She’ll soon adapt to being an inside cat. It’s safer for cats nowadays to be kept indoors.”

  “You musta really took—taken—good care of him, taking his picture and all that.”

  “Yes. I suppose he was spoiled. The children loved him and when they grew up and left home, my husband and I spoiled him even more. And when my husband died two years ago, Barney was a great comfort to me although he was ailing.”

  “Gee—he musta been an awful old cat.”

  “Yes, he’d always had such good care he lived to be almost twenty years old.”

  “What—what made him—die?”

  “When he began to suffer and couldn’t move much—when his hind legs wouldn’t work for him anymore, I had him put to sleep.”

  Joel stared at her.

  “You mean—you loved that old cat so much—and you let them do that to him? You let your old cat get put into that chamber?”

  “Oh, no, Joel. No! Not a decompression chamber! I didn’t think he deserved that. No animal does. Did you know that the decompression chamber has been outlawed in some states? Unfortunately, ours isn’t one of them. No, Joel. I took him to the vet. I held him in my arms while the doctor gave him a needle. I stroked him and talked to him, and Barney didn’t even know he’d had a needle. He just went to sleep, in my arms—for good.”

  MRS. GRANT PROMISED TO DRIVE OVER TO Joel’s house after supper to pick up the kitten after she’d made things ready for her, and Joel bicycled slowly home.

  Chapter Six

  WHERE IN BLAZES YOU BEEN, JOEL? Here, it’s pushing three o’clock, and I’ve got all this packing to do and no sign of you around to give me any help. Did you go over to that old lady’s place? That was about ten o’clock this morning I called you. Answer me, Joel! What you been up to anyway?”

  Joel stood in the doorway, the piece of old blanket trailing from his hand. He did not look at his mother and he did not answer.

  “You going to answer me or not?” She put down the piece of china she was wrapping in newspaper and started toward Joel. Then she stopped. Joel’s jaw was set, his lips tight shut, his eyes half-open, and blank.

  “Something’s wrong. Something’s got you all tied up. Something to do with that old cat, I bet. Come to think, I haven’t seen him since I been home. Where is he?”

  “Under the roses—under the roses in the alley.” Joel’s lips barely moved as he spoke.

  “What you talking about? Under the roses—what you mean?”

  So quietly that she could hardly hear him, Joel told her.

  “You mean, you spent all the rest of your microscope money just to have that old cat put to sleep?”

  He did not answer. He did not look at her, but as she looked at him, she knew what he would look like when he was older, much older, a man. Hard. No, not hard, strong. That kind of strength must have come from his father; she didn’t believe she could have given it to him. She was always too pushed, too tired trying to cope with the Fiends, with her job and making ends meet. Maybe when they got to their new place. . . .

  “I’m sorry, Joel. I’m sorry. I do wish you didn’t take these kind of things so hard. There—I’m sorry.”

  She stood at his side and put both arms around his shoulders and laid her cheek on his forehead.

  “I’m so sorry.”

  He pulled away from her and walked, without speaking, across the kitchen into the living room.

  The old sofa, the only remaining piece of furniture in the living room, stood on the rugless floor, solitary in the center of the room.

  Joel lay on his back, arms crossed on his chest, knees drawn up, and stared at the bare spot on the ceiling, the spot shaped like a mouse sitting on its haunches.

  The kitten came out from under the sofa and jumped up beside him. He stroked her, noting how, when he drew his hand across her back, her hind quarters rose—just like Old Cat’s. Just like Old Cat. He drew her up to his chest and she began to lick him, under his chin, around his ears, trying to nuzzle under his head and back of his neck. She was plump and warm and silky and—thanks to Old Cat—alive.

  He took her in both hands and held her up above his face.

  “You gonna be all right,” he whispered. “I promise you—you gonna be all right.”

  Then he turned over on his stomach and found that he could let them out—tears, not sobs. They flowed easily, pouring out comfort, and the kitten, between his shoulder and his cheek, licked them away as they fell.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  MARY E. LITTLE was a children’s librarian as well as the author of 1 2 3 for the Library, ABC for the Library, and Ricardo and the Puppets, among other books. She lived in New York City and Arizona.

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  If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher, and neither the author nor the publisher h
as received any payment for this “stripped book.”

  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

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  This Aladdin paperback edition September 2014

  Text copyright © 1979 by Mary E. Little

  Cover illustration copyright © 2014 by Daniel Craig

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  Cover design by Jessica Handelman

  Interior design by Mike Rosamilia

  The text of this book was set in ITC Baskerville.

  Library of Congress Control Number 93-30376

  ISBN 978-1-4814-1938-3

  ISBN 978-1-4814-1939-0 (eBook)