NOT THAT I BRAG

  BERYL KINGSTON

  Not that I Brag. Kindle Version.

  Copyright © Beryl Kingston 2022

  All rights reserved.

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  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 1

  They're sending me to a cattery! Me! The indignity of it! A cattery! If I hadn't heard it with my own sharp ears I'd never have believed it. I have the most acute hearing. Not that I brag. It's a fact of feline life, that's all. Or to be more accurate a fact of my particularly talented feline life. Acute hearing and a fine neat pair of ears. Jenny's always saying so. 'Haven't you got lovely ears darling,' she says. And then I narrow my eyes and smile at her to show her how sensible she's being, because for a human she's really not at all bad. If it had been left to her, there'd have been no consideration of a cattery.

  It's all his fault. I realise that. She would never have done such a thing, if it hadn't been for him. She'd have taken me with her, the way she always does. We have an agreement about these things. That revolting cat-basket would be taken out of the loft and I would allow her to put me inside it. After a struggle of course. That's perfectly understood between us. No self-respecting cat ever obeys anyone straight away. It's not in our nature. A little preliminary spitting and snarling is expected of us. After all we're not dogs.

  I knew we were in for trouble the minute she bought Him into the flat that night. Not a pre-possessing creature. After years of living in my extremely handsome company I would have expected her to have better taste. But a gangly, uncoordinated animal like that! I could hardly believe my eyes. And I do have exceptionally good eyesight and the most beautiful yellow eyes. She's always saying so. 'Haven't you got beautiful yellow eyes my darling and all that lovely black fur,' she says, and I narrow my eyes and smile at her to show her how sensible she's being. His eyes are the most non-descript colour you could imagine. Not even blue. A sort of wishy washy grey which probably accounts for his excruciating eyesight. He can't see more than three inches in front of his nose, which incidentally is not a pretty sight either, long and bony and, as far as I can ascertain, totally devoid of any sense of smell. He had a dish of prawns right under his chin for nearly ten minutes on one occasion and didn't even twitch.

  And now he has the effrontery to send me to a cattery. 'What are we doing with the mog?' he said. The mog!

  I was lying among the cushions on her settee, which is the most comfortable place in the flat, so after I'd given him my most venomous hate-look with my eyes narrowed and my head absolutely still, I opened my eyes as wide as they would go and looked at her. I must say I expected her to be as upset as I was. But no, she put one of her paws on that horrible shaggy fur he has on his head and made her cooing noises, and didn't even look at me.

  'I don't know darling,' she said. 'What do you think?'

  'Send it to a cattery. I know a good one.'

  It! I was so annoyed I had to leave the room.

  And now that revolting basket is standing in the hall and one of those awful cars is standing in the road and they're both running from room to room, calling me. As if I'd answer, at a time like this! I've got myself a nice little hidey hole in the airing cupboard, right at the back behind the hot water tank. It's like a furnace in here, of course, but occasionally one simply has to suffer for one's rights. I'm certainly not going to a cattery without putting up a fight.

  'Oh dear!' I can hear her saying. 'I can't find him. He couldn't have got out could he? Poor little thing!'

  'Not past me!' he says. The arrogance of it! It makes my fur bristle. As if I couldn't outwit a creature like that!

  'Perhaps we ought to cancel. Or go tomorrow. When he's got used to the idea. We can't just go off and leave him.' Now that's better. Now you're talking sense.

  'The flight's booked. The hotel's paid for. We're not ruining our holiday for some cantankerous animal. He's in here somewhere. It's just a question of looking.' Cantankerous! I like that! He should talk, that way he runs about the place when he's in a bad mood.

  'But what if we can't find him?'

  'We'll find him, wretched thing. Think criminal!' Oh that's nice! That's very nice! 'He's black, so where would a black cat hide? Somewhere pitch black, like a coal hole. Look under the beds.'

  'I've looked.'

  'Look again. Think. What's the darkest corner in the flat?'

  I can hear her feet pattering towards the airing cupboard. Damn man! Why couldn't he have kept his mouth shut?

  Well, I'm here, and it's every bit as bad as I expected. They put you in cages! Cages! I ask you! Rows and rows and rows of them, with an eighth-grade mouser in every single one. Not the right sort of place for an animal like me. I shall escape, of course, the very first chance I get. Oh, I'm glad I made them suffer on the journey. Jenny cried, tears in her eyes and sniffing and all that sort of stuff.

  She was pretty near tears when she found me behind the hot water tank. 'Oh look,' she said, 'he's hiding away, poor thing. I'm sure he knows. Look at his poor little face.'

  I gave her my pathetic look to encourage her and she picked me up and cuddled me under her chin, which was actually rather pleasant, because for a human being, she feels soft and smells quite nice. Not as nice as I do, of course, that goes without saying, but nice enough to make you want to purr. So I purred for a few minutes. She was pathetically grateful.

  'It breaks my heart to send him away,' she said. 'Couldn't we take him with us?'

  'No we could not.'

  'He'd be ever so good.' I looked angelic and narrowed my eyes at her again. And then He actually had the effrontery to seize me by the scruff of the neck and hurl me into the basket, as if I were some sort of vegetable. I was so stunned, I didn't even have time to scratch him. He takes my breath away. Doesn't he know what sort of animal he's dealing with? Ignorant creature!

  He didn't carry the basket any too gently either, even though she did try to warn him.

  'Don't swing him darling. He hates being swung about. Oh look at his poor little face.'

  'If you ask me, the sooner we get him to the cattery the better,' he said and he flung the basket into the back seat, so that I quite lost my balance. Only for an instant, of course, but it was very unpleasant. I need hardly tell you that no cat worth his salt would ever be seen losing his balance. It is quite the worst thing that could ever happen to a feline. We have absolutely perfect balance, when it isn't being interfered with.

  Then the car began to roar and throw itself about the way it always does. That always makes me howl, even at the best of times, and this was quite definitely not the best of times, so I set up the most heart-rending caterwaul you have ever heard. She was so upset she cried all the way.

  Not that it had any effect on him. 'It's only a cat for God's sake,' he kept saying. 'Take no notice.'

  It was a terrible journey. I made sure of that. She was still sniffing when the car stopped roaring and snarled to a halt.

  'Let me take him in,' she begged.

  He was foul to the last. 'No,' he said. 'I'll take him. You'll only get upset. He'll be all right.'

  'Carry him gently then,' she said, giving me a watery smile. The treachery of it. You really would have thought she'd have put up more of a fight. What's the matter with her? I turned my back on the pair of them. There are times when the best thing is simply to show them how contemptible they are. If he was going to fling me about again, then I had no intention of letting him see my face. I shall escape from this place at the very first opportunity. They needn't think they can do this to me and get away with it.

  Actually he didn't carry me far, which was just as well for he really is the clumsiest creature on two legs. I could hear bells ringing, at a distance, and then a gate creaking open and another man's voice speaking, but too softly for me to understand what he was saying. I'd have liked to look. But I have my pride.

  Then the basket swung, once, and the gate creaked and I was being carried again. Only a great deal more gently. For a minute or two, I almost hoped Jenny'd got out of the car and taken over, but then I smelled a new human being, and I knew I must be inside the cattery and with someone else.

  Now whatever I might think about catteries in general, I will say this for this cattery man, he smells extremely good, quite exciting in fact and certainly not human. Most humans only smell of soap and their awful sour sweat. He smells of that dreadful tobacco, the stuff he puts into a roll of paper and burns just inside his mouth, if you ever heard of anything so ridiculous. I can't smell tobacco on the cattery man at all, or soap, and only a trace of sweat which isn't unpleasant, but I can detect horses and donkeys, leather, compost, a whole variety of cats, of course, and cat's-meat and spearmint, and quite a lot of other things I haven't deciphered yet, so he's obviously a creature of taste.

  And he carried the basket very smoothly. Better than Jenny does, to tell the truth. In fact for a hu
man he would be really quite likeable if it wasn't for the fact that he lives in this awful place. He even held the basket steady while he unlocked the door to the second row of cages, which is rare in a human. When their forepaws are busy, they usually dump you down on the floor, right beside their clumsy feet. Which is not a pleasant place to be I do assure you.

  'There you are,' he said, when he'd carried me inside. 'First rate accommodation for a first rate cat.' He set the basket down on a shelf, just about level with his jersey and bent down so that his face was quite close to mine and we could look at each other. But I notice he kept a respectful distance between us. And quite right too. 'Are you coming out to have a look round? Or do you want to stay in there for a little while?' A polite man, you notice. Knows how to talk to cats.

  I decided to have a look round. So after a necessary pause, for no self-respecting cat ever rushes into anything, I stepped out of the basket, very gradually, of course, and delicately, so as to show him I wasn't approving of his cage, merely inspecting it. And I must say it really isn't at all bad. For a cage.

  For a start it's on three levels. A tiled floor. Very clean. I like a clean floor. Then this shelf where he'd put that horrible cat-basket and then above that another shelf right underneath a window. I walked up the ramp to the top shelf to have a look out and I could tell at once that was where the donkeys were. I could smell them quite clearly, and dogs, and rabbits, and mice, and tall grass. A good place for hunting. It occurred to me that I might spend a little time hunting before I escaped. And then, good feline heavens, I noticed a mouse sitting right underneath my window, cleaning its whiskers. The effrontery! It made my fur bristle. That wouldn't have lasted a second I can tell you, if there hadn't been all that wire between us.

  When I turned round to examine the rest of the cage, I had quite a surprise. The cat-basket was gone, good riddance to bad rubbish, and there were my own two bowls standing on the tiled floor, and my own bed tucked inside the house on the middle shelf. Well! How did he manage that? I was really quite impressed, especially as there was water in one bowl and some very strong smelling meat in the other, and quite palatable too. I tried it. After he'd shut the door and left me, of course, because it wouldn't have done to appear too keen.

  I shall have a little rest, when I've cleaned my face and paws. Then I shall plan my escape.

  Well I've been here several days now, and I must say it's not a bad place, taken all in all. The food is excellent, and served on time. No hanging about here. And the beds warm themselves up when it's cold, which is something any cat would appreciate, because we do like warmth.

  It's been raining a lot. I've been up at the window watching it. So I've deferred my escape for the time being. Better to wait for an improvement in the weather. After all there's no rush. And when I break out, I'd like to do it in comfort and style. There's nothing stylish about wet fur. It looks revolting and feels worse. No, no I've plenty of time. I shall choose my moment. Meanwhile there's plenty of good food, and a comfortable bed to sleep in whenever I want to, and the howling, of course. I do enjoy the howling.

  They're a very communicative lot in here. They howl and caterwaul at regular intervals all through the day, sending messages along the line and establishing rank order and that sort of thing. I have an exceptionally piercing howl, so it didn't take long to prove to them that I was the most important animal in our block. In fact I was leading the chorus on my very first day here. Which was only to be expected. The howl at daybreak is the best, I think. There is a tabby with three kittens in the end cage and she is a particularly sweet singer and very informative. Acts as look-out for the rest of us, and always gives me the most placating purr-talk. If it wasn't for the fact that I shall have to make a bid for my freedom sooner or later, I would actually rather like to see her.

  The cattery-man has just come in. What's this he's putting in my bowl? It smells like rabbit.

  It is rabbit. My whiskers, this is the life and no mistake.

  The rain has stopped. It was rabbit again this morning, Delicious. I ate every last morsel. I shall plan my escape when I've had a little nap.

  You'll never guess what's happened. They've come back. What do you think of that? On the very day I was going to break out too. Isn't that just typical? I had it all planned. The tabby at the end sang all clear, the sun looked as though it was set to shine for the rest of the day. It was the perfect opportunity. I was just washing my back, so as to be in perfect condition for the dash, when I heard a car approaching. Now I'd know the sound of His car anywhere, but really, if it hadn't been for the fact that I have perfect hearing, I'd have doubted the evidence of my own ears, sharp though they are. What on earth have they come back for so soon? Have they no sense of timing?

  Of course it was them, and He was driving. I could tell that from the way the car scrunched to a halt and the way his feet came scrabbling out of it and the number of times he had to bang the door before he could get it to shut. He has no finesse, clumsy creature. I couldn't hear Jenny, which was rather a disappointment.

  Then the outer door of my hut swung open and I could see that objectionable cat-basket swinging towards me and behind it the cattery-man treading softly and, behind the cattery-man, him, crashing about on those inelegant feet.

  The cattery-man unlocked the door. 'I'll coax him, shall I?' he said. A sensible creature, the cattery-man.

  'No,' he said. 'That's all right, thanks, I can manage him.' He grabbed me by the scruff of the neck and shoved me bodily underneath his arm, with one smelly hand clamped around my forepaws, which is not the most comfortable of positions, I can tell you, nor the most dignified.

  I bore it until we were outside the hut and then I made a super-feline effort, tensing my back legs against his ribs, and sprang out of his grip into the air, giving his bare arm a nice long scratch as I went. I could hear him yelling behind me as I landed on the roof of the hut but there wasn't time to look back. The tree was immediately in front of me. With two graceful bounds I was across the roof and climbing the trunk. What a marvellous feeling! Bark under my claws and all the exciting scents of the open air in my nostrils and the thick cover of oak leaves rushing towards me as I climbed. That'll teach them to send me to a cattery!

  Actually I went rather further up the tree than I'd intended, but it was a fine view and there was no way they could climb up after me and get me down. I sat in a fork and made myself comfortable and looked down to see what they were doing. He was examining his arm. What a wimp! And the cattery-man was looking rather worried. He was squinting up at me, and he'd taken off his cap to scratch his head. And there was Jenny, looking so upset, trying to see me through the mass of leaves. She's one of the nicer humans, but her sight isn't much good either.

  'Oh, there he is!' she said. 'My poor boy. What did you do to frighten him so?'

  'Do? I like that!' he said, rubbing his scratches. 'I didn't do anything, and he's scratched me half to death.' Good! I hope I have.

  'We'll have to get him down,' she said, 'poor thing. Is he stuck do you think?' I blinked at her to comfort her, but I don't think she could see, because she looked more worried than ever. 'Come on, darling! Come down to mummy!' She's always saying silly things like that. It seems to please her and she means well. So I blinked at her again. But I didn't move, of course.

  'Get a ladder!' He said to the cattery-man.

  'No darling, not yet. Let me call him. I expect he's frightened. You'll only make him worse with a ladder.'

  'I'll make him worse with a half brick,' he said. You see the sort of man he is.

  There was quite a long pause after that, and the cattery-man walked away behind the huts where I couldn't see him. I began to think it might be a good idea to descend. Not all the way to the ground of course. Not yet anyway. But down to a more reasonable height. There were two rooks circling the tree and they can be quite unpleasant if they've a mind to. Nasty beaks, rooks. I made a few tentative steps along the wider branch.

  At that moment a breeze sprang up. Not a violent breeze, I'll agree, but enough to shake the bough I was crawling along. And the cattery-man returned with a ladder. Time to take action, I thought to myself, surveying the possibilities. I waited until the ladder was propped in position against the fork I'd just vacated, and then I set off.