The longest day

This story needs to be told. It’s not one that I want to relive by even writing about it. Yet this being a reality one just can’t brush it aside though I want to believe it was an aberration and not a norm.

The day was a typical Sunday. Hectic. More so because there were two mother cats with their kittens to monitor.

Gibly had but one kitten-Tinku (refer-over-confident midwife). She was totally taken up by her baby. She had always been a slightly frail cat but now she had blossomed. Motherhood really suited her. She would not let Tinku out of her sight and would be forever dragging T back to her corner if she strayed even across the room. That morning she was in high spirit as T had just learnt to climb up the curtain and was busy showing off. Never the one to leave her baby alone, Gibly went out to the garden for scarcely ten minutes, if that, to do her job.

Puddy too had littered. She had a litter of fantastically good looking kittens- three. Puddy, being a veteran. Both she and Circuit were in the habit of going out for an hour in the morning and were missing as usual. As the mothers were slightly hostile it was our practise to keep the bedroom doors shut.

Busy with cooking I was not really monitoring anyone. I noticed Circuit return and decided to see whether Gibly was back. Opening the door, I was horrified to see Gibly frothing. I thought she was having a fit. I screamed for help and in less than five minutes my two daughters and myself were in a taxi going to the vet. We had had several bad experiences with our regular female vet. We decided to try another (and so began a long association). We reached but we were too late. The doc tried his best but to no avail. He said that it appeared that the cat had taken poison but could not be sure. We returned home shattered.

Soon we realized that Puddy had not returned from her round. Though naughty by nature it was unlike her to leave her kittens for so long unattended. The three of us took to the streets calling out to her. After several rounds one of my daughters said that this was typical of Puddy and since she could not be seen she would come back when it suited her. I felt uneasy and decided to check our back-yard before entering the house. You can imagine my shock when I found her caked in mud,  drooling saliva and with a glazed look in her eyes. We scooped her up, as she could barely totter, and ran for a taxi. On the way, we picked up T and put her with the other kittens. Poor T did not know that her world had just turned upside down.

We reached the vet’s place again. Not a minute too soon for they were just winding up to shut shop! This time God heard our prayers and we left with Puddy an hour later. There was no doubt that she too had been poisoned. For the next two days she could hardly walk and was told not to feed her kittens for the next few days.

A scene that I will take with me to my last day is poor T sitting with her back to the other three cuddled up together.

Losing Gibly was a major disaster. I have never seen an animal so taken up by her baby and to think that the most satisfying period of her life should be cut short so cruelly was heart rending.

The episode was baffling. We had no clue if these had been deliberate cases of poisoning. Meanwhile, we just locked and barred all windows refusing to take any chances. Next morning, the mystery was solved. Just in front of our house was an unoccupied house with an open ground. All animals used this as a thoroughfare. Just a few days before this incident, the owners had allowed a family known to them to stay there for a few days before their ‘quarters’ got allotted. They obviously had no love for animals.  Outwardly friendly they had even asked me the names of the various cats and I had obliged. I was shocked when early in the morning I was asked sweetly by this monster in human form, if all were dead. I froze. I was too rattled to say anything, which is not like me!

We became paranoid about letting the animals out in the garden.

A few nights later Puddy escaped. We were frantic to catch her before she was spotted. The Evil thought that they were all dead. B and T went out and managed to grab her by her tail.The pups meanwhile ran into their garden and we could hear them fighting over something. T rattled the Pedigree box and sprinkled some on the road to lure them out. It was a success. They came running out and Master was carrying something carefully in his mouth. He dropped it on the road. It was a small bowl with a fish-bone probably laced with poison.

The vet suggested that we took the matter to the police. With half the family away we just did not have the energy to follow it up. The neighbours left within a week. We were only too relieved to see them leave. Why they were so intolerant when they knew they were there for just a short while, we will never know. I only hope they realize how unkind they have been and what sin they have committed by depriving an animal of its mother. If they don’t they should stop calling themselves human beings.

Let me share something so that we do not end in a depressive note. Animals can be humans. Puddy adopted Tinku so completely that she probably did not miss Gibly, the way she could have. If Puddy could be accused of partiality (she was partial alright) it was Tinku and not one of her own!

From left to right – Tinku (Gibly’s daughter) Addy, Shymo and Ownie (Puddy’s children) in happier times.