The Haystack (5 page)

“W
HAT HAPPENS TO THE OTHER KITTEN
?” Mr Bluenose repeated. “I am just telling these two that my friend Maggie will know somebody who wants a kitten to take home now.”

When Mr Bluenose didn’t have his false teeth in, his chin went right up to his nose, or his nose came right down to his chin.

“Now?”

“Straight away at once.” His eyes crinkled, and his nose and chin almost touched.

“I’d take a kitten home straight away. Please, Mr Bluenose?”

“Which one?”

I picked her up.

“She is yours. I will keep the black one. He is so black,
the rats and mice will not see him coming. He will be very reliable, the black panther of my orchard, and I will call him Bagheera, because of Mr Kipling’s book about Mowgli.

“The birds will be safe, because they can see him coming, black in the sunlight. But boys? My reliable black panther Bagheera will hide in the shadows and eat the boys who come to steal my apples.”

“Will he eat me?”

“Black panthers do not like the taste of girls.”

“My grey kitten will hunt down in the back shed. Dad said there was one rat so big, it lifted the lid off the barrel of wheat, climbed inside, and wanted to fight him—she’s tickling my nose.”

“What are you going to call her?”

“Milly.” I scratched under her chin, and Milly pushed against my fingers. “I didn’t know I wanted her so much.”

Mr Bluenose spread a sugarbag inside a cardboard box, opened his pocket knife, and cut some holes.

“For air.”

“I can put her down the front of my shirt.”

“She would scratch and jump out. Here.” He opened the box, so she walked inside and sniffed around. Mr Bluenose closed the flaps, and Milly put her nose to one of the holes. Bagheera stuck a paw at it, and Milly clawed back.

“Carry her so she does not slide about, Maggie.”

I held the box level and whispered her name. “Miaow!” she said back.

“I will open the gate for you. If your arms get tired, put the box down carefully and rest. Much happiness in your new house, Milly.”

I walked carefully, holding the box level, whispering, “You’re all right. As soon as we get home, I’m going to give you something to eat, and a saucer of milk. I forgot to thank Mr Bluenose. I wonder if Bagheera is missing you?”

I was still talking and she was still saying “Miaow!” when Mrs Dainty popped out from behind her gate.

“Mr Bluenose gave me a kitten, Mrs Dainty.”

“I know.”

“How?”

“Half of Waharoa must have known, everyone but you. I hope you’ll look after your cat properly.”

“Her name’s Milly, and she’s going to fight the big rat in our back shed, Mrs Dainty. He gnashes his teeth and shakes his fist at Dad and wants to fight him.”

“You mustn’t go making up stories.” Peck, peck went Mrs Dainty’s nose. “Now, when you get as far as the school, your arms will be tired. Rest the box on that stand by the gate.

“Be sure and close all the windows and doors, and butter her paws. By the time she’s licked that off, she’ll have decided she likes being at your place.”

Mrs Dainty was saying something else, but I kept walking. I wanted to get Milly home; besides, the box was getting heavy.

“We’re nearly at the school. I didn’t know a kitten weighed so much.”

“Miaow!”

“Here, I’ll give you a hand, Maggie.” Mr Strap was at the school gate, and he helped me reach up to the stand.

“Miaow!”

“Her name’s Milly, Mr Strap. Mr Bluenose gave her to me. Dad said we could do with a cat because there’s a rat down in the back shed who gnashes his teeth and wants to fight him.”

“Indeed,” said Mr Strap. “Try swinging your arms like this, for the circulation. If they get tired again, rest the box on the post at the corner of your street, the one in Freddy Jones’s hedge. It’s not far from there to your place.”

I walked past the lawsonianas down the side of the school horse paddock. I rested the box on the post in Freddy Jones’s hedge, and Milly stuck a paw through one of the holes. I stroked it, but a claw stuck into me.

“Ow!” I told her, and she pulled it out. “Not far now.” I swung one arm and then the other, the way Mr Strap had shown me. For the circulation.

The box tipped a bit, and Milly growled. I carried it a bit further, rested it on Harsants’ gate, took it up
carefully, and almost ran. Our gate was open, and the back door, and Dad was taking the box from me and setting it on the floor. My arms were so tired, they just wanted to hang straight down.

“What’s this?”

“Mr Bluenose gave her to me. She’s called Milly. Can we keep her? You said we needed a cat to fight the rats in the bottom shed.”

“It looks as if we’ve got one.” Dad shut the back door. The other doors and the window were closed already. I knelt, rubbed the insides of my arms where the skin was creased white and red, and talked to Milly, and she miaowed back.

“There’s a saucer on the hearth. The milk will help her settle; and there’s some mince. Open the box and let her find her own way out.”

“Here we are, Milly. There, it’s coming open. Oops. I didn’t mean to shake you. You can come out now.”

Milly stepped delicately from the box, glancing about the kitchen, ready to run.

“I thought you’d jump out. Can you see her, Dad? She’s grey, and she’s got black stripes. See, right down her tail. And yellowy eyes.”

She didn’t even look at the milk and mince; she sniffed under the door into the front room, slunk across, tummy to the floor, and sniffed under the back door. She saw Dad and her eyes went round; he kept still, so I kept
still, too. She crept close to the wall and sniffed at the door out to my room. Then she came back and rubbed herself against the leg of the table. I held my breath. She was going to rub herself against me.

“Miaow!” She took no notice of me, but walked over and rubbed herself against Dad’s leg. She rubbed herself against the table leg nearest the stove, and against the cupboard door under the sink. I couldn’t help it: when she crouched by the saucer, I plumped myself down and stroked her, and she pushed her back up against my hand.

“She likes being stroked.”

“You could open your door. I closed the windows.”

She went out there at once, jumped up on the windowsill and walked along it, sniffing at the bottom where the big window slid open, rubbing herself against the frame and the brass catches. I watched her through the crack in the door.

She jumped on to my dressing table, sniffed my brush, jumped to the windowsill above my bed, and looked at the lemon tree.

“Dad,” I whispered, “she’s sitting on my bed.”

“You’ll find a seed box filled with dirt on the back porch. Bring it in, and she can use it for a lavatory. I’ll put down a newspaper; she might scratch and scatter dirt everywhere.”

“How will she know to use it?”

“Her mother will have taught her.” Dad spread the paper in the corner, and I put the seed box on it.

“Will she see the dirt there?”

“She’ll find it. Everything must sound and smell new and different—scary. She’ll be half-nosy, half-afraid. We’ll have our tea, let her get used to us.”

I kept an eye on my door, but didn’t see Milly come back into the kitchen.

“Maybe she’s gone to sleep on my bed.”

“Something just brushed my leg,” said Dad. I sat very still, stared at him, and felt it too. As warm as the post office steps, but soft and furry. I held my breath.

“She’s rubbing the back of my legs now. Dad, Mrs Dainty said she knew I was getting a cat. She didn’t growl much, and she told me to butter Milly’s paws.”

“You can try it. And a bit on her nose.”

“Won’t she just lick it off again.”

“It can’t do any harm.”

“She’s wiping her nose.”

“That means she’s getting used to us. You’d better eat something yourself, or I’ll be accused of not feeding you till all hours.”

B
USY WATCHING MILLY,
I heard Dad shifting the pots around on the stove: Bang! Bang!—the potato masher: Clomp! Clomp!—the fork: Whisk! Whisk! round and round. Milly didn’t seem to mind.

“Just as well tomorrow’s Saturday, so you’ll be here with her. Don’t let her out, and by Monday she’ll have settled down.”

“Do you have to go to work tomorrow?”

“It’s just the morning, besides I had that Saturday off not long ago. You can’t push it too hard these days, not with a line of poor devils at the factory door, looking for jobs. I’ve never seen so many men on the road.”

“Dad, will Milly miss her brother? He’s black, with green eyes, and Mr Bluenose said he’s going to eat the boys who steal his apples.”

“Wretched Freddy Jones.”

“And Billy Harsant. He steals apples, too.”

“Wretched Billy Harsant.”

“It serves them right. Mrs Dainty says thieves never prosper. Mr Bluenose’s kitten is going to grow as big as a black panther and guard the orchard. His name’s Bagheera.”

“Bagheera?” Dad held the big spoon over the mashed potatoes.

“Mr Bluenose said it’s in a book about somebody called Mogie—something or other.”

“Mowgli.” Plonk! Plonk! went the white hills on to our plates.

“What are we having with the mashed potatoes?”

“Guess.” Dad took the other saucepan off the stove.

“Is it—?”

“Where do you think the stuff came from for Milly?”

“I didn’t think. Why did you keep a bit raw for her, Dad? Did you know I was bringing her home?”

“I might have had an idea. Enough?”

I nodded. “I love mince, but not raw. I wish Milly would eat hers.”

“Give her time, and get on with your own. And, if you have to make roads of mince through your mashed potatoes, don’t go telling Mrs Dainty, or I’ll never hear the end of it. ‘What sort of a way is that to bring up a child, I’d like to know?’”

I always laughed when Dad did Mrs Dainty’s voice, but Milly ran and crouched under the sideboard, barley-sugar eyes staring wild.

“We’ll eat our tea, move slowly, try to keep our voices down.”

I dug silent roads through my mashed potato hills, and spread the mince on them like brown tarseal. A couple of spots were swaggers tramping along. I didn’t even moan when Dad dumped soggy silver beet on my plate. And when Milly crept from under the sideboard, around the corner, and out to my room, Dad and I just looked at each other, nodded very slowly, and grinned.

I tried to hide the last of my silver beet, but Dad was looking,

“I ate all of mine.” He looked smug.

It was no use. I covered the last silver beet with mince, held my nose, closed my eyes and swallowed, then soaked up the last bit of brown road with the last bit of white hill.

“That was lovely—all but the soggy silver beet. Dad, how did everyone in Waharoa know I was getting a kitten?”

“Who told you that?”

“Mrs Dainty.”

Dad almost said something, stopped himself, and hummed.

“And Mr Strap was at the school gate and he helped me rest Milly’s box on the stand there, and I told him about the big rat that wanted to fight you.”

Dad was thinking about something else. “Clear the
table,” he said, “and start on the dishes.” He went into the front room and lifted the lid of the seat in the bay window, then I couldn’t hear for the noise of the soap-shaker. I stopped, tiptoed to my door, and peeped.

Milly lay on my bed, yawning and staring straight up at me. My face felt hot, as I tiptoed back to the sink and swished the soap-shaker again.

“You’ve been looking round the door, haven’t you?”

“How could you tell?”

Dad tapped the back of his head. “Easy. I knew you couldn’t stop yourself. Haven’t you got that pot done yet?”

“There’s some dead old silver beet stuck on the bottom. Dad, Milly’s lying on the foot of my bed.”

“Here, I’ll finish it while you get yourself ready for bed.”

I scrubbed my knees and feet, and tiptoed towards my room. That’s when I noticed the book on the table, one that Dad must have got out of the window seat.

“What’s that?”

“Nothing.”

“Dad, you’re hiding something.”

“Don’t be such a stickybeak.”

“Oh, tell me?”

“It was going to be a surprise, for when you were in bed.”

I opened the book and read on the flyleaf: “Elizabeth, with love from Mother for Christmas”. And underneath
in pencil, in large round letters like my own writing: “Elizabeth Milne”.

“It’s Mummy’s!”

“One her mother gave her, when she was about your age.

“Will you read it to me and Milly?”

“That’s what I was going to do. No, don’t rush out. When you get into bed, slide your feet under her slowly and she won’t mind. Once she’s settled, I’ll come and read you a bit.”

“You’ve been peeping round the door at her—while I was scrubbing my feet,” I told him, and he grinned.

I smiled slowly at Milly, put on my pyjamas slowly, and remembered. “Dad,” I hissed, “I forgot the chooks.”

“I fed them when I got home.”

“Sorry.”

“I thought you might be too busy with your kitten. The old white rooster said to give you his regards.”

“Did he really—oh, he did not. I’m getting into bed now.”

I slid my feet under. Milly tilted, but stuck her claws into the eiderdown and wouldn’t shift. I put my feet around her weight, and that’s when I felt it. Dad must have filled the hot water bottle and put it in the bottom of my bed, and Milly was lying right on top of it. No wonder she didn’t want to move. I slid my left foot, and she tilted a bit more but hung on, eyes staring.

“It’s all right. I’m just getting comfortable.” A little steam engine chugged away, vibrating through the eiderdown and into my foot: “Purr! Purr!”

If I lifted my head, I could see her. If I closed my eyes, I could hear her. I put my fingers in my ears and felt her purr through my foot.

“I hope you’re comfy,” I said. “My right foot’s squashed.” I moved it carefully, and felt the little steam engine chug chug again.

“Ready?” Dad brought out a chair.

“The Jungle Book,
by Rudyard Kipling,” he read aloud from my mother’s book.

“That’s the name Mr Bluenose said, too.”

“‘It was seven o’clock of a very warm evening in the Seeonee hills when Father Wolf woke up from his day’s rest, scratched himself, yawned, and spread out his paws one after the other to get rid of the sleepy feeling in their tips…’”

Milly yawned, curled her pink tongue, and spread one paw. Dad looked at her, and nodded.

“‘Mother Wolf lay with her big grey nose dropped across her four tumbling, squealing cubs…’”

Then Tabaqui the jackal came into the cave; and then Father Wolf carried in the baby boy; and then—I pulled the blanket up to my eyes—the tiger Shere Khan stuck in his great square head and wanted to eat the baby boy who lay among the cubs. That was when
Mother Wolf chased him away and named the little boy Mowgli the Frog.

Dad read on about how Father Wolf took Mowgli and his wolf brothers to the Pack Council, and Shere Khan still demanded the man’s cub. As Mother Wolf got ready to fight her last fight against the tiger, Baloo the Bear spoke for Mowgli. Now he needed another to speak for him, just one more, and he would be accepted into the Pack, safe from Shere Khan.

“Somebody do something,” I said. “Quick!”

“‘A black shadow dropped down into the circle’,” Dad read. “‘It was Bagheera the Black Panther…’”

“Bagheera.”

The black panther spoke for Mowgli and gave a fat bull for him, one it had just killed.

“Bagheera.”

Dad nodded. “‘And that is how Mowgli was entered into the Seeonee wolf-pack for the price of a bull and on Baloo’s good word…’”

Something moving woke me. Everything was dark. Somewhere Shere Khan roared, but a black shadow dropped down from the lemon tree. I shoved the cold hottie aside, wriggled my toes, and Milly scrambled back on top of my feet; I whispered the black shadow’s name aloud, and we both went back to sleep.