AILOUROPHILIA

Chalky Jenkins: little cat lost

A. L. Rowse

He came in at the big upper gate on an afternoon when I was working at the border. It must have been autumn, or end of the summer vacation, for I was raking leaves out of the bed. He had followed Jack, my helper in the garden, in from the road. Jack had noticed a little white cat astray, on his own, looking for something to amuse him.

He was hardly more than a kitten still, perhaps three parts grown, for he was of a small species, delicate head, very dainty and spotless. For he was all white, except for the tiniest touch of tabby on his forehead, by which I should know him still among a hundred cats.

He was very circumspect and almost deferential at first coming into the big place, with a couple of strange men at work — and I came to know that that was characteristic of him. He had very good manners. He asked permission to play.

I stroked him very gently, less hard than he had expected or could have wished — and that is one clue to making friends with a cat: no roughness or brusqueness. Let them know that they are welcome, then let them do the running, for they are apt to be subtle animals — not obvious and bouncy, like dogs.

He at once recognised someone who knew about cats, himself made the pace, weaved himself in and out between my legs, and was shortly having a fine game with the leaves, following the rake with quick fascinated movements, making little runs and pounces with outstretched white paw.

All in inverted commas, of course. For, another thing about cats, they know that it is not wholly serious: they have a sense of humour; they pretend. Fascinated by movements of rake and leaves, watching, pouncing, crouching, withdrawing, giving up — for, after all, it I; only a game.

For me, he was an answer to prayer. I had long missed Peter, the cat of my life, dead now four or five years; and this little

cat that had suddenly appeared was white like Peter. But not a long-haired Persian: short-haired, with no such beautiful plume of a tail, rather stumpy in fact; and, as I was to learn, very different in temperament.

But where had he come from? Whose was he? He had arrived on me from nowhere — could he become mine?

Gardening finished, I took him into the house and gave him a saucer of milk. This was accepted — a difference from Peter, who was always a bit difficult about milk, and actually preferred water. But the little cat was not interested in food, not hungry: had obviously come from some home where he was well cared for.

I couldn't keep him, just like that. Beryl, boss of indoor domestic arrangements, said that he belonged 'down the village,' the hamlet of half a dozen houses in the valley below the big house.

So down he had to be taken, to the gate at the bottom end of the garden, where he seemed to know his whereabouts and whence he made his way home.

The next time I was at home from OxAft. ford he appeared again, always when someone opened the upper gate. It does not seem to have occured to him to crawl under the gate or to climb over the wall.

There he was again, in that attitude in which I shall always remember him: back to the hedge of the back-drive, tail up inquiringly, not in any way obsequious but just wondering about his reception. (I say "always," but, alas, I saw him only half a dozen times altogether.)

This time I knew his name, and that surprised him. He was called Chalky, and belonged — if that is the word for it — to a young family of newcomers down in the village. They had brought him with them; their little girl had been fond of him, but was now away at school, the young couple away for days at a stretch. Though they left food for him outside the door, he was on the loose; neglected, though not starved, still not much more than a kitten, half or three-quarters grown. Left to fend for himself. Chalky Jenkins.

I took him up in my arms, called him by his name, he leaped on to my shoulders, rubbing against my head, purring hardly audibly. (Another contrast with Peter, who purred like a traction-engine.) Setting him down inside the front door, I coosed' him along the hall to the kitchen, he turning round to see if I was there all right and skidding on the polished floor, just as Peter used to do.

But he knew his way to the kitchen,

where the milk was and also supper, which I got Beryl to give him.

But she wouldn't keep him in the house — he belonged to the Jenkinses, it wasn't fair to entice him away, then when I went

back to Oxford leaving him on his own, i.e. for her to look after. I well understood the

situation, and indeed it was unfair to attach him to me, when he belonged to somebody else, and then leave him on his own when I went away.

I took him to the back door and put him out. When I sat down to my supper in the dining-room, he found his way round to the front, and came pathetically putting his paws up to the window, mewing to come in.

That was too much for me and, knowing that I was doing wrong, I let him in and took him off to bed with me.

He knew all about going to bed, sat composedly inside my bedroom door, cleaning himself, making his toilet, but keeping an eye on me. When I was ready, I picked him up: he knew how to fit into the cosy little nest between the pillows and my neck, where the eiderdown came up and half covered him.

This was what he wanted. Before settling in for the night he gave my finger just one grateful lick — the only one I was ever to receive from him — just as Peter would do: one, and no more.

His bed manners were perfect. He never moved or fussed the whole night — where Peter Was apt to take more than his share of the bed and lie right across me, or begin to fuss to go out hunting in the middle of the night.

This little cat was very well brought up: no fussing, no trouble. I occasionally awoke and petted him, when there would be the faintest purr, a light murmur — perhaps he wasn't old enough to purr properly.

But when we both awoke and came down to breakfast, there was a fuss from Beryl. It wasn't " fair," it wasn't " right."

Nor was it. I took him down through the garden on my shoulders, he holding on to the manner born, thinking it a good spree, unsuspecting his betrayal — put him outside the bottom gate and shut it, leaving him alone in the lane to find his way home.

He did not try to. c:imb the wall and follow me back; but I shall not forget the look of mute reproach in his eyes.

Friends of mine coming to the house — the discriminating ones who would notice a cat — had caught sight of him. Frances and Nicholas Kendall over from Pelyn asked me if I hadn't got a new cat in place of the adored Peter. I told them the story, that I should like to adopt him, but wasn't allowed to, etc.

"But don't you see, dear AL, it isn't a question cf your adopting him: he's adcpting you."

I explained that I couldn't keep him, he belonged to people in the village.

"But he has chosen you. Cats do, you know. You can't possibly not have him." They, too, knew that he was just what I wanted: a little white cat to take the place of Peter. (They knew how I had grieved for him, how much I missed him from Trenarren, always waiting for me when I came home from Oxford, New York, California. He knew the sound of the hoot of my car — and I always hooted for him coming round Trevissick Corner and down Trenarren Lane. But he knew intuitively that I was on my way, without these premonitory signals. My heart always went faster as I rounded these last corners, with the thought of seeing him. Now no one.) It seems disloyal to say so, but young Chalky had one or two advantages over old Peter. For one thing, he was gayer, more eager and amusing. There was something a little sad about Peter: he was such a lonely cat. He gave his love to me — and I was away much more than half of the time, three quarters of the year latterly, when spending winters in California.

For another thing, Peter was easily frightened, he hadn't much confidence in life. The new little cat, though not so beautiful, was more spirited, had such an eager confidence in life, was capable of fending for himself (Peter was not).

But was this wholly an advantage? I reflected. Peter kept in around the grounds — a paradise for a cat — and hardly ever wandered out on the roads. This poor little cat was left on the roads, would take a ride with anybody in a car, (Peter couldn't be got to enter a car.) I was a bit concerned lest the cars scooting up and down our narrow lane mightn't run over Chalky, It didn't occur to me that someone might equally pop him into their car and away with him — they wouldn't be likely to do that with Peter.

The next time Chalky turned up was a gala day for him: televising going on in the house.

I was having to do a turn with Colin Wilson, a long interview about my poetry. The library was turned inside-out and upside-down, furniture thrown out into the hall, piled up in corners to make a cosy bogus hearth-side scene; a crew of eight or nine technicians, cameramen, men to do the lights, connect up with the van in the back court, producer, controller of Westward TV, secretary, what not. Huge arc-lamps, two menacing, moving cameras, cables, wires, wires everywhere, you had to be careful where to put a foot down.

In the midst of it all arrived Chalky. Somebody must have. tOld him down in the village that sorhething interesting was going on up at the big house — or perhaps, by this Wile, that life was always more amusing up there than at the cottage with his people for ever going away.

So up he came to lend a hand. And a fine old time he had — Peter would have run away into the backwoods at the racket going on. Not so Chalky: he put his nose into everything, marched up and down amongst everybody, inquiring into this or that, tail up, in and out the wires. When things began to hot up, I was afraid he might be electrocuted.

So, before the performance began, he had to be shut away in the glory-hole at the back, where he slept peacefully through all the proceedings: not a mew. Very well-behaved, knowing little cat.

When it was all over, and peace restored to the household, I determined to take him right down the hill to his people and tell them to look after him better. He rode joyfully on my shoulders down that bumpy hill to the cottage — all shut up and• desolate, nobody at home, the little cat's pate and saucer indeed outside the door but empty, 'licked clean.

Across the way were my Oxford friends, Joan and Harold, kindhearted and considerate to all creatures (even human). They told me the situation — how this exquisite little creature, beautifully mannered, brought up to be loved, wanting affection above all, was left for days on end loose on the roads.

I grew warm, in fact, furious. I remembered how frequently in America people would move house, !leave the vicinity completely — and abandon their cat, a castaway, to starve and be hunted down, Odious humans, their irresponsibility, their thoughtlessness, taking on a poor creature dependent on them, then cruelly throwing it over — all my hatred of humans for their sheer idiocy surged up: I left a pretty hot message to be delivered to the young couple when they came back to the cottage.

I left Chalky on his own deserted doorstep — my friends told me that they often fed him themselves and in fact he was left to scrounge round and about. Driven away from some doors — by the more primitive and ignorant types, taken in and given something by the more decent and kindly.

Enforcing my angry message, I left Chalky on his cold hearthstone and departed up the road. Again he did not at once track me, but within a remarkably quick time he was up at the house again.

That evening his owner came up to reclaim him: a rather handsome young fellow, with modern hair-do on face, a masculine type. He took Chalky back on his shoulders: evidently familiar, but no intimate feeling on either side. I learned later that the little creature was now shut up for days, my only consolation that at least he was safely off the roads.

I was looking forward greatly to seeing him when I came home in the spring. But, for a long time, he never appeared, perhaps under the new regime.

Then one morning when the postman came, Chalky was suddenly there. He had come in with him, in his usual fashion, when the heavy black gate was opened. The postman was engaging me with some nonsense about his small girl having seen me on the visit I had paid to my old school etc, when I caught sight of Chalky — in the familiar position at the entrance to the back drive, diffident, asking whether he was welcome.

Welcome! I paid no further attention to the postman, dropped him in the middle of his sentence with "There he is!" — to the man's surprise.

This time there was no doubt that Chalky had not forgotten me. He sprang into my arms and up on to my shoulders. I carried him indoors, set him down in the hall — where, looking round for me, he made for the kitchen.

This time he was unmistakably hungry. Fortunately there was something good going, and Beryl gave him a good meal of meat scraps. That over, I brought his bowl of milk into the library where I was working.

There is no better companion for a writer than a cat — as Matthew Arnold knew, not to mention Dr Johnson, Christopher Smart, Theophile Gautier, Baudelaire and others.

I fetched the green velvet stool, which Peter was not allowed to sit on — too apt to claw it with pleasure — spread the many-coloured woollen scarf Beryl had knitted for me, and drew it up to the desk beside me. Without a motion he knew it was for him and, before he had finished his milk, leaped up beside me.

It was evident that he wanted love as much as food. He once tried moving nearer, from his stool on to my lap, but found that there really wasn't room between me and the writing-table. Once he jumped down to finish his milk, but immediately came back without a word — no need to coax him, as with Peter.

He just knew. Strange, as Joan said that, with such a life, he had such beautiful, engaging manners. Yes, that was the word for him — above all things, engaging: gay, courageous, having to fend for himself, yet wanting love more than anything. Joan observed that he' can have had no sense of security whatever — brought up to be loved by the little girl, then neglected. He was a perfect cat, with such good manners and responsiveness, in spite of the treatment he had received — I think of Hardy's phrase, with tears: Who thinketh no evil For that morning the little cat found security. Fed and contented, he was tired and sleepy — he must have been scrambling round all night. He lay there quite quiet, with the tiniest, hardly audible purr, occasionally looking up to see if I was there. I worked away, happy to have his company, at my book on Westminster Abbey, for the American ambassador.

Once, when I had to leave the room to get a book, Chalky lifted himself up, concern in his eyes. I raised an admonitory finger and told him that I'd be back; he sank down reassured. He fell into deep sleep; we spent a happy morning, I at work, my little companion beside me, he in contentment and security.

But only for that morning. There came my lunch-time and after-lunch rest. And Beryl: "He's not to stay up here in the house. He has his own home: he must go down there. It isn't fair," etc. Though I well understood the motive behind these representations, perhaps, after all, it wasn't fair.

Weakly, regretfully, I put him outside the library window to make his way home. It was the last time I ever saw him.

Caught in a dilemma, I had planned a clever compromise. Since I couldn't take him on, in spite of his adopting me, I would leave things as they were. His unsatisfactory home could keep him in term-time when I was away, while I would have him up with me when at home in the vacations. It would be a very convenient arrangement.

From Oxford I always used to telephone to Peter on Mondays at six. Beryl would hold him up to the receiver and, when he recognised my voice, he would purr loudly a:1 the way to Oxford.

When I inquired for Chalky, Beryl hadn't seen him, either up at the house or down in the village. Weeks passed, and he was missing from his home. No one had seen or heard of him. No one has heard a word of him since.

And I am miserable about him. I failed him just like everybody else. I was no better about him than anybody else — worse, for I designed to have his love on the cheap. And he had chosen me, expressed his confidence in me. Which I betrayed, just like everybody else. So much worse, for I at least understood the situation in all its bearings.

And in some strange way it links up with the mystery of life — the mysterious inevitability of things, the irrevocability of what happens, the implacable sentence that time passes. If only one could reverse it, if only one could have one's chance over again! This little affair, my brief acquaintance with this little cat that never belonged to me, that gave me his confidence, which I betrayed, that could have been mine had I been willing to take the trouble to take him on — it is all an image of the crux at the heart of things: love offered and denied, the judgement . from which there is no appeal.

I at any rate have paid the penalty for my betrayal with an aching heart and many tears. But what is the good of that? It won't bring him back. Nothing will ever bring him back.

Wherever I look around here, especially in those few places associated with him, I , see his image still: most of all, by the upper gate where he used to come in from the road, pausing with back to the hedge to ask if he was welcome; or outside the gate at the bottom of the garden, where I left him looking back, with mute reproach, in the lane; or scampering along the hall, turning to make -sure I was there and slipping up on the polished floor; inside my bedroom door daintily cleaning himself for the night; or here, asleep and contented, at last secure, on the green velvet stool beside me in the library where I write this now alone. The perfect little friend and companion, cheerful and courageous, above all, with a way of endearing himself: a brave little spirit, confronting the chances of 'life, just 'like the rest of us. In his case, alone. Nothing can console me for my failing him, or to think that I shall never see him again — never, never, never, never.