57. Death Of A Black Cat

At first, the evening was a success. I walked along the edge of an over-grown field with woods on the right, looking for where a good hunter would put a treestand. I had given Hawkeye my climbing treestand, and he had left it out in the woods for a year. Unlocked and unattended. Don't get me started. I found an opening in the thicket along the edge of the field, walked at few steps into the woods, and saw his treestand at the base of a tree. I figured out how to loosen the cable loops around the tree and carried the rig out of the woods. Behind me, Audrey called Hawkeye and told him I had the tree-stand. I was proud of being able to figure out where it would be and even remarked to Audrey, "Damn, I'm good."
On the way to get pizza, beer, and a movie for our Sunday night fun, I made a detour to look for panthers near the New River. I saw the head of a black pantherette and pulled ito the trail. There was a small, young black cat on the trail, and she quickly backed over to her five young black kittens when I approached.
She let me get within a few feet and still did not move as she was curled up with the kittens, protecting them. Another young black cat burst out of some bushes nearby and ran off into the jungle-woods. Perhaps that was the daddy, and some human trash had abandoned all seven down by the river. I left, went to one of my panther feeding stations, scooped up some dry dog food, and brough it back for the seven or so cats and kittens. Then Audrey and I proceeded to get our supplies. We drank two quarts of Bush, had a Dijorno pizza, and wathced National Geographic's "Neanderthal Code" on TV and then finished with a western movie, "Jericho." At 2 a.m., things started falling apart. I had parked the Four-Runner at Audrey's house, and when we drove her Malibu back to her house, I could not find the key. The Toyota was locked, but we searched her car and the ground around the Toyota. I had to drive her Malibu back to my house. There were lights on inside her car that I could not get turned off, and I tried to call her, but the replacement phone Hawkeye had loaned me did not work. Finally, I figured out that a back door was not shut tight, and when I fixed that, the lights went off. I read until 3 a.m., and the next afternoon we went back to the cats. We made three trips getting leftover chicken, then milk, and finally a piece of tarp for rain protection. Each time, the same little kitten came out to greet me and follow me around. He had crust around his right eye. After three trips, it dawned on me that I had canned dog food -Science Diet- that would be much easier for the kittens to eat. I had tried to teach the friendly kitten how to drink milk, but he was not buying into it and was not sure he should continue to be so friendly. Audrey and I came back with an opened can of dog food and another pie pan.
I was angry that Audrey wouldn't even get out of the car to see the cats. She has very little compassion for stray animals, often boasting how she how driven away starving, lost animals. However, most recently two labs had come into her yard, and both Audrey and her son had fed them and had not tried to chase them away. Audrey had benefited greatly from government checks from the taxpayers, and I don't know if she would have survived without them. She's essentially alone except for her son, Larry, receiving very little attention from other members of her family. You would think someone who had received so much from the government, meaning the taxpayers, would want to give back to lost and abandoned animals, but I don't know if Audrey can make that link. On the fourth trip, I got out of the car with the dog food and pan while Audrey remained inside. The mother cat was by the chicken leftovers with two kittens trying to nurse her. I wanted her to see what I had so I got quite close to her as I did yesterday. Out of the corner of my left eye, I could see a truck slowing down on the road as it approached us. Just then mother cat had all of my presence she could tolerate. She bolted, ran by the front of Audrey's car, into the road, and into the front, left wheel of the approaching truck. She lay quivering in the road. The truck stopped up the road, made a U-turn, and came back. Another truck with two young men in it stopped too. Suddenly a pool of dark, red blood formed around the mother cat, and then she was still. I began swearing and throwing my new McCain-Palin cap onto the hard-paved road. I asked the single man in the truck, "I suppose you couldn't stop?" I swallowed my anger, knowing it was not his fault and added, "She just bolted onto the road, didn't she?"
"I'm sorry. I was watching you and then she was on the road."
I opened his side door and asked, "Do you have a pistol we can be sure she's dead with?"
"No, I'm sorry."
"She's got five kittens, and they face a terrible death without her."
I asked the two men in the other truck, but they didn't volunteer a pistol either. They said they were sorry and drove on. They left me throwing my cap onto the hard-paved road. If I hadn't been so angry, I would have told them they were great Americans for stopping. I salute you, and I am terribly angry about stupidly getting too close to mother cat. It cost her life. It will cost the life of her young too unless the other mature cat takes care of them and will fight for them. I'll keep feeding them. I also peed in a line, trying to use my human scent to scare off predators. Damn it!
Two-Guns at peternickerson12@yahoo.com