When we set off for a break in the countryside, we brought along our city cat, Percy. Out in the village, Percys own brother, Wilfred, was already living his best rustic life. Wilfred got his nickname from his rather bug-eyed appearancehere in the village, people tend not to mince their words.
At first, things werent easy for Percy. Despite Wilfreds unimposing size, he immediately made Percy feel like the unwelcome new lad, chasing him away from the food cupboard and hissing like an irate contestant on a well-known chat show.
One day, Wilfred committed the classic mistake of every cocky streetwise ladhe believed himself invincible and brazenly attacked Percy. With a dramatic swipe of his paw, reminiscent of an aristocrat idly flicking away a bothersome suitor, Percy accidentally landed a solid right hook. Wilfred had to be retrieved rather sheepishly from the kitchen bin.
And so, in a manner befitting most occurrences in Percys lifehapless and entirely by accidenthe found himself at the top of the hierarchy.
Cats in the countryside are treated with practical indifference; only the chill of winter spared Percy from being drafted into fieldwork. Meals in the village are more of a creative pursuit than a regular affair. Percy struggled to adjust, accustomed as he was to city living, where he dined from fine china right on the dot, summoned to supper by the butler.
The stress of it all soon reawakened Percys primal instincts. More than once, I found him late at night with his head buried in a saucepan on the stove. Wilfred, stationed atop a stool as lookout, would hiss desperately to warn his brother of my approach. Percy would glance lackadaisically in my direction, reassure Wilfred, No need to fear that oneif only youd seen the way he scours the fridge in the dark.
One day, convinced Percy was ready, we set him outside in the snow. He turned to us, his entire face dusted white, eyes heavy with the regret of a life not quite livedlike Al Pacino in the iconic scene from Scarface. After that, we agreed Percy was probably best kept indoors.
One evening, Edwards friends from the village came over. We gathered cosily in the sitting room while I read aloud to the childrena touch of English literature, The May Night by Nikolai Gogol. At the bit where the stepmother transforms into a pitch-black cat, her claws clicking across the floor, the living room door creaked open and in strutted Wilfred.
As fate would have it, Percy had passed along his party trick: opening any door, no matter the latch, with a flick of the paw.
Though the sitting room was quite snug, the children and I managed a frantic dash around. One small boy had to be rescued from the windowonly the quick hands of his well-fed grandmother saved him from tumbling out.
Oh, and I should mention: Wilfred is absolutely, unwaveringly black.
Its rare that classic tales have such a spectacular effect on modern children. That night, as the laughter died down and the children huddled closer together, we all learnt something: sometimes, the stories we read, the pets we love, and the adventures we stumble into, remind us theres a bit of magicand mischiefin the everyday, waiting to surprise us, if only we pay attention.
