by Holly Webb
Barbie nudged lovingly at the girl, rubbing up against her hand and scenting her properly. Now everyone would know that Edie was hers.
Then she gave a surprised little squeak as she was gently lifted out of the box and Edie snuggled her up against the cardigan she was wearing. Barbie sniffed at it curiously and stuck her tiny claws into the fabric, pulling herself up like a mountain climber. It was hard work but she climbed all the way to Edie’s shoulder and batted a paw at Edie’s plait, which was swinging temptingly next to her. It was so close – she could reach it if she stretched out, just a little. Barbie leaned over a bit further and her paws slid on the cardigan. She could feel herself slipping down and she scrabbled frantically for a second, and mewed.
Edie’s hand closed round her tummy, scooping her up again and setting her gently back in her safe box. The kitten yawned and slumped down, her front paws splayed out against the soft towel. She wriggled a little and breathed out a tiny, squeaky snore.
“Look, there’s a rainbow!” Layla pointed out of the kitchen window. “It’s really sunny and beautiful outside now.”
Edie came to stand beside her. “Amazing! Hey, do you want to come out searching for Barbie’s family again? I can’t help worrying about them – I mean, if there are other kittens and the mum had to abandon them, too… They could be out there on their own.”
“Because she couldn’t feed them? Would she do that?” asked Layla.
Edie sighed. “I don’t know. We still don’t know what happened to Barbie. I just hate thinking of kittens being hungry and cold.”
“Yeah…” Layla nodded. “Let’s try again.”
“Maybe we should look in other places – all round the field and in that little copse nearby.”
“That’s a long way from where we found Barbie,” Layla said doubtfully.
“I know but you just saw her climb up my cardigan and she’s only five weeks old! Mother cats do amazing stuff to look after their kittens. She might have carried them for miles. She’d have had to keep putting them down and leaving them – she can only carry one in her mouth at a time – so it would have taken ages but they can do it.”
“Mmm. Maybe…” Layla nodded. “OK. Should we tell your dad?”
Edie nodded and went to find him in the little office space under the stairs. “Dad, me and Layla are going to look for Barbie’s mum.”
He looked round. “OK… But if you find her, don’t touch her, will you? Feral cats can be fierce, especially if they’re protecting their kittens. Where are you going to look?”
“Round the edges of the field and in the copse?”
Edie’s dad checked his watch. “OK, but I want you back by five thirty – so you’ve got just over an hour. And don’t go on the road.”
“We won’t!” Edie hurried out before her dad could change his mind. She was allowed to go off exploring with Layla and her other friends, but she had a feeling Dad didn’t really like it. He worried too much.
“We could start by checking the hedges all round this field,” she suggested to Layla. They were standing in a corner of it. “She might just have made a nest in the bushes.”
It sounded simple enough, but the field was enormous and the rain had left the grass soaking wet. By the time they were halfway round, the girls were drenched and feeling a bit hopeless. They hadn’t seen any sign of a mother cat or more kittens.
“What about those sheds?” Edie asked suddenly. The buildings were over on the far side of the next field near a copse of trees and looked like they’d been abandoned for a while – she could see holes in all the roofs.
“Do you think it’s OK?” Layla said doubtfully. “Mum always says not to go inside anywhere like that, in case it’s dangerous.”
“I know, my mum and dad say the same. We won’t go inside – we’ll just look around.”
“All right,” Layla agreed.
They worked their way round the corner of the big field to a gap in the hedge and then round the next field to the tumbledown buildings. They walked into a yard with old sheds on three sides.
“I think this used to be part of the same farm that our houses were in,” Edie said. “Mum said it was a machine store or something. But it’s really falling down.”
Layla peered carefully at the walls and the open doorways. “We could just put our heads round the doors,” she suggested. “That would be OK.”
The old sheds seemed to have been abandoned for a long time. They were almost completely empty, with just a few bits of dusty equipment here and there. But in the smallest and least falling down of the three buildings, there was a pile of old sacks, and on them was a gingery, furry bundle of kittens.
Edie and Layla forgot completely about being safe and never going inside abandoned buildings. They crept as quietly as they could into the shed, and crouched down by the squirming mass of fur.
“How many?” Edie whispered.
“Um, three, I think? No … four? It’s really hard to tell when they’re all on top of each other. No, it is three, look, that leg belongs to that one.” Layla pressed her hand over her mouth, trying not to laugh out loud and disturb the kittens. “They’re so sweet – oh, they’re waking up! Sorry, kittens…”
The kittens were wriggling even more now, starting to climb on top of each other, so it was even harder to see which paws and tails went where. One of them was ginger like Barbie, but with shorter fur, and the other two were mostly black, but flecked and spotted with ginger.
“These have to be Barbie’s brothers or sisters,” Edie said. “Actually, two sisters and one brother, I think.”
Layla frowned. “You’re making that up!”
“I’m not! You know everyone thinks ginger kittens are boys? And actually, you can have ginger girl cats like Barbie, it’s just rarer? Well, I asked Mum to explain it to me again, and she said it’s super-rare to have a tortoiseshell boy cat. And two of these are tortoiseshell.” She pointed to the two kittens currently squirming on top of the ginger one. “And the ginger one is probably a boy.”
“Oh… OK. Well, whatever they are they’re gorgeous. And the tortoiseshell ones are so pretty. Look! This one’s got a ginger streak down her nose!”
“They don’t look like they’ve been abandoned, do they?” Edie looked around the shed. “This is a nest that their mum’s put them in, and they’re really plump and lively. She must be off hunting for food.” She turned to look out of the door. “I think Mum was right about what happened. Barbie can’t have wandered off from here and ended up caught on that fence, not by herself. Her mum must have had to move the kittens, but Barbie got stuck.” Edie’s voice shook a little. “Her mum had to choose between her and the others. She had to get her kittens somewhere safe.”
“She wouldn’t have been able to get Barbie off that wire either.” Layla sighed. “Wow. I wonder where she had to carry them from? And trying to do the journey four times with four kittens!”
“Every time she put one down to go and get the others, they must have been trying to wriggle away all over the place. She would have hated it. Poor cat, it must have been so horrible for her. Imagine having to leave your baby behind…”
“Layla, look…” Evie whispered, gently turning her friend round. “In the doorway.”
Watching them, frozen at the entrance of the shed, was a tiny black cat. She didn’t look big enough or old enough to have had kittens, Edie thought. She was so skinny and little, but she had the most beautiful golden-green eyes.
“Shuffle back!” Edie told Layla. “I think she’s scared to come in because we’re here.” Her mum had told her how shy feral cats could be. The kittens were too little to be scared but their mum wouldn’t want to come near people.
Slowly, carefully, the two girls wriggled back to the side wall of the shed, as far away from the kittens and the mother cat as they could get. Edie wished they could just leave, but the kittens’ mum was in the doorway. She had her ears laid back flat, and she was pressed against the side of the do
or as if she was terrified – but she didn’t run away. She was obviously desperate to get to her kittens.
“She’s shaking,” Layla whispered.
“I know… Maybe if we keep still she’ll come in and then we can get out of the door without scaring them.”
The cat watched them suspiciously, glancing back and forth between them and her kittens as if she still wasn’t sure it was safe to move. Then, at last, she darted across the shed to her nest on the old sacks. She huddled herself over her kittens, as if she thought she needed to protect them from the two girls. Then she leaned down and picked up the ginger kitten in her mouth, hauling him out of the nest by the scruff of his neck.
Layla gasped. “She’s hurting him!”
“No,” Edie whispered. “That’s just how they carry their kittens. Look, he’s gone all limp. I don’t think it hurts. But where’s she moving him to?” She looked worriedly at Layla. “I think she’s doing this because of us! We scared her, and now she thinks this place isn’t safe and she has to take them somewhere new.”
The cat didn’t seem to know what to do. She jumped up on to an old wooden crate that was behind the nest, with the kitten dangling from her mouth, but then she hesitated and jumped down again, putting the kitten back with his sisters. She padded around the little pile of sacks, looking over at the girls every so often and then nudging worriedly at her kittens.
“Let’s get out of here,” Edie suggested, breathing into Layla’s ear. “We’ll stay by the wall and try to be really quick. Yes?”
Layla nodded, and they scurried as quickly as they could round the side of the shed and out of the door. Edie looked back as they dashed out and saw the mother cat still staring after them anxiously.
“What if she moves them and they get hurt like Barbie did?” Edie said, as they stood in the long grass outside the shed. “Where’s she even going to take them? She had to go so far last time, all the way across two fields and the road at least. It’s so dangerous!”
“We were trying to help…” Layla said, her voice faltering.
“And I think we’ve just made everything worse.” Edie shook her head. “We shouldn’t have stayed looking at the kittens. But they were so cute, I didn’t think about the mother cat coming back and getting scared. We should have gone away and got some food for her and left them alone.” She bit her bottom lip. “We messed up. Can I borrow your phone to ring my dad? Maybe he’ll know what to do.”
Layla nodded, pulling the phone out of her pocket and handing it to Edie. It had been her birthday present and Edie was definitely planning to ask for a phone for her birthday, too. “Dad?” she gasped, as soon as he picked up. “Dad, we’ve found Barbie’s mum and the other kittens. They’re in the old machine sheds, across the field from where we found Barbie. But I think we scared her, she’s going to move the kittens, and we don’t know what to do…”
“Wow!” her dad murmured. “OK.” He paused and Edie could almost hear him thinking. “Right. I reckon we need to get them all to a shelter. They probably won’t be able to rehome the mum, not if she’s feral, but they could find homes for the kittens once they’re not feeding from her any more. They’re still young enough to get used to people. So … we need to catch the mum and the kittens before she moves them again.”
“She’s really nervous, Dad. I don’t think she’s going to be easy to catch.”
“I know, but we’ll bribe her. I’ll bring a cat cage and some good snacks. Your mum’s going to wonder what’s happened to the contents of the fridge. We just need to find out what she likes. I’m betting on cheese. Lots of cats can’t resist cheese. But you never know, it could be cold baked beans! I’ll bring those, too, just in case.”
Edie laughed shakily. She could tell that her dad was being funny on purpose, to try and calm her down.
“Don’t worry, Edie. We’ll manage. And it’s wonderful that you and Layla found them. I honestly didn’t think that you would. See you in ten.”
“Bye. Thanks, Dad.” Edie handed the phone back to Layla with a sigh of relief. “He’s going to come and catch them, and take them to a shelter.” Then she glanced around, pulling a face. “And then he’ll know we went inside this falling-down old shed. Maybe he won’t mind because we were so clever and found the kittens.”
Layla rolled her eyes. “I know… I’ve probably lost all my pocket money for about a month. But it was worth it.”
Barbie stood up with her paws on the side of her box, mewing hopefully at Edie’s dad. It was only a little while since she’d been fed, but she was wide awake and wanted to get out of the box. She could hear him moving around, opening and shutting the door that led into the garage, and then the squeak of the door to the fridge.
She mewed again, a sharp, demanding squeak. If Edie had been there, she would have come running to see what was the matter. She would have picked her up, and petted her and let her play on the kitchen floor, patting bottle tops around and climbing all over her lap. Edie’s dad was ignoring her.
Barbie scrabbled at the side of the box and sank her claws into the thick cardboard. It was a new box, bigger than her first one, and it had taller sides. But if she tried hard enough… Determinedly, she hopped and hauled herself up to the edge and mewed, half-scared, half-triumphant as she wobbled on the side of the box.
Edie’s dad looked round and saw her, just as she scrambled and jumped to the kitchen floor. “Perfect,” he murmured, scooping her up and popping her back in. “Just when I have to go and rescue the rest of your family, you decide it’s time to learn how to escape from your box. Brilliant timing, kitten. Sorry, but I’m not taking you with me. No, don’t just climb out again!”
But Barbie was already climbing up the side of the box and Edie’s dad looked around the kitchen, trying to work out if there was anything she could hurt herself on if he left her. There weren’t any gaps she could get stuck in and there was no way she could get out of the doors. With a sigh, he grabbed a piece of paper and some Sellotape and scribbled a quick note to warn Edie’s mum:
Free range kitten!
Then he closed the kitchen door behind him and taped it up where she’d see it before she opened the door.
“Dad!” Edie waved as she saw the car bumping down the lane that led the long way round back to their house. She pointed to the overgrown yard in front of the sheds, but her dad stopped the car in the lane instead.
“I’ll leave it here, I don’t reckon anyone’s going to be coming past and I don’t want to scare the cat any more. Where is she?” he added, as he got a wire crate out of the back of the car and a bag of food to bait it with.
“They’re all inside this shed.” Edie pulled him into the yard and across to the doorway.
“This isn’t the kind of place you two should be exploring,” Edie’s dad pointed out, glancing around and then eyeing the two girls.
“I know – and we never would usually…” Edie said apologetically and Layla nodded.
“We only meant to look round the door…” she said.
“And then we saw the kittens,” added Edie. “They’re gorgeous, Dad, look.”
Edie’s dad peered cautiously through the doorway and smiled. “Three of them, right? They’re all walking around now. I can’t see the mum, though.”
“I know, after we called you, we went on watching them from the door – the mum kept picking the kittens up in her mouth and putting them down again, and then she disappeared into this pile of old boxes and stuff at the back of the shed. That was a few minutes ago. Now the kittens are starting to wake up and mew, and one of them’s wandering round the shed crying for her but she hasn’t come back.”
“There are lots of holes in the walls,” Layla put in. “She could have gone without us seeing her. Maybe we just scared her off and she’s left.”
Edie swallowed hard. “What if we made her leave all her kittens behind?”
Behind a pile of old wooden crates, the black cat sat shivering. She didn’t know what to do. She was
desperately hungry and she could smell food, just there, so close… But her kittens! The talking and scuffling and banging must mean danger for them, and she couldn’t get close enough to pick up even one of them and run. She would wait. She had to, even though it made her whiskers itch with fear.
And all the time there was that delicious smell of food. If only she could eat, she would be able to feed the kittens better. She could even bite off some little bits of food for them, too. It was time they were learning… Perhaps she could just get close enough to snatch the food and run? But she could still hear the voices, rising higher. Her ears flattened back and she squirmed away, closer to the wall.
“I don’t think the mother cat would leave her kittens,” Edie’s dad said gently, putting his arm round Edie’s shoulders to hug her. “She’s probably just a bit spooked by you two turning up. Don’t panic.”
“Should we put the kittens in the cage?” Edie asked. “Maybe that would tempt her to come and look, too… Or it might just scare her off.” She sighed.
“It’s tricky to know,” her dad agreed. “Show me where you think she went.”
Edie and Layla crept back into the shed, and Edie’s dad laughed at the three kittens. The ginger boy was sitting on the sacks, making loud squeaky mews, obviously wanting his mother to come back and feed him. But the two tortoiseshell girls were stomping about the shed, batting at bits of straw. Then they both decided that they wanted the same tiny piece of stick, and pounced on it. One of the kittens whipped it from her sister, who jumped on top of her, trying to wrestle it away.
“Typical.” Edie’s dad shook his head. “Naughty torties.”
“What?” Edie stared at him.
