The Haystack

by Jack Lasenby

  “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.”

  Chapter Twelve

  White Hills, Brown Roads, and Soggy Silver Beet; Why Dad Tapped the Back of His Head; and the Name of the Black Shadow.

  BUSY 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 un
der. 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.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Why Mr Bryce Tried to Look Hurt, Why Freddy Jones Ran Bawling For His Mummy, and Why You Wash Sultanas.

  MILLY ATE THE MINCE, drank the milk, used the dirt box, and jumped back on the foot of my bed, licked herself and wriggled till she woke me. Then she slept while we had breakfast.

  “What about when I go down to the shops?”

  “She’ll be fine.” Dad put on his bicycle clips. “Tip her dirt box on the compost heap, and fill it up from the potato patch. Make sure she’s got something to drink. She’ll probably sleep while you’re doing the shopping.”

  “She slept all night, woke me this morning, and went back to sleep again.”

  “Cats do that.”

  “Are you going to read us some more Mowgli tonight?”

  “We’ll see. Keep the door and windows closed. Back at midday.” The gate clicked.

  He’d folded a sheet of newspaper and tied it to the end of a piece of string. Milly saw it when she came out. She leapt on it, lay on her back and clawed it, bit it, held it between her front paws and rolled over and over, ripping it with her hind claws.

  I washed and dried the breakfast dishes, and she rubbed against my legs. She chased the broom as I swept the kitchen. When the paper train whistled nine o’clock, I was tipping her box on the compost heap. I put in clean dirt, whipped inside the back door, and closed it before she could get out.

  I swept up some dirt, and she tussled with the broom again, eyes glaring. When I thought Mr Barker would have sorted the mail, and Mr Bryce would have written the names on the papers, I tied the torn bit of newspaper so it dangled from the light cord. Milly was lying on my bed, grey fur and black stripes dappled with sunlight coming through the lemon tree, as I closed the back door and ran.

  Mr Barker gave me a letter for Dad and asked, “How’s the kitten?” As I trotted past the billiard saloon, Mrs Doleman asked, “What have you called your kitten?” And Mrs Besant said, “I hear you’ve got a kitten.” She wrapped the bread and popped it into my basket. “That’s nice.

  “I’ve got a kitten,” I called, going into the butcher’s. Several people waiting laughed, and Mr Cleaver said, “I’ve put in some scraps”, and gave me our parcel.

  The Kelly girl handed me the paper. “I remember when I got a kitten,” she said. “Did yours make a mess on the floor? Mine did, and Mum made me clean it up myself.”

  “Dad filled a box with dirt,” I said, “and Milly used it last night. She’s a girl.”

  “Here. Two boiled lollies.”

  “Thank you, but I haven’t got any bottles to swap.”

  “They’re a present,” said Mr Bryce.

  “Not on tick?” I asked, because he’d trapped me that way before. He shook his head and tried to look hurt, so I’d feel sorry for him, but I knew him now. He was as bad as Dad.

  He pushed his glasses up on top of his head. “A present for the new kitten.”

  “Thank you, Mr Bryce, When she’s grown up, my kitten’s going to fix the big rat in the back shed. It hid in the wheat barrel and, when Dad took off the lid, it stood up, shook its fist, and wanted to fight him.” I grabbed the lollies, grinned at Mr Bryce, and tore out, straight into Mrs Dainty.

  “Oof! Running round corners again.”

  “Mrs Dainty, I buttered her paws like you said, and it worked. And Dad said to say thank you.” I ran again.

  “We say ‘as’, not ‘like’,” Mrs Dainty called after me. “Like is not a conjunction.”

  “Hoy! Maggie!” It was the Kelly girl, holding up my basket. I’d forgotten it with Dad’s letter, the bread, the meat, and the paper, but I had Mr Bryce’s boiled lollies in my hand.

  “Some people would forget their head, if it wasn’t screwed on,” a sharp voice said somewhere, but I was running again.

  Freddy Jones was playing on the path. “I’ve got a kitten,” I told him.

  “Huh. Our cat had kittens, so I put them in a sack with a brick and chucked them into a bucket of water.”

  “Look at that.” I opened my eyes wide.

  “Look at what?” Freddy Jones picked up his cotton-reel tractor and wound the rubber.

  “That.” I kept staring and pointing. “That dent in the dirt, where your tractor tipped over…”

  “Just an old footprint.”

  “Not just any old footprint.” I stretched my eyes like Milly’s, and made my mouth round like Choral Speaking. “That’s a tiger’s footprint. Shere Khan’s.”

  Freddy Jones stared at it, dropped his tractor, and backed away. “You’re not supposed to scare me; I’ll have nightmares.”

  “I heard Shere Khan last night. That roar he makes when he’s hungry.”

  “I’m going to tell my mother on you.”

  “Tonight, after you’ve gone to bed, you’ll hear him trying to get in your window. Shere Khan eats man cubs. And then there’s Bagheera.” I wrinkled up my nose, snarled, and showed my claws. “He’s a black panther, and he eats more boys than Shere Khan.”

  I turned and ran as Freddy’s gate clicked. “Mum!” he bawled.

  I climbed on the bed and curled myself around Milly, and she went on sleeping.
I almost slept myself, then remembered the meat needed putting in the safe, and the twelve o’clock whistle would be going soon. I lifted myself off, not disturbing her, put the meat in the safe, the bread in the bin, the paper on the table, and stood Dad’s letter against the alarm clock on the mantelpiece.

  I pulled out the damper, tipped on some coal to get the fire going again, put the kettle over the ring so it started to sing, and had another look at Milly.

  The factory whistle had hardly finished blowing before Dad was leaning his bike against the back shed.

  “Where is she?”

  “Miaow!”

  “She doesn’t do that for me…”

  “It’s only because she hasn’t seen me since this morning.”

  “Dad, everybody asked me about Milly, and Mr Bryce gave me a couple of boiled lollies, and I tore out of the shop and butted my head into Mrs Dainty.”

  “I hope you told her you’re sorry.”

  “Mmm, but she said like’s not a conjunction and something about people forgetting to screw their heads on.

  “Where’s my boiled lolly?”

  “You never let me eat boiled lollies for lunch.”

  Like Mr Bryce, Dad used to be good at making me feel bad. Not any more. He tried crying, but I just laughed and made him a cup of tea, and we had the leftover mince on toast, while Milly played with the tattered bit of paper. Then Dad had another cup of tea, read his letter, and had a look at the Herald.

  “Do you want to read the ‘Supplement’?” he asked, but I was doing the dishes, then I wiped the table around him till he shifted the paper, and I swept the floor, taking care to bump his feet with the broom till he got up and said he might just have a look at the garden.

  That afternoon, Dad did the washing. “It’ll dry overnight, and I can bring it in tomorrow.”

  “You don’t do the washing on a Saturday, specially not Sunday. You’re supposed to do it first thing on a Monday.”

  “It’ll be raining by Monday. Besides, I’m not getting up early to do the washing before I go to work, just because of a lot of—” I knew what he’d been going to say.