Trooper

by Forrest Bryant Johnson

  The fox was waiting, but he had been joined by two black cats. Neither appeared concerned with the other, so I joined the group with the chicken. The cats, one very small with long hair, resembled a Persian; the other, shorthaired, had a white mark on her chest like a marquise diamond. They waited patiently for the foxes to carry off some chicken and then quickly ate the remaining pieces.

  I reached to pet the cats, but they backed away.

  “Where did they come from?” Chi inquired.

  “Don’t know,” I replied. “They are both females. The closest home is almost a mile past ours. Someone must have dropped them off. Someone who no longer wanted them.”

  “Dropped them off? That’s horrible! How could someone be so cruel to just desert them way out here in the middle of nowhere?”

  “People sometimes do horrible things to animals. The cat learns to depend on someone, exchanges lots of love and affection for food and shelter, only to be tossed out like garbage. I doubt if they’ll ever trust humans again. I worry that these cats will hang around here, expecting their humans to return someday. They’ll starve or coyotes will get them.”

  “Could we take them home?”

  “I don’t think I can catch them. Even if I did, how will Trooper behave towards them?”

  “How about the animal-rescue people?”

  “We could call them, but by the time they get around to this area it will be too late.”

  “Then what can we do?”

  “Well, we can bring food and water tomorrow, and try to come up with a plan.”

  Walking away from the cats, I felt good about what we were doing. At least we could keep the girls well fed until we had a solution. These were not “outside” cats, judging from the condition of their coats. At least, at one time, they had been well cared for. But even if we fed them, there was still the worry of coyotes.

  The kit fox, on the other hand, had little to fear from the coyote. The fox’s speed closely matched that of the coyote, and like the jackrabbit, its ability to run and bound over bushes using a zigzag fashion quickly tired the larger predator. Perhaps because of those qualities, coyotes seldom pursue a fox.

  I found it interesting that during those nights of feeding, the fox and cats never bothered one another. I fed them a few yards apart and they indicated no interest in the others’ food.

  A week into feeding the cats, events began to unfold in that section of the desert which, at first, concerned me for the survival of the animals. But in the long run, it provided a solution to the problem. One night during this week, I noticed a few wooden stakes with ribbons attached at the top near the road’s edge. I knew, at once, that the area was being surveyed. I passed the feeding area the following afternoon and my heart sank. A large manufactured home on wheels sat only twenty yards from the grove of pine trees. One man with blueprints rolled and held tightly under his arm stood near the creatures’ home, talking to another who was wearing a yellow construction helmet.

  I stopped my car and walked directly towards the men.

  “Hi!” I said. “Sorry to interrupt you fellows. I live about a mile down this road. I’m curious. You getting ready to build something here?”

  The men were friendly and gave me a brief description of their company’s plans for the old golf course. They had been discussing preparations to level the area for a major real estate development, just as my neighbor, Jim, predicted the year before.

  “When is all this work to begin?” I inquired.

  “Equipment should arrive tomorrow,” he said, “and work will begin a day later.”

  I wished them good luck and departed.

  I don’t remember driving that last mile home. I was locked in deep thought about fate of the cats and the little foxes. Would they be crushed in their dens by heavy earth-moving equipment?

  That night we stopped to feed the animals as usual. The foxes were there, but no cats. I shone my flashlight beam into the pine trees in hopes they might be hiding there. No cats.

  Lights inside the construction cabin for the manufactured home came on, and a man, dressed in gray overalls, appeared in the doorway.

  “What are you doing here?” the man shouted as he started towards me.

  “I live down this road,” I replied. “I’ve lost two black cats! Have you seen them?”

  “Cats? No. I’m the night watchman for this project. I ain’t seen no cats. Sorry.”

  I thanked him, apologized for disturbing his rest, and returned to the car.

  “The black cats are gone, aren’t they?” Chi asked.

  “We’ll try again tomorrow night. Maybe they’re hiding. I left food for them.”

  The next night a large bulldozer sat a short distance from the cabin. The equipment had sliced a wide path through the desert, ripping up sagebrush and mesquite along the way. Now they were silent monsters in the moonlight, waiting for the sun to continue their destruction.

  The fox did not come to eat. Neither did the cats. The food I left the night before was untouched. We waited, without speaking, for a little over an hour. Then Chi began to cry.

  “They’re never coming back!” she sniffled. “This construction work frightened them.”

  “Yes,” I said softly.

  “But . . . there is no water out there. They will die with no water!”

  “The fox will be OK,” I said. “They’ll find a new place to hunt. They don’t need water.”

  “But the black cats need water! Do they have any chance at all?”

  I handed her a Kleenex. I could not bring myself to answer.

  “We tried,” I said.

  CHAPTER 12

  The Fox Knows

  “The cat has absolute emotional honesty. Human beings may hide their feelings, a cat does not.”

  Ernest Hemingway

  FOR ME, THE BEST CURE for melancholy is to get busy and bury myself in work. But sadness over the apparent loss of the two black cats sunk my wife into depression that proved hard to shake. Maybe, I thought, the solution to that problem would come once the day’s work unfolded at the office.

  Teri greeted me with something strange the moment I entered the office.

  “Good morning, Dad. Before you get started on anything, you have to know what Trooper is up to.”

  “What?”

  “Herman says that . . . Trooper has cats cornered in the big culvert pipe. The one which goes under the road.”

  At first the announcement didn’t sound like anything important. Then I remembered we had had no cat visitors since our move to the ranch.

  “He didn’t attack them, did he?”

  “No,” she replied. “Herman says he’s just sitting there, keeping them from coming out of the pipe. He is not in the gully. He’s looking down on them from the edge above.”

  A thought flashed through my mind. I must admit, this was an element of hope for an impossibility.

  “Did Herman say what color those cats are?”

  “He said there are two cats, both black. Why?” She glanced with a puzzled look, having not really expected me to show this much interest.

  I started to the door, turned, and gave an order.

  “Call Chi. Tell her to meet me at that spot, where the culvert goes under the road. Tell her to bring a can of wet cat food, one of those Trooper doesn’t like.”

  “You gonna feed those cats?”

  “I think I know the cats,” I responded with a big smile.

  “Herman says they are small. Don’t let Trooper hurt them, okay Dad?”

  “Don’t worry, I won’t.”

  On the way out the door I met Herman returning to the office.

  “Trooper still have those cats cornered?”

  “Yep. He was there a few moments ago.”

  “He fighting with them?”

  “Not at all! They were just looking at each other. No sound. Like they’re thinking about something. Trooper on high ground.”

  “Thanks. See ya later!”

  Once a
gain I wondered if cats communicate through some form of mental telepathy as they sit, facing each other, for considerable time. Perhaps they try to reach our cluttered minds, only to give up in frustration and resort to body movements, tail positions, and familiar cat sounds.

  I reached the edge of the gully and sat down next to Trooper, whose attention was fixed on the culvert. Inside the pipe’s entrance crouched two black cats, staring back at us.

  I sighed with relief. The cats were the same ones that had disappeared from the feeding area, a mile away.

  The pipe where they had apparently been resting for two days was large enough for an average man, walking upright, to pass through with little problem. The purpose of the pipe was to funnel rain water under the road, protecting the asphalt above from flood damage. Although the Vegas Valley area receives only two to four inches of rain a year, when the rain does come, it can be very heavy, rolling across the desert floor and into gullies such as the one bordering our property. The water then moves rapidly through the gullies, then overflowing its banks. But we’d had no recent rain and the sand along the bottom of the pipe was dry.

  I stroked Trooper’s back. He seemed very tense, but purred anyway. No doubt he was curious about the black cats’ intentions. Where did they come from? Why are they here? Are they after my food? All the usual questions that must run through the mind of a cat.

  Of course, he had no fear of the visitors, being three times their size.

  “Oh my goodness!” Chi exclaimed as she reached my side. “I can’t believe it. This is a true miracle!”

  “Really is,” I added, sharing in her happiness.

  “I’m so relieved. How did they find us?”

  “I think they knew where we lived from the beginning,” I answered. “They knew the direction from the sound of the car engine. They heard the car stop. It’s almost a mile, but flat. Nothing between here and their feeding spot. Even with their short legs it wasn’t such a long journey for cats.”

  “I hope Trooper didn’t harm them. Did he?” Her question was followed by the pop sound as she opened the can of cat food. She held the can for Trooper to smell. He turned his head away.

  “Trooper hasn’t bothered them. He’s curious. I guess in cat talk he’s asking them what they are doing here.”

  Chi giggled at my explanation.

  I began to explain to Trooper that we were going to feed the visitors and I wanted the three of them to be friends.

  According to Herman, the cat standoff had begun at dawn, and it showed no signs of stopping on its own; Trooper had no intention of backing away from his guard position and the black cats had no alternative but to continue to wait in the entrance of the pipe.

  I decided to take action and placed the opened can in front of us.

  “Come on, girls! This is for you.”

  Nothing moved.

  “OK, Chiaki. You too, Trooper. Let’s go to the house.”

  We began to walk away, and to my surprise, Trooper followed. The standoff had ended.

  Moments after we moved, the black cats, who probably had not eaten for two days or even longer, scampered out of the gully and took turns at the can of food.

  I slowed my pace and glanced over my shoulder. The two cats were following. Chi and I continued onto the front porch and sat on the top step. Trooper was coming to join us, but in traditional Trooper fashion, was going at his own pace and was in no hurry. He paused now and then to sniff at a leaf or some little thing that attracted his attention. I knew his delaying tactic was to keep the cats at a distance, for when he paused, they stopped as well.

  They were about fifteen feet away when Trooper decided it was time for an official introduction. He strolled slowly to the cats, who, despite Trooper’s size, did not appear intimidated. They briefly touched noses, then he came and sat down beside me. I wasn’t sure how to interpret his gesture, but it obviously was not aggressive. Perhaps they could be friends?

  I told my cat that we intended to feed the black cats and they would remain outside until we found them a good home. I guess he understood my intentions because I had already fed them. I knew that Trooper would establish rules and restrictions, as all male cats usually do.

  I gradually gave up all hope of companionship between the three felines, as Trooper never accepted the girls as friends, only tolerated them. But we also were to learn that my decision to keep the girls for a while was one of the best decisions I ever made. They would soon play an important role in Trooper’s life and, in the process, earn our respect.

  I felt a sadness for the cats. They elected to leave their feeding area, forced from it by the construction crews, and gambled to seek safety with us. We were their only hope for survival. They had no way of knowing if we would accept them or turn them out. They had obviously been treated cruelly by the people before. They gave up hope that those evil people would ever return, and now placed their lives in our hands. They were lucky. We are an animal-loving home, and perhaps they sensed that.

  So we moved ahead with a plan for the pair to live on the property, at least for a while, until we could find them a loving home. This would continue to be a delicate balance. We needed to care for the girls, but not make Trooper jealous in the process. We gave them both praise and attention, but not when Trooper was near. He always needed to know he remained “top cat; number one!”

  Chi suggested I not use the expression “number one” as it might imply that there was a number two or three. She recommended I use “only one” instead. So to make my wife happy I said to Trooper, “You’re the only one!” I believe he simply enjoyed any attention and never appeared concerned for his position.

  With Trooper’s careful inspection, we placed bowls in the shade along the north edge of the driveway, about thirty feet from the front porch—one for water, another for wet food, and a third filled with dry food.

  Herman constructed a “cat house” large enough for a big dog, in which we folded an old blanket for the cats’ comfort. The house was placed in the shade, a few feet from the food bowls. In all the months the pair lived with us I never noticed them sleeping inside their house, but they did make good use of its slanted roof, which was about four feet above the ground. From that position they safely watched our activity while resting.

  Trooper permitted the mother and baby to roam about the property at night, and even let them enter our office through his cat door. They especially appreciated this generosity on those rare nights when it rained. In the morning, before we humans arrived at work, Trooper evicted them and they retreated to shelter in a corner of our front porch.

  In order to make them feel even more welcome, we officially gave the pair names: the Persian-looking cat was Mama and the shorthaired one, Baby (I don’t think they were actually related).

  They came close to us almost every day, but we could not touch them. Any attempt resulted in them backing away. I wasn’t surprised by this behavior, considering they must have been traumatized by their previous experiences.

  As the two explored the property, I noticed they seemed fascinated with the area to the east, the patch that was cluttered with old farm equipment. Perhaps they felt comfortable in that area, for it was seldom explored by Trooper, or so I had believed.

  On hot days Trooper permitted the two to rest under the roof of our portico and on the front porch, and paid no attention to them once they fell asleep.

  During those lazy summer days, the sounds of earth-moving equipment leveling the desert a mile to the north reminded us that all evidence of the old golf course was disappearing. Soon the noise of hammers and electric saws announced the construction of new homes.

  During those first few days after the pair arrived, the construction noise intensified and my wife expressed concern for the animals left behind. I did my best to convince her that the jackrabbit cleared out before the first bulldozer moved dirt, and the fox family quickly followed.

  “The fox is smart,” I assured her. “They’ve gone to a safer
place.”

  “Where?” she pushed.

  “Deep in the desert, south of here. There is plenty of open desert to the south where they can hunt.”

  And that was how, on the fourth day after we adopted the two, a very unusual event occurred which set my wife’s mind at ease.

  It started with me observing the cats as they followed Trooper about the property on his daily routine inspection. They maintained a distance between themselves and the big cat, and when he stopped, they stopped. When he investigated a tree or bush they waited for him to move on, and then they copied the inspection.

  Some who observed this activity would conclude that Trooper requested their company, but knowing my friend, I doubt he did. He was simply demonstrating his system of inspection and the black cats followed, of course, curious and wanting to learn just what Trooper had planned next

  Early evening the same day brought an exciting surprise. We finished dinner and decided to stay home to watch the sun sink behind the Spring Mountain’s dark silhouette on the western horizon.

  Teri closed the office and called on the two-way radio to tell me there were letters on my desk needing my signature. A minute later, Herman radioed that he was conducting his final check of the property.

  We opened the front doors and stood, whispering how peaceful our world was at the moment. The distant call of quail scampering to their nest broke the silence. Then the sound faded away.

  I was about to turn off my radio and place it in its charger when Herman’s voice came through once again.

  “Mr. Johnson! Dogs in yard, playing with Trooper!”

  Chi and I glanced at each other, our faces reflecting the same question. What dogs? No dogs had visited our ranch before. Then I felt a chill. Could they be coyotes!

  I spoke into the radio.

  “Herman! Did you say playing? Not fighting?”

  “Playing!” came the fast reply. “Chasing each other. Dogs much smaller than Trooper.”

  “Where?”

  “Front yard, near the road.”

  We could not see ourselves what Herman was reporting because the trees in the front yard blocked our view. We left the porch and started down the driveway towards the road. I heard no growling or cat screams that would indicate a fight was under way. We joined Herman.