Better to leave well alone

Better to leave well alone

Do you believe in resurrection? I don’t mean as an article of faith, or in a metaphorical sense, or even in the macabre way you see in horror movies, I mean literally. I have seen the dead walk in broad daylight. It was both a pleasant surprise and deeply unsettling. Let me tell you about it.

I don’t know if anyone ever owns a cat. We have a cat that visits us periodically and allows us to feed her. She also allows us to open doors and condescends to sleep on a chair by the fireside. The neighbours on one side call her “Blackie” and we, showing no imagination at all, simply call her “Cat”.

Cat is plump, sleek and black. She has thick, shiny fur with a white star, or spot on her belly. She lives her own life. She comes in and out at times she chooses and woe betide the servant who does not open the door or bring sustenance when she requires it, because she is complains loudly.

The other day I was returning home from business. As I turned into my drive I noticed a black bundle lying motionless in the road a little beyond my house. As it wasn’t far away, I parked my car and walked back. There, lying motionless in the road was Cat, dead, the victim of a road accident. I prodded her corpse with the toe of my boot. There she lay, not apparently injured but motionless: fur dishevelled and slick with the drizzle, green eyes sightless and dull, beauty broken. Saddened, I turned back to the house wondering what to do.

I’m not particularly sentimental, but it seemed improper to leave her there on the road to be ground into the tarmac like refuse. I went to the garage, put on a fluorescent jerkin and picked up a shovel. Then I returned the 25 yards or so to the body, slid the shovel under it and lifted it up. There isn’t much weight in a cat. I could tell from the way the shovel slid under her body that rigor mortis was setting in.

The question now was: what to do with her? I rested the shovel, with Cat, on the top of a boundary wall while I considered what to do. This wasn’t something I had planned at all. I suppose I had intended to carry the body home and bury her in the garden, but that would have required digging a grave and the ground is stony. Instead, I waited for a break in the traffic and crossed to the other side where a small copse separates the field beyond from the road. Placing Cat on the verge, I reached down into the ditch and scraped a hollow with the shovel. I placed the body into the hole and dragged the autumn leaves across to cover it. It was the shallowest of shallow graves. There were no prayers and no tears but I felt melancholy as I trudged home in the light rain.

Imagine my surprise when, as I walked down the drive, out from behind my car walked Cat! She marched up to me and rubbed herself against my legs, mewing loudly. As the drizzle was turning to rain, I opened the back door and she swept past me while I turned to the garage to put the shovel away. On my return indoors I found Cat in her usual station, on the chair by the fireplace. She watched me as I laid the kindling and lit the fire. All the time she had that look, which said: “Where have you been? Hurry up! It’s cold outside and I need the fire. And by the way – Where’s my tea?”

What had happened? Obviously there had been another cat which looked very similar to our Cat. It was this second, unknown cat which had been killed, and which I had buried. Except of course, there is room for another explanation.

When my wife returned home I told her what had happened. All the time we were being watched by Cat. My wife said: “Don’t you remember? Siobhan (one of my daughters) sprinkled the cat with Lourdes water.” And that was true. There was the tiny bottle of water, sitting on the kitchen table, and there was Cat, sitting on the chair beside the fire, washing herself.

So now there is the tiniest doubt in my mind. It seems just barely possible that I have been witness to a minor miracle and Cat has been granted an additional lease on life. I suppose I could try and put the conflicting explanations to the test, but the rational side of me has no wish to go digging for in a ditch for a corpse, and the part of me that hopes for miracles is reluctant to look, afraid of what I might, or might not, find. Sometimes it is better to leave well alone.

 (20th November 2016 – 825 words)