By the fourth day, the cat was prowling the basement, walking haltingly but impatiently between the stacks of books and comics, the boxes of mail and cassettes, of pictures and of gifts and of stuff. He mewed at me to let him out and, reluctantly, I did so.
He went back onto the porch, and slept there for the rest of the day.
The next morning there were deep, new gashes in his flanks, and clumps of black cat-hair-his-covered the wooden boards of the porch.
Letters arrived that day from my daughter, telling us that Camp was going better, and she thought she could survive a few days; my son and his friend sorted out their problem, although what the argument was about-trading cards, computer games, Star Wars or A Girl-I would never learn. The BBC Executive who had vetoed Lud in the Mist was discovered to have been taking bribes (well, “questionable loans”) from an independent production company, and was sent home on permanent leave; his successor, I was delighted to learn when she faxed me, was the woman who had initially proposed the project to me before leaving the BBC.
I thought about returning the Black Cat to the basement, but decided against it. Instead, I resolved to try and discover what kind of animal was coming to our house each night, and from there to formulate a plan of action-to trap it, perhaps.
For birthdays and at Christmas my family gives me gadgets and gizmos, pricy toys which excite my fancy but, ultimately, rarely leave their boxes.