Two rabbits shot past me, closer than a rabbit would normally come to a cat, and fled up the track, their tails bobbing. Wood pigeons with their loud, flappy wings were flying out of the trees in a panic. The deer sped past, scudding as if blown by the wind, their dark eyes afraid. Bewildered, I stayed by the oak tree, watching more and more creatures fleeing.
When I identified the smell of fear, I climbed the oak tree and crouched up there.
The first gunshot was so close that I nearly fell out of the tree in fright. It was followed by a volley of shooting, the bangs so loud that the shock of them jolted the delicate bones of my skull. My ears hurt and hurt and I began to tremble all over. I wished I’d found a safe hole, not this very public oak tree.
More shots, and more, and to my horror I saw a pheasant falling out of the sky, somersaulting horribly, its bright wings flailing. It crashed to the floor close to my tree, and then, even worse, a brown-and-white dog came leaping through the bracken, its tail wagging manically. With elaborate care it picked up the dying bird and carried it away.
The shooting went on and on. Death had come to the wood; the wild creatures who had made it their home were being blown out of the sky. Terrified and upset, I clung to the oak tree and tried not to move. Two men came striding up the track, and I smelled blood. Hanging from their belts were dead pheasants and dead rabbits, swinging limp and upside down, their feet cruelly tied together.
What if they did that to me? The dogs had smelled me. One of them ran round and round the tree, looking up at me and barking.
‘What’s up there?’ The two men stopped under the tree. They peered up at me. I saw the glint of their eyes and their auras were a grubby red.
‘It’s a cat!’ said the younger man, and his eyes narrowed. ‘Bloody feral cats. I hate ’em.’ He raised his gun and pointed it at me. I stared down at him. He clicked something and his eyes squinted along the shining metal at me.
‘No!’ cried the other man, and he raised his arm and knocked the gun sideways. ‘Don’t shoot the poor devil. He might be someone’s lost cat.’
I heard kindness in the voice of this leathery man who had dead birds and rabbits hanging from his belt. I did what came naturally to me. I meowed at him. He looked pleased.‘There you are, he’s friendly,’ he said. ‘Feral cats do not meow at people.’ I meowed again, louder. I wanted to tell him how frightened I was, and how I was a cat on a journey.
‘What are you doing so far from home, puss?’ he asked. ‘Are you lost?’
His concern touched my heart and I did an extended-meow which echoed into the tree. At the same time I eyeballed the dog who whined and retreated behind his master’s legs. Once I’d done that, I wanted to make contact with this man who shot birds but had a heart. I worked my way down to a lower branch and walked along it, nicely, with my tail up.
‘My missus would love you,’ he said, and even though I was tatty and had burrs in my fur, he added, ‘Aren’t you beautiful?’
My spirits soared. This man was going to help me, I knew it. The words of the Spirit Lion came back to me. Be smart, he’d said. We touched noses, and I had him.
‘You need a bit of TLC, old fella,’ he said, and turned to the younger man who’d been going to shoot me. ‘You take the dogs down and put them in the truck. I’ll bring the cat, if he’ll come.’
‘You’re not seriously going to catch a scruffy old thing like that, Alf,’ protested the younger man, clipping a lead onto Alf’s dog. ‘Look at him. He’s a flea bag.’
Alf sighed.‘It’s payback time,’ he said, patting the orange-red plumage of the dead pheasants that hung from his belt. ‘You should try it some time.’
‘You’re an old softie.’ The young man shrugged and set off, laden with his dead birds and his guns. ‘See ya.’
Alf sat down heavily at the foot of the oak tree. He unclipped the dead pheasants and laid them on the grass. The gunman’s footsteps faded, and peace settled back into the forest. Tiny movements restarted in the leaves and branches, a robin hopping, the twitch of a mouse’s whiskers as he peeped from his hole in the grass. A green woodpecker flew down into the turf and stabbed at an ants’ nest with his red-rimmed beak.
Alf didn’t move. He didn’t invite me down or look at me. He just sat, with his blue eyes on the distant hills and trees. He didn’t shoot the woodpecker, but seemed to be enjoying his company.
Observing Alf from my branch, I saw that his aura was not such a grubby red colour now. It was filling with light, the kind of light a wise old soul would have around him … blue, white and gold. He looked up at me.‘You coming down, puss?’ he asked, and waited until I felt confident that the guns and dogs had gone and we were alone on the golden road. Cautiously I climbed down, eager for a cuddle with Alf. He was the first human I’d been close to for weeks.