Toodles

Henry had set up camp renting old Mrs. Matches’ three huts in the bush-covered property her husband had named Goblin Woods many years before. The first hut (kitchen hut) had a coal range for cooking, a couch and a hole had been cut in one wall to add on a square of corrugated iron that housed a draughty shower. The middle hut had a peaked roof and was empty, so Henry used it to work on his possum skins. He could hang three hundred in there to air dry, tacked to pieces of 4 x 1 timber and hung in the ceiling. The third hut had his bed and a couple of second hand sets of drawers to store some clothes. He did have a dirty clothes pile in one corner, which on ‘out of the blue’ occasions he searched through for something clean enough to wear.

Henry heard rats in the ceiling of the kitchen hut, mostly after dark when he sat beside the warm coal range reading and listening to the radio. Sometimes it sounded like they were playing a football match up there. Mrs. Matches had complained about the plague of rats too, assuming they had run out of nuts from under the hazelnut trees up the hill. Henry dealt to the rats but Mrs. Matches’ conversation with Bert’s wife was the reason Bert wanted to give Henry a kitten. Well, that’s what he said, Bert was a hard as nails and he reckoned if you wanted to nail is hide to the wall, you’d have to sharpen the nails first!  But Henry knew him to be soft! Their mother cat had a litter of kittens, and old Bert wasn’t at all keen to knock any of the unwanted kittens on the head!

Henry had no choice!  Bert brought the kitten around mumbling, as he did with his pipe still in his mouth, that the animal would keep the vermin down and keeping it would please Mrs. Matches! So like it or not, Henry had a kitten to care for! There was never milk in Henry’s fridge, he was weaned at an early age so had no need for lactose, and anyway, Toodles never had the trappings of household pets. He was brought up on the scrapings of fat and meat from fleshing the possum skins. Henry encouraged Toodles to catch mice, but trained him not to eat them because ‘mice carry stomach worms, that are transferable from cats to people’.

They did have mice catching competitions!  Beside the coal range there was a mouse hole where Henry scattered pieces of water biscuit. He would sit on his chair reading while Toodles sat there eyeing the hole, when a mouse popped out, Henry slashed at it with his long carving knife! Toodles quickly learned to wait for the knife-strike before he lunged, usually if the knife missed, the mouse would run out, rather than retreat. Henry reckoned on average it was a fifty/fifty split. Toodles didn’t seem to have an opinion.

Henry’s life changed a bit after he bought a property on the hill, and renovated the house. His new missus wasn’t too keen about Toddles’ muddy prints on the bedspread, so he was given the boot, no longer welcome inside! But Henry still had another possum hut and he made Toodles welcome and comfortable in there.

Toodles was never into the affection bit of being patted, he would take a little from Henry, then walk off, tail in the air proudly showing he was an Otago cat. All cats have the O for Otago!

The cat always followed Henry around the farm, which included down to the river, but he was also inclined to forage on his own. One day he came back unhappy, with a large fishhook sticking out of his cheek. How he managed that Henry could only speculate but speculation would have to wait because the big cat became a lion in defense of that hook!

Toodles wasn’t at all keen about being stuffed into a cardboard box and was prepared to take Henry’s hand off to prevent going in, but eventually to lid was closed and a string tied. Henry suggested to the vet that he castrate Toodles while he was out to it on anesthetic. It seemed the right thing to do at the time! The cat took umbrage, because once at home, as soon as he woke and could walk, he disappeared.

Henry moved on in life and among other things he caught a feral black kitten that had set up camp under the possum hut! It was only half tame when he introduced it to his boys, who more or less of finished the job. Unimaginatively Henry named the cat after its colour and the boys generally left him alone because Black did not take kindly to ear tugging, tail pulling, or eye poking! Black just patrolled the property, regularly bringing half eaten rabbits home – they too are harbourers of worms, so regular dosing went on for Henry and his family.

There was a meowing at the door that Henry recognized. Four years after his departure Toodles had returned, taking ownership of the place as if he hadn’t been away. The pecking order was quickly established with Black at the bottom but after the initial cat conversation, the two cats were mates. Toodles didn’t know the boys and he wouldn’t allow them to touch him but he picked up from where he left off by following Henry wherever he went on the farm. Even if he went on his farm bike, Toodles would eventually find him.

Toodles lived on to the age of sixteen years, outliving Black, he remained ever aloof and ever faithful, enjoying the possum seasons. Purring to the radio and sitting close to Henry as he worked. The tinned food didn’t go down too well with Toodles in the off-season.

He must have been in a fight, perhaps with a possum, because he had lost an eye, and when the vet sowed it shut he said the other eye was probably doomed as well. He was right, so Henry took on the responsibility of euthanizing his cat, he didn’t think it was right to palm the job off to anyone else. He never had any more cats, Toodles was a one off.