The Rogue's Tale

By Mewsette

Granny Feathers was known all down County Road 4 as a crotchety old lady, but the truth was she just didn't like human company. Her small house at the end of the road was criss-crossed front and back with chicken wire fences she had put up herself. There she lived contentedly with her three cats, her little flock of banty chckens, and a grey goose named Gertrude. The fences were meant to keep chickens out of the vegetable garden, cats out of the chicken pen, loose dogs out of the cats' back yard, and Gertrude out of everything. This might have worked well if Granny ever remembered to shut the gates, but they all coexisted nicely anyway.

The resident cats were litter mates, who lost their mother very young and had been with Granny for years. They were a large, bossy orange tabby named Stanley, his timid orange and white brother, Alfie, and their longhaired black and white sister, Sophie. The three spent more time outside in the pleasant autumn weather, but they had their meals inside and went in at night.

One day, after Granny had thrown pelleted chicken feed to the banties in their pen, she looked out her kitchen window and saw a strange animal in the pen. Putting on her glasses, she looked again. Why, it was just a cat, black and white like Sophie, but thinner, and it was..... oh, dear. The cat was eating little pellets of chicken feed off the ground. He must be awfully hungry, she thought, but he wasn't after the chickens; just a few pitiful pebbles of food. She hurriedly opened a can of cat food and dumped it in a bowl. taking the bowl outside and calling "kitty, kitty", but she nearly tripped over Stanley, who was glaring at the intruder from the patio. "Now stay here," she told him, "we have a visitor who's much hungrier than you are."

Granny was halfway across the yard when the hungry cat looked up and saw her, but Gertrude saw her too, and began honking and squawking two fences away. For a moment she was afraid the poor cat would flee, but he moved uncertainly toward her, staring at the bowl. So she set it down right there for him and went back into the house, taking Stanley and Alfie with her. There she watched out the window while the starving cat wolfed down the food as fast as he could. And where was Sophie? Oh, there she was, perched on the fattest fence post, watching.

In the next days and weeks, Granny moved the bowl to the patio out of the rain, kept it filled with dry food, and added an extra water bowl to the one she kept there. The new cat, who she called the Rogue, came every day for dinner and stayed longer and longer. She knew he was a male; he looked like one and her own boys certainly acted like he was, being decidedly impolite to him. He would run out of reach if she went outside, but Sophie often kept him company. One day Granny was gratified to see him taking a nap on her patio chair, as if he felt quite at home. He had gained weight, and become a handsome boy, and when the nights got colder, she put a box with an old blanket in it on the patio for him, hoping she could soon coax him inside for the winter.

But instead, the Rogue suddenly stopped coming. The weather got very cold, her cats stayed inside, Gertrude got loose and made a horrid mess of the cat food and water on the patio, and eventually Granny gave up on seeing him again. She had grown fond of him and she worried over what had become of him. Sophie was very quiet, as if she missed him, too.

It was early March and planting time when the Rogue returned. Granny went out the back door and saw something lying in the fresh turned earth by the patio where the new rose bush was going to go. He was badly hurt, and he could not even get up. How he had made it back to her in that condition, she couldn't imagine. She knelt down and began to cry. Stanley came out the door, stopped short and hissed at the poor cat in alarm, while Alfie hung back, staring. But Sophie went immediately to the Rogue, laid down next to him and began to wash his head. She turned her green eyes up to Granny, and Granny knew what must be done.

The huge old red car was seldom driven, because Granny went to town as little as possible. Whenever it rattled by, the people on County Road 4 laughed and called it the Grannymobile. They had ample opportunity for the next two weeks, because Granny wrapped the Rogue in the old blanket and took him to the vet in town, Dr. Jesse. Then she went back every day to see him. The news was bad at first. He had been hit by a car, and Dr. Jesse didn't hold out much hope for him. He also knew Granny couldn't pay for surgery and the extended care the cat would need, because he asked her.

"I'll pay somehow," she told him. "I can even bring you fresh eggs and vegetables all summer. Just fix him." Dr. Jesse was a country vet, and so he did "fix him".

At the end of the first week, when Rogue wasn't doing very well, Granny popped Sophie into her go-to-the-vet basket and took her along to visit him. Nobody knows what Sophie did, but it was magic. At the end of the second week, the Rogue went home.

Sophie welcomed Rogue as her new brother, and Alfie, following her example, was friendly to him, too. Eventually, even Stanley came around. "Eventually" was a long time, but he did. Granny Feathers was so glad she'd been able to save the Rogue and so pleased with his nice personality, she took to telling actual humans about him. And the Rogue - well, I simply must say it - lived happily ever after.