as the protector of his corner—
not to mention his reputation
as the meanest dog in town—
very seriously.
“Go!”
he shouted.
“Get away from here,
right now!
Go! Go! Go!”
The little cat
kept right on coming.
Gus couldn’t believe his eyes.
Nobody
walked right up to his fence
that way.
Nobody in this whole town!
It didn’t help
that the invading cat
had a helter-skelter look
about her.
One ear black,
the other ginger.
Black and ginger patches
tossed
here,
there,
and everywhere
on a white background.
Even her nose looked patched,
half pink,
half black.
Such a cat
shouldn’t be taking herself
quite so seriously!
Gus tried again.
“Get out of my sight,
you ugly thing!”
If someone called you
an ugly thing,
you’d probably turn around
and leave.
I know I would.
But though Patches certainly heard—
Gus was so loud
she couldn’t help
but hear—
she
kept
on
coming.
Like every cat in the world,
she knew herself
to be beautiful,
so it never occurred to her
that Gus might be talking
to her.
And if she had realized,
she would simply
have decided
he was a very foolish dog.
Gus was so flabbergasted
that he swallowed
the rest of his barks
and stood staring
at the little cat.
Gazing into eyes
as golden as two small suns,
Gus found himself thinking,
just for an instant,
that he might have been mistaken
when he called this cat
ugly.
He didn’t say that,
of course.
Who ever heard
of the meanest dog in town
apologizing?
Patches marched right up to the fence.
“I’m looking for a special place,”
she informed Gus.
“It has to be private—
very private—
snug,
dark,
quiet.
I want a place that—”
But by this time
Gus had overcome his astonishment.
He’d gotten past
admiring Patches’s eyes,
as well.
And he opened his mouth
so wide that,
if it hadn’t been for the fence
that stood between them,
he could have taken in
the whole
of the small calico cat
in
one
bite.
“GO AWAY!”
he roared.
“THIS INSTANT!”
Now,
Patches,
as you know,
was not a worldly cat,
but she wasn’t a foolish one
either.
Without another word
about special places,
she turned around
and marched back across the street,
carrying her tail
tall
and
proud,
the
white
tip
flicking
with
each
step.
The flicking
of that white tail tip
enraged Gus.
Who was this patchy little cat
to make a fool of him?
How could she
walk up to his fence
and demand a special place
like that?
Even Gus’s boy,
when he came into his yard
to bring fresh water
and kibble,
stepped carefully.
Quite respectfully,
really.
And no one—
no one!—
had ever walked away
from his fierce barking
quite so calmly
as this
small
cat.
Still . . .
what could a self-respecting dog do
except to say it all
again?
“Go!”
he shouted.
“Go! Go! Go!
And don’t you
ever,
ever,
ever
come back!”
Patches did what she was told.
She kept going.
But as to never coming back . . .
well,
that was another matter
entirely.
Because while she’d been standing
close to the fence,
she had noticed something
very interesting:
two bowls
next to Gus’s doghouse,
one filled with fresh water,
the other with kibble.
Patches had been well fed
that morning,
so she wasn’t hungry yet.
But it occurred to her
that there probably wouldn’t be
any chipped blue bowls
out here in the wide wide world,
so she made a mental note:
kibble and water
near the mean dog’s house.
This
was a place
to remember.
After all,
the great noisy thing
had to sleep
sometime.
Didn’t he?
The problem with searching
for a special place
without knowing
where such a place might be—
or even what
it might look like
should you find it—
is that the search
can take a great deal
of time.
And it did.
Patches wandered
from yard to yard,
from street to street,
from park to parking lot to downtown storefronts,
without once getting a glimpse
of the special place
she longed for.
Was it the sheltered spot
beneath the picnic table
in the park?
No.
Too many people
had gathered there
to eat lunch.
Was it the concrete urn
filled with flowers
on the steps of city hall?
No,
the urn had no roof.
What if it rained?
She glanced up
at the single dark cloud
c r a w l i n g
across the face of the sun
as
it
slid
down
the
afternoon
sky.
Was it the space
beneath the Dumpster
behind the butcher’s shop?
No.
It smelled nasty.
But even the smell
of meat going rotten
made her tummy rumble
and reminded her
ho
w late it was getting.
Almost dark.
Well past her suppertime.
And though Patches kept searching,
when she paused,
at last,
to look up at the star-pricked sky,
she found she felt
very
small,
just a bit lonely,
and
extremely hungry.
The little cat had searched so long,
in fact,
and grown so weary,
that she might have
given up entirely
and gone back home
to her girl.
If she had only known
where her home
and her girl
had gone off to!
But she had been walking
for so long
that she had quite forgotten
where she had come from.
So what could a small cat do
but keep walking?
She walked
until the pink-and-black pads
of her white paws
were sore.
And even then,
she walked some more.
Patches walked
until she found herself
on the corner
in front of the post office
once more
with its
f
l
a
p
p
i
n
g
red, white, and blue flag.
How could she have made a circle
without even knowing?
And there was that mean dog again,
barking.
“No! No! No!”
he was saying.
“Go! Go! Go!
Get away from here!
This corner is
mine,
mine,
mine!”
“Who wants your old corner?”
Patches said,
more to herself than to him.
But even as she said that,
she remembered . . .
fresh water
and a big
bowl
of
kibble!
Beside the doghouse!
And even as she was thinking
about water and kibble,
a drop of rain landed
right
on her small
pink-and-black
nose.
Patches looked around
for someplace dry.
Only the blue postbox
looked the least bit
friendly.
It stood up on legs
just the right height
to shelter a small cat.
Not the special place
she’d been looking for,
certainly,
but it would do
for now.
Perhaps someone had put
this blue box
here
just for her.
So Patches crawled
beneath the postbox
and lay down
out of reach
of the rain.
Her tummy rumbled,
reminding her
of what she’d known
for hours.
She was
very,
very
hungry.
She didn’t know when
she’d ever been
quite so hungry.
Thirsty,
too.
She gave her grumbly tummy
a lick,
just so it would know
she still cared,
and curled into a ball.
There it went again,
that rumbling!
Her tummy rumbled so hard
that it wriggled,
too.
“Oh my,”
Patches said.
She’d never felt anything
quite like that
before.
All of which
made her think again
about the bowls
of food and water
beside the doghouse.
But Gus was still busy yelling,
“Go! Go! Go!
Get out of here!
Now!”
making it clear
that he wasn’t asleep.
So she gave her sore paws
each a lick
and tucked her nose
beneath her tail.
Certainly she was sleepy
even if the dog wasn’t.
So sleepy
that neither the rumbles
nor the wriggles
in her tummy
could keep her
from closing her golden eyes
and slipping
away.
First she dreamed
of her warm, comfortable house,
of her chipped blue bowl filled with kibble,
of her girl.
And then she dreamed
of her special place.
It was waiting for her.
Somewhere near.
She was certain of it.
When the mouseling
stepped on Patches’s whisker,
the little cat woke
with a start.
It’s odd,
as I’m sure you know,
for a mouse to walk right up to a cat
and step on her whisker.
But the night was dark,
and this particular mouse
was very young.
Also, he was excited,
which was why
he wasn’t paying attention.
He’d been scurrying
home to his mother,
eager to show her
the bright red berry
he held
carefully
in his mouth.
In the darkness
he hadn’t noticed
the crazy-quilt curl of fur
when he ran
beneath the postbox.
And it was just bad luck
that the whisker
lay in his path.
Have I mentioned Patches’s whiskers
before?
Not just that she washed
and smoothed them
regularly,
but have I told you
how magnificent they were?
In case I haven’t,
I’ll tell you now.
Patches’s whiskers were splendid.
White.
THICK!
Long!
to be stepped upon
by a mouseling
so excited about
his red berry
that he forgot to look out
for obvious dangers
such as cats.
And that is how
Patches’s whisker,
her very own long, white whisker,
tugged her awake
from a sound sleep.
She jerked her head up,
slapped her paw down,
and caught
the mouseling
neatly
in the curve of her claws.
“Help!” he cried,
dropping the red berry.
“Let me go!”
Patches’s tummy rumbled.
Every cat knows
that mice—
even little mouselings—
are good
for eating.
Patches had never actually
eaten a mouse.
In fact,
she had never even met one.
(I’ve told you she was not
a worldly cat.)
But she was pretty sure
this was
a mouse she held,
in the curve of her claws.
&nb
sp; Still,
just to make sure
before taking a bite,
she asked,
“Who are you?”
“I’m a mouse,”
quavered the tiny fellow.
“I knew that,”
Patches snapped.
(She was usually
a polite cat,
but having to ask
something she should have known
rather embarrassed her,
so she covered her embarrassment,
as folks sometimes do,
with a sharp remark.)
“But,”
she added
in a more pleasant tone,
“surely you have a name.”
By this time
the tiny mouse—
who,
though he was very young,
didn’t have to ask any questions
to recognize a cat . . .
or the claws of a cat
holding him captive,
or the teeth of a cat
gleaming above him—
had begun trembling
from his teensy whiskers
all the way down to his skinny tail.
Still he answered bravely,
“I don’t think I do,”
he said.
“Have a name,
I mean.
My mother calls me mouseling,
but she calls
my brothers and sisters
mouseling too.
So it’s not quite the same.”
And then he looked
into Patches’s golden eyes
and said,
“I’ve heard
you have to own a human
to have a real name.
Do you own a human?”
“Of course,”
Patches answered,
her voice growing softer
at the mere mention of her humans.
“At least,
I had a girl once.
But a golden leaf
came dancing,
and she got lost.”
(Cats,
as you may have noticed,
are not much inclined
to take responsibility
for their own mistakes.)
“Oh,”
said the mouseling.
He wasn’t sure
he understood,
but it seemed best
to keep the cat talking.
Talking was far better
than biting,
chewing,
swallowing.
At least it was better
for him!
So he wriggled just a bit
to get away from the claw
pressing on his soft, round ear
and asked,
“Was she a nice girl?”
“Very nice!”
Patches said.
“Very, very nice!”
And then her tummy rumbled,
which reminded her that,
however nice her girl
might be,
her girl wasn’t here now,
and that she,
Patches,
was very,
very
hungry.
Patches looked down at the mouseling
still held snugly
beneath her paw.
Where should she start?
With that funny little nose?
The whiskers might tickle.
With the skinny tail?
Certain to be rubbery.
Even while she considered,
her tummy rumbled again . . .
more loudly
this time.
“Please!”
whispered the mouseling.
And that’s when Patches