but,
to be entirely honest,
he was rather amused,
too.
He couldn’t think of a single thing to say
to this impressive display
from such a small cat
until he remembered the mouseling’s advice.
“Please,” he said,
very politely.
“Don’t eat me!”
Please!
Don’t eat him?
Don’t eat this enormous
smelly
dog?
Patches was so astonished
that her back straightened,
her tail unpuffed,
and her
curving
claws
slipped back inside their sheaths.
She found herself looking
straight
into
Gus’s
eyes.
She saw no meanness there,
as everyone in town said.
It wasn’t even selfishness.
(“Mine.
These kittens are mine!”)
Pure and simple,
Patches gazed
into the brown eyes
of a very
lonely
dog.
That was all.
Slowly,
still holding Gus’s gaze,
she lay down
and wrapped herself around her kittens.
Gradually,
not looking away,
she found the first put-put-puts
of a purr.
And then,
at last,
she said,
“Hello, Gus.”
“Hello, Patches,”
Gus replied.
And then he seemed to remember
that he had not been
the world’s best-behaved dog
the last time
they had been together.
His
tail
drooped,
his
head
drooped,
and
his
long
ears
hung
longer
than
ever.
“I didn’t mean . . . ,”
he said.
“Well,
I did mean,
I guess,
but . . .
I just wanted . . .”
His apology
dribbled
away.
“You wanted
somebody
to love,”
Patches said,
understanding as mothers do.
In reply,
Gus lay down
right there
on the kitchen floor
and wrapped his great gray body
very tenderly
around the cardboard box,
around the little cat mother
and around her three
tiny
babies.
Is this it?
Is this the happy ending
we’ve been waiting for?
Dog
and cat
and kittens
together,
at last?
But what about the humans
in this story?
Humans have a way
of complicating
happy endings,
especially
those of the animal kind.
And these humans,
the man,
the woman,
the girl,
weren’t quite prepared
for an enormous dog,
a smelly one at that,
who seemed
to have taken possession
of their very own cat
and their very own kittens.
Not to mention their very own house.
(You’ll note that they,
too,
looked at Patches
and her babies
and said “MINE.”)
Given the dog’s size—
and his long yellow teeth—
they weren’t about
to grab him by the collar
and try to haul
him out of their house.
But this was a small town,
and everyone knew
who was attached to the green yard
with the chain-link fence
where Gus
ran up and down
and barked
day and night.
So,
after a brief phone call,
six humans
stood in the kitchen,
looking down
at the box with the cat
and kittens
and at the great gray dog
wrapped around
them all.
The boy spoke first.
“Come on, Gus,”
he said,
and he reached
for Gus’s collar.
Gus growled.
It wasn’t much of a growl.
Just a small one,
deep in his throat.
But it was definitely a growl.
The boy stepped back,
astonished.
His dog had never growled
at him
before!
Never!
“Gus!”
the boy’s father scolded.
And Gus ducked his head,
ashamed.
He hadn’t really meant . . .
Well,
he didn’t know what he had meant
actually,
except that now he’d found
his cat family,
he couldn’t let them
take him
away.
The boy’s father stepped up.
He took a firm hold
on Gus’s collar
and gave it a tug.
Slowly,
so slowly that the great dog seemed
almost
not to be moving,
Gus
began
to
rise.
But that’s when Patches took over.
Before Gus could get
his enormous body
more than two inches
off the floor,
she reached out a paw,
claws delicately extended,
laid it on Gus’s leg,
and said,
“MINE!”
Everyone gasped.
“He’s mine,”
Patches repeated,
more softly this time,
but she didn’t remove her paw
or retract the careful claws
attached to Gus’s leg.
Even humans
with no understanding of cat language
couldn’t possibly mistake
Patches’s meaning.
The boy’s dad
released the collar,
and Gus sighed
and sank to the floor.
Once more
he curled himself
around the cardboard box
that held
his cat family.
The humans all began talking at once.
What could they do?
Surely it wouldn’t be good
to upset
a new mother!
By the time the humans were quiet again
all was decided:
Gus could stay
as long as Patches
needed him.
The boy could come visit
every day,
take Gus out for walks
or to chase balls in the park.
Perhaps one day
when the kittens were older,
one of them
might even come
to live
with Gus.
Everyone was happy.
But th
ere remained
one small problem . . .
or two,
perhaps.
First,
the smell.
But that was easier to solve
than you might think.
“I have a wading pool,”
the girl said,
“in the backyard.
A little soap,
a little help”—
here she looked at the boy—
“and Gus could smell like roses . . .
or at least like a clean dog.”
Everyone liked that idea.
But then the boy’s father
looked down at the pepper grinder
and the place mats
and the spilled sugar bowl
on the kitchen floor
and cleared his throat.
“You may find,”
he said,
“that Gus
is a bit,
um,
rambunctious
for a house.”
Gus snapped to attention.
Rambunctious?
He wasn’t sure what the word meant,
but he knew enough to be offended.
He scrambled
to his feet,
his long ears flapping,
his long tail whacking the wall,
ready to defend
his honor.
For the second time that morning,
though,
Patches took charge.
Once more she laid a paw
with its sharp little claws
on Gus’s leg.
“Lie down, Gus,”
she commanded.
Gus lay down.
The humans stared at Patches.
They stared at Gus.
They stared at one another.
Then they laughed.
“I think,”
the girl’s father said,
“Patches has Gus
under control.”
And she did.
The men,
the women,
the boy,
the girl
returned
to the demands of their day,
and Gus
and Patches
and the kittens
stayed put,
in the warm silence
of the kitchen.
Several quiet moments passed
before Gus opened his brown eyes
and gazed
into Patches’s golden ones.
“Do you mind?”
he whispered.
“Is it all right
that I’m here?”
Patches’s purr
rumbled to life.
“How could I mind?”
she asked,
and for the second time
she gave his great nose a lick.
“I was searching,
didn’t you know?
And I was lucky enough
to find you
and your special place
and your special heart.”
Gus wagged his tail . . .
very gently.
And that,
my dears,
is a happy ending.
At last!
Oh . . . and the rest of the animals?
The ones who had cared so much
about mother
and babies
and Gus?
They knew,
in the way animals have
of knowing,
that Gus
and Patches,
Moonshadow
and Little Thomas
and Gustina,
were home safe.
So the grass,
the trees,
the sky,
even a nearby attic
rang with their joy.
And just to add to the celebration,
another
golden
leaf
leaped from the tree
in front of the house
and
fell,
wafting
this way
and
that!
Marion Dane Bauer is the author of nearly one hundred books, ranging from board books and picture books to easy readers, both fiction and nonfiction, and middle-grade and young adult novels, including On My Honor, which won a Newbery Honor in 1987. She was one of the founders and the first faculty chair of the Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults program. She lives with her partner in Saint Paul, Minnesota. Visit her online at mariondanebauer.com.
Jennifer A. Bell is a greeting card and children’s book illustrator. Her previous books include Little Dog, Lost by Marion Dane Bauer and When a Dad Says “I Love You” and When a Grandpa Says “I Love You” by Douglas Wood. She lives with her husband and son. Visit her online at jenniferabell.com.
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Also by Marion Dane Bauer
Little Dog, Lost
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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Text copyright © 2016 by Marion Dane Bauer
Illustrations copyright © 2016 by Jennifer A. Bell
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Bauer, Marion Dane.
Little cat’s luck / Marion Dane Bauer ; illustrated by Jennifer A. Bell. — 1st edition.
pages cm
Summary: A little cat named Patches manages to push out a window screen and leave her house, chasing a falling leaf, and sets out to find a special place to call her own.
ISBN 978-1-4814-2488-2 (hardcover) — ISBN 978-1-4814-2490-5 (eBook) [1. Novels in verse. 2. Cats—Fiction. 3. Adventure and adventurers—Fiction. 4. Dogs—Fiction.
5. Animals—Infancy—Fiction.] I. Bell, Jennifer (Jennifer A.), 1977– illustrator. II. Title.
PZ7.5.B385Lg 2016
[Fic]—dc23
2014037635
Luck