The Story of Jennie- or the Abandoned (20 page)

Under the railway and George V bridges they charged, past the steamboat wharf where passengers were queueing for trips to Greenock and Gourock and Inverary and Ardrishaig, down the busy Broomielaw, with ships loading freight and cargo for all sorts of interesting places, but not an instant did they linger now for they knew that when the black smoke belched from her funnel the Countess might depart any second.

On to the Quay they flew, along the Clyde, Cheapside and Piccadilly, and, sure enough, there a hundred yards ahead of them was the Countess of Greenock pouring forth her soft-coal cloud which ceased for a moment and was replaced by a squirt of white steam that curled around her stack like a feather, and they heard her hooter go.

'Oh,' cried Peter, 'she's leaving. Faster, faster, Jennie. All you've got.' And they both flattened their ears back, let their tails streamline straight out behind them and fairly ate up the yards, a white blur and a dark brown one. How they ran!

And at that, they would have been too late if the crew of the Countess had not managed to get the gangplank stuck in the last moment when they came to unfasten it from the side of the little freighter preparatory to having it drawn back down on to the dock.

Mr. Box, the carpenter, had had to be summoned with his tools, his hammers and chisels and sledges, saws and wrenches and drills and augers, ratchets and levers, and he grew red in the face and beat at it and prised, hoisted and pushed with a series of 'Blimeys' and 'Lummies' and `Coo's,' and could do absolutely nothing with it. For a moment it looked as though the Countess was either bound to the pier by the gangplank for the rest of her life, or would have to sail with it sticking out of her side.

At this point Mr. Box wholly lost his temper and arising from his knees where he had been poking, sawing, chiselling and prising, he aimed a violent and vicious kick at the offending gangway which landed squarely on it and caused it to come loose quite easily, showing that that was what it had wanted all along, though the damage to Mr. Box's boot and toe was later assessed as considerable.

`There you are, lads!' he shouted to the navvies waiting down on the dock. `Haul away'

And haul away they did at the precise moment that Peter and Jennie came whipping on to the pier and up the gangway. There was already a gap of several yards between the end of the gangway and the side of the ship, but at the speed that Peter and Jennie were travelling it was as nothing and they flew across the space like a couple of furred birds and landed kerplump on Mr. Box's chest knocking him flat on his back, since he was off balance anyway at the time due to hopping around on one foot.

`Blimey!' groaned Mr. Box-'oh blimey. THEY'RE back!'

And back indeed they were on the iron deck of the dear, messy, smelly Countess. Everything was just the same as when they had left it, and in a way it was just like home. From the cabin of Captain Sourlies came the tinkle, crash and clatter of breaking glass and crockery. Mr. Strachan was on the bridge, in charge, his blue cap set well back on his brick-red curls so that it was not at all difficult to see the still visible remains of what must have been the father of all black eyes. From the gallery aft came drifting the mournful strains of Mealie's voice as he rendered in song a lament upon leaving. Mr. Carluke was just emerging from his cabin, the fingers of his right hand pointed and cocked like a pistol, and his left swinging and manipulating an imaginary lariat.

And the crew, under Angus who was roaring up by the steam winch for'ard, was making a beautiful, beautiful mess of the departure, casting off the wrong ropes and cables, making other wrong ones fast, turning things off when they ought to be turning them on, tripping over chains, coming near to letting the anchor go, permitting the Countess to get her stern caught in the tide so that she almost sideswiped an excursion boat bound for the Isle of Man, causing her captain to say a few words, and thus with the hooter hooting, black smoke pouring from her, and close to complete chaos reigning on board, she managed to cast off, back out into the Clyde, and eventually set a course down the river and towards the open sea once more.

Peter and Jennie did not linger but went right on aft to see Mealie who welcomed them with a shout, after which he punched a hole in a fresh can of evaporated milk, cut some cold lamb off a joint in the larder, and invited them to dine with a `By Jomminy you just cotch 'im up in time, hey? By Jomminy, you hungry, good and some. You bring possage money again, hey?' and he roared with laughter. `How mony rots and mouses for one ticket? I think you hokay. By Jomminy, you want more lomb? How much you can hold? I give you what you got … ' and he proceeded to cut them some more, and eventually, still laughing, turned the bone over to them which Peter and Jennie each at one end gnawed contentedly in the first good meal they had had since they had quit the ship.

The return trip to London was without incident and was spent mostly in eating, sleeping, resting and sunning since there was little work for them to do. Word had got about in Glasgow as to the reign of terror that had been in effect aboard the Countess, no doubt spread by some lone survivor, and the rat and mouse population left her strictly alone, those ashore scheduled for a trip aboard her cancelling out and giving her a wide berth.

Mr. Strachan, who apparently was having guilty feelings with regard to his actions towards Peter and Jennie and what had taken place, treated them rather diffidently and appeared to be avoiding them almost as though he were afraid that someone might find out from the two where, how and why, he had acquired the black eye, but Mr. Carluke became very friendly to both, scratching under their chins and rubbing their heads, and Peter and Jennie used to spend hours in his cabin watching him prepare a new work for Pipshaw's Western Rider Stories, something he was calling Rootin Tootin Roger of Rabbit Gulch. Roger shot his enemies with a pistol over his shoulder by looking into a mirror, thus taking them completely by surprise. Peter explained all this carefully to Jennie as Mr. Carluke acted it out in front of his shaving-mirror, and she was just as impressed as Peter.

It seemed almost no time at all before they were rounding the North Foreland with Broadstairs and Margate plainly visible to starboard, picked up Mouse Lighthouse off the port bow, which, of course, because of its name held an especial fascination for Peter and Jennie who stared and stared as it blinked on and off, and soon were steaming into the mouth of the Thames and then up the broad river itself. Only this time Peter and Jennie took no chances, and when three hours from their destination they went off and hid together down below the coal bunkers, close to the propeller shaft, where nobody could find them.

They remained there long after the Countess docked in London, and at five o'clock in the afternoon, when no one was about aft, they sneaked ashore via the gangway where, as usual, there was no watch, and found themselves once more upon terra firma. Trembling with excitement and anticipation they set out to return over the way they had come from the lonely geranium-scented shack of Mr. Grims….

FOR, all the way home on the Countess of Greenock, Peter and Jennie had been talking about how pleased and surprised Mr. Grims would be when he saw that they had returned and learned that they had come to stay with him for good.

The pair had discussed just how it might happen, and Jennie said it would be nice if they could get back around tea the way it had been the first visit and he would surely invite them in again, only this time when he left the door open, or had to go out, they would stay, and perhaps rub up against him, or settle down in a corner all curled up to show him that they were now his cats.

Peter thought that it might be even more fun if Mr. Grims were away from his shack on the rounds of his docks and goods storage spaces and they might be able to get inside, either through the door left unlatched, or possibly through a window. But at any rate, as he imagined it for Jennie, they would be there, perhaps one sitting in each window by a pot of geraniums when he opened the door.

And he told Jennie how, when Mr. Grims came in from out of doors, his eyes would not yet be accustomed to the change of light and very likely he would not see them at all at first if they kept very still, and then they would both miaouw a shout of `Surprise! Surprise!' as had happened once to Peter at one of his birthdays when there had been a surprise party given him.

Jennie liked this idea too, enormously, particularly when Peter took pains to describe the pleased and happy expression that Mr. Grims would have on his face when at last he realized what had happened to him. Then they fell to talking and planning what life would be like when they had settled down and belonged wholly to Mr. Grims.

Because he was a boy, Peter dwelt more on the wonderful fun they would have exploring Mr. Grim's domain over which he held undisputed sway at night, the hundreds of different kinds of bales, boxes, sacks, packages, crates, cartons and bulk cargoes there would be to explore, shipments from the Orient done up in parcels of plaited straw, heavy with the mysterious fragrance of the East; huge piles of nuts from Brazil in which to play and slide, and sacks of coffee; piles of tobacco that would make them sneeze and teas that would intoxicate them.

Female-like, Jennie was more concerned with the domestic arrangements and how to make Mr. Grims comfortable at home and accustom themselves to his method of living. For there was more to being someone's cat, Jennie revealed, than just accepting meals and being about the house occasionally, or coming up with a mouse or two when it suited one. Jennie explained that they must get used to his hours of rising and going to bed, and work, and leisure, and adjust their own so that they would be at hand whenever he wanted them; they would have to study whether he liked them most on his bed, or on his lap, or at his feet, or curled up near the stove, or perhaps in the windows, and whether he cared more to fondle them and scratch their heads or preferred it when they came and rubbed up against his legs, or jumped into his lap and pushed against him. There were many things to be learned, and adjustments to be made, Jennie said, so that they could all live in harmony.

Now the realization of these pleasant plans and dreams seemed to lie just ahead of them as they hurried along the docks and through the back streets, with Peter almost as skilled as Jennie now in negotiating the busy streets and the heavy and congested traffic.

And here, seeing Jennie so eagerly straining on to reach their destination, Peter felt a sudden fear and premonition come over him. What if Mr. Grims should be no longer there? What if he had lost his job, perhaps, and had gone away and they were never able to find him? Or worse still, supposing something had happened to him and he had been taken off to a hospital? He was a very old man, Peter remembered, and a tumble or a knock, or an illness, might fall to his share at any time. In their talks and plan-makings aboard ship, he and Jennie had neither thought of nor discussed such an eventuality, and all Peter could think of was what a dreadful shock and disappointment it would be to Jennie were something to go amiss.

Something of this feeling seemed to have communicated itself to Jennie too, for although her feet were sore and tired from pounding along the rough cobbles and stone pavements she hurried forward now at even greater speed until at last, just after nightfall, they arrived at the iron gates of the docks, which were shut, indicating there was a quiescent period when no shipments or cargoes were arriving or being unloaded for distribution in the interior.

The locked gates presented no problem to Peter and Jennie since they were able to squeeze through the spaces of the ornamental grille-work at the bottom, and in a moment they found themselves on the other side and in the huge dock area itself. Except for a string of half a dozen goods wagons on a siding, it was quite empty, and the long ark-shaped sheds loomed like a mountain chain in the meagre light of a halfmoon and the handful of early stars powdering the sky.

Jennie had already seen something that caused her to pause and give a little gasp of excitement. 'Look, Peter, look!' she cried, ‘Down there, at the end.'

Peter did look where Jennie indicated. Far, far away at the extreme end of the inclosure, the darkness was pierced by one tiny pinpoint of yellow light.

'That's it,' Jennie said breathlessly. 'It comes from the shack. That means he must be there. Oh, Peter, I'm so relieved.'

But now that the goal towards which they had so strained was in plain sight, they did not rush forward to it, headlong and pell-mell, but for some reason that they could not fathom until long afterwards, walked forward slowly and soberly in the direction of the beckoning yellow light.

The illumination indeed came from the shack, as they saw when they had approached almost to the door a single, uncovered electric bulb hanging from the ceiling. And as they drew nigh they also heard loud voices emerging there from as though an argument of some kind were going on, but they could see no one, and otherwise to all intents and purposes the shack was exactly as they had left it. There were the two long boxes of red geraniums on either side of the door, and through the window they could even see some of the pots of pink, white, salmon and orange-coloured blooms. But except for the mysterious voices, none of which sounded like Mr. Grims', there was no sign of life about the place.

But the mystery of who was speaking inside was cleared up just as they approached the threshold, when the voices changed to a burst of music, a gay little musical comedy marching song.

Peter said, 'It's the wireless. Perhaps he's gone away and left the light burning and the wireless turned on because he intended to come right back. Maybe we can surprise him after all, Jennie. Oh, I do hope the door is open …'

But Jennie in reply only uttered a low growl deep in her throat, and Peter turning to her saw that her tail was fluffed and that her hair was standing straight up at the back of her neck.