The Great Cat Hunt |
It was Sunday Morning; the morning after the night before
— and what a long night it had been. The restaurant full of diners, all having a good
time, but now it was quiet, blissfully quiet.
It was then that I heard it, that unmistakable 'me-ow in the straw ceiling overhead. I'd heard it last year, just before she gave birth to kittens in the roof cavity and I thought, "Oh, no you don't. Not again. Last time it was a full scale job getting you out of there." I can still see the surprised look on the diner's face as he pushed his fork into his steak at the same time as the cat started to call to the kittens.
Immediate action is required. The Man of the House is called in. "That #@!!&% cat's in the roof again. I'll get the ladder. Find me the big broom. This time it's not coming back".
He climbs the ladder, raises the square of straw ceiling to see the biggest, meanest looking tom glaring back at him from the far corner. Not coming from farming stock, he'd seen large ferals before, but not like this one. Taking aim, he lunges at the cat to dislodge him from his possie, whereupon cat leaps through the opening in the ceiling and is gone, into the restaurant itself, with him in hot pursuit, brandishing his yard broom.
Fearing that all the dogs in Hell are after him, the cat tears through the restaurant, over tables, knocking over vases and sugar bowls, up the bar, across the top of the wine display cabinet (the bottles rock precariously, but miraculously none smash), hits the front window and leaps up the curtains.
All this time, Lady Wife is screaming at the Man of the House to get the cat before it wrecks the joint, which only incenses the animal even more. "Get down off the bar and stop screaming," he yells. You're scaring the flaming thing".
Finally we have it cornered, in the gents loo. Now what? "Get me a rope", he yells. "I'll lasso the @#!!&%." Oh yeah, this I've got to see.
With great fortitude, my hero, who has got the cat pinned down with his mighty broom, slips the lasso over the cat's head and gives a mighty pull as he dives out the door. "I'll just give him a minute or two, that'll knock the stuffing out of him and I'll be able to handle him", says my intrepid hunter. But what's this? The yowls are getting louder and angrier. "He should be running out of puff by now. I'll just crack the door and have a peek . . ."
He was lassoed alright, but the cat was smarter than he. He was securely lassoed around one foot, and he was mighty angry. Craftier measures were called for. We located a cat trap and threaded the rope through the back of it. "Now when I yell, you pull" says my hero. "Pull . . ." I was running . . .
Here ends the story . . . the pulse rate slowly returns to normal, the dust settles, we dwell on what might have happened if the red wine bottles had smashed on the carpet, or what our customers would have thought as they happened to glance through the window at the Chef, stalking this poor pussycat with murderous intent.
Now all that remains to be done is to fix the hole in the ceiling, right the wine bottles, clean up the mess and store this story away with the dozens more that get a regular hearing at our staff Christmas party.
Margaret Yelland
Ambrosia Restaurant
MURRAY BRIDGE, SOUTH AUSTRALIA
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