Six Lives of Fankle the Cat by George Mackay Brown

knocked at the door of the merchant’s house in the village. The store was locked for the night. Tom Strynd listened to Jenny’s story with a long face. Had Fankle maybe got tired of her and Inquoy? Jenny wondered aloud. Had he maybe missed the fine smells of brown sugar, coffee, and apples in the yard where he had first appeared? “No,” said Tom Strynd. “Fankle hasn’t come back here to live. I’m sorry, Jenny. I’ll send you word if he does.”
    Jenny thanked the merchant and turned away. It was getting dark. There was a star over the chimney. How would she ever find Fankle in the darkness?
    â€œIf you should ever want another kitten,” Tom Strynd called after her, “I’ll keep you in mind, supposing Silas Ingison ever dumps another one in the back of my van.”
    Jenny shook her head and moved on.
    ***
    Mrs Martin, in the manse sitting-room, was very concerned to begin with. Had Fankle ever been gone so long before? Had Fankle been quite well recently, and lapped his milk and licked the fishbones clean? (She poured Jenny a tall glass of lemonade that she had made herself. Jenny sipped the lemonade gratefully; her throat was dry with grief and over-much speaking.) Mrs Martin smiled when Jenny told her about Ma Scad and her elegies. (Jenny took a big gulp of lemonade and felt more cheerful at once. She didn’t know whether it was the lemonade or the kind old lady that made her feel better.) Mrs Martin declared that Fankle was the cleverest cat on the island – no, in Orkney – no, in the whole world. Wasn’t it Fankle who had cured her of her trouble, with his antics in the garden that fine day? Fankle had unlocked in her the little spring that had lain hidden and dark for so long. (“Drink up, Jenny, there’s plenty more lemonade ...”) That cat was so wise he seemed to have known what ailed Mrs Martin. Did Jenny think for one moment that an extraordinarily intelligent cat like Fankle could vanish into thin air? Fankle was unique. Fankle would be home in the morning. (Jenny drained the lemonade glass to the last drop. She did like this wise old lady who had suffered so much.) They exchanged goodnight kisses. The sky was thick with stars. Somewhere through the night, Jenny knew now, Fankle was moving, the essence of night and secrecy and wisdom.
    ***
    Old Sam Swann the tailor was sitting beside his kitchen fire listening to the wireless when Jenny arrived. Old Mrs Swann sat at the other side of the fire, in a rocking chair, knitting a jersey.
    â€œHave you seen my cat Fankle?” asked Jenny shyly. She had never been in this house before.
    Behind the curtains was the tailor’s bench, with its mingled smells of cloth, chalk, and resin.
    Jenny had come here, on an impulse. Going home, she had suddenly remembered her father saying that Sam Swann the tailor was the greatest expert on cats in the island. There was nothing he didn’t know about cats. People came from all over with their sick cats to the tailor shop, and more often than not Sam Swann knew the cure.
    â€œIsn’t the wireless a fine thing?” he said in his small sweet voice to Jenny. “It tells you things. It educates you.”
    He was a very eccentric man, Sam Swann. Though he knew everything about cats, he didn’t keep a cat himself. If somebody whose cat he had cured asked him to name a fee, he would say something like, “Oh yes, I think it will be a fine day tomorrow, indeed,” or “General Amin seems to be stirring things up in Africa.”
    â€œIt’s about my cat Fankle I’ve come,” said Jenny. “He’s been missing three days.”
    â€œI don’t know what I would do without the wireless now. I don’t know what in the world Annabella would do ...” Annabella Swann, who was as deaf as a doornail, knitted away steadily.
    â€œIs it usual,” said Jenny, “for cats to go away for three days at a