By mid-March, Henrietta had established herself as second in command and we decided it was time to put her in a cat carrier and whisk her off to the animal clinic. She still had a festering sore on her right front leg, matted fur on her belly and a broken fang. She also needed shots.
George hated the cat carrier but, though he struggled and complained so loudly I was sure that people as far away as Mora Bay thought someone was being tortured, he was fairly easy to handle – provided we grabbed him before he knew the carrier was waiting for him. Otherwise, we had to pry him out from underneath the couch or coax him from behind the old upright piano.
"We'd better sneak the carrier in the same way as we do for George," I said. "Put it on the kitchen table where Henrietta won't see it and don't let the handle rattle."
"What's the problem?" Ben asked. "There are two of us and only one of her and we're a lot bigger."
When the carrier was in place, Ben said, "Now, pick up Miss Mew and give her a little cuddle. You'll have her in the cage before she knows what's happening."
A great theory, but it bore no resemblance to reality. Within two feet of the open cage, Henrietta turned into a windmill. Head, teeth and four legs whirled in different directions, propelled by a body which had suddenly acquired superior strength. She kicked me and disappeared.
We'd locked every exit, so we knew she couldn't get out of the house, but where was she? We searched everywhere, even in places she couldn't possibly be. Or so we thought. Finally I shone a flashlight between the head of our bed frame and the wall. I couldn't imagine Henrietta squeezing herself into a space two inches wide, but there simply wasn't anywhere else to look.
Two large, slanted yellow eyes stared back at me.
Now we had a new reason for panic. Never mind how she'd got in there; how was she going to get out?
A closer look reminded me that the bottom of the headboard was six inches off the floor and the actual width between bed and wall, at floor level, was five inches. A tight squeeze, but manageable for a cat. Not for us, though. I got an arm into the tunnel but Henrietta simply backed out of reach. Ben tried from the other side but the king-size bed was too wide. Henrietta sat in the middle, untouchable. We'd just have to wait until she came out on her own.
She did, almost at once. Cats aren't stupid. A hiding place is no longer a hiding place if humans know about it.
I worried that she'd never speak to us again, but she seemed inclined to forgive and forget. Her forgiveness, I suspected, hinged on us forgetting about putting her in a small dark box.
We canceled our appointment with the clinic and started plotting. How were we going to get this stubborn feline into a carrier? We consulted Jerry, who gave us some tranquilizers.
All the tranquilizer did was make poor Henrietta unsteady on her feet and inclined to fall down every three steps. She didn't even get drowsy. When picked up and lowered toward the cat cage, she turned into a windmill again.
"Try putting some canned tuna in the carrier," the Houseboy suggested. "She won't be able to resist that."
"Forget it," I said. "Not even tuna will make her go inside that box unless she's starving and that would take three or four days. How would you feel, refusing to feed her for such a long time?"
The guilt on his face was sufficient answer. "Where are those cat tranquilizers?"
"Why? They don't work on her."
"I'm going to take one myself."
Slaves quickly learn patience and cunning and we were no exception. We waited until Henrietta, who slept soundly, was snoozing on the couch. Then we tiptoed in with the cat carrier and very carefully lowered it to the floor in front of the couch. Holding my breath and trying to pretend I wasn't the least bit nervous, I picked her up and popped her into the cage. The Houseboy tucked her tail inside and slammed the lid down as she woke up.
"Whew! Let's hope she never needs to go to the hospital again," I said. "I don't think I could pull that off a second time."
"Oh, she'll learn it's for her own good," Ben said. "We won't have this trouble again."
"I can't believe you said that." I was grateful that Ben had fallen in love with cats, but someday he'd have to get over being naive and unduly optimistic when it came to what they would or would not do.
He peered through the tiny screened window at her and crooned, "What a sweet little lady! There's my gorgeous girl. You'll be all fixed up soon."
An hour after we left Henrietta at the clinic, Jerry phoned.
"I've done everything you asked me to do. I assume you want him neutered as well?"
"Him?"
Jerry chuckled. "Yes. It's Henry, not Henrietta."
I went outside to tell Ben, who was staring at the fence around the garden as though he could force it to grow another four feet by will power alone.
"It's a good thing you picked 'Henrietta' as a name; all we have to do is shorten it. Jerry says Henrietta is a boy."