“Oh, no! Are you OK?” I ask.
Dr. Mac takes a deep breath and walks over to the sink. She turns on the hot water and squeezes soap on the cut.
“He got me good,” she says as she scrubs the wound. “This scratch is pretty deep. That’s why I get my shots every other year. Even if he’s carrying a disease like rabies, my vaccinations will keep me safe.”
“Are you going to need antibiotics, too?” I ask.
“Spoken like a true doctor’s daughter,” Dr. Mac answers. “If this were a bite, I would. But I’ll put some antibiotic cream on it and it should be fine.”
“I can’t believe how fast he moved,” I say.
She turns off the water. “That’s how cats are. A dog will usually give you a sign that he’s irritated and might bite. But a cat can turn and attack before you know what’s happening.” She dries the scratch with a paper towel, spreads the germ-killing cream on the scratch, then covers it with a small bandage.
She looks at our patient, then at her hand. “I think we should call this one Tiger. He’s definitely feral, a wild one.” She looks me in the eye. “Be careful, Sunita. Feral cats are unpredictable. You always have to be on your guard around them.”
“You sound just like Mrs. Frazier. He just needs some love,” I say. “Once he’s feeling better, he’ll calm down. Then we’ll find him a good home.”
Dr. Mac shakes her head. “He might look like a house cat to you, but he’s not. He was born in the wild, probably to an abandoned or runaway pet. He’s been raised wild and doesn’t have any interest in being a pet. Now, I could use some gauze and disinfectant here.”
I get the supplies she needs from the cupboard. I know I can’t say this, but I think she’s wrong. Tiger has had a hard life so far, and he just needs some tender, loving care. I could teach him, show him that humans aren’t bad. I’m the only person Socrates is willing to cuddle with, and I can calm down our crankiest cat client.
That’s what I’ll do. I’ll take care of Tiger while he’s recuperating, help him get used to people. I’ll tame him. That will change Dr. Mac’s mind and Mrs. Frazier’s, maybe even my mother’s.
But that won’t happen overnight. Animal Control is coming to get the cats in Cat Land tomorrow. We have to find a way to stop them—fast.
“Sunita?” Dr. Mac says to get my attention. “You look like you’re a million miles away. We can start the exam now.”
The sedative has relaxed the cat so much that Dr. Mac can take him out of the cage and lay him on the table. He doesn’t even flick his tail when she starts the exam.
First, she listens to his heart and lungs with a stethoscope. “His heartbeat is strong—a little fast, but that’s understandable, given all the stress. Respiratory rate is fast, but I don’t hear any wheezing or whistling.”
She moves her hands slowly over the cat’s legs, back, and stomach.
“No broken ribs—that’s good. That leg might be fractured, so we’ll X-ray. Hopefully, it’s just swollen from the trauma of the accident. If so, he’ll just need to stay confined for a while so it can heal. While he’s recovering, we’ll give him all his shots, and we’ll neuter him so he can’t go out and make any kittens. There are already too many feral cats out there.”
Dr. Mac takes a bag of clear intravenous fluid—an I.V.—from the cupboard, hangs it on a metal stand, and connects some long plastic tubing to it. An I.V. is a mixture of sterile water with important nutrients that injured animals need.
“I’ll start the I.V.,” she says, inserting a thin plastic needle into a vein in Tiger’s foreleg. Then she connects the end of the I.V. tube to the needle, allowing the fluid to flow from the bag into Tiger’s vein. “That will rehydrate him and make him feel better,” she says as she adjusts the flow of fluid into the tube.
While she’s cleaning out the scrapes on Tiger’s hip, I tell her about the conversation with Mrs. Frazier.
“She can’t get the county to put those cats to sleep, can she?” I ask. “And what about Socrates? He could get captured, too.”
“Yes, she can,” Dr. Mac answers. “The law in every state allows officials to remove animals that pose a danger to the health of people. Mrs. Frazier is probably most concerned about rabies. It is usually seen in foxes, raccoons, skunks, and bats, but domestic animals can get it, too. With rabies, you can’t be too careful.”
“What is rabies, exactly?” I ask.
Dr. Mac tosses a dirty piece of gauze in the trash and takes a clean one. “Rabies is a disease that is passed in saliva, when an infected animal bites another animal or a person. It attacks the nervous system and the brain. When an animal is infected, it becomes very aggressive. It drools and attacks anything that comes close. Rabies can be prevented if a bite victim receives treatment quickly. Without treatment, the victim will die. That’s why Mrs. Frazier and her neighbors are so scared.”
“But you said you got shots,” I say.
She moves on to another raw spot on Tiger’s leg that looks really infected. “Animal-care workers get vaccinated because we’re around animals all day, every day. It doesn’t make any sense for the average person to do that. Instead, the law requires all pets like dogs, cats, and ferrets to be vaccinated. That keeps the animals safe, and their owners, too.”
She peels off the latex gloves. “Done. Let’s get him into a nice cozy cage in the recovery room before this stuff wears off.”
Chapter Five
The recovery room is where a couple of different things happen. It’s where we take animals who have just had surgery, so we can keep an eye on them. It also has our hospital “beds.” There are rows of cages built into the far wall, where patients who are still too sick to go home can stay.
Dr. Mac walks over to the cupboard on the far wall and rummages through the top shelf.
“What are you looking for?” I ask.
“This,” she answers, holding up a sign that says DANGEROUS ANIMAL. STAY AWAY! She hangs the sign on Tiger’s cage.
“That ought to do it,” she says.
Tiger blinks his green eyes at me and meows softly.
“He looks so sad,” I say.
“He’ll be fine,” she assures me. “He’s in for a couple of days of rest and recovery. Now, I have a few chores for you and the others to do before you go to the Lakes’ house for dinner.”
“Dr. Mac, wait,” I say as she steps to the door. “I have to ask you something.”
She turns. “What, Sunita?”
How do I say this? “It’s . . . Socrates and the other cats. I’m worried about them. Mrs. Frazier says they’ll all be taken away, and—you know what that means.”
She nods once. Dr. Mac hates it when animals are put to sleep for no good reason.
“Couldn’t you talk to her?” I ask. “Convince her to leave the cats alone? We could set up an adoption program like we did for the puppies.”
Last month, Maggie tracked down a puppy mill and we rescued all the dogs who were being abused there. Dr. Mac worked with some other vets and the local animal shelter to find homes for all the dogs. I bet we could do the same thing for the cats in Cat Land.
Dr. Mac pulls up a stool and sits down. She taps her finger on the counter for a minute. Finally, she speaks.
“Mrs. Frazier has a very good point, Sunita. The size of that colony will just grow and grow unless something is done. A pair of breeding cats can have a litter of five or six kittens three times a year. And by the time those kittens are six to seven months old, they can have kittens of their own.”
I do the math. “Dr. Mac, that means one pair of cats could wind up with eighty kittens in a single year!”
“That explains why Mrs. Frazier is upset, doesn’t it? Imagine all those cats living behind your house,” she says.
“I’d rather have them living in my house.”
Dr. Mac chuckles. “I’m sure you would. But it’s not that simple. The life of a stray or feral cat is short and harsh. And it’s a huge problem. I just read an ar
ticle that estimated there are sixty million feral cats in the U.S., as many as there are pet cats. And the number grows every day.”
I look past the DANGER sign to Tiger, who has drifted off to sleep. “We can’t let Animal Control round them up. We have to find homes for them,” I say stubbornly. “We can’t leave them out there.”
“Your intentions are great, Sunita, but you aren’t looking at the facts. There may be a few strays in that group who are used to being around people, but most of them are feral—born wild and will stay wild. You can’t turn a feral cat into a house cat.”
“None of them will have a chance to be any kind of cat if we don’t do something by tomorrow morning,” I plead. My heart starts to race. Socrates! What if Animal Control gets him? He could be put to sleep with the other cats. I turn around to face Dr. Mac.
“You’re always telling us to make a positive difference. Can’t we do it here? Can’t we do something to save these cats?”
Dr. Mac taps her finger on the counter again.
“There might be another option,” she says slowly.
“What?”
“I’ve read about a few communities that have been trying TVSR programs.”
“What’s that? It sounds like a cable TV station.”
Dr. Mac smiles. “No, not quite. TVSR stands for Treat, Vaccinate, Spay, and Release. They trap the cats in a colony, like Cat Land, then bring them back to the veterinary clinic. There they sedate them, like we did with our friend Tiger, and give them a complete checkup, treating any infections or injuries they may have. Then they vaccinate the cats against rabies and other diseases. They spay the female cats and neuter the males to keep the population from growing.
“Once they recover from the surgery, the animals are released. They put a small notch in the cats’ ears so people will know they’ve been treated. They won’t reproduce, they won’t spread disease, and they get to live out their short lives in peace. As far as I know, we’ve never tried anything like that around here. Might be worth giving it a shot.”
She stands up and slaps her hands on her jeans. “Here’s what I’ll do. I’ll go down to Cat Land in the morning to talk to the Animal Control officers. I know most of them. I’ll see if they’ll let me try a TVSR program.”
“Can we come with you?”
“Don’t know why not. It’s a Saturday. We could take another look around for Socrates if he hasn’t come home by then. But now, there’s work to do before you all go to Brenna’s. Let’s get cracking.”
Chapter Six
Ta-da!” Brenna shouts as Mrs. Lake turns the car onto the gravel road that leads to her house.
We drive up to a roomy log cabin. It looks almost magical, with flowers of every size and color blooming, bird feeders hanging from branches, and the smell of pine in the air. The Lakes’ property is surrounded on three sides by a nature preserve. It’s hard to believe we’re in the middle of the suburbs.
“The Lake family estate!” Brenna says with a grin.
“You’re so lucky to have a place in the woods,” Zoe says.
“It reminds me of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House in the Big Woods,” I add.
“Or the ‘Angry Beavers’!” shouts David, naming one of his favorite cartoons. “They live in the forest, too.”
“My mom calls it the ‘Hundred-Acre Wood,’” Brenna says. “I think she does that just to embarrass me.”
Mrs. Lake looks at us in the rearview mirror of the station wagon. “You used to think that Pooh Bear and Tigger lived next door,” she reminds Brenna.
“No, I didn’t,” Brenna protests.
I believe her mother. Brenna’s face is turning deep red.
I like Mrs. Lake. Her chestnut brown hair has silver strands in it that match her silver earrings and bracelets. She works part-time at Golden Age, the retirement community where my grandfather lives.
“I can remember . . .” Mrs. Lake starts.
“That’s enough, Mom,” Brenna says quickly. As the car stops in front of the house, she opens her door. “Come on, let me show you around!”
“Don’t be long,” Mrs. Lake says. “Your dad said he would have dinner ready.”
We follow Brenna around back. There are two other small cabins set a short distance behind her house.
“That one is Dad’s workshop,” Brenna says. “He’s a carpenter. He makes furniture.”
The double doors of the workshop are open wide. The walls are lined with tools all neatly hung and organized by size. There are a couple of woodworking machines in the middle of the floor and some beautiful chairs under the window, waiting for customers.
“Don’t you love that smell?” Zoe says. The air smells like sawdust.
“You’re only saying that because we don’t have any skunks right now.” Brenna laughs. “Want to see the critter barn?”
The “barn” is where the Lakes keep injured wild animals and nurse them back to health. The Lakes are licensed wildlife rehabilitators. Sick or hurt animals are brought to them, and they nurse the animals back to health. Once the animals have recovered, they are set free. Brenna is really proud that her family does this.
She holds up her hand to stop us before we go in.
“We can’t stay in there long. Mom and Dad don’t want the animals to get too used to people. And we have to be quiet. If we talk loudly or goof around, that can scare them.”
“What do you have in there?” David asks, trying to see through the window over Brenna’s shoulder.
“Only a woodchuck and a baby fox right now. The fox arrived yesterday. He hasn’t settled in yet. He got hit by a cart on a golf course. Can you imagine that? Let’s go.”
We file into the barn silently, pass a few empty pens, and walk to the center of the building. Brenna holds her finger to her lips, then points to a hollow log in one pen.
“Woodchuck,” she whispers.
You could have fooled me. The woodchuck must be hiding inside the log. Since there isn’t much to look at, we move on.
The baby fox is in the next pen. When he sees us, he skitters into the corner and hides his head, his body shaking. His left back leg is bandaged.
He lifts his head a little to peek at me over his bushy tail, his eyes wide with fright. I wish I could pick him up, stroke his beautiful red fur, and tell him not to worry, everything will be all right.
“We better leave,” Brenna whispers.
The Lakes’ kitchen table is small, but they’ve set up a card table at the end of it so we can all sit together. As we take our seats, Brenna introduces us to her father, who has a cheerful bushy beard and one pierced ear. Her older brother, Sage, and younger brother, Jayvee, look just like their dad, minus the beard of course.
“Hey, Poe!” Brenna calls. She whistles once and a large black crow hops into the kitchen. He looks at us and tilts his head.
“Everybody, this is Edgar Allan Poe Crow,” Brenna says. “He’s my buddy.” She tosses him the corner of a hamburger roll. Poe snaps it up in his beak and gulps it down.
“Caw!” he cries.
Poe’s wing was so badly damaged by gunshot last year that he can’t fly any kind of distance. He’s the only “critter” that the Lakes have let stay with them permanently.
“Sit down, everybody,” Mr. Lake says as he carries the food to the table. “Let’s eat.”
While we feast on hamburgers and the best homemade potato salad I have ever eaten, Brenna tells her parents about Socrates’ disappearance and what we found in Cat Land.
“I’m sure Dr. MacKenzie’s cat will come home in a day or two,” Mrs. Lake reassures us. “From what Brenna has told us, he sounds like an independent, smart animal.”
“Yes, but he was hurt in that fight,” Maggie points out. “If his wounds get infected, he won’t have the energy to come home.”
“He’s only been gone a few hours,” Mr. Lake says. “I wouldn’t be worried yet.”
“I hope you’re right,” I say. “That’s pretty much what Dr. M
ac said. Seeing the strays really scared me, though. What if we never find Socrates and he ends up living outside? What will he do when it snows?”
“Well, the size of that colony of strays should prove it’s a good place to live,” Mrs. Lake says as she passes the potato salad down to David. “I had no idea it was so large. I had heard that there were only a few cats there.”
“I wish we could rescue all of them,” I say. “I’d love to take one home.”
“I don’t think they need rescuing,” says Sage. “Those strays have survived without much help.”
“But they shouldn’t have to,” I say hotly. “It’s not fair for them to have to live like that.”
“Maybe, maybe not,” says Mr. Lake. “It can be hard to tell when it’s right for people to interfere in the life of a wild animal.”
“Assuming these cats are all feral,” Mrs. Lake adds.
“You say they are being fed by that boy and his sister. To me that means they aren’t really wild, they’re dependent on humans for food,” Mr. Lake says.
“Yeah, but what about the bears in Yellowstone National Park?” Sage says. He leans on the table. “They used to eat the garbage left behind by tourists. When the park made sure people cleaned up after themselves, the bears went back to their normal eating habits. They weren’t depending on the humans. They were just taking the easiest meal they could find. The cats are doing the same thing.”
“But cats are not bears,” Zoe says. “Cats are pets. I think Sunita is right. It’s not fair that they have to live like that. They all deserve something better.”
Brenna’s father pulls at his beard. “Now I’ll disagree with what Dr. Mac said on one point. There are some people who have brought feral cats into their homes and more or less domesticated them—made them into pets.”
“So I’m right,” I say.
Mr. Lake shakes his head slowly. “Not exactly. Even those ‘domesticated’ ferals are nervous around people. I know a woman who has done this a few times. She said it took her cat more than a year to get used to being in the same room as her. And it still won’t sit in her lap or let her pet it.”