MILLY DIDN’T LIKE SULTANAS, but I nibbled a handful, plump and moist from their wash, better than when they dried out.
“Dad,” I said, “I told Freddy Jones about Shere Khan.”
“Oh, yes?”
“And I showed him one of his footprints outside his place.”
“What else?”
“I told him Shere Khan eats boys.”
“Come on, you might as well tell me everything.”
“I told him tonight he’d hear Shere Khan trying to get in his window. And I told him about Bagheera; I said he’s worse than Shere Khan.”
“If you think you’re going to run down the street before you go to bed, and roar, and scratch Freddy’s window—forget it. Remember what happened the time you hooted like a morepork? Poor Freddy.”
“He said he had a mother and I didn’t.”
“All the same.”
“He reckoned his cat had kittens, and he put them in a sack and drowned them.”
“He’s just trying to impress you. You give him nightmares with stories about Shere Khan, and I won’t read you any more about Mowgli. Look at those knees. Just as well it’s Saturday night. You can have a good bath, soak off the dirt, and wash your hair while you’re about it.”
Stretched out full-length, head floating, I could turn the hot tap on and off with my toes.
“Are you going to use all the hot water?” Dad yelled from the kitchen.
I waited a few minutes and yelled back, “Are you going to rinse my hair?”
“Did you scrub those knees?”
“Hold on.” I held my nose, closed my eyes, and Dad tipped the bucket over my head.
“All wet wisps like a drowned rat. You can open your eyes now.”
“I’ve got soap in them.”
“Here.” Dad dabbed them.
“Why does cold water take away the sting?”
“It just does. Here’s a towel and your pyjamas; they’ve been warming on the rack. Make sure you dry yourself properly.”
I ran out to the kitchen, wrapping my head in the towel. “Read us some now? Please, Dad? Milly wants to hear some more about Bagheera.”
So, while I sat with my feet in the oven, and Milly sat on my lap, Dad read us the bit about how no jungle animal, not even Bagheera, could look Mowgli between the eyes, and how Shere Khan plotted to overthrow Akela, the wolf leader, and eat Mowgli. But Mowgli took the Red Flower, the fire in a pot, and singed Shere Khan’s whiskers, and then Mowgli cried, and I cried with him, because he had to leave his family and the jungle, and go to live with men.
“I wanted him to live for ever with Mother and Father Wolf, and Baloo, and Bagheera.”
“It’s not the end of the story.”
“But it said he left Mother Wolf…and I love Mother Wolf.”
“Of course you do.” Dad hugged me. “But there’s more to come.”
“Will you read us some more tomorrow? Because Milly’s worried about Mowgli. You see, she’s got no mother now.”
Dad stretched and yawned.
“Promise?” I asked, looking him between the eyes.
“Promise.” Dad stared back and closed the book without looking down. “I know what you’re trying to do. Just look at the clock. High time you and Milly were in bed.”
“You looked away at the clock,” I told him, “so you must be a jungle animal.”
I think Dad piggybacked us both to bed. Outside, I knew the black shadow was keeping guard in the lemon tree. If Shere Khan roared for Freddy Jones I didn’t hear him, because I woke and it was Sunday morning, and Milly was staring at me, her nose almost touching mine.
“Were you trying to wake me up?” I stared back until she closed her barley-sugar eyes. When she opened them, I stared between them as Mowgli did. Milly looked away, and I knew the story about Bagheera must be true.
“My name is Mowgli,” I told her as I slipped out of bed. “I am crying because I am a man’s cub, and I must go.” I rubbed my eyes. “But I will come back to lay out Shere Khan’s hide upon the Council Rock. ‘Do not forget me! Tell them in the jungle never to forget me!’“ But Milly had curled up and gone to sleep.
I fed the chooks, told off the cockerels for making such a din, warned the wicked old white rooster what I’d do, collected the eggs, and emptied Milly’s dirt box. I poked her poop with a stick.
“That’s an awful stink.” I threw the stick on the compost heap. “For a dainty little kitten…”
When I came back, she was asleep again and wouldn’t wake up and look away, not even though I held my face right up to hers and stared and stared between her eyes.
I let up the blind carefully, so it wouldn’t shout “Hulla-baloo!” and looked outside at the lemon tree, but the black shadow had hidden itself, and the yellow footballs hadn’t grown any bigger. Milly yawned, looked at the sun spilling through dark green leaves, and yawned again.
“You’re the sleepiest cat ever,” I laughed, and there was a groan from Dad’s room.
“Shhh!” I put my finger to Milly’s lips and grinned at her.
Dad groaned again. It sounded like “Hurgle”.
I put my hand over Milly’s mouth to stop her giggling.
“What’s the time?” he asked.
I whispered, “Half past nine, hang your britches on the line”, as I ran out to the kitchen, looked at the alarm clock, and called, “Half past six. Dad, do I have to go to Sunday school?” I whined, “Milly will miss me.”
The voice gave several long groans which meant: “That’s all right, but you’ll have to explain to Mrs Dainty. You know she watches.”
“I’ll tell her I had to keep Milly inside.”
Dad groaned back to sleep. Sunday was his morning for a lie-in, which was why I took pity on him, and tried not to let the blind fly up.
“You stay there,” I told Milly, and got the fire going. Dad had set the porridge to soak before going to bed, so I shoved the saucepan over the heat.
Milly seemed to know as soon as the kitchen was warm. I stirred with the wooden spoon and told her, “You got trodden on, last night, sitting there.”
When porridge starts going “Slop! Plop! Glop!” it looks like the mud pools at Rotorua. Still stirring, I moved the saucepan to the back of the stove, so it wouldn’t catch, put the kettle over the heat, and listened to it sing. Milly ran and sat under the table when I nearly trod on her, but she could still see everything from there.
“Aren’t you a clever kitten?”
Dad came out, bumping into everything, arms straight out in front of him. “Is it midnight yet?” he asked in his sleep-walking voice.
“It’s after seven, and I felt the washing, and it’s just about dry enough to bring in.”
“We’ll bring it in as soon as it looks like clouding over.
“How do you know it’s going to cloud over?”
“It’s been fine for days; and it feels like a change coming.”
“Mr Bluenose says he can feel it in his bones.”
“That’s aches and pains in his joints. Rheumatism.”
“What’s that other -ism word? What Kaa did. I woke up this morning, and Milly was staring into my eyes, trying to…trying to—you know!”
“Hypnotism?”
“Trying to hypnotism me.
“Hypnotise.”
“Hypnotise me. So I stared back between her eyes like Mowgli looking between Bagheera’s.”
“Did it work?”
“She just closed her eyes and pretended to be asleep. Dad, do you think I could hypnotise the old white rooster?”
“You put your face too close to his, he’ll peck out your eyes.”
“But you said you can make a chook go to sleep by tucking its head under its wing.”
“I wouldn’t try it on that wicked old devil. Which reminds me, I thought we might have a cockerel for dinner today. What did you say?”
“Nothing; I just wondered if Freddy Jones would go to sleep, if I stuck his head under his arm.”
Dad tried to catch me and put my head under my arm, but I was too quick. “You can give me a hand catching a cockerel,” he said.
“Are you going to kill it?”
“It’s kinder to kill them first, before cooking them.”
“Oh, Dad.”
They came running when I threw a bit of wheat and called, “Chook! Chook!”
“You’re about the biggest.” Dad grabbed a cockerel by the legs, so it flapped its wings a couple of times, then hung upside down with its beak open. “It’s not a bad weight.”
I followed to where the axe leaned against the chopping block.