The Saga of Dan and Hannah’s Boots (6 of 7)

Thursday

As I am walking through our bedroom in the early afternoon, there he is right outside the bedroom window by our bulkhead.  I know he zipped away when he saw me before, but not being terribly bright, I still open the front door, and bam he’s off to the races; I mean sprinting across the front yard, down our driveway towards the road (in five years Boots never went toward Chases Pond Road), stays on the shoulder to the north, then cuts in by our neighbor’s driveway.  The seeds of doubt are growing that this is Boots.  Why would he bolt?  Trauma from a year in the wild?  Maybe.  He looks shorter than he does in my memory.   He’s leaner.  And why does he zip away so quickly?  Abused?  Maybe, but I’m just guessing.  I’ll take a picture with my phone if I get another chance.   I’m discouraged that he zips away so quickly.  How are we going to catch him?  How to lure him in?  Leave food closer and closer to the door so he eventually comes in?  That seems like a pipe dream.   All three bowls of dry food I’ve placed around the house have not been touched.  Seeds of doubt are growing, but I’m resolved to learn the truth if this cat is Boots.  What are the odds another black cat with four white paws would be hanging around our house?  I hope zero.

Friday

I have to say my fire is gone.  No sighting.  No animal eating the food in the three bowls I’ve placed around the yard.  My doubts multiply.  In the afternoon I take around the final Boots flyers.  Few people are home so I’m not energized by the give-and-take of conversation.  One guy tells me his mother-in-law who lives nearby has had a cat in her yard for a year.  He doesn’t remember the color, but I’ve already dropped a flyer off at her house.

Boom.  At 520P I get a call. It’s his mother-in-law.  She tells me that they’ve had a black cat with white paws around their house, barn, and shed for the last year.  Whenever they try to get close to the cat, it runs away (just like this cat has done twice with me over the last week).  She thinks it could have been in the barn over the winter.  They’ve not fed it because they don’t know where this wild cat might have been.  I’ll email the picture of Boots to her to see if they’d think it’s the same cat.  The cat is definitely leaner and wilder, but that’s what might happen when a cat is fending for itself and living off its wits.  She suggests using a Have-A-Heart trap and then take it to the vet to see what the vet thinks. 

Maybe Boots is forever wild and we will have to enjoy him from afar and on occasion.  Not much satisfaction in that.  I’ll call some vets to see what they think.