Across the pond

Although the country is in the middle of the big freeze and here in Dorset my neighbours say we have more snow than they remember seeing before, my eldest daughter’s family were here just after 2 PM. Little Dulcie led the march up the drive, holding a wire cage containing a small black and white cat, who is named Summer.

Holly had decreed that Summer should not be banished to a cat sitter, but should enjoy Christmas with all the family. With Kath, my youngest daughter, who is coming by train today, after doing her nursing shift today. Roger whose coach from Oxfordshire was half an hour late, arriving at 6 PM. But the connecting bus to Charmouth. which should have left at 5.15 PM was even later. It pulled in just after the coach arrived in Dorchester, so he was here quicker than usual. And the New Zealand cousins, who were  delayed two days in Hong Kong while. Hearthrow airport were battling with the snow and ice. They should be here from London today, snow and ice permitting.

Summer was shut in the kitchen, where Janet was making mince pies and I was doing something or other. Summer ran around in fright, but finally found a resting place on top of the microwave.

Disaster.

When all the luggage, and the food and booze and Christmas presents were in the house, we discovered she had vanished. I was sure she must be somewhere in the house, and spent a wasted hour looking on the top of all the cupboards and underneath all the beds.

The others thought she must have run out of the front door when we were looking the other way.

Neil and Linda, over the read helped to join in the search of the neighbourhood, which went on for hours. Mark next door came round to lend us a gigantic lantern  to help the search when night fell.

Just before I went to bed I listened to Holly’s plaintive cry, ‘Summer’, as she had yet another look around the garden and underneath the terrace decking. It’s only a cat. But it was heart-rending.

I woke at 5.30. Optimistic, because one dream fragment I remembered had Holly coming in to report that Summer had walked back in through the door, which we had left ajar, when we went to bed with a food dish just inside. Desite the below freezing tempartures.

My heart lifted when I got to the hall. The door was closed.

But when I got to kitchen, so was the cat litter tray. And the food was untouched.

So if  you live in these parts and have seen a small black and white cat wandering around, please email me, ASAP.