Old Salt
His lone green eye stares out upon the boundless sea. There's a ship on the horizon. Every day the ships bring him new treasure. He licks his wrist, his tongue searching for traces of blood. The flavor reminds him of the delectable fish guts he had for dinner the night before. He would have eaten more if the seagulls hadn't swarmed him, not that he didn't eat his fill.
Old Salt is a fast eater. It's a lesson he had learned years earlier. When fish guts hit the dock, everyone hears. The belligerent white birds had learned lessons of their own. That's how they knew to come at him in a swarm. If a seagull were to attack him alone, Old Salt would be having seagull for dinner.
The large gray cat rules the docks. He had never been a great hunter, but on the docks, food was plentiful. You just have to be strong and aggressive enough to take it. Strength and aggression are qualities Old Salt has in abundance.
Scratches and scars decorate the skin under his soft gray coat. The wounds around the left side of his face are too multitudinous for his fur to hide. As a kitten, an infection stole his eye, leaving him vulnerable. Despite his handicap, he managed to claw his way to the position of top cat on the docks.
A cat also has to be a good judge of humans. You have to know which ones are willing to feed you and which ones want to stomp on your head or worse, kick you into the water. A cat in water is like a fish outside of it, they don't live long.
Humans are strange and unnatural animals. They're completely unpredictable. You just kind of have to get a feel for them. Old Salt feels as though he knows them fairly well. The important thing to remember is that they can change at any minute and for no discernable reason.
Fortunately, cats can usually sense when it's safe to approach one and when it's best to keep away.
As the ship gets closer, he wonders whether it will be a fish ship or a rat ship. Fishing boats go out every morning and return before dusk. Cats are not usually welcome on fish ships. Humans never like to share the tastiest parts of the fish, only the parts they don't care for.
Rat ships are different. They stay docked for days. Cargo gets loaded and unloaded. Most of the crew go into town. The ones who stay on board don't mind cats coming and going at their leisure. In fact, they're almost always happy to lose some of their rodent population.
The dirty little secret is that most cats are terrified of full-grown rats. Rats can grow big enough and nasty enough to kill a cat. They don't scare Old Salt. He once fought off half a dozen rats in defense of a fat juicy fish head. He's even killed and eaten full grown rats, but only in desperation. The flavor is not worth the fight.
Rats may look like big mice, but they're not. Mice are tender and succulent. Rats are quite the opposite. Full grown rats that is. Younger rats are a different story. They can be rather tasty little morsels. The younger, the better. Rat babies are the best. They're born blind, helpless, and delicious.
When the ship finally docks, the feral feline is famished. He hides behind lobster traps as the crew tie up and set the planks. Most of the crew then stroll merrily into town. Old Salt slinks over a plank and slips unnoticed onto the ship.
This ship doesn't smell of fish, it smells of rat. A ship like this is filled with little hiding places that are filled with rat nests. Those nests are filled with yummy little babies just waiting to be plucked out and devoured. Old Salt begins his search.
Silently, he treads on padded feet, stalking the lower decks. His open ears listen for the tell-tale signs of scratching. He crouches between walls and under floors until he hears a gnawing sound. He follows it to find a young rat, the size of a mouse, chewing on something. A small rat is not as fast or hard to catch as a mouse.
Old Salt pounces at him and misses. The diminutive rat scurries away. The cat gives chase. He pursues his potential meal into a hole that leads to the inside of a cabinet. Squeezing through the hole slows him down. His prey escapes.
The predator scans the box he finds himself in. He sees no rat. He hears no rat. He smells...what is that he smells? It's fish, and it smells like heaven. The olfactory sensation thrills the cat. He rubs the side of his head and body hard against a wall in excitement. Unfortunately, the wall turns out to be a door. It opens, and he plummets unceremoniously to the floor below.
"Are you alright?" The voice is gentle, pleasant, and earnestly concerned. A young human female sits on a chair. As something of an expert on human behavior, Old Salt quickly judges her to be non-threatening.
He shakes off the effects of his fall and walks towards the girl. More accurately, he walks to the exquisite smell coming from the table in front of her. He stretches up on his hind legs to sniff.
"Are you hungry?" She asks. With her right hand, she sets her plate on the floor. "I fear that my appetite has abandoned me."
Old Salt takes one deep sniff, inhaling pure ambrosia before gulping it down as if a flock of seagulls were on him. He had never tasted cooked fish before, let alone fish cooked in butter. He had never dreamed food could taste this good.
As he finished the last bite of fish and began licking the butter from the plate, the girl reaches down and scratches behind his ear. The feeling is euphoric. No one had ever pet him before. He liked it, and he liked her. He decided to keep her.
The humans on this ship smell bad, even by human standards, but she smells nice and fresh like a spring breeze. She smells safe. He instinctively leaps into her lap. She laughs and pets him. Her left hand is shackled to the chair. She appears to have been crying. He curls up into her warm, soft lap and begins to purr, involuntarily.
"You're a very nice kitty" The girl makes stupid human sounds from her mouth. "I haven't seen a friendly face in quite a while. Your face is friendly, handsome too, especially for a pirate cat. You're even missing an eye like Mr. Campbell. He's a mean pirate, not nice like you. He comes in here and threatens to do the most ghastly things."
Her voice is sweet. It has a relaxing cadence that the cat finds comforting. The girl seems to find comfort in the cat, as well. She pets his head and under his chin as she continues to babble on pleasantly.
"The pirates took me to hurt my father. He is the new governor. He has delivered powerful, punitive blows to the local buccaneers. I know that they want to hurt me to hurt him, but I must remain calm and wait for my father to rescue me."
The girl continues to blather on interminably. Old Salt assumes it's her way of purring. He soon falls asleep, as does the girl. The cozy cat sleeps longer and sounder than he has in his entire life.
Occasionally, a noise would stir him, but her dozy hand would gently caress the back of his neck, causing him to drift back into the realm of dream.
There is a great ruckus outside the cabin. Men are shouting. Sails are unfurling. Iron and wood are banging together. A frantic crew beats a hasty retreat from the harbor while the two new-found companions sleep peacefully below the deck unaware of the panic above their heads.
The cabin door slams open and a large, foul-smelling man with an eye patch bursts in. The cat leaps to the floor and hides under the chair. The pleasant girl wakes up startled.
"What is it? What's happening?" She asks.
"Tis your father what's happening, girlie." The pirate replies. "He came upon us with a proper man-o-war he did. Got the jump on us, too, but we're on full-blown sails now. That lumbering behemoth will not catch us."
Mr. Campbell smiles a wicked black toothed smile and leans his gnarled face into hers. "I don't think you and me are going to get to enjoy all the fun I promised you, lassie. The captain ordered me to bring you up to the main deck. He wants your father to watch you get your pretty little throat slashed in his fancy spy glass before we pull too far away for him to see the show."
The girl gasps in terror. The grizzled pirate laughs. "What do we have here?" He asks.
A hand grabs Old Salt by the scruff of his neck and lifts him into the air. "Is this your friend then?" He asks. "Maybe we'll toss him in the drink after you."
Mr. Campbell holds the cat at arm’s length, but the cat is too heavy. The pirate has to bend his elbow to hold him up. It's not much, but it brings Old Salt close enough to scratch.
With one lightning-like strike, the cat swats the pirate's good eye, scratching deep inside the cornea. Mr. Campbell screams and drops the cat. Old Salt runs out of the open door. The governor's daughter hits the blind buccaneer with her chair. She follows the cat holding the chair she's still chained to in front of her.
The cat runs upstairs and onto the main deck. A boot kicks his ribs, and a pirate trips hard to the deck. The girl and her chair run up the stairs. She runs towards the railing when a man grabs her arm.
Without thinking, Old Salt runs up the length of the man's leg to his neck, clawing the whole way. The man releases the girl who immediately jumps over the side. The cat follows her.
The reason cats always land on their feet is that they are the smartest animals in the world. That's not completely true, but cats do think faster than everyone else. This is most pronounced in emergency situations. It's as if time slows down for cats when they need it to.
It seems like a lifetime goes by as Old Salt falls from the ship into the water. He first looks for something to grab onto. There's nothing. He looks for a safe place to land, but his only option is ocean. Like a fish out of water, a cat in water is doomed. He doesn't feel like the smartest animal in the world now.
When he finally hits the water, it hurts. He struggles to stay afloat. A hand reaches out and pulls him to safety, the safety of a floating chair.
"I have you, kitty." The girl says. "Just hold on." He does. She kicks her feet, and the gap between them and the rapidly fleeing ship grows. Musket fire rings out from the passing pirate ship. They miss.
The governor's daughter, her chair, and her wet furry friend swim towards the big ship pursuing them. The pirates soon disappear over the horizon. A small boat is lowered from the man-o-war to retrieve the girl and her cat…and their chair.
The governor is so very pleased to get his child back safely, that he lets her keep the cat. Old Salt now lives in the governor's mansion and eats shrimp every day. He no longer needs to fight for food, and the quality of his food has dramatically improved. He now has the girl, her father, and several other servants to attend to his every need. Food, drink, and massage on demand, this is how cats were meant to live.
Sometimes he remembers the old days on the docks. He wonders who's the top cat now that he's gone. He thinks about going back some day, just to reassert his authority, someday, but not today. Today he is going to lie in the sun with a full belly and let his humans pamper him. After all, he is still a magnanimous ruler.
Joseph Galeani
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