First Contact

Raleigh is still in my bathroom. He seems content to be there for now, but has been peering around the corner out the doorway, when it is open. I have been leaving it open, under my supervision, a bit more now, to accustom little Peachy to the sounds and smells in the apartment. When the door is closed, it is not latched, for the same reason.

But I will this week introduce him to the resident beasts. I was hoping to put all of them away in a room or two, except for Josie and Renn - who are the easiest for a new cat to meet - and then release Raleigh for an hour or so. My plan was pre-empted, however, by a certain Siamese princess. She had been sniffing at the bathroom door for a few days, and during the weekend decided to go further.

I was in the bedroom when I heard a series of frantic hisses and a scrambling noise. I hurried out to see Cammie hurrying away from the bathroom in high dudgeon, the bathroom door ajar and, within, Raleigh, looking bemused and startled.

Apparently, Cammie had pushed her way into the bathroom and encountered the newcomer, probably snoozing, no doubt minding his own business, and became outraged that another cat was present. I’m sure she knew this beforehand, as she could smell him. But confirmation merely lent force to her fury.

I hastened to assure Raleigh that the princess was not typical of the cats he would meet in the cosy apartment, though I am sure he has met all kinds during his time on the fringes of a feral colony, and his scars testify that some of them possessed malice that Cammie would never have. Still, of all my cats, I would have wished any but her to have been Raleigh’s initial contact. But life has its way of determining its own course, regardless of one’s intentions - “man proposes and God disposes” - as may be seen by the fact that I now have six cats…