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To put you in the proper frame of mind for this story, forget the current spell of warm, springlike weather and go back to mid-February, with four inches of snow on the ground and a thermometer that hadn't moved above freezing in three weeks.
On one of the coldest of those mornings Honey asked me, "Have you seen Flop today? I haven't seen him all morning. I'm a little worried."
No, I had not seen Flop the Cat, and I could not remember whether he had come in the night before.
Of our three young ex-gentlemen cats, Flop during the cold weather had transitioned from the least likely to the most likely to ask to go outside. And it is less of an "ask" than a sudden bolt past one's feet when one of us opened the front door to bring in firewood. The other two cats, Fizz and Louie, would think they wanted to go outside until the cold air hit their faces.
A fruitless search of the house ensued. Had Flop inadvertently been shut up in a closet or unused room? Was he asleep on the air hockey table in the basement? No and no.
As soon as it got light outside I walked around the house, crunching through the snow and calling, "Flaw-op! Flaaaw-op!"
"You and the boys were in the garage last evening. Would you check there?" Honey asked.
I looked in the garage, calling and calling. No Flop.
COYOTES ARE always a worry. Now and then we hear them howling up on the hill, and we know they will take small pets. In the long cold spell they must be very hungry.
If not coyotes, then the cold: with overnight temps approaching 10 degrees, I feared Flop might have holed up somewhere and frozen to death.
The house had been a little chaotic the night before: Honey's sister and nephew were visiting, and our four youngest grandsons arrived for an overnighter. The cats make themselves scarce at such times. It's no wonder we lost track of Flop.
"Flop is missing," Honey told the boys when they woke up. "I'm worried the coyotes might have gotten him."
A search! A rescue mission! Thrilled to be called into action, the boys dressed quickly in winter gear and swarmed out the door.
Looking out the front windows, we could see them running here and there, noses to the ground like dogs on the hunt. It was not long before they returned with a sad report of Flop's probable demise.
They told of finding intermingled cat tracks and coyote tracks on the driveway behind the garage, and large patches of disturbed snow leading up into the woods, mute evidence of a desperate struggle. One thought he saw traces of blood; another reported seeing a tuft of fur.
It seemed pretty clear: Flop had put up a desperate fight, and lost.
"SHOW ME," I said.
I followed the boys back to the scene of the fight.
"Here's where Flop's tracks go under the deck. I saw a piece of fur on this bush," said The Favorite.
I peered closely but could make out neither tracks nor fur.
The boys said there were cat prints emerging from under the far side of the deck, and that's where the coyote jumped him. Yes, the snow had been disturbed there, but Bob said, "Uh, those are my tracks."
The 747 and Lamppost Head pointed out large patches of dug-up snow alongside the driveway, with more going up into the woods. Here were a lot of tracks, but they were deer tracks. The deer had been digging for acorns under the snow.
We trudged a short distance up the hill into the woods, fighting the blackberry briars and thorny multiflora before giving up. Deer tracks, nothing more.
Still, Flop was nowhere to be found. Coyotes could have gotten him.
A BIT LATER I made another circuit of the house, calling Flop and peering into the dim spaces under our deck, half expecting to see his frozen corpse.
Taking a last look in the garage, suddenly I heard a very faint and repeated "Mew," in response to my call. But with only one good ear, I couldn't tell where it was coming from. I called Honey on my cell phone.
"Hurry, it's getting fainter," I said.
Bob got there first. His young ears located Flop underneath a counter, against an outside wall and behind boxes of automotive stuff. Bob moved the boxes, but Flop acted strange and would not at first come out.
Suddenly he seemed to come out of a trance, emerged and dashed out of the garage like he was being chased. He ran straight to the house, went inside and within a short time was his normal aloof self again.
The next evening I caught Louie trying to sneak out late. "What's the matter with you?" I yelled at him. "Don't you know that's how Flop got eaten by coyotes?"
"But, Flop didn't get eaten by coyotes," Honey said, confused.
"Shhh. Louie's not too bright, and the legend is more important than the facts."
(Fred Miller's new book of 100 stories, "Falling Under Honey's Spell," is $10, available locally at Connie's Kitchen, Davis Bros. Pharmacies, Frank's Pastry, Giant Eagle Calcutta, Green Marble Coffee, Museum of Ceramics, Pottery City Antique Mall, and at fredmilleratlarge.com.)