In which, Hot Dog dies and Rastus goes away...

Most pet stories end on a sad note, and some end in a mystery. This one ends in both.

Dogs ran free where I grew up, and those without street smarts usually didn't live long enough to reproduce because National Highway 62 ran right through our town -- and so did big 18-wheeling scofflaws who figured the lowered speed limit was intended for locals.

Often, they figured right.

Hot Dog, generally street smart and careful, didn't perish under the wheels of a semi-truck. He fell victim to the car of our high school counselor by rushing into the road on his short little legs in a vain attempt to catch up with my youngest brother and his friends.

The counselor felt bad. My brother felt worse. But our cat Rastus took it hardest of all.

All that Rastus knew was that Hot Dog didn't return one day. Or perhaps he smelled Hot Dog underground in the corner of our garden. Maybe he even thought that we had done away with his friend.

That could help explain his subsequent behavior.

Or was he simply mad with grief?

Whatever the cause, Rastus changed from a gentle, trusting cat who would curl up our our laps, or lounge out upon the rocking chair near the stove, to a hissing, suspicious feline that perched atop our refrigerator and scratched at us when we passed by.

That aggressive behavior went on for days, then weeks ... until, one morning, Rastus left the house and never returned.

We called for him and left milk and food ... but to no avail. He was forever gone.

I've often wondered what became of that cat.

Did he, like Hot Dog, fall under the wheel of a car? Or did an eagle pluck him from the ground as sometimes happened? Or did he instead wander off into the woods to die alone in his grief?

Or might he have lived on?

An old woman once told me about a cat of hers that lived to be 28, and I've read somewhere of a cat in China that has lived into its thirties. According to Wikipedia, the oldest known cat lived from 1903 to 1939, reaching the age of 36. Perhaps some few, unknown cats have lived even longer, reaching 40 or more years.

If Rastus be one of these few, then he could be out there somewhere still, almost anywhere by now, prowling the earth, watchful and remembering...