The Story of Jennie- or the Abandoned (18 page)

The words came out in spite of himself and knowing how Jennie felt about people and having anything to do with them. But oddly enough she did not become angry with him, but only gave him a long and searching look. She opened her mouth as though about to speak, and then, apparently thinking better of it, closed it again without uttering a sound.

Encouraged, Peter was just about to say, 'Jennie, don't you think you might try just once more-' when without a moment of warning, baying, barking and slavering, three dogs burst upon them from out of the gloom around the stone and steel abutment of the suspension bridge, and were almost upon them before they could move.

There was a snap of teeth and a shrill scream from Jennie: `Peter! Run! They're killers …' and he saw her flash upwards, a giant pit bull at her heels, and the next moment, gripped by absolute terror and panic he saw the other two bearing down upon him. Long after, he could remember only the horrible burly effect of them made by their massive chests and the small, long, snake-like heads with the cropped ears and slanted eyes, now blazing with the quarry in sight. Their jaws were open, tongues lolling, white sabre teeth shining, and the sound of their feet and toenails scrabbling and pounding on the stone was horrid. And then he was off, running for his very life, around the stone abutment in which was set the tall steel south tower of the suspension bridge.

What had become of Jennie he did not know, nor in his panic could he so much as even think, but he knew her warning to be a supreme effort on her part to save him. For if the dogs once caught them, they would destroy them as cleanly and as quickly as he and Jennie had killed their rats and mice. A snap, a wrench, a toss, and it would be all over.

Never was there a sound as horrible as the hoarse, throaty growl, a murderous cry if ever there was one, and it was coming nearer as with each stride the long-legged, powerful brutes gained on Peter. There was a snick and something touched one of his hind feet, yet still managed to miss a hold. He felt their horrible breath as they closed in.

And thereafter Peter could remember nothing but going up, up, up, straight up into the air. His feet, urged on by panic, touched stone and steel, first rough then slippery and knobbed, slanted and crossed and riveted, a network of iron as it were, rising to the clouds, and as fast as his paws touched they were up and away, giving him new impetus, even higher and higher so that he did not seem to be climbing, but rather flying up and ever upwards.

The fog and the rain shrouded him in so that he could see neither where he had come from nor the next few yards higher, yet he kept on, driven by the fear that would not permit him to stop until gradually he became aware of the fact that the terrible growling and barking was no longer in his ears, nor the sound of the pursuing feet, nor, for that matter, any sound whatsoever but the distant hooting of boats somewhere, and far, far in the distance, the roar of traffic.

Only then did he dare to slow down to listen. For safety's sake he gave a couple of more spasmodic leaps still higher and then came to rest at last, but trembling from head to foot. There was no more pursuit, no dogs, nothing of anything.

He seemed to be wedged into a kind of an angle of several short lengths of riveted steel that came zigzagging up out of the swirling mists and vanished into the thicker fog above. There was a penetrating wind all about him too that seemed to pluck at him. Peter realized that he did not have the faintest idea where on earth or heaven, or between the two perhaps, that he was—or how he had got there. He wedged himself more closely into the angle of the steel and clung there with all four feet.

TIME went by, how much, Peter could not tell. In the distance he heard at last a clock striking six, and then another and another, almost as though for some reason he could suddenly hear all the clocks in the world announcing the hour. But whether it was in the evening or in the morning he, had no way of telling, for the shock of the sudden attack and escape had frightened him completely out of his wits.

However, now they were beginning to return to him. Whatever the hour, the gloom of darkness, fog and rain was still impenetrable and he was aware that there was nothing for him to do but remain perched where he was until he should be able to determine where it was he had got to in his frantic rush of panic.

At that moment he heard a faint call, a dear and well-remembered voice coming from out of the darkness, apparently a little below him. He shouted-'Jennie! Jennie, where are you? Are you all right?'

She replied at once, and although Peter could not see her, he could hear the relief trembling in her voice. 'Peter! Oh, I am so glad, I could cry. I was frightened to death they had caught you. Are you sure you aren't hurt?'

Not at all,' he replied, `except that I got terribly scared. But where are you? And for that matter, where am I? I want to come to you.'

There was a moment of silence and then Jennie's voice came through the fog, quite tense. `Don't stir, Peter. We're up in the towers of the suspension bridge. Way up high, I think.'

'Up in the tower,' Peter repeated in amazement. `Why, I don't remember anything but just running-yes, for a moment I did seem to be flying…. I say, how exciting. ..'

'Peter. ..'Jennie's voice was a little plaintive now. `Can you forgive me for leaving you that way? I couldn't help it. It's the one time when cats just don't think.' And then before he could reply, she continued: 'It's all my fault-being so upset over that foolish Maltese, with all her talk about Turks and Knights of St. John and Lord Nelson. Of course, she doesn't come from the Island of Malta at all. Trying to pull the wool over my eyes with her grand ways. They just call those short-haired greys Maltese. And then the way she talked about you. But even so, I should have smelled those dogs long before they got close enough to surprise us, and we could have taken steps, except that I haven't been myself these past days at all. Oh, Peter, I'm so sorry for all the trouble I've brought to you.'

'Trouble …' Peter repeated in amazement. 'But, Jennie, you haven't …'

'Peter,' she cried, her voice full of despair this time, 'you don't know what I've done. Everything is my fault.'

Peter didn't know, and what was more, couldn't even think what she meant, except that something was troubling her about which she had not yet told him. When she did not speak to him further, he thought it best to remain quiet himself, and he settled down on the narrow, slanting piece of steel and clung there, cramped, cold and shivering.

An hour or so later, the rain stopped, a breeze sprang up, and the fog about Peter began to swirl and thin, drifting in wisps, shredding, permitting him almost to see and then closing in again, only at last to be pierced by the yellow rays of the mounting sun. Then the blue sky appeared overhead, the last patches of mist were dissolved and he could see everything. Jennie had been quite right. They were up in the towers of the Clarke Street Suspension Bridge.

They were high up too, almost at the top, with Jennie a few yards lower than he, stretched out on one of the upwardslanting girders of the twin neighbouring tower that paralleled the one he was on. Below them, like a map, lay all Glasgow, threaded by the grey ribbon of the Clyde and marked with the ugly patches of the Central and St. Enoch's stations with their lines of railway tracks emerging from them like strands of spaghetti from a package.

Here, Peter thought, was the perfect bird's-eye, or to be more modern, aeroplane pilot's-eye view of the great grey city. To the east lay the pleasant emerald gem of Glasgow Green, to the west the broadening river, the docks and the shipping, amongst which he could even make out the shabby but loved lines of the Countess of Greenock, and he saw that there was black smoke again pouring from her thin funnel which meant that she must be getting ready to sail. On and on his eyes travelled, like glancing over a page in a geography book. There were blue mountains and lakes in the misty north, and he was certain that he could see storied Ben Lomond rising amongst them.

To his surprise he found that the height made him neither dizzy nor frightened, and he could enjoy the view and the surroundings as long as he did not try to move. It was when he did so, as he wished to descend at least to Jennie's level, that he found himself in difficulties. He discovered that he could go neither up nor down.

Peter called over to his friend: 'Jennie-I'm all right. But how do we get down from here? I'm sure the dogs have left by now. If you go first, I'll try to follow you.' He thought perhaps if he saw the way she did it he might be able to take heart, or copy her the way he had in so many other things.

It was some time before she replied, and in the ensuing silence he could see her looking up at him with an odd kind or despair in her eyes. Finally she called to him: `Peter, I'm sorry, but I can't. It's something that happens to cats some times. We get up on to high places and lose our way and can't get down– even from trees or telegraph poles where we might manage to get a grip with our claws. But this horrible, slippery steel-ugh! I just can't think of it. I'm terrified. Don't bother about me, Peter. Try to get down.'

`I wouldn't leave you even if I could, Jennie,' Peter said, `but I can't. I understand what you mean. I'm the same way. I couldn't move an inch. What will happen to us?'

Jennie looked quite grim, and averted her eyes. `We're for it, Peter. We stay up here until we starve to death or fall off and are dashed to pieces below. Oh, I wish I were dead already, I'm so miserable. I don't care about myself, but when I think of what I have done to you, my poor Peter …'

Peter found that his immediate concern was less with the dangerous situation in which they found themselves, than with Jennie. For assuredly this was not the old, brave, self possessed friend he had known who had a solution to every difficulty and the right answer to every question. Obviously something was troubling her deeply and robbing her of her courage and ability to think and act in emergencies. He could not imagine what it was, but since it was so, it was his place then to assume the burden of leadership and at least try to support her as she had him so often.

He said: `Oh, come. At least we're still alive, and we have each other and that's all that matters.'

His immediate reward was a faint smile and a small, soft purr. Jennie said wanly, `I love you for that, Peter.'

`And besides,' Peter continued stoutly, `sooner or later someone is bound to see us marooned up here and come to fetch us down.'

Jennie made a little sound of despair in her throat. 'Oh! People! My Peter, you don't know them as-'

`But I do,' Peter insisted. `At least I know one is always seeing pictures in the papers of people gathered 'round and firemen climbing ladders to fetch cats down out of trees-,

'Trees perhaps,' Jennie said, `but they'd never bother about us way up here …'

`Well,' said Peter, even though he did not feel at all certain that anyone would trouble to help them even if they were seen, 'I'm for trying at least to attract somebody's attention,' and inhaling his lungs full of air he emitted a long, mournful siren howl in which from time to time Jennie joined him even though she did not believe it would do much good.

And indeed, it appeared as though her pessimism was justified. Far below, the busy city came to life. Traffic began to flow through the streets, from which arose a kind of muted and distant roar that drifted up to the two fixed to their precarious perches and tending to drown out the cries by which they sought to draw attention to themselves. On the suspension bridge, footwalkers crossed in a steady stream between Portland Street and St. Enoch's. People walked along the embankment and in the busy sidestreets. But no eyes turned upwards towards the sky and the top of the towers. Not any time that whole long day.

And all through that next night, Peter called down words of courage to Jennie and comforted her to try to keep her spirits up. But by the following morning both he and Jennie were perceptibly weaker. Their voices were nearly gone from shouting, and Peter felt that his grip on his girder was not as strong and secure as it had been. Nevertheless, he refused to give up, and said to Jennie: `Look here—we must make some kind of an attempt. I'll go first and you watch what I do and follow me.'

But Jennie moaned, 'No! no! I can't, I can't, I can't. I'd rather have the dogs get me. I can't bear coming down from high places. I won't even try .. ,'

Peter knew then that there was nothing to do but stay there until the end. He closed his eyes, determined to rest and conserve his strength for as long as he could.

He must have fallen asleep, for it was many hours later that he was suddenly awakened by a confused shouting and cries from below, and the sound of engines and sirens and the clanging of bells. There was a crowd gathered on the south bank of the river on the square giving entrance to the bridge, people swarming like ants about trucks and wagons glistening with brass and gear and machinery, and new apparatus kept arriving, fire engines dashing along Portland Place, and police cars and equipment lorries from the light and telephone and bridge maintenance companies.

'Jennie! Jennie!' Peter called. `Look down. Look below you and see what is happening.'

She did and her reply came floating back to him faintly: 'What is it? There must have been some kind of an accident on the bridge. What difference does it make?'

And now that she looked more carefully she could indeed see that all the white faces in the dark mass of the huge crowd that had gathered were turned upwards, that fingers were pointing up at them and men running about and policemen trying to clear a space about the bridge abutment from which rose the twin steel towers; ladders were being raised and apparatus hauled into place.

`There, you see!' Peter crowed. `It's all for us. Oh, I say, but we are important! Look, they have quite everybody come out to try to rescue us …'