All at Sea with Truffles Read online

  When we got back Sheila picked up a card that was lying on the bed and read it. “Huh,” I heard her mutter to herself, “madam won’t like that!” She gave a wry grin. I didn’t know what she was on about so I didn’t take any particular notice. We carried out our normal bedtime routines and got into our respective beds. I switched on my sleep mode and was out like a light.

  The next day

  We woke up early the next morning and once more bright sunlight had us both blinking. I went out and performed my morning ablutions, and then looked over the edge to see that we were parked up by the side of another dock, but this one was not nearly so big as the ones in Gibraltar or Southampton. There were a few buildings not far from us, but not all that big, and I could see green hills in the distance and leading up to them what looked like fields of strange, pale mauve-coloured grass. I could hear some lady humans singing out of tune, accompanied by some even more out-of-tune music. Looking down, I saw several people all dressed in odd-looking outer coverings and with funny hats on their heads. The ear-jarring music was coming from strange sets of pipes being played by three man humans. I must say that our local cats’ chorus, which meets usually on a Saturday night on our neighbours’ wall, sounds much better! Behind them were some outside shops selling lots of colourful things, but they were a bit far away so I couldn’t see exactly what they were. Quite a large pr… pro… propor… part of what they were selling was in the same mauve shade as the grass in the fields. More useless stuff for Sheila to throw away her money on, I reckoned!

  “Come in, Truffles,” Sheila called, so I went back in. She nipped out and brought the litter box inside for some reason, and also the sack of catlit, and then she slid the doors shut behind her. I’ve usually eaten my breakfast outside, so I vaguely wondered why her routine had changed, However, I was more interested in my actual breakfast awaiting me in my bowl, which she’d placed on a sheet of paper near my bed in the corner of the stateroom. “I’m off for my breakfast now,” she said, “as I’m getting off the ship early because I’m going shopping with Margaret in Provence.” So that’s where we are, I thought - not that it meant anything to me! It was just somewhere that wasn’t in Cornwall! I finished off my meal and went to the patio doors, but they remained closed. I wanted to go out and sit in the sun as usual. Why had she shut me in? I felt a sulk coming on.

  Just then Sheila returned. I went and sat by the doors, looking expectantly at her to open them for me. “I’m very sorry,” she said, “but not this morning. You’ll have to stay indoors, Truffles. Look, I’ve got to go now. Be good and I’ll see you about lunchtime, or just after, I expect. You can go out later on this afternoon.” With that, she gave me a pat, gathered up her ship’s tote bag and her handbag and off she went.

  I sat down, looking through the impenetrable (yes, another long word of yours that has somehow stuck in my brain over the years!) glass doors to the outside, and sulked. I had been dreaming of spending a nice morning lazing in the sun, but my dream had been shattered without any explanation.

  As I sat there sulking, I thought I could hear a kind of roaring noise. It seemed to be coming from the stateroom on our left side, or rather from their balcony. It was definitely getting nearer and much louder. I stood up, my ears pricked. Suddenly all hell broke loose! From next door two members of the crew, dressed in matching white outer coverings and each holding what looked like a huge black snake in their paws, climbed onto our balcony and pointed the snakes’ heads at the decking and the patio doors. Out of the snakes’ mouths came a massive torrent of water! It made a horrific noise and I don’t mind admitting that I was totally terrified! Like a bullet out of a gun, I shot up the curtains and jumped onto a narrow ledge that was above them, clinging on for dear life - my claws extended to full stretch! The noise of the water jets sounded like the torrential rain we get at home, which hammers horizontally on the windows, but what was happening outside here was much, much worse! I could hear another noise like the sound of a hundred mice pitter-pattering at full speed across a co… corr… corrug… tin roof. I realised it was the pounding of my heart! Everything on the ship so far had been lovely, but this experience was truly awful - a great deal more scary than even the nasty black bird! I prayed I would be safe up there - nothing was coming through the doors ... so far! I was shaking all over, but somehow I managed not to fall off the ledge. How long the torrents of water and the roaring sound went on I couldn’t guess, but eventually the men moved over to the neighbours on our right and gradually the awful noise subsided as they got further away. The sound of the mice running over the tin roof faded into the distance. My goodness, this had been a real shock to the system and I should not be subjected to shocks like that at my age! How had Sheila let it happen? My tail wagged in anger. No wonder she was anxious to get out so early!

  Help! Help! Scream! Scream!

  I decided I would remain perched on the ledge indefinitely, as I felt comparatively safe there, in spite of the fact that my paws were beginning to feel numb from gripping on so tightly. The men and their snakes might come back again and this time I would be prepared! However, nothing happened, and after a while there was a knock at the door and Eduardo came in. He didn’t see me at first. “Where are you, Trufools?” he said, looking all around.

  Then he suddenly saw me and said, “Trufools, what are you doing up zere? Pleeze to come down, Trufools!” No way! I clung on defiantly, scowling at him with my tail wagging. Despite his pleas and some tempting shrimps that he waved in front of my nose, no way was I going to move. No way! At least not until Sheila came back, at which point I would be giving her a piece of my mind! He shrugged and said something in a language I didn’t recognise, before starting on his morning chores. He continued busily changing the sheets and towels and doing all the other stuff he does, whilst calling up at me from time to time to come down. He was totally unsuccessful on that score! I was not moving until I was sure that nothing else was going to happen outside. Eventually, after calling to me one final time, he went.

  Time passed; quite a lot of time. No more sounds came from outside and neither did Sheila return. It was the sight of the shrimps that Eduardo had left in my dish that finally persuaded me to surrender my perch! I jumped down. When I looked through to the balcony I could see that everything was soaking wet and there were pools of horrid water on the decking. There was certainly nothing I could do about what had happened, so I ate the shrimps and set about regaining my composure. Then I returned to my bed and carried on sulking.

  Eventually I heard the card pinging in the door and Sheila came in, carrying several bags. I sat up and turned my face to the wall. No way was I going to give her a welcome. “Oh dear,” she said, “Have they been already?” She went over to the patio doors and looked out, noticing all the water. Then she came and picked me up and sat with me on the sofa, cuddling me. “Look, Truffles,” she said, “when I read that card last night it told us that they were going to clean the balconies today, but I didn’t know exactly what time. That’s why I kept you in. I should have drawn the curtains, but you would only have gone under them and still looked out, so I didn’t bother. I feared you might be frightened, but I couldn’t just hang around waiting until whatever time they arrived. I’m really so sorry. You must have had a bit of a shock.” A bit of a shock? I nearly had a heart attack! I was still livid, but she seemed genuinely apologetic so I had to forgive her, didn’t I? She continued stroking me and soon I began to feel much calmer. She has that knack of comforting me if there’s been some kind of drama. In a little while harmony between us was restored again! Sheila tidied her shopping bags away and I saw that another neck ornament and another new handbag had appeared. “Well,” she said, looking outside again, “there’s no way we can go out yet, as it’s still so wet. We’ll have to wait until the sun has dried everything out. So, come on, we’ll go up to the sun deck and have an ice cream, and then maybe we’ll have a little game of golf so you can pat the
ball about, as a treat after your terrible morning. And,” she continued, “I’ll order you the pigeon again this evening. How’s that? Am I forgiven?” Okay, okay, yes she was! I wasn’t sure what ‘golf’ was exactly, but the word ‘ball’ I did understand, so I knew it would be something nice!

  We made our way up to the upper deck and Sheila found a chair. She left a towel on it and tied me to one of the legs, asking the people next door to keep an eye on me for a moment whilst she fetched an ice cream. They were nice people and were called Graham and Petra. They gave me lots of pats and I purred up at them. When Sheila and the ice cream returned, they all sat chatting and I heard her telling them how I came to be on the ship. Petra told Sheila that they cared for three cats called Moondoggie, Gidget and Chlöe and two dogs called Hampton and Parker. Crumbs, I thought, they had almost as many pets to care for as Sheila and Peter did when they had the house with the big garden. Besides me, they had four cats called Tansy, Lucky, Taro and Robbie and two dogs called Hennessy and Lady. Graham, Petra and Sheila continued reminiscing about past cruises while I half listened, vaguely noting that Petra had a strange accent, like Bobby and June did, but she didn’t sound in the least like them. All I knew was that it was certainly different from the Cornish accent I was used to hearing. I think she came from some place “over the pond”, as they described it, called something like Amerrika I think. Meanwhile, I licked up my share of the ice cream. It was so lovely and creamy and soft that I almost forgot the morning’s trauma. Food is always a great healer!

  Graham and Petra said that they were going to play golf too, so we all went a bit further along the deck and ended up where we’d seen all the little green areas where people were using long, thin sticks to try to get little white balls into little black holes. So this is golf, I thought. Well, I don’t need a stick to get the ball in the hole - I’ll paw it in and I bet I get mine in before Sheila does! Graham and Petra picked up two sticks and Sheila asked them if they’d mind if she borrowed one of them just to play the first two holes to see what I would do. They all laughed and looked at me. Well, don’t just stand there, I thought, let me at it! Sheila took hold of a stick and tried to hit a ball into the hole. She was miles out! I smiled to myself. “Come on, Truffles, you have a go!” she said, letting my lead run out to its full length. Graham dropped a ball on the ground in front of me. Deftly, I swiped it right into the hole. They couldn’t believe it! They all just looked at one another and appeared to be struck dumb! “That must have been a fluke,” said Petra. No it wasn’t, dear, I’ve had plenty of practice hooking mice in and out of holes during my long life! Sheila managed to get her ball into the hole after another three shots (!) and the others had their turn (they took two shots each, I noticed) and then we all moved on to the next patch of green. I noticed that this green stuff wasn’t real like the big grassy area where Sheila had played the ball and hoop game with Connie and Ron. At the second ‘green’, Graham put the ball down for me and they all stood watching. By this time several other people were looking at me too. I’ll show ‘em, I thought! As before, I pushed the ball straight forward and into the hole with one swipe of my paw. There was stunned silence all round and then a burst of clapping! I smirked. “Goodness, Truffles,” said Sheila, “I ought to put you on the stage! Come on now, we don’t want everyone looking at us!” I love being the centre of attention but, even though I could have quite happily gone on demonstrating how to smack balls into holes for the rest of the afternoon, we left the others to continue their game and returned to sit down near to one of the water pools to enjoy some more sun.

  Hole in one!

  As the sun started to get lower in the sky we went back to the elevator meeting place. There were several people waiting and two were the ro… rot… rotu… well-covered Mr and Mrs Golightly. A man standing by us sighed. “Even if the elevator does turn up soon, none of us will be able to get in with them in there!” he said pointedly. The other people waiting all nodded in agreement. Mrs Golightly said nothing, but Mr Golightly turned round and shook his fat front paw menacingly at the man, who shrank back behind his wife! The elevator duly arrived and the Golightlys squeezed their way in... just! The doors made several attempts to close. The unseen lady must have been getting a bit of a sore throat with continually having to say “doors closing”. However, at last the doors did close, and the elevator groaned in sympathy and disappeared quickly downwards. “I bet it travels down faster than a scalded cat with them in it!” said the man whom Mr Golightly had threatened, looking down at me. Everyone nodded in agreement and tittered. “Just as well we couldn’t get in it,” said his wife. “I’d have been scared to death thinking we would drop right to the bottom of the shaft!” We did eventually get into another elevator before too long and hurried back to the stateroom - Sheila was looking forward to her canapés and I was looking forward to my pigeon dinner!

  Back in the stateroom, Sheila looked out and saw the decking was more or less dry after the thorough dowsing it had been given earlier. She put the clean litter box outside again and I rushed straight on it for a solo performance, taking care to scuff plenty of granules over the sides! I was still a bit sore about what had happened earlier and so took great pleasure in watching her having to clean out the box again and brush up the spilt granules! She told me ruefully that I was a little monkey, and I knew exactly what she was thinking! All my life, if she or anything elsehas upset me, I have eased my temper by either giving something a good kicking (like a catnip ball or toy mouse) or else scuffing litter all around. It’s a good feeling if you’re a cat!

  Anyway, peace now reigned and we sat outside until Sheila heard Marcello arrive with her treats. She greeted him and they chatted for a moment or two. Then she poured a glass of bubbly and brought out the bits and pieces and some of the fruit. “Oh, it’s your lucky day,” she said (well, I wasn’t so sure about that!) taking off the lid and looking at the little tray. “There are some smoked salmon and jumbo prawn ones here, so you can have some of them - you wouldn’t like any of the others. Only one prawn, though, I’m having the other!” We sat nibbling on our treats and then she went inside for the usual rummage around to decide what outfit she would wear in the evening and, what always seemed to take her far longer, which acc… acce… access… ornaments to wear with it. As I think I told you earlier, she will never wear the same thing twice on a cruise. I’ve always known that she has an awful lot of outer coverings (let alone the bags and paw covers!) but until I saw her on this trip I never realised quite how many she had! No wonder she’s always complaining about all the washing and ironing! I’ve always said that there’s just no need for all these outer coverings. We cats have a perfectly serviceable fur catsuit, which can be used for every occasion and only needs a quick lick-over once or twice a day to keep it in purrfect condition and looking good. On the other hand, I have to say that in my opinion when you humans do take off your outer coverings, well, you are such an unattractive pale pink colour underneath that no wonder you want to cover yourselves up!

  Sheila watched the news and spoke into the machine by the bed to order my pigeons, which didn’t take very long to arrive, and I savoured every mouthful. The food of the gods! I will never look at the two who live in our garden in the same way again! Unfortunately, I’m not as mobile as I was when I was younger, so nowadays I have no real chance of catching one. I have to be realistic about that. Great shame!

  Off Sheila went to meet her friends for her own dinner, not forgetting her pre-dinner cocks’ tails (or whatever they were called, I forget now) and probably some more naughty drinks after. Or maybe she would go to a trivia quiz, dancing or a show, or whatever. Still, I was pleased to see her enjoying herself, as I know she gets lonely sometimes just being at home, despite my sin… scin… scinti… terrific company. I settled down on my cushion to catch up on some sleep. With all the ups and downs of the day, I had by no means reached anywhere near the goal that I try to uphold of sleeping 22 out of eve
ry 24 hours!

  When Eduardo arrived later he first peered round the door and he seemed relieved when he saw me comfortably sitting on the sofa. “Oh, Trufools, I so pleezed you okay,” he said, coming over to pat me. “You worree Eduardo thees morning.” I purred up at him. It was nice to be worried about. I felt a bit bad because I had been rude to him when I’d been up on the ledge, and he’d only been trying to be helpful. So I purred with added enthusiasm and rubbed my head on his hand. “Look ‘ere,” he said, “for you!” And he dropped two jumbo prawns in my bowl. Great! They didn’t remain in the bowl for more than a few seconds, as they were immediately transferred to my tummy! I returned to the sofa, after allowing him to plump up my cushion, and stayed there while he hummed some sort of tune under his breath, working like a little beaver as usual. His towelling creation this evening was a giant creature that looked like a sort of fish, I thought, though I didn’t recognise it. But then, my fish usually comes in tins!

  After he’d finished and left I dozed on and off, still thinking about the morning’s little drama and hoping that I wouldn’t have nightmares about those big black snakes! Eventually Sheila turned up looking quite pleased with herself, so she must have had a good dinner, too. “Well, Truffles,” she greeted me, “I’ve been to another great show and I met a nice couple called Suzy and Steve when I had my aperitif before dinner. They don’t have a cat but have a lovely white dog called Boomer. He’s as spoilt as you are! He even has his own white leather chair to match his fur! I’m going to have a drink with them tomorrow night, too.” Oh dear, all these naughty drinks she’s having, I tutted to myself. “Now,” she went on, “are you coming to the casino? Maybe I’ll get lucky tonight!” But no, I didn’t want to go to that noisy casino again; I wanted to catch up on some sleep, so I turned around and curled up more tightly, hoping that she’d get the message! She did, so I was left in peace once more.