One morning while walking by myself through the dusty field behind our house on my way to Cuyamaca Elementary School, I notice something move behind one of the houses on Pearl Lane. Those houses also have the big field behind them. I decide to leave the path and walk through weeds to see what caught my eye. Wow. It’s a pheasant in a big outdoor cage. It’s more than one pheasant. There are at least five of them. They are so big and not too afraid of me. Maybe they are just females since none has the showy bright colors of grown-up males. Then I hurry back to the path and on to school so I won’t be late.
After school is out, Richard Holland joins me for the walk home. He lives up on Sushine, on the other side of Washington. As we pass the place where I left the path, I remember the pheasants. “Hey Rich. Want to see some pheasants? They’re in a cage over there,” as I point over to our right.
“Sure.” This time when we approach, the pheasants are startled and madly run flapping into the chicken wire of the cage.
“We shouldn’t be so close,” Richard says.
“Nah. Don’t worry. They’ll calm down.” Sure enough, in a few seconds the pheasants seem to hardly notice us. Richard still stays back away from the cage. In a few seconds I turn and we retrace our steps back to the path and continue toward our homes.
Gloria, the younger girl that lives in the house on the other side of the Joneses from us, has a swing in her back yard. I hurt myself pretty badly on it a long time ago when myrear-end slipped off the seat while I was fooling around. I was swinging super high and tried to keep from falling by holding onto the chains real tight. The chains removed skin from my fingers as they slipped through my hands. It had hurt more than anything and blood was running out and pieces of torn skin hung here and there.
Today I’m just hanging out on her swing; hardly swinging at all. Gloria is telling me about going to the beach with her family on the weekend.
I see a tall man in the field walking toward us. Then over the weeds, I see Tam coming towards us, half scampering, half walking. The man is following her. Something bad happened; I’m certain.
Tam hops through the fence and comes right over to me as I get off the swing. She brushes against my legs for reassurance so I sit down on my heels and pet her.
“Is that your cat?” asks the tall man. He sounds kinda angry but he doesn’t scare me too much.
“Yessir.”
“That cat killed two of my pheasants.” He pushed down on the fence wire and stepped over it into Gloria’s yard.
“You’re the one that’s got pheasants over there?”
“You’ve seen them?”
“Yeah. They’re in a cage across the field. I’ve gone over to look at them a coupla times. They’re very pretty. I’m sorry about your pheasants but don’t worry. My parents will pay you for the pheasants so you can get some more. We live just three more houses that way.”
The man’s face brightened. “No, no, that’s OK. I just had to follow your cat. He’s pretty amazing.”
“Tam’s a she.”
“OK. She’s amazing. Last week I found the door to the hutch open and one of the pheasants was a ways away and partly eaten. I figured somebody unlocked the hutch and let their dogs in. I have a pretty good latch on that door so I thought a person unlocked it but just a few minutes ago I happened to look out my kitchen window and saw your cat at the hutch. I thought the latch was too high for a cat but she reached right up and undid it. I didn’t imagine a cat could figure out how to undo it. Then she opened the gate. She’s awful clever.”
“She killed another one today?”
“No, but by the time I got out there she was dragging one of the hens away. It’s way bigger than your cat. I didn’t think a house cat could take down a pheasant. I chased your cat off and the pheasant is still alive but I think we’ll butcher her since she’s torn up some. We raise those pheasants for food anyway.”
“You really should talk to my parents. They’ll pay you.”
“That’s OK. I was just so amazed that I had to follow the cat wherever it was going. What did you call her?”
“Tam. That’s short for Tam-Malacha. She’s a Siamese and awful strong.”
“Tam. I’m honored to make your acquaintance.”
Thankfully he did not try to approach and pet Tam. She can shred a grownup’s arm in an instant although she won’t hurt a kid.
“The first thing I’m doing is put a better latch on the hutch.” He turned and stepped over the fence again
“You oughtta get a padlock, mister.”
He turned his head and called back, “Oh I’ve got a latch that’ll work.”
Gloria and I watched him stride back across the field.
I turned to Gloria, “I still think he’d better get a padlock.”