I decided I had to take the ultimate step and leave him out overnight. The first night I did it I saw him lurking in the area where the bins were kept. I tried to sneak in without him seeing me. It was a stupid move. He was a cat, he had more senses in one of his whiskers than I had in my entire body. No sooner had I opened the door to the building than he was there squeezing his way in. I left him outside in the hallway that night, but he was on my doormat when I emerged again in the morning. For the next few days we went through the same performance.
Each day I stepped outside he’d either be hanging around the hallway or would be waiting outside. Each night he’d find a way of getting into the building.
Eventually he decided that he’d won that particular battle. So I was soon dealing with another problem. He began following me down the main road.
The first time he came as far as the main road, but returned to the block when I shooed him away. The next time he tailed me for a hundred yards or so down the road, towards Tottenham High Road where I got the bus to Covent Garden.
A part of me admired his tenacity and sheer perseverance. But another part of me was cursing him. I simply couldn’t shake him off.
Each day after that he got further and further – becoming bolder and bolder. Part of me wondered whether one day, after I left him, he’d actually keep going and find somewhere else to go. But each night I got home, there he was – waiting. I knew that something had to give eventually though. And it did.
One day I headed out for work as usual. I had packed my large black acoustic guitar with its red trim on the edge of the body, slung it over my shoulder along with my rucksack and headed downstairs.
I saw Bob was sitting in an alleyway and said hello. When he started to follow me, I shooed him away, as usual.
‘Stay there, you can’t come where I’m going,’ I said.
This time he seemed to get the message and slunk off. As I headed down the road, I looked back occasionally to see if he was there, but there was no sign of him. Perhaps he’s finally getting the message, I said to myself.
To get to the bus stop that would take me to Covent Garden, I had to cross Tottenham High Road, one of the busiest and most dangerous roads in north London. This morning, as usual, cars, lorries and motorbikes were carving their way along the road, trying to pick their way through the clogged traffic.
As I stood on the pavement, trying to spot a gap so that I could run for the bus that was looming into view a hundred yards or so down the traffic-packed street, I felt someone – or something – rub against my leg. Instinctively, I looked down. I saw a familiar figure standing alongside me. To my horror, I could see that Bob was going through the same process as me, looking for his opportunity to cross.
‘What the hell are you doing here?’ I said to him.
He just looked at me dismissively, as if I’d just asked a really stupid question. Then he focused once more on the road, nudging himself nearer the edge of the kerb as if getting ready to make a dash for it.
I couldn’t let him risk it. It would almost certainly be suicide. So I swept him up and put him on my shoulder, where I knew he liked to sit. He sat there, snuggled up against the side of my head, as I sidestepped and weaved my way through the traffic and crossed the road.
‘All right, Bob, that’s far enough,’ I said to him as I put him down on the pavement and shooed him away again.
He sidled off down the street into the throng. Maybe now I’ve seen the last of him, I thought to myself. He really was a long way from home now.
A few moments later the bus pulled up. It was an old-fashioned red double-decker bus that you could jump on at the back. I went to sit on the bench at the back of the bus and was placing my guitar case in the storage space near where the conductor was standing when, behind me, I saw a sudden flash of ginger fur. Before I knew it, Bob had jumped up and plonked himself on the seat next to where I was sitting.
I was gobsmacked. I realised – finally – that I wasn’t ever going to shake this cat off. But then I realised something else.
I invited Bob to jump on my lap, which he did in the blink of an eye. A moment or two later, the conductor appeared. She was a cheerful West Indian lady and smiled at Bob, then me.
‘Is he yours?’ she said, stroking him.
‘I guess he must be,’ I said.
Chapter 5
Centre of Attention
For the next forty-five minutes or so, Bob sat quietly next to me, his face pressed against the glass of the bus window, watching the world go by. He seemed to be fascinated by all the cars, cyclists, vans and pedestrians whizzing past us; he wasn’t fazed at all.
The only time he pulled away from the window and looked to me for a little reassurance was when the blare of a police siren, a fire engine or an ambulance got a bit too close for comfort. This surprised me a bit and once more set me thinking about where he had spent his early life. If he had grown up on the streets he would have got used to this noise a long, long time ago.
‘Nothing to worry about,’ I told him, each time giving him a friendly stroke on the back of the neck. ‘This is what the middle of London sounds like, Bob, better get used to it.’
It was odd, even though I knew he was a street cat and could run away at any time, I had this deep-seated feeling that he was here in my life to stay. Somehow I sensed this wouldn’t be the last time we’d make this trip together.
I was going to get off at my usual bus stop near Tottenham Court Road tube station. As it loomed into view, I picked up my guitar, scooped up Bob and headed for the exit. On the pavement, I fished around in my coat pocket and found the makeshift shoelace lead that I’d left in there after taking Bob out to do his business the evening before.
I put it around his neck then placed him down. I didn’t want him wandering off. The junction of Tottenham Court Road and New Oxford Street was bustling with shoppers, tourists and ordinary Londoners getting on with their day. He’d have been lost in a second – or, even worse, crushed by one of the buses or black cabs whistling towards and from Oxford Street.
Understandably, it was all a bit intimidating for Bob. It was unfamiliar territory for him – well, I assumed it was. I couldn’t be sure, of course. As we picked our way along I could tell from his slightly uptight body language and the way he kept looking up at me that he was uneasy. So I decided to take one of my normal short cuts through the back streets to get to Covent Garden.
‘Come on, Bob, let’s get you out of the crowds,’ I said.
Even then he wasn’t 100 per cent happy. Weaving our way through the throng, he kept shooting me looks as if to say he wasn’t quite sure about this. After only a few yards I could tell that he wanted me to pick him up.
‘All right, but don’t make a habit of it,’ I said, gathering him up and placing him on my shoulders just as I’d done crossing Tottenham High Road. He’d soon settled into a comfortable spot, at a slight angle across my right shoulder blade, with his front paws placed on the top of my arm, looking out like the occupant of the bird’s nest on some pirate ship. I couldn’t help smiling inwardly. I must look a bit like Long John Silver, except I had a puss rather than a parrot sailing along with me.
He certainly seemed to be very comfortable there. I could feel him purring lightly as we walked through the throng, across New Oxford Street and into the smaller streets leading down towards Covent Garden.
The crowds had thinned out by now and after a while I began to forget Bob was there. Instead I started to immerse myself in the usual thoughts that went through my mind on the way to work. Was the weather going to be good enough for me to get a solid five hours’ busking? Answer: Probably. It was overcast, but the clouds were white and high in the sky. There wasn’t much chance of rain. What sort of crowd would there be in Covent Garden? Well, it was getting close to Easter so there were a lot of tourists. How long would it take me to make the twenty or thirty pounds I needed to get me – and now Bob – through the next few days? Well, it had taken me the best part of five hours the previous day. Maybe it would be better today, maybe it wouldn’t. That was the thing with busking; you just never knew.