Charlie the Kitten Who Saved a Life

‘Oh, no! Your head! You’re bleeding!’

‘Ow, ow, ow!’ Caroline was crying, holding her paw up to her head. ‘No, it’s my finger that’s bleeding. That horrible seagull bit me, Grace!’

‘And you hit your head, look – you’ve cut it open. Oh, Caro, we need to go to a hospital. I’d better go and get help.’

‘No!’ Caroline mewed. ‘We’ll get into terrible trouble, Grace. And I’m not going to hospital. I hate hospitals!’

‘But you’re hurt!’

‘I’ll be all right. Just give me a minute. I’ll … I’ll wrap something round my finger, and maybe you can help me clean up my head … we can use the sink in that toilet block behind the café.’

She tried to stand up, but she must have been feeling dizzy, like you do if you’ve chased your tail for ages, because she quickly sat back down again and held her head. There was red blood dripping down the back of her neck onto her T-shirt and even though Grace tried to wrap a tissue round her finger, blood was still coming through that too.

This was no good. I knew I had to do something now, or I’d definitely have to consider myself a champion scaredy-cat for the rest of my nine lives. And there was only one option. I belted back along the pathway to the little café where they’d bought the sandwiches. The woman was inside now – I could hear her talking to the boy, and laughing.

‘Quick!’ I meowed at them in Cat from the doorway. ‘I need your help! It’s an emergency!’

‘Oh look,’ said the boy. ‘A nice little tabby cat. I haven’t seen him around here before. He doesn’t look like one of the ferals.’

‘No, he’s not. He looks well cared for. Are you lost, puss? He’s only a kitten, Robbie.’

She came over and bent down to stroke me. I wanted to tell her I was getting a bit big to be called a kitten, and that my name wasn’t Puss, but there really wasn’t time for any pleasantries.

‘Outside!’ I meowed. ‘On the beach! Quick!’ I walked back out of the door, turned round and meowed at them again urgently. ‘Come on!’

‘What’s up with him?’ the boy said, without moving.

But the woman, frowning and muttering to herself, wiped her hands on a towel and followed me out of the door.

‘What is it, puss?’ she said. ‘Hungry, I suppose, are you, or …’ She stopped, staring down at the beach. ‘What’s going on down there?’ And then she called back through the door to the boy: ‘Robbie, call an ambulance. There’s been an accident on the beach. A little girl, tell them. Nine-nine-nine, you fool, and hurry up about it!’

Then she ran, as fast as a plump little human female can, down the steps and across the beach, calling out to the girls as I watched her approaching them.

‘Don’t try to get up, dearie. There’s an ambulance on its way.’

‘Oh no,’ Caroline said. ‘Please, we don’t need an ambulance. I’m fine. Honestly, we’ll just get going.’

‘Caro,’ Grace said. ‘I actually think you should get your head looked at. It looks quite bad.’

‘Yes, my lovely, that’s a nasty cut on your head, it probably needs stitches – and look at your poor finger too! How did that happen?’

‘A seagull bit her,’ Grace said.

‘Oh, they’re a dratted nuisance, those damn birds,’ the woman said. ‘Now then, why don’t you go and fetch your mummy and daddy from the car,’ she added to Grace. ‘Tell them the ambulance is coming, and I’ll stay here with your friend until they get here.’

Even from where I was watching, I could see the look Grace exchanged with Caroline.

‘Don’t say anything,’ Caroline warned her.

‘We have to,’ Grace said. ‘It doesn’t matter anymore, Caro. It’s all gone wrong, and we shouldn’t have done it in the first place. We’re going to have to go back. After you’ve been to hospital.’

‘Back where, my lovely?’ the woman asked, looking from one of them to the other.

Grace looked down at the ground. ‘We told you a lie,’ she said, so quietly that I had to prick up my ears to hear her. ‘Our parents aren’t with us. We were trying to run away.’

‘But only to Grace’s great aunt’s house,’ Caroline said, as if that made it all right. ‘We were going to stay with her.’

‘That’s why you wanted to go to Duncombe. I did think it strange. And your parents didn’t know.’

The girls both shook their heads.

‘Are we going to get into really big trouble?’ Caroline mumbled.

‘Not from me, dearie. It’s not for me to say. But your poor parents will be beside themselves, you know. You’ll have worried the life out of them. Let me give them a call, for you, shall I? Let them know you’re all right?’

‘My parents probably don’t even know we’ve gone,’ Grace said, starting to cry now. ‘I’m supposed to be staying with you in Mudditon, aren’t I?’

‘Laura might have told them. And she’ll definitely have told my dad, and he’ll have totally freaked out. He’s probably had to come back down from London. I’ll be grounded for the rest of the holidays!’ Caroline said, joining in with the mewing.