Gangrene

"Yellow Cat, daddy. I think his leg is hurt."

The old man carried his daughter to her room. The old woman followed. The cat stayed, looking down from his perch, breathing hard. The girl's mother took a towel from the drawer in the hallway and dried the little girl's legs. The front of her dress was soaked as well so she removed it. The old man just stood in the doorway of the little girl's room, as if lost for a moment.

"You should go look at Yellow Cat," the old lady said to the old man. "Check him out. He may have gotten hurt somehow while he was away."

The old man stood at the entrance of the room for a moment longer as he thought out what had happened. That stupid cat. Probably got in a fight with a dog or something, maybe got torn up a little. What non-such! The old man mumbled to himself as he turned to leave, "I should dump that stupid cat on some dirt road."

As the old man entered back into the bathroom, Yellow Cat whose low growl could be heard from the hallway, looked up and hissed, and struck out again at the old man. The man stepped up to the bathtub, and quickly grabbed the cat off of the shower caddie. Holding the cat by the scruff of the neck he turned it around looking for any signs of injury. Yellow Cat continued it's low growling sound, but other than the sound made no other sign of resistance.

After a few moments of inspection, the old man found what he had been looking for. On the inside of the cat's left hind leg an ugly wound bore witness to the burden that Yellow Cat had brought back with him into the old man's house. The stupid cat had probably tangled with some neighborhood dog, or maybe he had been actually struck by a car or something. Either way it didn't matter really, it was done. The man took a long look at the wound. It wasn't especially gruesome. The cat's fur had been torn away in a small area about the size of a pocketknife. The raw flesh was exposed, and a small amount of muscle from inside the leg had been pulled through the outer flesh and it dangled there before the old man's eyes. His precious Sugar had come across the injury while giving the cat a bath and of course she had reacted to the sight of her kitty cat's plight with total unreasonable horror. Such was the way with little girls. It almost made the old man smile for a moment.

Holding the cat up by the scruff, the old man stood there looking at the injury for a few minutes. He decided that he could pour some hydrogen peroxide onto the wound to kill any germs and then wrap it with some pads and tape. As he did this he was torn between anger and a strange pride. He cursed to himself low for a few moments, the idea of this stupid cat causing such a stir, but then this strange feeling overtook him. Look at me, he thought. I'm not such a bad old chap, taking care of this cat like this. Sugar will be so proud that I ?saved' her kitty.

It took the old man maybe ten minutes to wrap the cat's leg. It growled and tried to pull away scratching the old man's forearm in several places but the old man just held tighter the neck, pressing it's head firmly into the porcelain sink. He raised the cat's head up a few inches and then slammed it back down a few times, after that the cat stayed still. When done the old man carried the cat out of the bathroom and dropped him to the floor in the hallway. The cat landed on its feet, but the injured leg gave way and it's rear end hit in a very un-catlike way. The old man gave the cat a quick scat with his foot and the cat scurried down the hall and disappeared into the living room, probably hiding behind the couch where it usually stayed, hiding from the old man when the little girl was away, or in bed asleep.

When the old man went back into his daughter's room, her mother was tucking her into bed. "Daddy, oh my, I'm so sorry," she said when she saw him come through the door. "Where is Yellow Cat? Is he alright?"

"Don't worry about your kitty Sugar, I've taken good care of him. He'll be as good as new in a day or two. What's this anyway, going to bed already? You haven't even ate dinner yet."

"Oh I couldn't eat a bite daddy. Not even a bite. Mother said I could go to sleep early tonight, I've had a terrible fright you know."

It made the old man chuckle, the way his little girl talked. "Yes. Yes you have had a terrible fright my dear. But don't worry, your kitty will be just fine."

"Oh can you bring him here. Can he sleep with me tonight?" she asked.