“What a fine big black cat!” went on Mrs. Thompson. “Come to me, pussy! How did you get up here?”
“Pur-r-r-r-r!” said Blackie out loud. That, and mewing, was the only way she had of talking to real folks. But to those who understand, cats can say several things in just those two ways. Sometimes you can tell by the way a cat mews, whether it is hungry, or whether it wants to go out doors. And when it cries in another way you know it is in pain. And when it says “pur-r-r-r-r!” like that, sort of softly and slowly, and rubs up against you, why then you know the cat is happy.
Blackie was beginning to feel happy again, for she saw the lady looking out through the hole in the roof, and the black cat thought the lady would take her down and feed her.
“Why, you’re a nice cat,” said the lady, speaking to Blackie in a way the cat liked. “You certainly are a nice pussy. I wonder how you got up on this roof?”
Then, as she rubbed Blackie under the cat’s ears, in a way Blackie liked, the lady looked along the roofs, and she saw on the roof the cover, or scuttle, which Blackie had pushed to one side to get out.
“Oh, I see! That’s how you got up here, through the hole in the roof,” said the lady. “Well, I must close it, or the rain might come in Mr. Smith’s house. I see how it is. The family there moved out, and you were left behind, Blackie. It’s too bad they forgot you. But never mind, I’ll take care of you.”
Of course Mrs. Thompson was not right in thinking Blackie had been left behind by the family that had moved away. But Mrs. Thompson did not know that Blackie had run away, and had wandered in the vacant house by herself. And Blackie could not tell.
“Now I’ll just close that scuttle over the roof for Mr. Smith,” went on Mrs. Thompson. “He doesn’t know it is open, I dare say. Then, after that, I’ll take you down in my house, Blackie.”
You might wonder how the lady knew Blackie’s name, never having seen her before. But when a cat is all black, as this one was, it seems natural for every one who meets her for the first time to call her Blackie.