By Allan Ross Wark

Have you ever wondered what the life of a barn cat would be like?

Probably not, but I'd like to tell you about a very special cat. Her name was Tilley.

She knew everything there was to know about barn living, for she lived in ours for as long as I can remember.

She was the oldest of a dozen or more cats and I guess her age gave her some privileges, for she bossed the others like some feline monarch. She would let out a low hissing sound if any of the others came within range of her food. Tilley guarded her prize catch -usually a mouse -with great pride, and if younger cats dared approach, she dispatched them with a well aimed paw!

I remember Tilley as a frolicking kitten, playing with a piece of binder twine or rolling in play with kittens from the same litter. But, she stood out. When the others ran for the safety of the hay mow at my approach, Tilley cautiously came to me, sniffing the contents of my out-stretched hand.

On days when I roamed the fields behind the barn in search of unknown treasurers, Tilley was at my heels. She played the game as well as I did. Tilley was a tabby, with beautiful white fur circling her neck. She loved to be stroked, and would roll over to have her tummy tickled.

In spring, even before winter’s chill was gone from the air, Tilley could be seen skulking the brown meadow grasses in search of unsuspecting field mice. And when she caught her prey, as she usually did, she toyed with it, making a game of the hunt. Often the mouse was dropped at my feet, more to show her prowess as a hunter than as an offering to me.

With the first warming days of summer, Tilley loved to stretch on top of the lower half of the barn door. It was as if warm sun rays brought increased life to her lithe body. She was like a little kitten again, running "willy nilly" about the barnyard. She slapped at daisies and buttercups that lined the path to the wood lot. Sometimes she disappeared for days, only to reappear and disregard the fuss I made over her. Independent creature!

There was one time though, when Tilley would have nothing to do with me.

Know when that was?

That's right, when a new litter of kittens appeared on the scene.

Each time I searched them out, Tilley led me a merry chase. Just when I though I'd finally found her secret hiding place, I was disappointed, for she had moved the litter thirty minutes before. Even later when I tired of hide and seek, I saw Tilley tenderly carrying one kitten at a time to a new location, keeping them safe from real or imagined danger.

Summer evenings found her silhouetted against the red western sky, followed closely by two or three of her off-spring. Hot sticky days found her lazing in tall sweet grasses surrounded by adoring young.

Tilley appeared to abandon her kittens in autumn, for she followed me as I rode well worn trails through scrub brush to the creek's edge. Many times I marveled at her narrow escapes from the hoofs of my horse as she approached dangerously close. Cats certainly do have nine lives, or so it seemed at times like that. By now, Tilley's kittens were grown and earned their keep as effective mousers about the place.

Cats came and went, but Tilley remained. She was the one constant in a changing farm year. I could always count on Tilley. And then, one cold winter's day, Tilley was gone. As I hurried up the lane after departing the school bus, I noticed in the half light left to day, something off to one side in a bank of snow. It was Tilley. She lay stiff, eyes wide but unseeing. I lifted her gently and took her into the warmth of the house. I placed my friend in a large egg crate then took her to the barn to await a proper funeral.

That spring, I buried Tilley close to the lane winding to the wood lot, among the daisies, among the buttercups.