Last cat standing, p.1
Last Cat Standing, page 1
Last Cat Standing
Emilie Jacobsen
Published by Emilie Jacobsen, 2024.
This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.
LAST CAT STANDING
First edition. October 1, 2024.
Copyright © 2024 Emilie Jacobsen.
ISBN: 979-8227597090
Written by Emilie Jacobsen.
Also by Emilie Jacobsen
Dynasties and Desire
The Queen's Choice
The Lady's Dilemma
The Wise Woman's Mistake
Ghosts of London
Until Death Unites Us
Have, Hold and Hardtack
Lust and Longing
A Second Wedding Night
Falling for a Footman
A Portrait of Love
The Marquis Who Ruined Me
Mating Rituals of the Haut Ton
An Accidental Elopement
Three Wishes Upon a Tombstone
Lust and Longing - Box Set - Book 1- 3
Lust and Longing Box Set - Book 4-7
Lust and Longing Box Set - Book 1-7
Standalone
Winter Hearts
An Impotent Rake
Regency Romance Collection
Last Cat Standing
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Also By Emilie Jacobsen
Prologue
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Sixteen
Seventeen
Eighteen
Nineteen
Twenty
Twenty-One
Twenty-Two
Twenty-Three
Twenty-Four
Twenty-Five
Twenty-Six
Twenty-Seven
Epilogue
Epilogue II
About the author
Also By Emilie Jacobsen
Prologue
Kent, 1807
“Close the door, close the door, close the door!” Jane shouted and made her way through the labyrinth of chests of drawers, unhung paintings, and a side table in the narrow hallway of the cottage.
The two men in the doorway who were carrying a tallboy inside looked up at her with an astonished expression on their faces. Jane danced around them, stuck her foot in the gap between the door and the wall just in time to prevent Billy Goat from sneaking out, and shut the door in his face. The large grey cat looked up at her with an accusatory gaze in his yellow eyes.
Jane smiled and picked him up, which he let her do. She carried him back to the kitchen to find her maid Susie unpacking the crates of pots, pans, and plates.
“He almost escaped,” Jane sighed and slumped into a chair that had been placed by the wall. She found the spot under Billy Goat’s chin where he preferred to be scratched. The large cat instantly started purring loudly.
“You cannot keep them inside forever, Miss Stuart,” Susie told her evenly and turned her back to place a stack of plates in a cupboard. The large piece of furniture made the young maid, only fourteen years old, look tiny in comparison, even though Susie had gained at least a little weight since Jane had first met her.
Susie had only been in the dowager baroness’s employ for four months when the lady had died. Yet Jane had taken an instant liking to the nine year younger girl and offered her the position as her maid when she learned she was to move into Rose Hill Cottage. Jane had considered hiring a housekeeper as well, but Susie had told her that she could handle both positions as long as Jane helped a little. It would allow Susie a much larger wage than what was customary for a girl her age.
“I like the pattern on the china,” Susie observed and showed Jane one of the teacups with a beautiful dark blue swirling pattern of flowers and leaves. Jane nodded absentmindedly while mulling over what Susie had said.
“But how am I to protect them, if we let them outside?” she asked Susie.
The maid was placing the cups in the cupboard as well. There was enough for at least eighteen people. The dowager Baroness Flaxley had certainly thought of everything when she had it written into her will that Jane, her former companion, was to take care of her thirty cats after her death. The dowager baroness that was, not Jane’s own. Even the deceased Lady Flaxley could not make such demands of her, Jane supposed.
The baroness had had her solicitor buy Rose Hill Cottage for Jane and the thirty cats along with more furniture than Jane had ever had access to in her whole life.
“You cannot protect them,” Susie told her matter-of-factly. “It’s not your job to make certain that no harm comes to them, it would be impossible. You were to care for them for the rest of their natural life.”
Jane recognized the quote from the will the solicitor, Mr. Pruit, had read out loud to them only a week ago. All the staff from the dowager house as well as some of the senior staff members from the main house had been present besides Lord Flaxley, Jane’s former employer’s nephew, and his wife.
It had been stifling hot since the housekeeper had filled the fireplace with wood, making the fire roar and dance. It would seem prudent in the middle of January, except the housekeeper seemed to have forgotten that at least fifteen odd people would attend the reading and that the parlor at the dowager house was not a particularly large room.
It was one of the aspects that had reminded Jane of the reading of her father’s will six years prior. Her father’s successor had wanted to make a point that he at least could afford to keep the vicarage nice and warm.
Mr. Pruit had also been the solicitor to read her father’s will, but he was the only of his occupation in the village.
What had turned out to be completely and utterly different from the reading of her father’s will was that there had been anything of value for Jane to inherit. When her father had died, she had been left with a small valise with five dresses, three books, a few paste jewels, and a miniature of her parents from when they had first married. Her parents’ lack of financial sense and overly generous nature had carved a hole so deep that the sale of the furniture just about covered the debt her father left behind.
Jane had expected a token of five or ten pounds from her employer through six years. Instead, she had received a cottage, thirty cats, and a promise of five hundred pounds when the last cat died. The amount of money was so great that Jane had accepted without hesitation when Mr. Pruit had asked her. She knew her fiancé George would understand.
The loud screech of cats in disagreement and a vase being knocked over made both Jane and Susie run to the small sitting room. The cottage was about half the size of the dowager house and even that had felt crowded with thirty-odd cats.
A ball of tabby fur ran over Jane’s feet, followed by a lightning of fawn. They ran through the labyrinth in the hallway. Susie had not entered the room completely and was quick to snake around the remaining furniture, open the front door, and shoo both cats outside. Billy Goat wrestled from Jane’s arms and ran after his friends.
“They must be let outside, Miss Stuart. We cannot have fights inside and collect cat droppings from all around the house,” Susie told Jane and closed the door firmly as if stressing her point.
Jane nodded and picked up the white cat lying in the chair behind her, before sitting down again with it in her lap. It had become second nature while living at the dowager house that she always checked the chair before sitting down. Each cat had had its favorite chair and not all of them were prone to sharing.
Désirée however never minded, which was also why any visitors to the dowager house were shown to her chair. If she was there, she would not mind being lifted onto the lap of the visitor. If she arrived after the visitor, she would jump into the lap of whoever was there and make herself comfortable.
Susie gave the bottom of a ginger cat a shove to be able to sit on the end of the settee which was currently occupied by at least four cats. It looked like a very delicate, multi-colored fur coat had been casually slung there. Only the whiskers and the occasional curl of a tail gave away that it was in fact live animals.
The ginger cat, Jeremy, lifted its head and gave Susie an offended look.
“We are two people living here too, you rascal,” Susie told the cat good-naturedly and petted its head. Jeremy lay down again.
Jane liked that Susie was not afraid of the cats as some of the other staff members had been. Or she had been so grateful to be employed that she had not minded helping Jane bathe and brush the cats once a week upon the dowager’s request, both of them wearing a dress of rough, tough fabric to prevent scratches.
“This is what we will do, Miss Stuart,” Susie stated. “We will open up at least two of the bedrooms upstairs and make them comfortable for the cats to stay in with pillows, soft blankets, and the like. The more they are spread out around the house, the easier it will be for us. They will all be let outside every day. If they want to stay outside, then fine by me. We will feed them twice a day, make certain all of them are taken care of if they have been in a fight or are sick, we will pet them and talk to them, and generally make their lives as comfortable as possible, but we will not imprison them
Jane could not help but smile and nod. She wished she had been as self-assured when she had been fourteen.
“I will speak to Mr. Pruit about it this afternoon,” Jane said thoughtfully, already formulating the sentences in her mind.
“He cannot mean for the two of us and thirty cats to be trapped in this cottage for the next ten years,” Susie told her drily. “Nor do I think it was the dowager’s intent.”
Jane chuckled and buried her nose in Désirée’s white fur.
“No, it’s just... there is the road right outside the window, and the garden is so small, there will certainly be other cats in the area, and...”
Susie rose and placed a hand on Jane’s shoulder.
“Some of them will be hurt, and some of them will die over the years. You cannot tell me that none of them have been injured while Lady Flaxley was alive.”
“No,” Jane mumbled, and in her mind’s eye, she saw the many sick, injured, and dead cats she had had to take care of over the past six years. “I will speak to Mr. Pruit,” she told Susie in a firm voice, trying to reassure herself as much as her maid.
“What does Mr. Adams think?” Susie asked with a slight smile and a gesture around the house.
“I have not had time to write him with everything that has happened,” Jane admitted.
She had meant to, but there had simply been too much with the move. Usually, she and George would write each other a letter a week, and over the past few months, she had started reading them out loud to Susie as well. When she told George, he started adding a greeting for Susie, which had instantly endeared him to the orphaned girl.
“He will probably be a bit disappointed that you cannot join him yet but will also understand. Five hundred pounds is a lot of money,” Susie said and mirrored Jane’s thoughts.
George was as financially minded as herself, which was one of the reasons she liked him. He had been her father’s curate, and they had quickly become friends after he started working for her father. Her father had allowed it if they were chaperoned or in sight from the house. When it was evident that Jane’s father would not recover from pneumonia, George had asked Jane’s father for her hand in marriage. Her father had agreed with the caveat that they waited a few years to marry until George had secured a position as a vicar. Her father had arranged for Jane to become a companion to the dowager Lady Flaxley after her death.
Jane had thought George would succeed her father as vicar in the small church, but Lord Flaxley had chosen the son of one of his friends as his successor. Shortly after, George had been offered a position as vicar in Suffolk and had left.
“I am certain he will understand, and I will be able to join him in due time,” Jane told Susie. She was not certain how to interpret the small kernel of relief she felt at the thought.
One
Seven years later, Kent, July 1817
Jane felt sweat trickle down her back as she worked on pulling the dandelion from the ground. She supposed she could have Joe do it, the man who looked after the ponies and helped them with manual labor around the house, but she wanted to win this battle. There was a primal satisfaction in being able to pull the weed from the ground on her own.
“There was a letter for you from Mr. Adams,” Susie told her as she walked through the garden.
“Oh, great,” Jane panted and landed on her bottom with a grunt as the large dandelion finally gave way.
Susie chuckled. Jane tore off her gloves and reached for the letter.
“Are you going to read it out here?” Susie asked and when Jane nodded, she added: “Will you wait a moment? I will just get a stool and the peas and be right back.”
Jane threw the dandelion into the pile of other weeds she had pulled from the garden and patted Jeremy who was lounging close by in the sunshine. He was scrawny, missing one eye, and with a wheezing breath. She had known for months that he would die soon, yet the thought filled her with sadness.
Over the years, all the other cats had died or disappeared except him and Désirée. Even Billy Goat had not returned home last fall, and despite an extensive search party by her, Susie, and Joe, they had not been able to find him. Not even his body. Despite her caring for all the cats, he was one of the cats Jane missed the most.
As she had suspected, life in the cottage had turned out to be rougher on the cats than that of the dowager house. The cottage was right next to the road, and at least seven of the cats had been run over. Another six, including Billy Goat, had simply disappeared. Ten of the cats had died from old age, while five had died due to sickness.
When the first one fell ill, Jane had consulted with Mr. Pruit, since the farrier along with several farmers skilled in animal husbandry had told her it would be most prudent to put the animal down. But if she did, would it then breach the stipulations in the will? After consulting both the farrier and the farmers himself, Mr. Pruit concluded that if they deemed it more humane for the cats to be put down, then he saw no reason not to if the cat would soon die from its disease in any event. Jane had cried all five times the hunter from the main house had taken the cats away to shoot them out back.
Another two cats had unfortunately been poisoned when Susie had spread arsenic to kill rats, and the cats had then eaten a dead rat. Jane had been heartbroken and gone to Mr. Pruit’s office in a state of great distress as she feared he might think she had killed them on purpose. After speaking to Susie and examining the surroundings, Mr. Pruit had concluded that Jane had not breached the stipulations of the will and that she would still receive the money upon the death of the last cat.
Susie returned with a stool, a bowl, and a basket of peas Jane had picked this morning in their vegetable garden. It gave her a warm and comfortable feeling in her stomach every time she was able to harvest their own food. A mix of pride and comfort in knowing that they could to a large extent live off their own garden during the summer and at least for part of the winter as well.
“What does he write?” Susie asked. She was just as keen to have George’s letters read out loud as she had been at fourteen. With her eyes on Jane, she cracked the first pod and with a practiced movement had the peas rain into the bowl below.
Jane opened the letter as Desirée ran towards them from the house. She sniffed at the content in the bowl:
“Nothing for you there, it’s not kippers,” Susie told her good-naturedly and shoved her away.
Désirée crawled into Jane’s lap and made herself comfortable. She had become Jane’s absolute favorite. The past few years, Jane had even allowed the cat to sleep in her bed, enjoying waking up to the soft purring animal on the pillow beside her.
She sometimes thought it was a shame she could not allow Désirée to have a litter, but when one of the cats had had a litter after their first month in the cottage, Mr. Pruit had told her that she would have to take care of any offspring of the cats as well.
“Only the female ones though. You can hardly be kept responsible for what the male ones do,” Mr. Pruit had said with a slight smirk that Jane had had to hide her disgust over.
She and Susie had become experts in knowing when a female cat was in heat. They would lock the female cats in some of the bedrooms upstairs, and Jane had become very adept in growing valerian and catnip to calm the cats. They had not found a way to keep the male cats away from the door, other than physically removing them though.
It had been a nightmare and Jane was happy that part of taking care of the cats was almost over. Jeremy seemed too weak to take an interest in Désirée in that way and Désirée was coming into heat less frequently at any event.
Jane unfolded the letter.
“Now let’s see what he says, Desi,” she mumbled to the cat and scratched her behind her white ear. Désirée leaned into her touch and started purring.
The housekeeper had made a delicious pie, George wrote, he had been invited to dinner at the house of one of the local gentries, and it had been agreed that George would start tutoring the man’s son in Latin and French. At the end, he had included the opening to his sermon from last Sunday.
“I wish I could hear Mr. Adams preach someday. Mr. Dillings’ sermons are always so dry,” Susie told her.
