Cats in the City of Plague

By A. L. Marlow

Fans of Tad Williams's Tailchaser's Song and Richard Adams's Watership Down, add Cats in the City of Plague to your list of favorite books.

Set amidst the chaos of the worst pandemic in history, the Black Death of the 14th century, Cats in the City of Plague tells the tale of a group of cats who are unfairly blamed for the plague.

The main character, Leander, and his fellow cats cannot understand why people they have trusted have turned against them. But they realize that their only hope of survival is to escape from the French city that has long been their home and return to the forests where, cat legend has it, their kind originally lived.

While evading the humans who seek to destroy them, the cats embark on what Booklife calls “a tense and dramatic journey through the city, powered by the danger and sacrifice inherent in tales of epic quests.”

Racing over rooftops, hiding in the cathedral’s crypt, can they make it out of the city before dawn reveals them? And if they do make it, can these city cats learn to live in the wild?

The setting of a great pandemic will resonate with modern readers, but it’s the flight of these intrepid cats that makes Cats in the City of Plague an unforgettable story.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Nov 3, 2021
• ISBN: 9781665541947

A. L. Marlow

A. L. Marlow is a successful non-fiction writer who has published several books and articles for both scholarly and general readers. Over the years, his plays have been performed in New York City and he has published one short story for young readers. Marlow has enjoyed the pleasure of cat companionship for most of his life. Cats in the City of Plague is his first novel.

Book preview

CATS

IN THE CITY

of

PLAGUE

A. L. MARLOW

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AuthorHouse™

1663 Liberty Drive

Bloomington, IN 47403

www.authorhouse.com

Phone: [phone]

© 2021 A. L. Marlow. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, names, incidents, organizations, and dialogue in this novel are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

Published by AuthorHouse 10/26/2021

ISBN: 978-1-6655-4196-1 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-6655-4195-4 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-6655-4194-7 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2021921533

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Cover artwork by Margaret Ariori

Book design by Sarah E. Holroyd (https://sleepingcatbooks.com)

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Contents

Historical Note

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

Epilogue

About the Author

To all the feline companions

who have enriched our lives.

Historical Note

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T his story is set during the pandemic known later as the Black Death. Between 1347 and 1353 it killed, according to some estimates, close to half the population of Western Europe. In some cities and towns virtually all the inhabitants died. Originally, the plague in bubonic form was spread by the rat flea, Xenopsylla cheopis, which carried the bacterium Yersinia pestis. It is believed, however, that the plague evolved into pneumonic form and so could have passed from person to person by airborne means, for example by a cough or sneeze. In that form, death often came rapidly to those who contracted it. It seems that both forms could have struck a population more or less simultaneously.

In the 14th century, many different theories were advanced about the origin of the plague, the means of its transmission, and the preventative or curative measures that might be taken against it. Some of these are depicted in this story: the origin (punishment from God); transmission (bad air, evil doers); prevention (purifying the air by burning fragrant wood or herbs); and cure (butterbur/cough wort). Jews and Gypsies were accused of causing the plague, but many individuals and animals—especially cats, but also dogs and pigs—were targets, accused typically of being in league with the Devil. It is generally believed that tens of thousands of cats were killed as a response to the plague. Whatever the various impacts on animals, however, the Black Death was undoubtedly one of the greatest catastrophes in human history.

Language Note: Le Chat is French for the Cat.

Time: Spring 1349

Place: A city in northern France

1

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E ven from a distance, Leander could tell something was wrong.

He could smell that something before he heard or saw anything: the odor of burning torches and the scent of a mass of people. Then he heard a low hum of voices, growing louder with each tentative step.

It wasn’t right. A crowd of people in the city square? Late at night?

He couldn’t remember anything like it.

Normally, the square was empty except for a few beggars who slept on the steps of the great cathedral, one hundred years in the making but still unfinished. The square in front of it was mostly packed dirt, but a wide groove in the middle made by feet, cart wheels, and horse and donkey hooves ran from the city’s main gate to the church’s steps. The square, ringed with the shadows of official buildings and closed shop stalls, had always seemed a vast empty space in the night.

But not this night.

Although puzzled and a little frightened, Leander was curious enough to continue, cautiously to be sure, down to the end of the lane. He kept to the protection of the shadows, his smoky-gray coat making him barely visible—at least to human eyes.

At length he came up to the square where people, perhaps a hundred, gathered in small groups and conversed with large animated hand gestures. The beggars huddled up close to the doors of the cathedral, apparently more frightened than Leander was.

Then he heard a man cry out from the lane beyond the square, We see them! They are coming!

To Leander’s astonishment, the crowd of people moved at once and followed the crier as he raced off, shouting his message. After the people (except for the beggars) had gone, the cries grew fainter and the usual scents of the square—horse manure mostly—returned. Still, Leander was troubled. Something still didn’t seem right, still didn’t smell right.

He crossed the square, venturing out of the shadows and picking up his pace. He entered a very narrow dirt lane but quickly hopped up onto a wall that marked the lane-side boundary of a small orchard of apple trees, just beginning to bloom, their sweet scent in contrast to the harsh odors of the square. A strong limb from one of the trees hung low near the wall. He leapt onto it and crept to the end, where he jumped down onto the gently sloping wooden roof of a structure that faced the square.

He could make out other cats lying on the roof in various places and positions. One was crossing the roof he was on to hop onto the roof of the building next to it. The two structures, market stalls during the day, were connected but the second roof was higher—a long step up. More than a dozen pairs of eyes reflected the light of the night sky. A few of these moon-filled eyes met his.

A large black cat, standing at the edge of the roof, looked disdainfully at him. Leander, he said with a hint of a threat. But Leander was as large and as powerful as the black cat.

Eusebius, replied the smoke-gray cat. His ears pricked forward, framing his broad gray face and large copper eyes.

You are here to tell us what the humans are doing. Right, Leander?

I am as puzzled as you, Eusebius.

Really? Then with a trace of a taunt: I would have thought you would have smelled what they were up to—your extra special nose, right? I’ve never believed it.

Leander walked slowly up to him and looked straight into his rival’s pale blue eyes. Eusebius had unusually long legs and stood on his toes to emphasize his advantage. But Leander was stocky and strong and unimpressed by Eusebius’s posing. Nevertheless, Leander stopped a few paces before reaching the black cat.

What’s the matter? Eusebius asked, taking a step toward him. Scared?

Leander turned away and walked casually along the edge of the roof. Not of you, Eusebius…But he’s watching. With his eyes, he indicated a cat on the top of the roof of the second building.

The cat watching them was a giant, a tiger-stripe of lush tan and ginger fur, named Innocent by the humans. He sat in the same place from night to night, at the highest point of the two roofs. The second roof was tiled and sloped downward more steeply toward the square, but the back end was a flat wooden beam that Innocent had made his own. He typically adopted the same position he was in now, lying on his stomach with his massive paws stretched out flat in front of him. Often, he would sit that way for hours, closing his eyes from time to time to doze.

Doesn’t look like he’s watching to me, Eusebius said. Maybe a fight would get his attention.

Only uncivilized cats would think of fighting here, Leander said. But we all know he’d stop us.

How do we know that? Has he ever stopped anyone? Eusebius asked.

Leander didn’t answer because Eusebius was right—in a way. Innocent had never stopped a fight because there had never been a fight on these rooftops, where cats would gather on bright, cool nights like this one. Leander, like most of the others, believed that Innocent was the reason that there had never been a fight. Innocent was so large and so imperturbable that all the other cats were puzzled or afraid of him—usually both.

Leander knew that many cats wondered if Innocent was not right in the head. He often appeared not to notice what was happening around him. No cat seemed more peaceful, and only the younger cats ever disturbed him—and they did it just to play, chasing after his great tail, which he swished around for their enjoyment with a playful glint in his enormous golden eyes. The other cats noted every odd twitch of his great ears, which had sharp points with swept-back wisps of fur at the ends. The narrowing or widening of his eyes was imbued with significance, even if none of the cats were sure what such changes meant, or if they meant anything at all.

Ready to challenge him, Eusebius?

Not yet and not here…but someday…you’ll see.

Why don’t you just go to his home and challenge him there? Leander asked provokingly.

Of course, the cats knew Innocent’s home ground and kept their distance. He lived in the home and shop of the blacksmith.

Eusebius moved to stand face to face with Leander. Leander, you’d love to see that. I don’t think the way it would end would make you happy. But as I said…not yet.

Leander hadn’t listened to Eusebius’s reply because he was aware of another cat staring at them—another cat who commanded attention.

You two. Be quiet, the oldest of the females hissed.

Lavinia…we…we… Eusebius began.

She was just about to tell this newcomer about the one we call the First Cat, said a younger female, a harlequin, called Aurore. She eyed Leander and Eusebius with evident disapproval, then, turning her face to a newcomer, added, He doesn’t know the story…as he should.

Aurore, Lavinia and several other cats had gathered around the newcomer, a smallish dark gray tiger stripe with distinctive lines of black under each eye and across his forehead, and with green eyes so large they seemed too big for his small but growing head.

Lavinia shot one last stern look at Leander and Eusebius. Both cats took a slight step backward from her gaze.

Lavinia was the oldest of all the rooftop cats. No one could say when she first started coming to the rooftops. No one else had been there so long. She was visibly old to be sure; her fur was gray ticked with black, but was increasingly turning white, and her whiskers, too, were changing from black to white. But despite her age, and rather diminutive size, she was afraid of no one—probably not even Innocent, and certainly not Eusebius or Leander, both of whom she had smacked on the nose at one time or another to discipline them the way a mother cat keeps her kittens in line.

Now she was talking quietly to the new young cat. The youngster had, Lavinia learned, recently come to the city to a human home near her own. She had met him on her way to the square that evening and he had followed along.

This is the story of cats and humans, and about the First Cat to live among humans, she began. Didn’t your mother tell it to you?

I don’t remember her. I was living with humans and other cats but without a mother cat for as long as I can remember.

You need to listen then. All cats know this story, said Lavinia.

That’s right, a fat, unkempt brown and white cat named Esprit said. You can’t be a cat unless you know this story.

The newcomer looked puzzled. I-I can’t be a cat?

Of course you can be a cat, said the old female, eyeing the brown and white cat impatiently.

Stupid Esprit, Aurore muttered.

Yes, never listen to Esprit, said another. The only part of the story he cares about is the part of humans feeding cats.

Leander moved away from the group back toward the roof’s edge above the square. Eusebius followed.

You know the story, Leander? Eusebius asked.

Leander was puzzled by the question. Of course. I’ve heard it many, many times, as have you.

But doesn’t your story go differently? asked Eusebius with mock seriousness. Isn’t yours about a cat whose nose was more sensitive than all the other cats?

Leander saw that he was being goaded to start a quarrel. Of course he’d never…which made Eusebius all the more amused as he stared directly at Leander’s face.

Irritated, Leander growled. As you well know the story is always the same. Nothing about a cat who had…

The old female again paused and stared at Leander with a matriarchal glare. When he became aware of it, he looked away guiltily.

Long ago, cats lived in the forests… she began.

Esprit, the fat brown and white cat, interrupted again. That’s the part I don’t understand. I have been in many places in this city. What is a forest?

A place of many trees. You can see one if you climb the city wall and look out beyond the fields. You would see tree after tree…so many beyond the city.

If Esprit could drag his fat stomach that high…

Lavinia was growing annoyed. All of you, she said, her gaze sweeping past each of the cats. Be quiet. Esprit, you especially, she scolded, and he looked down at the ground. The forest…that’s how the story goes and that’s all we need to know. There was silence.

She continued.

Although he had heard the story many times, Leander listened anyway. There was something reassuring about it. Leander thought it showed not just