Now that Frank is feeling better again, he wanted me to write down the
following instalment of his biography. We cried together as he dictated
and I wrote it down, but as you all know, it ended happily:

It has taken me a long time to prepare to give you an account of this, a
very painful period of my life. I cannot look back on it without a
shudder of horror at what might have been. It happened when I was three
years old. We had just come back to town after a summer on the island.
My hoomin was seeing this male hoomin that neither Nikki nor I liked at
all. We tried to tell our hoomin, but she was too young and stupid to
know that us cats always know best.

The male hoomin called and asked my hoomin if she wanted to go to his
cabin in the country for the weekend. 'Bring the cats,' he said. He used
to put on this act of liking us, but we could see right through it. We
knew he was pure evil. How blind can a hoomin be, not to realise that?

Well, off we all went, me and Nikki in the carrier, with bad forebodings
of what the weekend would have in store for us.

When we got to the cabin, our hoomin let us out of our carrier. We saw
the open door, and dashed out, away from that disgusting man. Our hoomin
had been travelling all around with us, and we had stayed close to her
because we had her pretty well trained, but we hated this guy so much
that we didn't want to stay in his cabin another minute. Not even with
our own hoomin there.

Nikki and I hid in the bushes near the cabin to lay our plans for
further escape. We didn't want to leave our hoomin, but we also didn't
want to get near the male. Now, Nikki sometimes panics with hoomins, and
so she gets caught because she doesn't stick to the plan. When our
hoomin wants to stuff us into the carrier, Nikki will flee to the top of
the bookcase, but then she will panic and come down, and then it's easy
for the hoomin to catch her. She panicked in the bushes again, and ran
right into the hoomin's hands.

Nikki was carried into the cabin and shut inside, but I outwitted the
hoomins and they never saw a glimpse of me, though I was sitting right
there watching them, waiting for a moment when the male was not there
and I could go up to my hoomin and tell her we needed to get out of
there quick. But the male never went far off, and I never got a chance.

The hoomins stayed one night longer than they had planned, but then I
saw them drive off. My hoomin has told me later that she had to go back
to work, but I do think it was unconscionable of her to just go off and
leave me.

Now I was alone. Nikki was gone. My hoomin was gone. I was all alone in
the world. This was a scary thing for me, because I had never been on my
own or taken care of myself. I had always had hoomins giving me food and
shelter. The summers on the island had taught me some survival skills,
but I had a rough time of it. Days and days passed, and nights (chilly
nights, I may add), and I scrounged food where I could get it.
Fortunately, there were a lot of cabins in the vicinity, and there was
always a place where a kind hoomin would leave out something nice for
me. The cabin next to the evil man's was a good place, the people there
left me kibble in a bowl on their doorstep. Nikki had not quite
convinced me of the merits of hunting your own food at that time, so any
offerings from hoomins was welcome.

One day the evil man came back, and he took me by surprise, so he
managed to catch a glimpse of me. I hid in the bushes, and he came
crawling after me with an open tin of tuna. The smell was delicious, but
I wouldn't let him fool me. I was never going to let that evil man catch
me. My hoomin later told me he hadn't told her he was going to the
cabin, and since she doesn't have a car herself, she couldn't come for
me by herself.

Some days later, I saw the evil man's car arrive at his cabin. I snuck
over to the neighbour cabin so he wouldn't see me again, and hung out
there. Then I saw a familiar figure walking up the drive to the cabin. I
was pretty sure I had seen this hoomin before, but wasn't quite sure. My
former life had become a blur in my mind. I knew I had had it nice and
warm, food had appeared on demand, and I had a kitty friend to cuddle up
with. But the hardship of living outside had started to erase these
memories, and I couldn't quite place this hoomin. I hid and decided to
observe what she would do.

She went up to the steps and saw the bowl of kibble. 'Frank.' she called
softly. 'Franky-Lanky!' These words made something stir inside me, but I
couldn't remember what it was. I decided to take a closer look, and
silently hopped up on a wheelbarrow behind her. 'Mah,' I said. She
turned around, and stood stock-still. I think she was in shock or
something. Then she started to move towards me, but I'd grown wiser
during my time in the wild, and I darted away to the edge of the forest.

She then went and sat down by the bowl of kibble. She ran her fingers
through the kibble, and the sound was so enticing, I couldn't resist, I
just had to go and have a bite. I snuck up, casting suspicious glances
at her all the time. Then I started eating, and it was so good, I forgot
to be careful, Suddenly I felt something falling on my shoulders. It was
my harness.

All those half-forgotten memories suddenly rushed back into my head and
I realised this was her! My very own hoomin! She had come back for me!!!
I started headbutting her and rubbing my smell all over her. She
carefully fastened the harness and stood up to go with me, but I
wouldn't let her walk, she had to stay still and be thoroughly marked
and scented by me, over and over again while she gradually carried and
walked with me to the evil man's cabin.

My hoomin put me in the carrier, and for once I was happy to go into it,
because I knew everything would be alright now. She had lined it with my
favourite woollen sweater that smells so much of her. She put me in the
back seat and sat down in front, but just before we took off, she
switched and came and sat in the back with me. She opened the carrier
door, and I climbed into her lap, stretched up with my front paws on her
shoulder and purred in her ear all the way home.

When we got home, I had so much to tell her, but I was also very hungry
and very tired. I slept for many days, only waking up to eat, and while
I ate I told her of my adventures. She said she had put ads in the local
newspaper and asked the local radio station to tell its listeners about
me. She had had quite a few tips of sightings (I stole a newly caught
fish from one hoomin), but since she had no car of her own, she hadn't
been able to come for me sooner. The evil man never told her he was
going to visit the cabin, and so she couldn't make him bring her. She
said I'd been on my own for five weeks, but I looked just as sleek and
neat as ever. Everyone had told her to stop looking for me, that I was
gone forever, but I'm glad she didn't give up. I'm glad she came to get
me eventually, when she was able to. I'm glad she dropped that harness
on my back, because I wouldn't have recognised her if she hadn't. I was
glad to be back with Nikki, though she hissed and cursed at me the first
couple of days. She thought I was an impostor and not the real Frank,
because I smelled so strange, but I finally convinced her that it was me.

A few weeks later that evil man came to visit, he smelled terrible and
he beat our hoomin. After that she refused to ever see him again. Now,
if she had believed us when we told her he was evil, she would have
saved us all a lot of trouble and pain. Since then, I'm glad to say she
has always trusted our opinions.