Our friend Francis came to us almost 4 years ago, after his previous human moved and needed to rehome him. He had been an outdoor cat up on Roberts Hill Road for all of his 15ish years, a tough-love kind of fellow with a reputation for running off dogs and for sharing his meals with stray cats. His first human had named him Baby, but for practical reasons I changed his name to Francis — after the saint, of course, and also after a beloved friend who had passed away a year or two before. I quickly discovered that he wasn’t the instrument of anybody’s peace! But although he hated dogs, he came to tolerate Bonnie, and later somewhat begrudgingly shared his home with Buttercup. I started to call him Frank. It fit his cattitude, although occasionally the Francis came out. Like, for example, last spring, when a wren made her nest in his greenhouse. He never exhibited any birding tendencies, nevertheless, I was concerned. I shouldn’t have been. Francis never harassed the mother as she busily fed her babies, and she never considered him a threat. The day the babies ventured out of the nest, he stood guard over them until they learned to fly.

Frank took to the role of house cat when the weather was cold, but he loved being outside during the warm days. We shared many beautiful days in the garden. I will never forget the two of us experiencing the eclipse together in my yard. He stretched out on the steps next to the carport and didn’t seem to notice a thing as the sky turned toward twilight and back again, and the shadows of the leaves turned to crescent shapes and danced around him. As he began to feel his age, he preferred to remain in the house on chilly spring mornings, and his territory shrank just a bit. He didn’t venture beyond the side garden, and he thoroughly enjoyed the warmth and security of the deck.

Frank loved to eat, and when he lost his appetite last week, we knew something was amiss. As it turns out, there was a tumor in his intestines. We decided to risk surgery, as although he was 19ish, he was still strong and clear-eyed. Wednesday he spent all day on his deck, soaking in the sun and taking a few small meals over the course of the day. Yesterday, when Ryan Hammonds took a peek under Frank’s hood, he found that Francis had the kind of cancer that can’t be surgically removed. So, after consulting with me, Ryan let Francis ease off over the bridge.