My heart sank when my husband told me my daughter’s cat was missing.

I had just come home from a 13-hour workday. It was 10:30 on a brutally cold Friday night, and when he said India was gone, all I wanted to do was look for her.

My husband, Phil, and my 21-year-old daughter Laura had already done that, he said, for several hours. Laura had noticed India was missing just after sundown. She combed the entire house. India usually comes when Laura whistles or calls. She never came.

When Laura was certain India was not inside, she enlisted the help of neighbors for an outdoor search.

We are remodeling our master bathroom. Phil figured while the contractor propped the door open to bring in supplies, India slipped out. Barking dogs in the adjacent yards may have scared her into running away.

It was too dark to see a tiny, 6-pound, tortoise shell cat now. We would have to wait until morning.

All I could think is how scared the little kitty must be. She’s a former stray who has been a house cat since she was 2 weeks old. She never goes outside and has no coping skills.
The temperature was hovering just above freezing.

At dawn we restarted the search. We posted flyers; we walked the woods and drove the neighborhood calling her name.

Phil called Dave, our contractor. He said he had never seen our cats while he had worked on Friday, and the thought they were both safe behind a closed door somewhere in the house.
He drove to our house and unlocked his trailer, to see if she was hiding inside. No luck. Dave then searched our neighborhood for more than an hour, finding several feral cats but not India.

Laura went to Roanoke Animal Control. They had not found India, but suggested we put her litter box outside our door with a piece of Laura’s clothing, hoping the scents would lead her home. They told her check back in a couple of days. They didn't tell her only 5 percent of all lost cats are reunited with their families.

I had to work Saturday covering, of all things, the cat show. My husband, my daughter and I kept in constant contact. No one had seen India.

By late Saturday afternoon, we feared the worst. There are foxes in the nearby woods, and probably coyotes. India would be pretty low on the food chain, little more than a tasty snack to a predator. We were losing hope to ever see her again.

Then we heard a faint “meow.”
Phil thought it was our other cat, Thai. Laura was looking right at Thai. He was silent. We heard the “meow” again.

Laura ran to the deck door through our dining room, but India was not outside. She heard the cry again, coming from the ceiling. The remodeled bathroom is directly above the dining room.
We ran to the bathroom and called India’s name. Below the plywood, we heard her again. India was under the floor of our new shower.

For the first time in this whole ordeal, my normally stoic daughter broke down in tears.
“My cat’s alive,” she sobbed.

Phil called Dave, who raced over to the rescue. He had opened the floor below what had been the bathtub on Friday to move the drain for the new shower. She must have wandered into it while he was away. He never heard or saw her.

He cut a hole in the plywood floor. The sound of the saw must have scared the already-traumatized kitty, because she retreated where we could not reach her, but with a mirror and a flashlight we could see her.

It took three hours and a bowl of water to entice her out. But she was indeed alive, and apparently no worse for the experience.

India’s normally an aloof cat, usually choosing to stay in Laura's room. Sunday she was very social, hanging out most of the day with us and even with our dogs. I think she was happy to be back with her family.

Clearly, we are relieved. But this could have been a deadly mistake, and we would only have ourselves to blame if she had been hurt.

Cats are by nature explorers, and they can fit into any space that can accommodate their heads. I have heard other tales of cats trapped in walls during construction.

Pets should be secured while workers are in the house, while doors are open, or while any access to walls, floors and vents is exposed. We should have realized this; we were careless.

Had India slipped outside, the tag on her collar and her microchip would be her best bet to find her way home.

When the work week began, Laura locked the cats in her room, where they are safe from the danger of their own curiosity. The dogs were, as usual, in their crates.

No animals will be harmed in the construction of our new bathroom. Not again, anyway.

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• Posted by Nona Nelson in Safety
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