Rick's grandfather, Richard (Dick) Mercer was an animal lover. He had cats, rabbits and canaries at different times. He called one large rabbit Big Bun, another Tarzan. Dick always called canaries Bing after Bing Crosby. One of the last cats, a steel gray colour, he named Smokey.
Smokey was an adventurous cat. The Mercers had venetian blinds to the large window in their living room. These blinds provided an Everest-like challenge to the wily cat who scaled the blinds behind the curtains and eventually fell, cutting her whiskers on the sharp edges on the way down. The cat always had short whiskers that looked as if they were cut deliberately. In a sense they were because Smokey continued her adventures with the blinds. It was obvious that she didn't mind the quick return to earth. Dick enjoyed her antics.
His love of all animals made Dick curious about them. Once during his time at work in the accounting department of Bowaters Paper Mill in Corner Brook, he had an unusual opportunity. One of his colleagues there, a young woman, dated and later married the supervisor of the woods department. One of the crews at work in the woods had an encounter with a mother bear and her cub. They killed the mother and captured the cub which they turned over to their supervisor. Dick found out about the cub through his colleague and asked to see it.
The couple brought the cub to Dick's home in Corner Brook and they phoned for Rick to come to the house as well. The fluffy little creature climbed up the woman's leg when she stood up as if it was climbing a tree. After some activity, it curled up on the birch wood in the brass holder by the fireplace.
We don't know what happened to the little cub.
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