Eileen with Timmy

Timmy was one of the longest lived family pets, born on Alistair's second birthday. Like all our kittens he was sent off to Mill of Benholm to become a professional mouser, but Timmy ran away. Eileen went to rescue him from a potato store where he had hidden in the roof and brought him home in a potato sack strung on her bicycle handlebars. He never left home again, and performed a number of duties. When either of us had a nightmare, rather than staying out of bed to sooth us, Eileen would call Timmy in from his nightly rabbit-hunts and deposit him on the bed, where his stentorian purring set everything to rights.