Goodbye Norma Jean ... cat lover who took in stray 9 years ago has to return her to owner
WITH her big eyes and sleek black fur, Norma Jean was never going to be short of admirers.
But the adventurous cat has now found herself at the centre of a tug-of-love after going on an extraordinary 450-mile, nine-year holiday.
The family pet, a Siamese cross, vanished from her home in Torquay, Devon, in 2007. She was found by holidaymaker Rosalin Montgomery, 52, who thought she was a stray and took her home to East Kilbride, Lanarkshire.
For nearly a decade she lived with Miss Montgomery under a new name, Ember, enjoying time sunbathing on her balcony.
Then last week she went missing again. This time she was handed in to Cats Protection – where astonished staff found a microchip and details for her original owner, Samantha Roberts, hundreds of miles away in Torquay.
Mrs Roberts is delighted, having now been reunited with her pet, which shares a name with Marilyn Monroe – the actress was born Norma Jean Baker.
Miss Montgomery, however, is devastated. ‘We haven’t stopped crying,’ she said. ‘I would love more than anything if the original owner would consider giving her back to us. She is our baby.
‘Her original owner has done nothing wrong. I know she must be an animal lover like me. All she has done is have her cat returned to her. We just miss Ember so much.’
Miss Montgomery found Ember when visiting her boyfriend Gary James, 51, who lived in Torquay at the time, in 2007.
She claimed the cat – then a kitten – would turn up on his doorstep regularly, and she believed she had been abandoned or was feral, so soon took her in.
‘We knocked on doors and asked around, and nobody knew she belonged to anyone,’ she said. ‘She looked underfed and we thought she was feral.
‘She was with a big tom cat and another feral cat and we followed them one night and they were sleeping in an old lock-up.’
When Mr James moved to join Miss Montgomery in East Kilbride, he took Ember with him. Miss Montgomery said the cat loves nothing more than sunbathing on their balcony and snuggling up with her labrador River, and other cats Salem and Smirnoff.
But last week she went missing for a few days before briefly returning home and then vanishing again.
Staff at Cats Protection managed to trace Mrs Roberts through Facebook. By chance, she was on holiday in Scotland at the time and went to collect her long-lost pet. Mrs Roberts, 47, an NHS worker, said she had spent months trawling the streets for her cat. ‘She liked getting in people’s cars, so I wondered if she’d been driven away somewhere,’ she said.
‘I feared the worst but I didn’t want to upset my children, so I told them she would be living it up somewhere with another family.’ After being reunited with her pet, Mrs Roberts said: ‘When I arrived she was just sitting on a cushion, looking very regal, like she always did.
‘I started to cry. I really didn’t think I would ever see Norma again. I’m so excited to get her back. She’ll be allowed outside eventually – but she’s grounded for now.’ Lisa McRae, a volunteer for Cats Protection’s Lanarkshire Branch, said: ‘We were a bit surprised when he heard Rosalin thought the cat was hers but it just goes to show what a popular cat Norma Jean is. It’s a shame for Rosalin but it’s nice to know that Norma was being so well cared for all for that time.’
‘We thought she was feral’