I don't know why our dad named the pussycat fisher but I presume it was because of the supposed role it will play in the house.
We never knew our dad to be a lover of pets but maybe the rats were stubborn.

There was a day our last born Mabel run to our mum's room and refused to sleep in her room for fear of the rats.
Growing up, especially during the moon season in our little village, life used to be full of fun. It was during this season that boys and girls played hide and seek and our grandparents told us folktales.
My siblings and I never partook in the hide and seek because our dad never allowed it. On one occasion he asked our elder sister whether she wanted a protruding stomach like the daughter of Mr Agwa. I don't know what he infer by that but I only knew that it was a gathering where boys chase after girls who hide away from the shining light of the moon.

Though we never go out to play hide and seek but follow the voices of each of our friends and often whisper among ourselves who was running after another as we lay on our rafter mat.
Our grandfather, a tall slender man with an unfathomable sense of humour was the greatest treasure we had on such nights if he failed to go on his drinking spree.

On such nights, we hastily finish our chores and spread our mats beside his chair and open our ears for his rendition of the mastery of storytelling.
It was during one of such nights that he told us a story about Okoli and the ghost. Okoli was one of the most notorious boys in the village. Grandpa told us that he had rickety legs I don't know what that means but he told us that when he walked it was as if his posterior would touch the ground and his mum always prayed that the whirlwind never meets him.

In a culture where respect for elders was sacrosanct, grandpa told us that Okoli had not an iota for the elders. He was fond of evading peoples' farms and plugging their mangoes and oranges at will. Nobody liked him in the village because of his rude behaviour.
One day, on the eve of the new yams' festival, when the gods of the land come out to clean the land Okoli committed a sacrilege. He insulted the village chief priest because he sent him to go and fetched water from the stream for him. Grandpa told us he don't know whether he was possessed or not but what he did that day was taboo.
Everybody was shivering like the epidermis of everyone at the village square had goosebumps. Nobody dared to beg for Okoli and many wished the chief priest pitied him not.
They say mercy is an orphan who had no parent people said Okoli was lucky for he would have gone six feet down that day but maybe the gods had excess secretion of dopamine.

I don't know if it was this story from our grandpa that made our lastborn run from her room that day. Maybe the sounds from the rats made her think it was the ghosts in the Okoli's story our grandpa told us but I knew she never got to sleep in that room until Pricilla her immediate elder came back from the boarding house.
I think her running away made our dad buy the pussycat. His decision never went down well with us as I and my immediate younger sister were not fans of a pussycat.

I don't know for me but my sister complained about the constant sniffing of the cat and her failure to perform the duty she was bought for.
Fisher was a very lazy cat. one only sees her only at meal times. My sister always complained about whether it had a clock for checking when the means would be ready.