Gumbo the cat is missing. Old Town Bluffton businesses fear he’s been cat-napped
If someone tells you they are looking for Gumbo, you may be surprised to find out they aren’t looking for food.
A cat named Gumbo, who was a fixture at the restaurants and businesses along Calhoun Street in Old Town Bluffton, has gone missing.
Those who work in the area and take care of him say they hope the person who took him will bring him back. At the very least, said David Palaces, operations manager of The Cottage in Old Town Bluffton, that person should take Gumbo’s sister as well so the cats can be together.
The two were adopted by Cottage employees from a local shelter about a year and a half ago, Palaces said. They mostly live outside but are let inside when the weather is bad.
He said the cats make their rounds from The Cottage to other area businesses, where food is left out for them and customers give them extra attention.
The cats have a strong bond, he said, and Muffin — who is blind in one eye — has been crying and looking for her brother since he went missing last Tuesday.
“They were a team,” Palaces said.
“Our main thing is really reuniting the cats,” he said. “If (the person) wants to give them both a home together, we would be all right with that.”
Cat-napped
Palaces thinks he knows who took the cat.
On Tuesday afternoon, he spoke with a brunette woman outside the restaurant who asked questions about the cat and said she wanted to take Gumbo home with her.
Palaces said he told her they were his cats and he didn’t want the pair separated. The next morning, Gumbo didn’t show up for breakfast, he said.
He described the woman as being in her late 20s or early 30s and wearing a red and black flannel shirt. Video surveillance recorded at the front of the restaurant shows the woman but doesn’t show her taking the cat, he said.
Palaces insists he’s not a cat person. He said it wasn’t until Gumbo went missing that he realized how emotionally attached he was.
“Certain cats, they have that personality about them,” he said.
Alexis Sargo, owner of Wink Lash Room across the street from The Cottage, said she was not a cat person until she met Gumbo.
“He was probably the favorite part of my morning,” Sargo said. “He would hear my car alarm and run over to get his probably 10th breakfast every morning.”
She said she even came to the shop on her days off to put out food for her furry friends. That food hasn’t been touched since Gumbo went missing.
Sargo and Gumbo’s other caretakers said they talked to the police and spread the word among local vets about the cat.
“We just miss him,” Sargo said. “... He belongs to all of us.”
This story was originally published November 26, 2018 at 4:51 PM.