I just wanted to share my joy. I am so very happy. She is very thin and grubby but she's alive. :) she has been purring for 3 hours now.
We'd leafleted and rang everywhere and put posters up, and two people said they were certain they had seen her lying dead, she is very distinctive (tabby, small, only one eye, half a tail) but the council didn't have her body (she is tagged and chipped), and I thought someone had binned her and we'd never know for sure. She is nearly 9 and has never done this before - we moved house, like fools! but we kept her in for 2 months, and we went out with her in the garden for three weeks, and then, she was gone.
Two lovely people rang me tonight, she was begging at their back door, about 2 miles away. My Kitty K is home, I am so happy!
She is never, ever going out again, never, not ever going out again. :)