The Killer Cat's Christmas Read online

  In fact, I was hoping that the whole idea of special little nursery rhyme shows would go away forever.

  7: Twanging the spider’s web

  BUT NO SUCH luck. All that they did was stick a plaster on to Ellie’s arm and move on to a safer nursery rhyme.

  ‘Ding Dong Bell, Pussy’s in the Well’.

  It wasn’t a real well they planned to put me in, of course. Lucilla and Lancelot made it while Ellie was trying to tempt me out of the cupboard with some of Aunt Ann’s quite delicious bitesized salmon tarts. (She is so posh she calls them ‘canapés’.)

  The twins used the box the coffee table came in. The two of them pulled out the staples and flattened it. Then they cut off the top, folded it into a circle and stapled it up again.

  After they’d painted grey squares all over it, it looked like a stone well. They carried it into the living room. It seemed that Lancelot was to be the star of this part of the show. He found some red velvet knickerbocker trousers in the dressing-up box and pranced around singing, ‘Who put him in?’ and ‘Who took him out?’ over and over.

  They didn’t dare put me inside their stupid well.

  ‘Wait till we’ve practised the song,’ said Lancelot, giving me a worried look. ‘It might be safer.’

  ‘Yes,’ Lucilla agreed. ‘Let’s not put Tuffy in there until we’re sure that we’ve got everything right.’

  Ellie looked down at the plaster on her arm, and then at me. ‘Yes, Tuffy. You can be in the show later.’

  I’d had enough of people telling me where I could or couldn’t go in my own house. I gave a mighty squirm in Lucilla’s arms.

  Terrified, she let go.

  I jumped straight in their silly well.

  They were all thrilled. ‘Oh, Tuffy! You’re a genius!’

  I raised my head and yowled.

  They were all so excited. ‘Look! Tuffy can act! He can pretend that he’s stuck down our well!’

  ‘Oh, he’s so clever!’

  ‘Quick! Sing your song, Lancelot!’

  So Lancelot started off again. ‘Ding dong bell. Pussy’s in the well. Who put her in?’ he warbled.

  The girls sang, ‘Little Tommy Lynn.’

  ‘Who took her out?’ sang Lancelot.

  ‘Little Johnny Stout,’ sang Lucilla and the Corncrake.

  ‘I get the next two lines!’ said Lancelot, and started singing, ‘What a naughty boy was that –’

  But the girls butted in, ‘– to try to drown poor pussy cat.’

  Lancelot was getting cross. ‘I am the star of this show! So I get to sing the last two lines all by myself.’

  ‘No, you don’t,’ Lucilla argued. And she and Ellie sang together to try to drown him out:

  ‘Who never did him any harm,

  But killed the mice in his father’s barn.’

  I was so bored with listening to them singing and arguing that I settled down to watch a great fat hairy spider climb out of a staple hole inside the cardboard well, and start on a new web.

  The spider was good fun to tease. I let it spin a couple of lines, and then reached out to twang one – not so hard it broke, but just enough to set the spider bouncing.

  Spin, spin.

  Twang, twang.

  Bounce, bounce.

  It was a laugh. I kept on doing it. But the spider was stubborn and kept on spinning. I was so busy twanging, I hardly noticed when The Three Bad Singers finished their stupid argument and started up again.

  ‘Ding dong bell!’ Lancelot sang loudly. ‘Pussy’s in the well!’

  ‘Who put him in?’ chirruped Lucilla.

  ‘Little Tommy Lynn,’ gargled the Corncrake.

  ‘Who pulled him out?’ warbled Lucilla.

  And that’s when Lancelot reached over the side of the well to pull me out.

  Well, don’t blame me for everything that happened next! I already told you twice. I wasn’t really listening. I was much more interested in twanging the web – a little harder each time. I don’t see how I was supposed to know that suddenly I’d twang too hard, and the spider would lose its grip on the web and fly up in the air.

  Or that it would be Lancelot’s turn to sing the next line of the nursery rhyme.

  So that his mouth would be open wide.

  Very, very wide.

  Okay, okay! So scream the house down, everyone! Lancelot swallowed a spider. What’s the big deal? I’ve seen him eating fish. Fish are a whole lot bigger than spiders. (And they have creepy eyes.)

  And he ate pork last night. That is a lump of dead pig’s bottom. So why make such a fuss about an eensy-weensy spider? And anyway, it was already deep down inside him, getting mixed up with his lunch. So there was really no point in reeling round and round the room, screaming and gagging and spluttering.

  That spider was inside to stay.

  If anyone had any reason to make a fuss, it was the poor old spider, not fussy Lancelot.

  Lucilla and Ellie were on my back, of course. ‘Tuffy, that was so mean!’

  ‘That was a horrible thing to do, flicking that spider into Lancelot’s mouth!’

  ‘Poor Lancelot!’

  Poor Lancelot? I like that! Why should Lancelot get all the sympathy? Who is it who has spent the whole day locked in a room with the The Three Show-Offs?

  Me, that’s who.

  So how about feeling sorry for me?

  8: Chasing half-dead mousies

  NOW IT WAS Lucilla’s turn to be Star of the Show.

  ‘Which nursery rhyme will you choose?’ they asked her.

  Lucilla hugged herself with glee. ‘I’m going to sing Pussy Cat, Pussy Cat, where have you been? I’ve been up to London to visit the Queen. Then I can wear that lovely, lovely crown in the dressing-up box.’

  (These three can get excited about anything. The jewels on that ‘lovely, lovely crown’ are stuck-on wine gums. I know that for sure because I’ve licked them.)

  Ellie wasn’t happy with Lucilla’s choice. ‘Oh, please don’t let’s do that one! I always cry when it gets to the bit that says, Pussy cat, pussy cat, what did you there? I frightened a little mouse under her chair.’

  ‘Why?’ Lancelot asked.

  There was a silence. They all looked at me as if I was a criminal – as if I spent my whole life chasing half-dead mousies round the house.

  I was offended, if you want to know. They wouldn’t open the door, so I just went and sat under the Christmas tree, next to the presents.

  Okay, okay. So I was sulking. But how is it my fault that my tail was flicking from side to side? I am a cat, and that’s what happens to our tails when we get cross. My tail’s a part of me. From my point of view, it’s just the end of my bottom. You don’t spend all day looking to see exactly what’s going on at the end of your bottom, do you? Well, neither do I. So how was I supposed to notice that it was acting like a little furry brush, and flicking all those silly little labels off and out of sight, under the carpet?

  It took them ages, but finally, finally, they managed to choose another rhyme for their show.

  ‘“Three Little Kittens, They Lost Their Mittens”,’ decided Lucilla.

  ‘Yes! Perfect!’ Ellie said. ‘We can use Tuffy and my two soft cat toys.’

  ‘Use’ Tuffy? Excuse me! What am I now? A kitchen towel, or something?

  Nobody ‘uses’ me.

  Now Lancelot was pitching in. ‘And we’ll need twelve little mittens.’

  I looked up. Mittens? On my paws? Oh, no. No, no, no, no. Not even if they made me Star of the Show.

  But they were already rushing off to look for what they needed. While they were gone, I had a laugh, reaching up to bat a few of the glittery balls off the tree. Just like last year, I gave myself five points if they fell down among the presents, and a bonus of five if they rolled on to the carpet.

  I got a hundred and twenty points in all.

  Excellent score! Even better than last year. But that’s practising for you. You know what they always say: ‘Practice makes pe
rfect.’

  9: Bare at the bottom

  OKAY, OKAY! SO no one warned them when they rushed back in. Three pairs of feet can trample on an awful lot of decorations before skidding to a halt. So there were crispy bits of glittery ball everywhere. All trodden in. Ellie’s father had to get out the vacuum cleaner, and Ellie’s mum spent ages picking tiny silver slivers out of the fluffy slippers Aunt Ann had left by the sofa.

  Things were quite quiet after that, apart from Ellie’s father’s constant grumbling. ‘I knew we should have kept Tuffy behind bars. Look at that tree! What a mess! Practically bare at the bottom now. And overloaded at the top. It looks quite shocking.’

  You could tell Ellie was worried I might end up in the cattery. She said, ‘We could move some of the glittery balls that Tuffy couldn’t reach down to the lower branches.’

  But Mr Didn’t-Get-His-Way was in a giant snit. ‘Why would you do that? Just to help the fiendish little beast smash all the ones he couldn’t reach before?’

  Did you hear that? I get accused of everything. I didn’t smash the glittery balls. All that I did was set them rolling where they got trodden on. Is it my fault if people can’t be bothered to look where they are putting their big fat feet?

  I just gave him the cold cat stare as he went out. Then, sticking my paws over my ears, I tried not to listen as Ellie and Lancelot and Lucilla pranced about all afternoon, singing that great long boring nursery rhyme about the three prissy little kittens who spent their whole time losing their mittens, and finding their mittens, and getting their mittens dirty, and washing their mittens, and drying their mittens and –

  Oh, excuse me. Their life’s so dull I fell asleep just telling you about it.

  Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

  10: Chocolate coins and sausages

  THAT NIGHT, IN Ellie’s bedroom, The Three Ninnies couldn’t stop whispering excitedly. ‘Yippee! Christmas Day tomorrow!’

  ‘We’ll wake to find our stockings on our beds!’

  ‘And we’ll have sausages for breakfast!’

  ‘Then we’ll unwrap the presents under the tree!’

  ‘Eat a lovely big lunch!’

  ‘And super-duper Christmas pudding!’

  ‘Then everyone will come in the front room to watch our show!’

  ‘It’ll be magic!’

  I settled down on Ellie’s bed. She put her arms round me. ‘Oh, Tuffy! I do love you so.’

  She’s not so bad. I gave her a brief purr. I was quite looking forward to the stockings myself.

  No such luck. Right in the middle of the night a huge hand scooped me up and dumped me out on the landing. ‘I think these stockings will be safer away from you.’

  Well, thank you, Santa! All the other doors were closed, so I just settled on a nice warm towel I pulled down from the bathroom rack. It wasn’t a bad night, though I was woken ridiculously early by frantic squeals. ‘Look! Santa’s left our stockings!’

  ‘Chocolate coins!’

  ‘I’ve got a little jumping frog.’

  ‘I’ve got a clockwork mouse.’

  Oh, please! How old are Ellie and the twins? Three? You wouldn’t catch me playing with a clockwork mouse – unless it was to push it into Aunt Ann’s furry slippers and give her a heart attack.

  But I still reckoned it would be more fun to watch them unpacking their stockings than to hang around the bathroom on my own.

  So I jumped up on Ellie’s bed.

  She threw her arms round me. ‘Oh, Tuffy! Christmas is magic, isn’t it? You think so too, don’t you, even though you don’t like chocolate coins.’

  Who says I don’t like chocolate coins? They’re bright and gold and shiny, and fun to bat off the bed.

  Okay, okay! So twist my tail! Some of the ones I batted went down that giant hole that Mr I-Can-Fix-It-All-By-Myself made in the floor when he was sorting out that leaking pipe. Is it my fault the hole’s so deep she couldn’t fish them out again?

  No. It is his.

  But not having quite so many chocolate coins as usual meant Ellie got hungry sooner. So we all went down for breakfast. There didn’t seem to be too much Christmas Spirit coming my way. Nobody offered me a special breakfast. To get some sausages, I had to creep up beside Lancelot and jump in his lap, knocking his elbow.

  Success! The sausage he was trying to cut flew off on to the floor.

  If it had been a mouse, I couldn’t have pounced faster.

  Got it!

  I reckoned it was safer to take my prize out in the garden. So I rushed through the cat flap.

  The last thing that I heard behind me was Mr Not-Very-Nice bolting it closed behind me.

  Well, happy Christmas to you too!

  11: Showers of falling food

  WHILE I WAS looking for a way back in, the grown-ups must have cleared away the breakfast things and started to prepare for Christmas lunch. By the time I had found the only bedroom window that was unlatched, and squeezed inside, the turkey was already stuffed and trussed, and sitting forlornly in its tray, waiting to go in the oven.

  I ask you. Honestly! They all go on and on about the way that I chase sparrows. But I would never treat a bird like that.

  Hypocrites!

  Anyhow, once it was safely in the oven (out of my reach) the four of them went through to the front room, to join the children, and unwrap the presents.

  I had forgotten about the labels my tail had accidentally flicked away, out of sight under the carpet.

  Uh-oh. The trouble started almost at once.

  ‘Who is this gift for? It doesn’t say.’

  ‘This one doesn’t have a label.’

  ‘Neither has this one. Or this.’

  I couldn’t help but look a bit uncomfortable. (I hadn’t realized I’d flicked off so many.) The children rooted around, lifted their heads and wailed, ‘We’ve looked at all the presents, and not one has a label.’

  ‘What are we going to do?’

  ‘We’ll simply have to guess.’

  That didn’t work too well, and arguments broke out all over. ‘I think this one is probably for me.’

  ‘No, dear. I think that Santa brought that one for Lucilla.’

  That set Lucilla off. ‘But I don’t want it, Mummy. I like this present much better.’

  ‘But that one was meant for Ellie.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘I just do, dear.’

  ‘You can’t read Santa’s mind!’

  ‘Neither can you!’

  We were a little short on Christmas cheer. And then a scuffle started when Lancelot tried to snatch back a present that Ellie’s father said was not for him. The carpet rucked up underneath his shoe, and there they were – all of the labels.

  And one or two telltale ginger hairs, off my tail.

  ‘A-ha!’ cried Ellie’s father.

  Everyone turned to look at me. I turned to look at the door. I don’t think it was my fault that, just at the moment that I fled towards it, Ellie’s mother was coming in carrying a giant plate of tiny tarts and titbits and fancy little things on sticks.

  I just think I was lucky that, in the showers of falling food, I managed to get clean away.

  12: Star of the show

  I SKIPPED LUNCH. And the washing up. And all that fuss when Aunt Ann realized that there were lumps in her cake icing, and she would have to keep stirring.

  I wasn’t going back outside. Cold, wet and miserable. So I stayed out of sight, hiding in one of Uncle Brian’s welly boots till I heard Ellie walk past.

  ‘Tuffy! Tuff-eee!’

  I stretched up in the boot to see which way she was headed. That was a big mistake. The boot began to wobble and I lost balance.

  Out I spilled, on to the floor.

  She scooped me up. ‘Time for the show,’ she told me. ‘And guess who’s going to be the star!’ She nuzzled her nose in my fur. ‘You are! You’re going to be the very best of all of us because you’re so clever.’

  The best of them all! So c
lever! How can you run away and hide when someone as caring as Ellie thinks that you’re the bees’ knees? Call it the Christmas Spirit if you will, but suddenly I felt mean, trying to sneak away after they’d worked so hard painting the well, and practising their songs, and making paper mittens for the two toy cats.

  They’d even gone next door to borrow two tiny pairs of real woollen baby mittens they could fit on me.

  How could I let them down?

  So I gave up and let Ellie carry me into the front room. The cardboard well was on the rug. Lucilla and Lancelot were ready in their costumes. Aunt Ann had even stopped stirring her icing and put the mixing bowl safely down on the floor behind the sofa.

  All of the grown-ups settled on the sofa, ready to watch. Even the huge fat fairy on the top of the Christmas tree seemed to be peering down and waiting for the show to start.

  ‘Ready?’ Lucilla asked.

  Why not? I thought. Why not do something nice for Ellie? Why not make the best of things, and turn their stupid little betsy-wetsy show into a triumph?

  WOW them! Amaze them with my wonderful acting skills! Help out The Three Soft Noodles, and give the grownups the surprise of their lives!

  Tuffy, the Acting Cat. Star of the Show.

  Everything started brilliantly. We did ‘I Love Little Pussy’ first. When Ellie tipped her head winsomely to one side, I tipped mine even more winsomely to the other. I stared so lovingly into her eyes. I even purred. It was a shame the only decorations left on the tree were all up at the top, so they won’t show up on the photographs. But, still, Ellie and I made a nice pair, and if it wasn’t for her awful corncrake voice, that bit of the show would have been perfect. Certainly I was