Cat Among the Pumpkins Read Free Page A

have made it so easy to give up altogether. A few kind cats had taken her in for a couple of nights or left food on their doorsteps, but until now there had been no reason to welcome a new day and what it may bring. Living with Hettie, every day was different, and they faced whatever came their way together.
    It should be said, though, that no day started with both cats pulling in the same direction. Tilly knew that Hettie would never consider opening one eye, let alone two, until a cup of milky tea had been placed on the arm of her chair, and even then there was no guarantee that full consciousness could be achieved until a round of toast with a cheese triangle spread generously acrossit was proffered. But this morning was different: the familiar noise of the bread ovens had been replaced by an odd sort of tapping noise, and it was quite some time before Tilly realised that it was coming from the window which looked out onto the backyard. It was still very early, and as the tapping became more persistent, Tilly crept from her blanket and tugged at Hettie’s right ear, the only part of her that was visible amid swathes of dressing gown and blanket.
    ‘Wake up!’ she whispered without any success. Thinking fast she tried again, this time more urgently. ‘Wake up! There’s a sausage and bacon roll for breakfast.’ As if by magic, Hettie sat bolt upright, making a circuit of the room with her eyes and sniffing the air as if she had been snapped out of a trance by a hypnotist.
    Satisfied that she had her full attention, Tilly continued. ‘There’s something tapping at our window – listen.’
    Cross and disappointed at a no-show breakfast, Hettie grudgingly pricked up her ears, but the only obvious sound was the rumbling of her stomach. ‘I can’t hear anything. What are you doing up at this time anyway? If you can’t sleep, read one of your library books. You early risers are a menace to society.’ She continued to grumble as she pulled the blanket back over her head, and her words were lost in a tangle of bed clothes. Tilly looked at the belligerent heap of bad tempered cat, satisfied herself that the window hadceased to tap and returned to the comfort of her own blanket just as the first of the bread ovens sprang into life. Awake and alert, she reached for Marmite Sprat’s interpretation of the Milky Myers case, eventually drifting back to sleep to circle the Peggledrip house in a dream. A few minutes later, she was rudely awoken again, this time by a knock at the door and the unmistakeable sound of Beryl Butter’s voice.
    ‘Wakey, wakey you two! You’ve got a gentleman caller. Poor lad looks a bit rough, but he’s askin’ for Hettie and finishin’ a pie off in the yard.’
    Tilly sprang from her blanket and pulled Hettie’s off her chair, hoping that the shock of cold air would do the trick. This time, Hettie yawned and stretched, promising a more positive approach to the day.
    ‘Come on! We’ve got to get dressed and tidy up. We’ve got a visitor,’ Tilly explained as she folded blankets and shoved them into the staff sideboard. ‘It might be a new case to work on. There’s a cat in the yard asking for you. Oh, do hurry up! I’m dying to see who he is, and that explains the tapping in the night – it must be urgent if he came that early.’ Tilly threw Hettie’s clothes at her, crunched her way across to the table through last night’s popcorn and proceeded to bring some sort of normality to the aftermath of their scary night in.
    Hettie was less enthusiastic at the prospect of an unseen client in the backyard. Deep down, she hated meeting people and would have lived in a very smallbubble if she’d had any choice, but good cases that paid well were hard to come by and their coffers were running low; a boost from the backyard was just what they needed. She pulled on her clothes, pushed her armchair back from the fire and riddled the coals into life, adding some kindling to cheer things up. Then,