The Killer Cat's Christmas

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.