The Return Of The Killer Cat

10: How it ended

SO THAT SORT of explains what all the fuss was about when the car drew up at the roadside, and out spilled the family.

‘Tuff-eee!’ yelled Ellie, catching sight of me through Melanie ‘s open garden gate. She rushed in to greet me. ‘Tuff-eee!’

Then she spotted Melanie, sobbing her eyes out.

‘What’s the matter?’

‘Your cat ought to go to prison!’

Melanie shrieked at her. ‘Your cat’s not a cat. Your cat’s a pig. And a beast.

And a murderer!

I went back to trying to look all sweet and Janety.

Ellie’s eyes had gone huge. She looked at me sternly and her eyes filled with tears. ‘Oh, Tuffy!’ she whispered, horrified. ‘What have you done?’

I like that. Very nice! Aren’t families supposed to stick up for one another? Charming of Ellie to believe the worst, just because her best friend is watering the lawn with her tears, and there are bits of shredded nightie all over.

I was pretty put out, I can tell you. I stuck my tail up in the air and started the huffy strut out of there.

Wrong way! Straight into the vicar’s arms.

‘Gotcha!’ he said, scooping me up before I’d even spotted him lurking behind the pear tree. ‘Gotcha!’

And that’s how, when Ellie’s mother finally strolled through the gate, she found the vicar holding me the way that a cat lover doesn’t hold a cat.

And staring at me the way a cat lover doesn’t stare.

And saying things I don’t believe a vicar ought to say.

Ever.

He won’t be asked to cat-sit in our house again.

Anyone sorry?

No. I didn’t think so.

Byeeee!