The Kitten Hunt

by Anna Wilson

  Kaboodle yawned and flicked his tail irritably. ‘Never mind about her – I think it’s time we had a little chat about you, Bertie.’ ‘Me?’

  ‘Yes. You. I’ve been watching you very closely as I said, and I happen to think I am just the friend you’ve been looking for, though I say so myself Kaboodle purred loudly and wound himself in and out of my legs, rubbing his soft fur against me.

  I couldn’t help smiling. This mini-cat had a mega-attitude, but I couldn’t help liking him. Actually, I realized, he reminded me a bit of Jazz. I chuckled softly to myself.

  Kaboodle stopped his weaving movements and looked up sharply ‘What are you laughing at?’ he snapped.

  ‘Oh, er – I’m just a bit ticklish when you do that,’ I fibbed. I was pretty sure Kaboodle wouldn’t be chuffed at the comparison with my mouthy mate.

  Then something occurred to me. ‘Kaboodle,’ I ventured. ‘I mean, Oba-wotsit—’

  ‘Please – if you can’t say it properly, don’t say it at all,’ he snapped.

  I winced. ‘OK. Kaboodle – erm,would you like to come and stay with me while Ms P is away?’

  Kaboodle purred so loudly, he sounded like an engine. ‘I would be honoured,’ he said. ‘But how will your father feel about that, I wonder?’

  ‘Oh, we won’t tell him,’ I said vaguely, pushing aside the nagging doubts that were rushing in to crowd my mind.

  ‘Well, you can count on me to keep my head down,’ said Kaboodle, pushing against me again. ‘We cats are masters of deception, you know. Now then, how about that hug? It’s getting exceptionally chilly hanging around out here.’

  8

  Call Number Two

  Kaboodle had agreed to lie low so that Dad wouldn’t suspect anything. As it turned out I was very thankful that he was prepared to go along with my request, because Dad came home later that day in the foulest mood I had seen him in for a very long time.

  The first bad sign was the sound of the door being slammed hard enough to wrench it off its hinges and possibly take the house walls with it. Then Dad whirled into the kitchen where I had been opening a tin of tuna for Kaboodle, scowled and banged his laptop down on the kitchen table.

  A panicky sick feeling rocketed up from my stomach and swirled round my chest.

  ‘Multi-storey blinking car parks!’ Dad barked. ‘I’ve had it up to here with people who get their pathetic little knickers in a twist about things as deathly dull as multi-blinking-storey-blinking-car-blinking-parks!’ he muttered crossly. ‘I am a writer!’ he carried on, as if to himself. ‘I should be writing epic works of fiction or dramatic works of art to add to the nation’s canon of literary talent, not scribbling ranty little columns in that rag that calls itself a newspaper!’

  I let my breath out slowly and quietly and tiptoed over to put the kettle on. ‘A cup of tea always wo rks wonders,’ as Jazz’s mum would say .

  Dad sighed loudly and shook his head. ‘Sorry, love,’ he said wearily, as though he’d only just noticed I was in the room. ‘Bad day. How’re you? Hey – aren’t you supposed to be at Jazz’s?’ he added, squinting at me.

  ‘Oh, I er – yeah, I was at Jazz’s,’ I began. I had my you’ve-caught-me-red-handed face on – a sort of a cross between a grin and a grimace.

  Dad raised his eyebrows and waited.

  ‘But we, er, we kind of had a falling out, so I came home a bit early,’ I said lightly. ‘I’ve only been on my own for about five minutes.’ ( Thanks to Kaboodle who’d only just gone out into the garden.)

  ‘You girls,’ said Dad, shaking his head. A smile twitched at the corners of his mouth. ‘Nothing serious, I hope?’

  ‘Nah,’ I grinned, in the hope I could coax a whole smile out of him. ‘You know what Jazz is like. Reckons she’s our school’s answer to Madonna. She was doing one of those routines again and I kind of teased her a bit about her singing, that’s all.’

  Dad laughed. ‘You can talk, Roberta Fletcher! The last time I heard you singing in the bath I thought the pipes would burst. It was more like a rusty nail being dragged across a slate roof-tile than a sweet melody of divine tunefulness.’

  ‘Huh!’ I said, pretending to be offended, but feeling myself relax at Dad’s change of mood. ‘“Sweet melody of divine tunefulness”? Call yourself a writer?’

  Dad chucked his notepad at me and I whooped and ran away from him.

  ‘Not so fast, young lady!’ he shouted, grabbing a sponge from the sink and hurling it at me.

  I snatched a J-cloth and chucked it back at him and soon we were steaming round and round the kitchen table, giggling and throwing stuff at each other. It was the best fun I’ve had with Dad for ages.

  My phone!

  I froze. What if it was Jazz, calling to have a go at me? What if it was Pinkella, calling to ask about her kitty-catkins? What if it was Kaboodle – no, surely even that kitten didn’t know how to use a phone . . .

  ‘Aren’t you going to answer it, then?’ Dad was staring at me.

  ‘Must be a wrong number,’ I muttered, but just in case, I scuttled out of the kitchen and went up to my room, answering the phone on the way.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Hello. Is that Bertie Fletcher’s Pet-Sitting Service?’ said a man’s voice.

  Help! ‘Er, yes,’ I said, trying to keep my voice low so that Dad wouldn’t be able to hear.

  ‘Oh, good. This is Mr Smythe from number two. I received one of your leaflets a few days ago.’

  ‘Oh, right. Bertie Fletcher speaking! How can I help you?’ I tried to put my businesslike tone on, but it came out a bit shaky.

  ‘Well, I almost threw the leaflet away, as I thought it was just another piece of that junk mail that seems to be flooding our neighbourhood these days –’ Great, I’m getting a lecture, I thought glumly. Next thing, he’ll be round here saying he wants to speak to Dad about how irresponsible I am and then – I realized he was still speaking, and that the tone of his voice did not seem too angry or off-putting, so I tuned back in – ‘so your leaflet came in the nick of time, actually. I’m about to go away to my daughter’s for a couple of days, you see, and I could do with your help. I’ve got two hamsters who would be very grateful if you would come and feed them and clean them out while I’m away.’

  ‘Hamsters?’ Bit of an unusual pet for a grownup, I thought. But then I realized that this was a fabulous opportunity for expanding my Pet-Sitting Service. A fter all, hamsters must be the easiest pets in the world to look after.

  ‘Hamsters, that’s right,’ said Mr Smythe.

  ‘Hurrah!’ I said happily. ‘I mean, er, that would be a pleasure, Mr Smythe,’ I added, quickly going back to my professional voice.

  ‘Lovely,’ he said. ‘Can you come round tomorrow morning? I’m leaving after lunch, you see, and I need to get Mr Nibbles and Houdini sorted out before I go.’

  ‘Mr Nibbles and—? Oh, the hamsters. I see,’ I said. And Kaboodle thought his name was pants!

  I agreed to go round at nine, said goodbye and pressed the red button on my phone.

  ‘Getting a lot of wrong numbers recently,aren’t you?’

  ‘Dad!’

  He was leaning against the door frame, his arms crossed, and he was frowning.

  ‘Is there something you’re not telling me, Bertie?’ he asked.

  ‘I, er, not really,’ I said pathetically.

  Dad walked over to me, tilted my chin and inspected me closely. ‘Are you OK?’ he asked, narrowing his eyes.

  ‘Yes,’ I lied. What with falling out with Jazz, discovering a talking kitten and trying to run an undercover Pet-Sitting Service, I was feeling just fine, obviously.

  ‘Mmm,’ he said. ‘Are you sure it wasn’t a bad fight you had with Jazz?’

  ‘Noooo,’ I said, putting on a ‘what nonsense’ expression and shaking my head vigorously.

  ‘Is it – oh no – it’s not . . . boyfriend trouble?’ he whispered, a mixture of horror and disgust crossing his face.

  ‘NOOOO!’I ye
lled. Boyfriends? Me? URGH! Had Dad even looked at me lately? I wondered. I was ELEVEN for heaven’s sake, not a hundred and eleven (which is how old I will have to be before I even THINK about having a boyfriend).

  Dad’s forehead creased and he held up both hands as if he thought I was going to hit him. ‘OK! OK! Keep your hair on!’ he said, trying to laugh in a jokey way.

  I glared at him.

  Dad sighed and let his hands drop to his sides. ‘I’m sorry, Bertie. I’m just not very good at this.’ He opened his arms and beckoned to me with one hand. ‘Come here,’ he said.

  I walked tentatively into Dad’s embrace, steeling myself for a Ta lk.

  He hugged me and talked over the top of my head at the window. ‘I mean, it’s obvious you’re upset about something.’ I cringed so majorly I thought my stomach would turn itself inside out. ‘You’re getting older, Bertie, and I know there are things that girls your age normally talk to their mums about. And believe me, there’s not a day goes by when I don’t wish with all my heart that your mum was here to talk to you. But she’s not, so you’re stuck with your old dad. Tell me – what’s up?’ he asked, pushing me gently away from him so that he could look me in the eye. ‘I don’t know why you’re being like this, and if you don’t give me any clues, how am I supposed to know how to help you?’

  You could try not working so much and letting me have my own pet for starters, I thought bitterly, shrugging Dad’s hands off my shoulders. But one look at Dad’s face was enough for me to know I’d never be able to say how I really felt. It was my turn to sigh. Heavily.

  ‘You can’t help me,’ I said finally.

  ‘Suit yourself.’ Dad tried to smile, but his mouth was too thin and his eyes weren’t really in it.

  Then the doorbell rang and, relieved by the distraction, I hared down the stairs to answer it.

  It was Jazz. And she was holding a wriggly,hissy and very unhappy cat.

  ‘Kaboodle!’ I cried.

  ‘Tell her to put me down!’ Kaboodle spat.

  ‘Look!’ cried Jazz. ‘I found him! He’s not dead!’

  ‘No, I know – I mean, oh great – yes, definitely not dead, is he?’ I babbled.

  ‘Good to see you two are on speaking terms again,’ said Dad, appearing in the hall behind me. ‘I didn’t know you had a kitten, Jazz.’

  ‘There’s a lot you don’t know, sunshine,’ Kaboodle hissed. ‘For example, this vile girl is squashing the life out of me and if she doesn’t let go this instant, she’ll be wearing my mouse-and-vole breakfast all down her disgusting skintight jeans.’

  ‘Oh, Kaboodle! You wouldn’t!’ I said.

  ‘Eh?’ said Jazz, as I gasped and clamped my hands over my mouth.

  Kaboodle at last succeeded in wriggling free of Jazz’s tight and sweaty grasp and leaped to the ground. He then started to wind around my legs. ‘Thank goodness you’re here,’ he purred. ‘Someone sensible to talk to at last.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah,’ I whispered. ‘But can you stop talking to me in front of everyone?’

  ‘I thought you girls weren’t talking,’ said Dad, scratching his head.

  ‘We weren’t,’ Jazz answered, eyeing me suspiciously.

  ‘But we are now.’ I chipped in quickly, grinning like a raving lunatic. ‘We just had a bit of an argument about this cat because I said he was lost and Jazz said he was dead and—’

  ‘Hang on a minute,’ Dad interrupted, holding up one hand like a traffic policeman. ‘I thought you said you’d been teasing Jazz about her singing?’

  Jazz glared at me. ‘You didn’t actually tell him about that?’

  I blushed. I was getting deeper and deeper into extremely scalding water. If I was not careful, I would reach boiling point and then probably evap-orate. Actually, that didn’t seem such a bad prospect at that particular moment.

  Dad raised his eyes to the ceiling and said, ‘You know what? I’m exhausted. I’ve spent all day listening to arguments and I really can’t be bothered to listen to any more. Jazz, put your cat outside and then why don’t you come in and sort it out in Bertie’s room in front of a DVD with some popcorn or something? You can take my laptop from my study to watch a film on – you know how to work it. I’m not doing any more on it today – I’m bushed. I’m going to put my feet up and watch some telly down here.’

  Jazz perked up at the mention of popcorn and DV Ds, but I suddenly remembered I had to talk to her about Mr Smythe and said, ‘NO!’

  ‘What now?’ said Dad wearily.

  ‘Erm – the kitten. We have to take the kitten back to where he comes from – and you don’t like animals in the house, do you, Dad?’

  Jazz was mouthing ‘What are you on about?’ at me, and Kaboodle was whining, ‘Can’t we go with the popcorn and DVD option? Your dad’s not the only one who’s tired, you know. It’s been quite a day.’

  I ignored Kaboodle and mouthed back at Jazz, ‘Pet-sitting!’

  Meanwhile Dad let out an exasperated puff of air and said, ‘I don’t know what you two are up to, but just let me know when you’ve decided what you’re doing. I’ll be in front of the telly.’

  At least he didn’t kick off about Kaboodle being there.

  Jazz waited until Dad was out of earshot and then said, ‘What is “peck city” when it’s at home?’

  ‘Eh? Oh – not “peck city”! Pet-sitting!’ I said.

  A fit of giggles took me by surprise It was quite a relief to just let the giggles take over and not have to think of what to say for a minute.

  Luckily Jazz seemed to be infected by my out-of-control laughter fit and had stopped glaring and scowling at me, and soon the two of us were squeaking and holding our sides and trying to get our breath back.

  ‘Stop! I’m going to die!’Jazz squealed.

  Kaboodle sat on the doorstep, glowering at the two of us, looking very much unamused. ‘When you two have quite finished,’ he said sourly, ‘perhaps you’d be good enough to show me to my room, Bertie?’

  Dad was deep into some mindnumbing programme about DIY by then, so it was easy to smuggle Kaboodle upstairs. Jazz stayed for the DVD, but we didn’t watch much of it. We spent the whole time planning the next level of our pet-sitting empire. Kaboodle quickly bored of our excitable conversation and crept out of my bedroom window, telling me over his shoulder, ‘I’m going to see some friends of mine. Don’t wait up.’

  Once Jazz had gone home, Kaboodle slept on my bed that night. Dad didn’t find out, because Kaboodle hid until Dad had come to say goodnight, and then leaped softly and silently on to my duvet and curled up beside me on the wall side of the bed.

  ‘What if he comes in while I’m sleeping and sees you here?’ I whispered.

  ‘Oh ye of little faith,’ Kaboodle sighed. ‘I keep telling you, we felines are the masters of deception. I’m mostly black – I can merge into the shadows as easily as ice melting on a hot day, my dear. And besides, humans only ever see what they expect to

  ‘I don’t understand,’ I hissed.

  ‘Your dad isn’t expecting there to be a cat in your room. He thinks I belong to Jazz, remember? So he won’t see me,’ Kaboodle explained impatiently. ‘Now let me get some sleep, can’t you? It’s been an exhausting day.’

  I sighed and wriggled down to get comfy. ‘Just one more thing,’ I said. ‘Why do you want to stay here?Wouldn’t you prefer to be in your own house on one of those fluffy cushions?’

  Kaboodle raised his head and those spooky big eyes flashed orange in the darkness. ‘Can’t a cat have a bit of company once in a while without being grilled under a spotlight about his motivations?’ he snapped. ‘Now, goodnight.’

  9

  Mr Nibbles and Houdini

  When I woke up, I realized that Kaboodle had disappeared from my bed at some point in the night. A twingey feeling of disappointment settled in my tummy as I rubbed my eyes and realized blurrily that he wasn’t there Oh no! What if he’d crept into Dad’s room?

  I scuttled out of bed at top speed a
nd tiptoed along the landing. Dad always left his bedroom door ajar in case I had nightmares. I kept telling him I was not a baby any more, but Dad still worried about me just as if I was still a little girl. I shook my head to get rid of the confusion welling up inside me I was not a little girl and if Dad was so worried, he should wake up and smell the bacon and not leave me alone so much.

  I peered into his room.

  Phew! No sign of Kaboodle. And Dad was still snoring. I crept back to my room to get dressed and realized the window was still open. Hopefully Kaboodle had simply headed out to do some prowling, or whatever it was cats did. I couldn’t help feeling a bit worried for him though – after all, he wasn’t fully grown yet, and I was responsible for him. What on earth would I say to Pinkella if something happened to him? She was obviously still upset about losing her old cat . . . and to be honest, I’d be pretty upset too. I ’d already got used to the idea of having Kaboodle around the place.

  I pushed those horrible thoughts out of my mind and glanced at my bedside clock. Eight o’clock. Jazz had said she’d come with me at nine to go and meet Mr Smythe’s hamsters. I’d have no problem being allowed out – it was Sunday which meant Dad would want to have a lie-in and then read the paper, a ll of which I knew was code for ‘I want to be alone.’

  Although you’d have thought he would have had enough of newspapers for one week.

  ‘So. Hamsters,’ said Jazz. ‘They’re not exactly any hassle, are they? Sam and Aleisha used to have hamsters before I was born. Leesh says all they do is eat and sleep and make huge nests from bits of chewed-up paper.’

  I started. ‘You didn’t tell Aleisha about this, did you?’

  Jazz widened her eyes and batted those extra-long eyelashes. ‘As if !’

  I shook my head at her and said, ‘You’d better not have, that’s all. Anyway, I don’t s’pose Mr S’s hamsters will be that much hassle. But we’ll probably have to clean them out and stuff.’

  ‘At least they won’t run off like Kaboodle, leaving you to fly into a frenzy,’ Jazz said airily, reaching up to ring Mr Smythe’s doorbell.