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Authors: Doreen Tovey
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cut him out. If he did, I shouted back, he'd kill him. You couldn't get a bee's whisker between Solomon's neck and the basket, let alone a penknife. Look!
  I put out my hand to show him how firmly Solomon was stuck â and Solomon immediately bit my finger to the bone. If he had enough strength to do that, I thought, he had enough strength to stand what I was going to do now. Without more ado I put my hand flat against his face, shut my eyes and pushed. There was a sort of sucking noise and then, with just enough time to bite another finger for luck, Solomon's head plopped back to safety like a cork from a bottle.
  On we went. Dante's Inferno on wheels. The hole in the basket plugged with a scarf, me with my hand wrapped in a towel and Sugieh, the cause of it all, still going round and round the car like a spinning top. At Glastonbury we found a basket shop, bought the biggest hamper they had and shut her in it. Now at least she couldn't race round the car. Instead she expended her energy in screaming louder than ever.
  We hardly expected to reach Halstock alive ourselves. We were even more astounded when we reached the kennels and unlocked the baskets. Out, from one, stepped Sugieh, sleek and composed as you like, to greet the Francis's with a gracious bellow. And out, from the other, tumbled four lively kittens fit and fresh as daisies, led by Solomon whom we had expected to find at least a hospital case.
  We left them going up and down the wire of their run like caterpillars. We arranged, however, to ring the cattery later that night to see how they were. Charles said they might be suffering from delayed shock. When I heard him talking to Mrs Francis on the 'phone after dinner, and he gave a suppressed groan, I thought he was right. When he put down the receiver, however, he assured me that everything was quite normal. It was just that Sugieh had spotted Rikki and was busily shouting greetings at him the entire length of the cattery while the kittens â as Charles said, grimly, they would let us down â liked their nice, clean, sparkling earth-box so much they had gone to sleep in it.
EIGHT
Downfall of a Church Organ
C ats, said Father Adams, leaning dejectedly on our front gate with his hat tilted over his eyes, was the very devil. From which remark we gathered that, despite all his efforts, Mimi was once more in season.
  Three times now she and Ajax had honeymooned uproariously in the attic, and three times Father Adams, praying piously for the patter of tiny paws, had been disappointed. Not only had Mimi failed to outdo the strawberry patch, now the strawberry patch wasn't any good either. A couple of Mimi's earlier suitors had staged a prize fight in it one night to console themselves and trampled all the flowers.
  Father Adams said it had him licked. He wouldn't listen to Mrs Adams's theory that it all arose from Ajax already having a wife and steadfastly refusing â as all good husbands should â to look at another cat. He said she was a silly old fool. Not about Ajax having a wife. All Dr Tucker's patients knew Ajax's wife. She was a slender doe-eyed creature called Andromache who had two claims to fame. Firstly that she had bitten the grocer's boy, which was something a good many housewives who had suffered from his cheek would like to have done themselves. And secondly that she was so fond of Ajax that even when she had kittens, which is a time when most queens will attack a tom on sight, she would let him get into the basket with them.
  Father Adams knew that was right. He had seen it for himself. Hefty, battle-scarred Ajax tenderly washing the ears of his latest batch of offspring while Andromache sunbathed on the porch. Father Adams's comment on that was that he was an adjectival fool. Catch him putting a flannel to any of his kids' faces while his missus sat round sunning her fat rump.
  What Father Adams refused to believe
  I put out my hand to show him how firmly Solomon was stuck â and Solomon immediately bit my finger to the bone. If he had enough strength to do that, I thought, he had enough strength to stand what I was going to do now. Without more ado I put my hand flat against his face, shut my eyes and pushed. There was a sort of sucking noise and then, with just enough time to bite another finger for luck, Solomon's head plopped back to safety like a cork from a bottle.
  On we went. Dante's Inferno on wheels. The hole in the basket plugged with a scarf, me with my hand wrapped in a towel and Sugieh, the cause of it all, still going round and round the car like a spinning top. At Glastonbury we found a basket shop, bought the biggest hamper they had and shut her in it. Now at least she couldn't race round the car. Instead she expended her energy in screaming louder than ever.
  We hardly expected to reach Halstock alive ourselves. We were even more astounded when we reached the kennels and unlocked the baskets. Out, from one, stepped Sugieh, sleek and composed as you like, to greet the Francis's with a gracious bellow. And out, from the other, tumbled four lively kittens fit and fresh as daisies, led by Solomon whom we had expected to find at least a hospital case.
  We left them going up and down the wire of their run like caterpillars. We arranged, however, to ring the cattery later that night to see how they were. Charles said they might be suffering from delayed shock. When I heard him talking to Mrs Francis on the 'phone after dinner, and he gave a suppressed groan, I thought he was right. When he put down the receiver, however, he assured me that everything was quite normal. It was just that Sugieh had spotted Rikki and was busily shouting greetings at him the entire length of the cattery while the kittens â as Charles said, grimly, they would let us down â liked their nice, clean, sparkling earth-box so much they had gone to sleep in it.
EIGHT
Downfall of a Church Organ
C ats, said Father Adams, leaning dejectedly on our front gate with his hat tilted over his eyes, was the very devil. From which remark we gathered that, despite all his efforts, Mimi was once more in season.
  Three times now she and Ajax had honeymooned uproariously in the attic, and three times Father Adams, praying piously for the patter of tiny paws, had been disappointed. Not only had Mimi failed to outdo the strawberry patch, now the strawberry patch wasn't any good either. A couple of Mimi's earlier suitors had staged a prize fight in it one night to console themselves and trampled all the flowers.
  Father Adams said it had him licked. He wouldn't listen to Mrs Adams's theory that it all arose from Ajax already having a wife and steadfastly refusing â as all good husbands should â to look at another cat. He said she was a silly old fool. Not about Ajax having a wife. All Dr Tucker's patients knew Ajax's wife. She was a slender doe-eyed creature called Andromache who had two claims to fame. Firstly that she had bitten the grocer's boy, which was something a good many housewives who had suffered from his cheek would like to have done themselves. And secondly that she was so fond of Ajax that even when she had kittens, which is a time when most queens will attack a tom on sight, she would let him get into the basket with them.
  Father Adams knew that was right. He had seen it for himself. Hefty, battle-scarred Ajax tenderly washing the ears of his latest batch of offspring while Andromache sunbathed on the porch. Father Adams's comment on that was that he was an adjectival fool. Catch him putting a flannel to any of his kids' faces while his missus sat round sunning her fat rump.
  What Father Adams refused to believe
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