A Christmas Cracker: The only festive romance to curl up with this Christmas!. Trisha Ashley
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glad to see you, in his way,’ she conceded.
‘Come on, Pye, let’s spring you,’ I said, carrying him out into the corridor. ‘This is the day we both get out of prison!’
‘But I’m afraid that’s impossible,’ the girl said. ‘Since he was signed over to us for rehoming, he’ll have to stay here while we go through that process – you know, inspect your house and suitability as an owner and—’
‘Don’t be daft,’ I said shortly. ‘I lost my home and fiancé when I went to prison and I’ve only just got out.’
She flinched. ‘But we have to make sure they go to suitable homes.’
‘Look, the cat is mine, he’s microchipped in my name and was given away illegally and without my permission. And anyway, if you think you can detach him from me, go ahead and try!’
She accepted defeat.
‘I suppose in the circumstances … though we’ll have to go and do some paperwork and I’ll need an address.’
‘I have a job with living accommodation, so he’ll be fine,’ I assured her, though not in the least certain how Mercy Marwood felt about cats, especially cats like Pye.
But I filled in the form with my new address and had to pay her some money before she would sign him over to me. My cash was fast running out, but I also purchased a cardboard pet carrier into which, with extreme difficulty, I inserted Pye.
It was now four o’clock and I needed to be at Mote Farm by five, to be tagged, and while it was only about twenty miles away, I suspected it would be a long and convoluted journey by train and bus – and Pye was already working on shredding the box. I counted what was left of my money and then got the receptionist to call me a taxi.
Due to the miracles of satnav I was dropped off at dusk, at the bottom of a narrow tarmac road which apparently led to Mote Farm, my destination.
Paying the taxi took every last penny I had and then I trudged wearily off up the road, trundling my laden suitcase and weighed down by the cat carrier. The hills enclosing the narrow valley cast a dark shadow over it, but the lights were lit behind the curtains of the short terrace of workers’ cottages that Mercy told me about.
The shape of the mill loomed up, closed and silent, and I turned to cross a stone bridge towards the drive that led up to the distant house, the cat seeming to get heavier with every step.
I had to keep stopping to rest, and Pye was getting crosser and crosser. But at last I trudged over another stone bridge that spanned a narrow moat, mocked by the quacking of ducks beneath. The house stretched out on either side of the porch with the glimmer of light showing the edges of inner wooden shutters.
I put Pye down again and pulled at a ring in the huge ancient door that pealed a distant bell. It swung open so quickly that Mercy Marwood must have been standing right behind it.
‘My dear, there you are!’ she cried, as if she’d been expecting my arrival at that exact moment. ‘Come in, come in. Welcome to Mote Farm.’
I stepped into a long, paved entrance hall lined with flickering electric candles in old iron brackets and immediately put down the cat box and luggage again. I swear my arms had stretched at least six inches during the walk up the hill.
The pet carrier began to move about, growling, like a strange, rectangular and very vocal giant jumping bean and Mercy looked down at it with surprise.
‘Now, what’s this?’ she said.
‘I’m afraid I had to bring my cat,’ I began to explain nervously.
‘Of course you did!’ she agreed. ‘Come into the drawing room and we’ll let the poor creature out – he really doesn’t like being in there, does he?’
‘To be honest, he doesn’t like most things,’ I warned her.
‘He and my brother, Silas, are clearly destined to be soulmates, then,’ she said with a giggle, hoisting the cat carrier with amazing ease. ‘Come on, let’s introduce them!’
Q: What do you call a cat that falls down a chimney?
A: Santa Claws!
I followed my new employer into a large, flagged inner hallway, from which a wide staircase ascended into darkness. We went through a door to the left into a huge and rather splendid room, wood-panelled to dado height and with an intricately moulded ceiling.
For all Mercy’s assurances that Mote Farm was not a grand house, it seemed pretty impressive to me. An immense, dimly hued carpet covered most of the floor, and old sofas, chairs and tables were randomly grouped around, like early guests at a party.
There was a larger cluster around the flickering fire, which as I drew nearer proved to be a realistic gas log one. The room resembled a surreal filmset and I began to feel somewhat swimmy-headed with tiredness and the stress and emotions of the day.
‘Now, Silas,’ Mercy said loudly, advancing on a small elderly man who was peacefully dozing in a high-backed chair before the fire. ‘Here’s Tabitha come to join us.’
He started awake and bestowed a look of acute loathing on both his sister and myself, before struggling painfully to his feet.
‘Please don’t get up!’ I begged him, but he ignored me, tottering forward to shake my hand, using only his sandpaper-dry fingertips.
‘One must do these things, however agonising it is. Rheumatism is a dreadful thing and bouts of sciatica even worse,’ he said, in a martyred way that seemed to cheer him up. Then, relieved from the burden of good manners, he subsided back into his chair.
‘Mercy says you’ve come to help with the cracker factory at the mill. It was too much for me. I’m a sad invalid, you know.’
‘You’re a sad, grumpy old malingerer,’ Mercy said. ‘You just couldn’t be bothered, I know.’
He glowered at her. Then his eye fell on the jumping and increasingly shredded cardboard pet carrier. Pye had been quiet for some minutes, but now emitted a bloodcurdling scream.
‘Tabitha’s brought her sweet little pussycat with her,’ Mercy told him. ‘I was going to get a cat now I was home again, so that has saved me the trouble. I think he’d like to get out, Tabby.’
‘I’m afraid he’s very far from being a sweet little pussycat,’ I began to warn her, but before I could leap forward and stop her, she’d popped open the carrier and out shot Pyewacket, all snarl and claws.
His first view of the strange, vast room stopped him dead in his tracks, his odd-coloured eyes wide. If he’d been able to raise his eyebrows, he’d have done it.
He sat down, in order to take it all in and better consider his options, his tail lashing from side to side like a slow metronome.
‘Pye,’ I warned him, ‘behave yourself!’
‘Mmmrow!’ he said crossly, expressing his indignation that first I’d abandoned him for weeks on end, then closed him up in a box for a couple of hours. He decided to show me how far from favour I’d fallen by getting up and advancing in a friendly way on Mercy, who made much of him. Then he turned his attention to Silas, even going so far as to jump on his lap and sit looking triumphantly at me.
‘This place is more like it!’ he seemed to be saying.
‘He must know that Silas and I are fond of cats,’ Mercy said. ‘What a clever, handsome creature he is!’
‘Speak for yourself. Unless they catch mice, I’ve no use for the creatures,’ Silas snapped, though his thin hand, knobbed with rheumatic joints, was slowly