SOLOMON’S
Tale
SHEILA JEFFRIES

To Andrea, Annette, Val, Jackie and Pauline

CONTENTS

Cover

Title Page

Dedication

Chapter One: Finding Ellen

Chapter Two: Another Cat Got There First

Chapter Three: The Bailiff

Chapter Four: Leaving Home

Chapter Five: That Dog

Chapter Six: Going to the Vet

Chapter Seven: ‘You Cheeky Cat’

Chapter Eight: The Marmite Sandwich

Chapter Nine: Abandoned

Chapter Ten: The Diary of a Desperate Cat

Chapter Eleven: If Cats Could Cry

Chapter Twelve: The Diary of a Star Cat

A Note on Tuxedo Cats

The Real Life Solomon

The Orphaned Kittens

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Copyright

About the Publisher

FINDING ELLEN

I sat down in the middle of the road to think about why I had left home on that summer morning.

I was only a black kitten, eight weeks old, but I had a tough decision to make. Should I stay in my comfortable home and live a boring predictable life, or should I set out on a long journey to find the person I loved best in the whole world? Her name was Ellen, and I had been Ellen’s cat in another lifetime, when she was a child. She’d called me Solomon and I was her best friend. I wanted to find her again.

Suddenly a lorry was coming towards me. The road underneath my paws started to tremble. I could feel it vibrating along my tail and tickling the fluff inside my ears.

It loomed closer. Two glaring eyes, a forehead made of glass, and a name emblazoned across its chin. SCANIA. It had massive wheels and was roaring like fifty lions.

Hypnotised, I stared into its eyes, thinking that if I acted like an assertive tiger, the lorry would stop and let me finish washing my paws.

My angel didn’t usually shout at me, but she did now.

‘Run Solomon. RUN!’

I took off so fast that I left skid marks in the gravel. As I sailed into the hedge, the lorry thundered past in a gale of gritty air. Hissing, it pulled over, stopped, and was finally silent. A man climbed out and disappeared into a nearby building.

Being a very nosy kitten, I crept out to inspect the giant lorry while it was quiet. I sat in the road and looked at it. The sky darkened and icy hailstones came pinging down into my fur. Underneath the lorry was a good place to shelter. The wheels were hot and I sat close to one, watching the hailstones bouncing on the tarmac. I’d been outside for a long time and I needed to sleep.

I crawled into a hole at the front of the lorry. Inside, it was toasty warm. The stink of oil, the heat, and the chorus of hailstones made me drowsy. I curled up on a little shelf close to the engine, wrapped my tail around the tip of my nose, and fell asleep.

Hours later, I was jolted awake by an ear-splitting clatter. Every bone in my body was being banged up and down as the engine hammered into life. Terrified, I scrabbled to get out but saw only a chink of speeding wet road. I climbed higher, onto an oily ledge, my white-tipped paws ruined and stinking. Through a crack in the metal was a view of fields and bridges racing past.

I clung there, trying to communicate with my angel. But all she said was, ‘your journey has begun, Solomon’.

I understood.

And I remembered how, before I was even born, I had agreed to make the perilous journey to find Ellen.

It all began when I was a shining cat, living in the spirit world between lifetimes.

In the spirit world we cats are shining cats, and we live in a way that is impossible on earth. We are invisible to human eyes. There is no meowing or yowling, but we do purr, and we communicate by telepathy. Lots of other creatures live there, shining dogs and shining horses, even shining guinea pigs. There are shining people too. No one argues. There is no pollution, no illness, and no war.

Ellen’s mum had died when Ellen was young, and now she lived in the spirit world with me. She knew how much Ellen missed her and it was her idea to send me.

‘I’d like to send Ellen a cat,’ she said, ‘a special cat to love and support her. She’s going to need it with that husband of hers.’

My response was immediate.

‘I’ll go.’

Ellen’s mum took me onto her lap, where I did lots of purring, and together we sent the idea out into the light. Then we waited until an angel appeared.

Thousands of angels live in the spirit world, and they are all different. Some of them are immense and glittering warriors of light. Others change colour like holograms. My favourite ones are the comfort angels who are more like people, and their robes are soft and swishy. They shine so brightly that their faces are almost invisible.

The angel who came to us introduced herself as the Angel of the Silver Stars. I’d never seen her before, but as soon as her twinkling robe billowed around me I felt special.

‘I’ll be your angel for this lifetime, Solomon,’ she said. ‘It will be a tough assignment, but I will be there to advise you about the choices you make. Of course you will make mistakes, but that is part of your learning, and I will still be there for you. My light is so bright that I become almost invisible on earth, but if you remember to look at sparkles whenever you can, you will see me, especially if you study the sunlight glittering on water.’

‘I’ll remember,’ I said, and hoped that I would.

‘There will be times when you are upset or lost or hungry,’ said my angel as she covered me in stardust. ‘That’s when you might forget me, but I’ll be there, and from time to time other angels will come to help the humans in your life. But don’t expect it to be easy.’

It didn’t sound difficult to me, since I already loved Ellen. My mind was buzzing with excitement at the prospect of going to earth again. There would be tins of Kitekat, and cosy fires, and all those mice. I couldn’t wait.

‘You’ll have to be born as a kitten in the usual way,’ said the Angel of the Silver Stars. ‘I’ll help you, but you must help yourself too. It’s not just about Ellen. You’ve still got stuff to learn.’

‘I’d like to be a majestic tomcat,’ I said, ‘with a really powerful purr. Black and glossy, with white paws and a white chest. And please will you send me to the right address? Last time it involved being dumped at the RSPCA before Ellen found me.’

‘This time you will have to find her,’ said the angel. ‘You must learn to use your psi sense.’

‘Psi sense?’ I asked.

‘Humans call it Sat Nav,’ said the angel with a smile. ‘Are you sure you want to go, Solomon?’

Nostalgically I gazed around at my beautiful home in the spirit world. I loved being a shining cat. Here, you could just be. No one would chuck you out in the rain, or cover you in flea powder.

Then I remembered Ellen’s house, with its sunny windows. My favourite cushion was there, made of amber velvet. And the stairs were my best ever playground. Ellen had a cosy kitchen and a cherry tree in the garden.

I’d been Ellen’s cat when she was a child, and she’d loved me more than anyone else in her life. She wouldn’t go to sleep unless I was there, purring on her bed, and when her mum had turned out the light and gone downstairs, Ellen would turn it on again and play with me. When we were tired, Ellen showed me her secret diary, and read it to me. She had a lovely musical voice, and I was the only one who heard it because Ellen wouldn’t talk to people very much. She wouldn’t do her homework or tidy her bedroom. All she wanted to do was dance, and play the piano.

The best memory I had of Ellen was the way she shared her musical gifts with me. Early in the morning she sat down at the piano, on the velvet stool, and she was so small that her feet didn’t reach the floor.

‘Come on, Solomon,’ she’d say, and smile as I jumped up to lie on top of the shiny piano. I liked to be there and see the light in her eyes as she played, and watch her come to life. She played on and on, with her tiny hands dancing over the keys, her blonde hair bouncing. The music gave me a buzz, up my spine and along my whiskers. At those times there were always angels shimmering around us.

Her mum would come in with Ellen’s school bag and coat over her arm. ‘It’s time for school.’

‘I don’t want to go there, Mummy.’

‘You’re going.’

‘But I want to finish playing this tune, Mummy. I made it up and Solomon loves it.’

‘Ellen, it’s TIME FOR SCHOOL.’

I had to watch helplessly as the light drained away from Ellen. Her small face tightened, her skin paled and her eyes clouded as she closed the lid of the piano.

‘Listen to me, Solomon,’ my angel said, and I focused on her again.

‘Ellen is grown up now. She’s not the child you remember.’

‘So what’s the problem?’ I asked.

‘I must warn you that Ellen is in such a state that she may not be able to look after you properly,’ said my angel. ‘She has a little boy who is just toddling, and a husband who shouts at her, and they are in desperate trouble.’

‘I want to go,’ I said firmly.

My angel hesitated, as if she wanted to tell me something else.

‘And,’ she whispered, ‘there’s Jessica.’

‘Jessica?’

My angel was silent. She looked at me lovingly with her silver eyes.

‘I’m sure Solomon will be fine,’ said Ellen’s mum. ‘He’s a healing cat. And he’s brave and cheeky too. He’ll be OK.’

When the time came for me to be born, I watched my angel dissolve into a kaleidoscope of sparks. The silver stars turned hazy, and suddenly I was whizzing through space. The light crackled like fire, and I burst through the great golden web which separates the spirit world from the earth. It was a brilliant ride.

Then everything changed.

I was no longer a shining spirit cat. I had to be compacted to fit inside this tiny sausage of a kitten, which had just been born. All I could do was wriggle and squeak. My eyes wouldn’t open. My legs wouldn’t walk. I couldn’t see what colour my fur was. It was devastating. Why did I agree to do this? I wasn’t a proper cat. I was a sausage.

But I wasn’t alone. Four of us lay there in a purring heap, all silky and rhythmic. The power of the mother cat enveloped my whole being as she licked and suckled me.

Nine days later, my eyes opened to see the edge of a basket close to a warm stove. I saw my paws and they were glossy black with white toes, just as I’d requested. Big feet were walking around, two in slippers and two in boots, and hands kept coming down to gently stroke our tiny heads. It wasn’t Ellen, but I kept faith that she would come and choose me.

My early kittenhood was happy. Right from the start I was picked up and held tenderly against massive chests, with hearts beating so slowly I thought those humans would die between beats.

‘He’ll be the last to go, that little black one with the white paws. They always choose the pretty ones first.’

‘Yes well he’s the runt of the litter. He’s so small.’

The runt of the litter! Me?! That couldn’t be true.

Soon we had turned into proper little cats, bouncing like tennis balls, climbing up curtains and under chair covers, with the humans laughing at us. But I was impatient to grow up and get to Ellen.

‘He’s got a wistful look, that little black one.’

Looking out of the window was my obsession, waiting for Ellen to come down the road. People began to arrive to choose kittens, and each time my whiskers stiffened to attention.

‘Hide!’ said my angel sharply one afternoon. It was the first time she had spoken to me since my birth, so my reaction was fast. Through a hole in the fabric, I shot into the dusty innards of the armchair to listen to the latest arrivals.

‘I would have loved a black one.’

It wasn’t Ellen’s voice.

‘We have got a black one somewhere.’

‘Try under the chair.’

They slid the chair back, with me clinging well concealed inside, but they didn’t find me.

Finally the visitors took both the remaining kittens, and when I emerged there was no one to play with. I was eight weeks old, and about to grow up in a hurry.

Ellen didn’t come. Days and weeks went by and still there was no sign of her.

I stopped eating. Food was of no interest to a cat with a mission. The window was the only place to be, watching for Ellen.

‘He’s sick.’

‘Take him to the vet.’

They did, and that was my first experience of the cat basket, a terrible cage that squeaks and bounces you up and down. Being a wise cat, I sat quietly, thinking how pointless it would be to waste my energy trying to escape.

The vet held me firmly by the scruff while he ran his thumbs over my body. He squeezed my paws and all along my tail. Then he forced my mouth open to look inside. I noticed his fingers smelled like the kitchen floor. He put me down on a cold table and said something very insulting to a proud young cat like me.

‘Of course he’s the runt of the litter.’

‘But he’s very loving. He’s got a really special personality. If no one chooses him, we’re going to keep him.’

My mum cat bullied me into eating, but still I pined for Ellen. Exploring the garden and seeking out high places to sit and watch for her became my favourite pastime.

Seeing my angel was more difficult now that I was in a body. To see my angel on earth I had to concentrate on ignoring everything else, but even then it was disappointing to see her so mistily.

‘It’s no good just waiting, Solomon,’ she said. ‘Use your psi sense.’

Midsummer morning was overcast and dark. I closed my eyes and used what the angel had called my psi sense. Immediately Ellen’s location was obvious. She was due south of here, and it was surprisingly easy for me to sense the direction. The distance came more slowly, chilling me with the realisation that Ellen’s house was hundreds of miles away. I looked at my delicate white-tipped paws and twitched my long whiskers. A hundred-mile journey was some challenge for the runt of the litter. That description stirred up enough anger to fire me into action. Without a backward glance I trotted down the road, to the south.

And that is how I ended up inside the engine of a lorry.

I had nothing to eat for hours and hours. Too scared to sleep, I used every thread of strength to stay on the vibrating shelf. The alternative was to fall onto the speeding tarmac, or to be mangled by the engine. The fumes and noise gave me a terrible headache. My skull felt like an eggshell. I was cold and starving.

The hissing wheels sent filthy spray splattering in and soon I was wet through and spiky-looking. Ellen would not want me, I thought in despair. I was hardly cuddly and appealing.

It was dark when I felt the lorry slowing down. Exhausted, I now lay stretched out limply, at the mercy of every bump in the road, and when at last the lorry stopped, I just lay there, drinking in the silence and stillness. I hurt all over.

I dragged myself out. My legs were wobbly, and it was still raining. The lorry had parked outside a supermarket, but there were houses nearby. I sniffed the air. I could smell the delicious scent of a cake baking. Using my senses, I knew this was coming from Ellen’s kitchen.

Trotting from one garden to the next, I made my way along the road until I came to an iron gate set deep in a thick hedge. I could smell the sparrows who were snuggled up in there, lucky things. They were asleep while I was wide awake, covered in oil, shivering and homeless. Now the rain was pelting down, covering the road in puddles. My little paws were drenched and freezing cold. Flashes of lightning and echoing booms of thunder frightened me as I cowered under the hedge. There was no way through, so I squeezed under the gate. Despite the rain I knew I must go out into the middle of the lawn to attract Ellen’s attention, and came face to face with the four staring windows and big brown door of a house.

‘You have to meow as loud as you can. Now,’ said my angel.

So I did. Feeling small and dirty and spiky, I let rip with the meows. I wouldn’t have believed an exhausted kitten could make such a noise. My voice echoed all over the housing estate, and soon a window opened above me, and a face looked down. It was her. My beloved Ellen.

‘What on earth is going on?’ Ellen leaned out and saw me. Terribly ashamed of my appearance, I stuck my tail up, which is a cat’s way of smiling.

‘Oh look, there’s a tiny kitten! I’m going down.’

Ellen picked me up and cuddled me against her heart, I could feel its soothing rhythm through my fur, and she could evidently feel mine for she said, ‘Your little heart is racing! Where have you come from?’

I turned my pea-green eyes to gaze into hers. They were smoky blue in the summer darkness. Ellen still had long hair the colour of barley, just like I remembered. I patted it with my paw, intrigued to find it had become crinkly and fuzzed out around her head. Love glowed in her eyes, but her cheeks were thinner, and her hands felt different as she stroked me. They were tense and quick, less inclined to linger, and the healing light which used to shine around them was clouded. She seemed stressed, as if she had no time to use her healing gift. I knew that a storm was gathering, a storm right inside of Ellen. She was in trouble. And I was there to help.

From now on, it was my job to protect Ellen and to stay by her side through thick and thin. This was my first chance to try and ease her pain and so, with exquisite slowness, I turned my head sideways to touch noses.

‘Oh you little darling!’

That was the moment of bonding. As the clock struck midnight the rain began to fall in long needles of silver. Many times after that night I heard Ellen tell people how she had found me on midsummer night in a thunderstorm.

‘What a scruffy little object!’

A man stood there, emanating resentment, and outside that was a hard cocoon of humour. He didn’t fool me.

‘You must bond with Joe too,’ said the angel.

I hesitated, feeling afraid of the huge pink nose on Joe’s face. What if it sneezed? But I managed another nose touch and eye gaze. He did like cats, and he was stroking me gently. But I was not comfortable with those gingery eyes. They were too bright. Bright but not smiling.

‘He’s covered in black stuff!’

Ellen put me down quickly and there were smears of oil from the lorry over her pale blue T-shirt. I paraded into the kitchen leaving little dark paw marks, my tail up straight with a kink at the top.

‘What a skinny little tail,’ said Joe.

‘He’s in such a mess, poor little thing.’ Ellen was nearly crying as she realised the state I was in. ‘Let him eat something first. Then I’ll give him a warm bath and dry him off.’

Joe groaned.

‘Here we go again,’ he said. ‘I suppose you’ll be up half the night pampering him. I’m going to grab another beer and head back to bed.’

He opened the fridge and took out a black and gold can. I meowed, thinking it was going to be milk for me. Then he said something alarming.

‘Don’t let Jessica see him. She’ll have him for breakfast.’

Who, I wondered, was Jessica? A dog? A cross neighbour? Another cat?

A cold feeling of betrayal washed over me. In the kitchen was a dish with ‘PUSSY’ on it and some half-eaten food. I collapsed on the floor, my heart pitter-pattering against the blue and white tiles. My bones ached and my wet fur felt heavy. The burning taste of oil was on my tongue. I felt like giving up.

After coming all that way, Ellen already had a cat.

Another cat had got there first!

ANOTHER CAT GOT THERE FIRST

After a horrible bath, a long drink of milk and a good night’s sleep, I was feeling more positive. Especially when I awoke to find myself lying on the amber velvet cushion.

‘Cats always love this cushion,’ Ellen had said, putting me on it so gently after she had dried me with a fluffy towel. ‘It belonged to my mum. You go to sleep little cat, and in the morning we’ll find out who you belong to.’

But first, there was Jessica.

Jessica was the naughtiest cat I’d ever met. She was black and white, silky and cute with pink pads which she enjoyed flaunting, making out she was washing them. But when I saw her challenging buttercup eyes, I fell in love with her instantly. I felt intimidated by her, and a bit jealous; I could sense that she was tough and powerful, but she was gorgeous too, and I wanted her to be my friend. I could see that behind Jessica’s confident exterior was a charming little cat who wanted to be loved. Already my mind was planning how to befriend her. I wanted to curl up with her in her basket, and feel her sleek warm body against mine. But I was still a kitten, and right now I longed to be allowed to play with her. Being bossed around by Jessica would be hard, but give me six months and I’d be the boss, and, hopefully, her lover.

‘You wretched cat. GET OUT!’

What a shock. Could that really be Ellen’s sweet soft voice shrieking like that? At me? Kittens can move even faster than cats, and I shot straight under the piano, despite being mid-yawn.

I stayed under the piano and watched the commotion as Ellen evicted Jessica and cleaned up the mess she had made in bringing a dead bird through the cat flap. This was the first of many such episodes. Jessica was outrageous. She tore up carpets, shredded furniture, and bolted her food, especially if she’d stolen it. And if she was shut outside she would rap imperiously on the window, and glare with square eyes until she was let in. Worst of all, she scratched Ellen’s young son John and made him cry, and the crying started Ellen worrying. Then Ellen’s worrying sent Joe into a temper.

On that first morning I felt clean and optimistic. This was my old home where I’d shared Ellen’s childhood. My desire to see the stairs was overwhelming and I longed for Ellen to open the door into the hall. Persuading humans to open doors is achieved by sitting elegantly close to the door with your chin tilted up. Keep gazing at the handle and eventually they will get the message. It’s telepathy at its most basic.

‘He wants to explore.’

Joe opened the door for me. He obviously liked cats.

Walking into the hall was breathtaking. I remembered the fun we’d had in this lovely house. Those incredible stairs were still there, and they were perfect. To a kitten born in a bungalow, stairs were the ultimate in dry cat gymnasiums and power perches. The best spot was the post halfway up where the stairs turned left. From here you could see out of the landing window, sunbathe, and get attention from whoever came up or down. The scent told me that Jessica had already claimed it, and I soon discovered how cheekily she sat there, reaching out a draconian paw to swipe anyone who failed to acknowledge her as they passed by.

Jessica didn’t want to share the stairs with me at first, but she couldn’t resist showing off, streaking upstairs like a rocket. There she liked to lie in wait for me with her chin on the carpet and do a star-shaped pounce at me which was scary. The adrenalin was addictive. As I settled into my new home, Jessica and I would spend wild evenings pelting up and down stairs with flat ears and loopy tails, our flying paws thundering on the carpet. ‘Mummy, LOOK!’ John squealed when we started chasing each other up and down, making all three of them laugh at us, until the house was full of flying cats and giggling.

The happiness filled the walls with diamond stars and, when we finally slept, the house hummed contentedly. ‘It’s just the fridge humming,’ Jessica said, but I knew it wasn’t. Jessica was a switched-off adult cat. She had disapproving whiskers. I was young and still attuned to the spirit world. Happiness was definitely a cloud of singing stars, an energy you could generate.

As much as I loved my new home, naturally I was jealous of Jessica. Day and night my brain echoed with the thought, I am Ellen’s cat. Not you. It’s all wrong. Being an advanced cat, I tried to stay cool, but it hurt.

Seeing Jessica on Ellen’s lap was almost more than I could bear. One day, whilst Jessica was curled up on her knee, I sat on the floor and stared at Ellen, feeling jealous and lonely. Her eyes shone back at me thoughtfully, and she reached down and lifted me up onto her shoulder.

‘Are you a jealous little cat?’ she crooned. ‘There’s no need to be, darling. I love you to bits and I hope you can stay with us.’

I heard Jessica growl, but Ellen just stroked her until she was quiet again.

‘You’re very beautiful,’ whispered Ellen, looking at me. ‘And you’re like the cat I had when I was a child. Don’t you worry, you little sweetheart, I’m going to look after you, and there’s enough love for both you and Jessica.’

After that, I felt much better. I purred and buried my face in the soft glittery scarf Ellen was wearing.

My best move was making friends with John. He hated Jessica and screamed if she went near him, and he even ran away from strange cats in the street, running as fast as his little legs would carry him. Jessica had made him frightened of all cats.

So I spent a long time purring and rubbing against John as he sat playing on the floor. I never messed with his Lego or ran off with his teddy bear like Jessica did. I didn’t want to make John cry, so I approached him gently, always purring, and one day he stretched out his little hand and touched my fur. I crept close and pretended to go to sleep curled up against his legs, still purring of course. John kept very still and began to stroke me.

‘Nice cat,’ he said to Ellen.

‘He’s not like Jessica. He’s a kind, loving cat,’ Ellen said, and after that John wanted to hold me and even play with me. I’d made a big effort to be good, and it was worth it.

‘We’re going to keep you, little cat,’ Ellen told me joyfully a week later. ‘No one has claimed you. We’d better give you a name.’

I looked squarely into her eyes and radiated ‘Solomon’ to her. To my surprise she got it right. Ellen really was quite psychic.

‘I’ll call you Solomon,’ she said, ‘because you’re so wise. You are exactly like the cat I had as a child, and he was called Solomon. You don’t make trouble like Jessica. I’m so glad we can keep you.’

In that golden moment I understood the wisdom of the angel. She had planned for me to take that long journey and arrive on Ellen’s lawn looking pathetic. Even if I’d been born in the same street, Ellen would not have come looking for me since she already had Jessica. Appealing to Ellen’s motherly need to shelter a lost kitten had ensured me a place in her home and in her heart.

I couldn’t believe that this slim, stressed woman with dark circles under her eyes had once been a free spirit, a happy child who would dance barefoot on the lawn or who loved putting on her beloved pink ballet shoes and twirling all over the house, over the beautifully polished wood floors which were now covered in a tatty old carpet. I’d encouraged her by scampering about, making her laugh while she was dancing, and watching her eyes sparkle with creative energy.

I wondered why Ellen never danced now. She didn’t play the piano either. One day when Joe was out and John was asleep, I sat on it and just looked at Ellen. I knew she was telepathic so I sent her my thoughts. It worked.

‘Are you trying to tell me something, Solomon?’ she asked.

I put my chin on the polished top of the piano and I could sense the silent strings inside, waiting to be played. I dreamed of the rippling music Ellen used to play when she was a child, and sent the dream into her mind.

She looked at the clock, then sat down and opened the lid. I was thrilled. My fur tingled as I waited for the music to begin.

It didn’t work out as I’d expected.

Ellen sat there with her long fingers over the black and white keys, frozen and silent. Then, she slammed the lid down and burst into tears. She flung herself onto the sofa, sobbing and sobbing.

Horrified, I crept close to her, purring and licking the tears from her hot cheeks. It was all I could do.

I wanted to understand, so I remembered my previous life and why Ellen had cried when she was a child. When Ellen was ten years old, I’d wanted to give her a present to show how much I loved her. I knew she liked robins because there were cards all over her bedroom with pictures of them. So early one morning I headed out into the frosty garden and caught one for her. As I ran up the stairs with the robin’s soft body in my mouth, I was excited. It was the first bird I’d ever caught, and I was going to put it right on Ellen’s bed for her. A real robin!

Ellen was sitting up in bed, waiting for me as usual. I put the robin down with the greatest care on the duvet in front of her and sat back, satisfied with my act of giving.

But instead of saying thank you, Ellen burst into tears. Her mum came running in and gasped when she saw the robin lying on her little girl’s pink duvet.

Ellen cradled it in her small hands, sobbing and sobbing. ‘Look at his lovely colours,’ she cried, stroking the robin’s breast with one finger. ‘His breast is orange, not red. Look at his tiny feet all curled up. And he feels so warm. Look at his beak, and his sweet little face. Oh Mummy, he’ll never sing again will he? He’s dead.’ Ellen howled in grief. ‘I can’t make him fly again.’

She looked up and saw me sitting there. ‘You horrible cat, I HATE you. Go away!’

Her mum picked me up. ‘That’s not fair, Ellen. It’s natural for cats to catch birds, isn’t it, Solomon? He thought he was bringing you a present.’

She tried to take the robin away, but Ellen sobbed even harder. ‘No Mummy. I’ve got to look after him, even if he’s dead.’

Later, I watched in astonishment as she wrapped the dead robin in layers of rainbow tissue paper and put him in a cardboard box. When her mum wasn’t looking she took the bread knife from the kitchen, dug a hole in the ground under a rose bush, and buried the gift-wrapped robin. Ellen didn’t stop crying all day, but she did forgive me when I cuddled up to her, purring. It taught me a lesson I would remember forever.

But I didn’t understand why she was crying now, over the piano! I soon found out though when Ellen began to talk to me quietly, her speech interrupted by sobs.

‘I love music so much, Solomon. But I can’t do it now. I’m too exhausted. Music feeds my soul you see, and I can’t do it in fragments of time. It has to be total, so that I disappear into it. And I’ve got painful memories of it too. Mum was always pushing me to perform for people, and she’d get so angry because I just couldn’t. I used to freeze. Then she would punish me by locking the piano, or taking my ballet shoes away.’

We both looked up at the pair of faded pink ballet shoes hanging under the mirror on the wall.

‘It was the same with ballet. She and my teacher wanted me to perform. And it wasn’t about performing, Solomon,’ she said passionately, stroking my fur very fast. ‘It– it was about joy. Like you and Jessica when you play on the stairs. It’s pure joy and fun.’

I sat up and looked at her for a long time, trying to show her that I understood. I kissed her on the nose and purred into her soft ear. That made her smile, and she said, ‘Were you that cat, Solomon? Were you?’ I did a loud purr-meow. ‘I do believe you are the same cat, come back to me. We’ll be friends forever, Solomon, won’t we?’

She got up and walked over to the piano.

‘Maybe I will play a bit – for John,’ she said, and stroked the lid thoughtfully. ‘And for you. But there’s not time right now.’

I knew Ellen was unhappy. Often she’d sit in the garden so tired that she would almost fall off her chair. She coped patiently with John’s lively, bubbling personality. She was always there for him, playing with him, reading him stories and laughing with him. Ellen’s mother love was too strong for her own good. If John hurt himself she panicked, and if he was ill she always thought he was going to die. She worried about him so much.

‘Why isn’t she happy?’ I asked my angel one morning. I’d climbed onto a post in the garden to catch the morning sunshine on my fur.

‘She’s frightened.’

‘Of Joe?’

‘Yes – but she is also frightened of being homeless and starving. Because she is a mum, she’s very vulnerable, she has to protect and feed her child and provide a home for him. The man is not wise. He’s getting into debt.’

When the angel explained to me what debts were, the anxiety started. I could lose my home. I was still only a kitten. Who would feed me? Would I be able to stay here and become Jessica’s lover?

Then the angel used the word ‘repossession’, and explained what that meant. Bailiffs could take Ellen’s lovely home away, and evict the family into the street.

I climbed down from the post feeling old and responsible, a big burden for a kitten. I didn’t want to talk to the angel any longer. Being spiritual seemed increasingly irrelevant in this earth life. Survival was paramount. It went something like this: get Kitekat. Keep warm and dry. Keep fur clean. Don’t go on other cats’ territories. Be assertive with dogs. Stay out of Jessica’s basket. Get humans to open doors for us. Resist climbing the curtains. Forgive humans when they step on you. Resist thieving cheese off the table even if Jessica does it. And so on. It didn’t seem to leave much time for loving Ellen.

But love was all I had to offer.

So I swanned into the kitchen with my fur radiating love, and enjoyed eye contact with Ellen. She scooped me up at once, hugging me against her heart. Alarmed to hear the heartbeat unusually loud and fast, I leaned my cheek against her chest and purred endlessly. As I turned my head, I saw Joe standing on the other side of the room, arms folded, his eyes glittering with menace.

‘Anyway Solomon LOVES me,’ Ellen said defiantly to Joe. His aura was dense with anger and prickly like a teasel. I could feel its destructive power in Ellen’s pretty kitchen. John was sitting on his plastic tractor in the doorway, looking anxiously at his parents.

I tried to stay calm while Ellen clutched me too tightly as Joe shouted at her. He sounded like a dog barking in a concrete kennel. The pain in my ears was terrible, but I concentrated on purring, knowing I was protected by angelic light. The shouting filled the kitchen and spread through the house like smoke, going under doors, into corners and up the stairs. It permeated everything; the apples in the fruit bowl, the cosy cushions, the clocks, the bright sunny bedrooms. Then it exploded into the street in a shower of glass.

‘No Joe. Stop it. JOE!’ Ellen screamed, and put me down. I ran under a chair, terrified by the crack and crunch of Joe kicking the front door with his boot. His ginger hair and red face made him look like a man on fire, and his eyes were bleak slits of pain. Saliva gathered at the corners of his mouth.

‘Shut up! Shut up screaming you silly cow or I’ll give you something to really scream about.’ Joe turned on Ellen, muscles quivering, breathing fast, his skin sweating.

‘We can’t afford a new door, Joe. Don’t do this, PLEASE!’

‘And why can’t we afford a new door?’ Joe raged. ‘Because you insisted on giving up your job, didn’t you? Selfish cow!’

‘I wanted to look after John whilst he’s little,’ said Ellen, glaring right back at Joe. ‘You promised me you were going to get a job, didn’t you?’

Joe hunched his shoulders and clenched his teeth. He towered over Ellen, shuffling closer and closer.

‘Shut up,’ he hissed, ‘or I’ll smash that smug face of yours and then I’ll get some peace from your endless nagging, woman.’

Ellen went quiet. She went limp against the wall, and slid to the floor, her hands over her ears. Joe stamped his foot, and grinned when she jumped. It startled me too, so much that I wailed in fright. I thought Joe was going to kill my lovely Ellen.

I had to do something.

So I walked out from under the chair and sat between them, facing Joe. I yowled and looked right into Joe’s eyes, a hard cat stare, a power stare that I didn’t know I had until that moment. I could feel my angel filling my aura with a burning light.

‘Don’t get nasty,’ she said. ‘Just sit there.’

Joe turned and left, slamming the door so hard that the whole house vibrated and the remaining shards of glass crashed into the hall.

‘I’ll kill the pair of you,’ he bellowed as he headed out.

Ellen picked me up and wept into my fur.

‘What are we going to do, Solomon? What are we going to DO?’

I just kept my head down and carried on purring into Ellen’s heart. She seemed frozen. Nothing I did made any difference. Perhaps that first row was the most difficult, at least it was for me anyway. And through it all Jessica was out in the garden, shamelessly chasing butterflies. For once I envied her ability to detach herself from family upsets. I made a mental note that detachment was a skill to be acquired in another lifetime. Right now I felt hopelessly inadequate, especially when Ellen put me down and picked up John, who was crying.

‘What did Daddy do?’ he was wailing.

‘He kicked the door in.’

‘It’s broken!’ John wailed even louder. ‘And the foxes will get in.’

‘We can mend it darling. Calm down. Daddy’s gone out now.’

‘Has Daddy gone away forever?’

‘No.’

‘He said he was.’

‘He won’t. He’ll be back. You’ll see,’ soothed Ellen, but her eyes were sad and frightened.

‘Jessica’s got a butterfly!’ shrieked John. He wriggled out of Ellen’s arms and both of them rushed into the garden. I didn’t understand why Ellen felt she had to rescue a butterfly when her own wings were broken.

Exhausted by the rowing, I crawled onto my favourite cushion to doze through the morning. Blessed sleep took me quickly into the spirit world.

‘How are you doing, Solomon?’

The sight of my angel’s beaming face stopped me moaning too much. The feelings of inadequacy and the pain in my ears melted into a stream of bright stars that healed my confusion. It was hard, my angel agreed, but warned me it would get worse, and in between the bad times I must concentrate on eating, playing and building myself into a strong cat.

Refreshed and brave again, I awoke at noon to the silence of an empty house. I yawned and stretched, and walked into every room with my tail up, expecting to find Ellen. Even Jessica was nowhere to be seen. A plate of cat food was in its usual place in the kitchen so I ate most of it, thinking it had an odd metallic flavour. Rabbit, it said on the tin. Tin-flavoured rabbit. Well, it was different.

I considered braving the cat flap, but it was too heavy for a kitten like me, only three months old, and it had a way of snapping shut on my tail. I decided to go upstairs to look for Ellen.

The hall was full of broken glass, and the door had been mended with a piece of cardboard and parcel tape. John’s room was empty, and so was the bathroom, but Ellen’s bedroom door was shut. I sat outside it staring, trying to use my psi sense to find out if she was inside, but apparently she wasn’t. A few meows brought no result so I ran downstairs and jumped onto the lounge windowsill, and there, to my amazement, was Ellen. My fur stood on end, my tail bushed out like a bottlebrush. What I saw was so strange.

Ellen was inside a silver door, about the size of the puss flap. She had shrunk to the size of a blackbird. I stared and stared, not daring to move in case it happened to me. It was definitely Ellen. She had blonde hair and she was smiling, her eyes were full of light. Then I noticed something that made my fur even stiffer. Only her head was there in that silver door, the rest of her was missing. Spooked, I looked carefully behind the silver door and nothing was there. I tried to touch noses with her but a glassy screen was across the door. I sat down, feeling I mustn’t take my eyes off her, and waited for her to come out.

I heard the puss flap slam and Jessica came in with a dead starling in her mouth. She dumped half of it in the kitchen and half of it under the sofa before seeing me up there staring at Ellen in the silver door.

‘What are you all blown up about?’ she asked. ‘You look like a hedgehog.’

‘Something terrible has happened to Ellen.’

Very few cats ever master the art of laughing. I certainly couldn’t. But Jessica knew exactly how to curl up her mouth, spark her eyes and roll on the floor as if she were laughing.

‘That’s a picture,’ she explained. ‘It’s not really Ellen. It’s a flat image on a piece of something.’

‘I don’t understand.’

‘Humans have lots of them.’ Jessica sounded bored and scathing. ‘Haven’t you ever noticed them? Look at that flat barn owl on the wall. And there are flat rabbits on the wall in John’s room. And there’s a flat horse at the top of the stairs. I don’t bother looking at them any more.’

I did look at the flat barn owl and felt quite spooked by it, and angry with Jessica for laughing at me. I pounced on her from the windowsill and we wrestled, squealing on the floor. Then she chased me up the curtains. At that moment, in walked Ellen – the real Ellen, not the flat version. I was pleased to see her but she was not pleased to see me at the top of the curtains. That was our ill-timed mistake. The skin around her eyes looked red and her aura was dark. I wanted to love her but she shooed me into the garden along with Jessica, and a few minutes later half of the dead starling came sailing out too.

I hated Jessica for getting me into trouble. Hate was something I should not be feeling. It was bad. It upset my stomach and clouded my vision so that I couldn’t tune in to my angel. Mist surrounded me. Earth mist. Hate mist. How to get out of it, I didn’t know.

In this environment I could soon have lost touch with my mission and become a boring old cat who just ate, slept and survived. I walked into the road and considered leaving. The problem with leaving is that you are likely to regret it and go back, which is even more difficult. And embarrassing, I thought, when the car returned and Joe got out, shamefaced, and padded slowly up the path, a bunch of roses in his hand.

THE BAILIFF

Jessica hated the postman. She acted like a guard dog, lying in wait for him under the bushes by the front door, and pouncing on his shoelaces whenever he came near. On wet days she sat on the stairs glaring at the letterbox, and as soon as the postman pushed letters through onto the mat, she shredded them with ferocious claws. If Ellen didn’t get to them first, Jessica would then use the pile of torn paper as a litter tray. Her rage was infectious. Ellen and Joe, and even little John, screamed at her, and Jessica would disappear under the sofa at speed.

She’d got a private collection of toys under there, a dead mouse, a blue and yellow Lego man, a shoelace and a Dairylea cheese portion pilfered from the kitchen table.

One morning Jessica furiously attacked a crackly brown envelope that Joe obviously wanted.

‘You DEMON cat!’ he roared, purple in the face as he dangled the shredded letter in his hand. As usual, he turned on Ellen. ‘You would have to choose a manic moggy like her wouldn’t you? Well I tell you now, that cat is going down the RSPCA.’

‘No Joe,’ pleaded Ellen. ‘We promised to look after her, and anyway she can be a sweet little cat sometimes.’

‘Sweet little cat! She’s rubbish. And we can’t afford to feed one cat, leave alone two.’

They were chilling words. I gazed at Joe from where I was sitting quietly on the windowsill enjoying the morning sun. Keeping calm wasn’t easy, but I was managing, even when I heard the dreaded RSPCA word. Later I padded across to the sofa and coaxed Jessica out. Her eyes were huge and black, but she emerged and sat beside me in our favourite chair.

‘I love you,’ I said. ‘And Ellen does too. But why must you tear up letters like that?’

Jessica said something surprising.

‘I only tear up the brown ones. They’re bills, and they make Joe bad tempered. Actually he tears them up himself, I’ve seen him doing it. And he hides them from Ellen.’

Jessica fascinated me. One morning I sat and watched her in the garden. She spent half her time airborne, doing reckless leaps from the garage roof to the cherry tree, then clambering up through the branches. Next she sat on the high wall and batted at swallows. The tiny birds dive bombed her, almost clipping her with a blade-like wing as they twisted out of her reach.

‘Do you wish you were a bird?’ I asked her.

‘No.’ She waited until I’d climbed through a prickly bush to the top of the wall to be with her. ‘Tiresome teenage kitten,’ she growled, lashing her tail at me. She took off down to the lawn, leaving me marooned up there, meowing. She slipped through the cat flap and I figured she would be in the kitchen eating from my dish. Moments later she emerged with a big brick of cheese in her mouth.

‘YOU PIGGING CAT!’ Joe burst into the garden and saw Jessica’s tail disappearing under the shed. ‘Why do I bother giving you a home? I worked my hands to the bone to pay for that cheese and you go and nick it. Thieving moggy. You’re nothing but trouble.’

He seized a broom and banged on the shed with it. But Jessica didn’t come out. I saw Sue-next-door peering through her curtains, and I wondered where Ellen was. I felt scared on top of the wall, with Joe’s voice booming all over the garden. I wanted Ellen to come and coax me down.

Horrified, I watched Joe lie down and ram the broom handle under the shed. Jessica would be killed. The shed was creaking and rocking as Joe attacked it. I looked up at Sue-next-door, who was standing firmly at the window with her arms folded, and I sent her a silent meow. She responded by rolling her eyes.

Jessica popped out from the other side of the shed, still with the cheese in her mouth, and streaked across the lawn. I saw a flash of white paws and pink pads as she cleared the fence into Sue-next-door’s garden. Joe hurled the broom after her with such force that it snapped a row of tomato plants which Ellen had been growing against the sunny fence. A hot, dusty smell rose from them and green tomatoes rolled over the grass.

Joe stood there, his aura steaming. His face was red and his hands trembled. Slowly he walked over and picked up a green tomato, and looked at it in silence. He picked up the two halves of the broom, tried unsuccessfully to fit them back together, and stalked back towards the house. He walked right past me but didn’t look up, and I saw big fat tears on his furious cheeks. I sensed his pain.

I wished Ellen would come back. But she didn’t. Instead, a purple silence filled the garden.

Jessica had called me a ‘tiresome teenage kitten’ but that wasn’t true. I was a healing cat. If I saw tears on human cheeks I had to do something. So I climbed down through the prickly bush, and trotted into the house with my tail up. I could tell where Joe was by the sour smell of beer. He was slumped in a corner by a pile of magazines, wiping his tears with the back of his hand, sniffing and slurping from a can. I ran to him as if he was my best friend. Being careful not to scratch him, I walked nicely along his leg and up his torso to his heart. It was bang-banging in there, and his arms were shaking. He looked at me in surprise.

As soon as we had eye contact, I gazed into his soul and purred. I licked the salty tears from his face, but more of them came zigzagging down.

‘Oh Solomon,’ he whispered. ‘How can you love a bad-tempered bastard like me?’

I purred louder, stretching my paws over his heart, and rubbed my head against his bristly chin.

‘The truth is, Solomon,’ he said, ‘I don’t like myself one bit. Everything I do goes wrong. I’m no good. In fact, I’m bloody doomed.’

I pretended to go to sleep and let him talk, his hot hand smoothing my fur, and after a while he quietened down and my angel came close, shining her light over us as we dozed in the chair.

‘You’re doing a great job, Solomon,’ she said.

After Joe’s outburst I needed another cat to curl up with. Jessica didn’t come back until it was dark and everyone had gone to bed, even the swallows. Moonlight spilled in through the window and polished her sleek fur as she came in. I ran to meet her. She condescended to touch noses with me, and I got to look into her eyes. In the night they were deep saucers of green, and her whiskers glistened magnificently each side of her little pink nose. To me she was exquisitely beautiful. Why didn’t she want to be friends with me?

I followed her to her basket, but she wouldn’t let me in there. Sensing she was tired, I sat watching her. All I wanted was to curl up against her silky warmth.

‘Go away,’ she hissed. ‘You smell like that sour stuff Joe drinks.’

‘I’ve been lying on him,’ I said. ‘Healing him.’

Jessica looked at me out of slitty eyes.

‘Traitor,’ she said. ‘You should have been scratching him after the way he treated me.’

‘I don’t scratch humans. I’m a healing cat.’

‘Poof!’ Jessica curled up into a silken mound and closed her eyes as if I wasn’t there. Confused, I watched her go to sleep, and respected her peace. I didn’t dare to even put one paw inside her cosy basket; I spent the night hunched on the cold floor just to be near her.

In the morning her eyes were buttercup yellow again, and when she yawned, I saw the curl of her tongue and the pink roof of her mouth. She looked surprised and not pleased to see me there. We touched noses and it made me buzz all over with excitement. Her eyes hardened and she hissed at me, but not before I’d seen the sadness that lurked behind those golden eyes. Sadness – and anger. I wanted to know where it had come from, but Jessica wouldn’t talk to me.

I’d fallen in love with a cat who didn’t want me.

One evening Joe came through the back door with a bottle of wine and a pizza in a box. He had a rare smile on his face.

‘Where did you get this?’ Ellen asked.

‘Stop frowning, Ellen,’ Joe said, and he fished into his back pocket and took out some cash. ‘I’ve got a JOB!’

‘A job? Oh wow, that’s amazing.’ Ellen’s face lit up with a happy smile. She gave Joe a hug and pushed his hair out of his eyes. ‘Doing what?’

‘Don’t get too excited, it’s only casual work – in the bar at the pub. Three nights a week.’

‘Great,’ said Ellen, ‘but …’

‘Don’t give me that face, Joe said. ‘I won’t be drinking if that’s what you’re worried about. I’m going to look after my family.’

Ellen sighed and opened the big pizza box.

‘Hmm. Yum. Do you want a little bit, Solomon?’

The times when Joe went to work were peaceful for us, golden summer evenings in the garden, with John, Jessica and me racing around while Ellen worked on a little flower bed. On wet evenings I managed to persuade her to play the piano again. John got so excited, dancing and squealing and singing little songs. Even Jessica enjoyed it and she came and lay beside me on top of the piano, feeling the ripples of music and watching Ellen’s aura brightening as she played.

‘Will it be all right now that Joe has a job?’ I asked my angel. For a moment she was silent. Then she looked at me sadly and new colours flickered in the light that shone around her; deeper blues and purples.

‘No,’ she said. ‘It’s too little, too late.’

Summer passed and the lawn thundered with falling apples. Ellen and John walked round the hedges picking lush blackberries and putting them into bags, and I insisted on going with them, always with my tail up very straight.

‘Like a snorkel,’ Ellen laughed as I dashed through the long grass.

But she didn’t like me following her to the shop. After my trip in the lorry, traffic really scared me, and if I tried to follow Ellen along the main road it involved panicky dives into strange hedges and gardens. I followed Ellen everywhere. I would not let her out of my sight. Sometimes she shut me in and then I sat at the window like a sentry awaiting her return.

Ellen was changing. Often she was angry and frightened, and exhausted by the frequent rows with Joe. But she always welcomed my love, and the supply of Kitekat continued. I was cuddled and brushed and sprinkled with flea powder. She even gave me vitamins and the occasional egg. I grew into a glossy tomcat.

It was a cold winter night when Jessica finally let me into her basket. I held my breath and stepped in gingerly. Hardly daring to hope that this was happening, I silently eased myself close to her. She’d had a bad day and I knew she needed me, as I needed her. For once she didn’t push me away. She growled a little, and purred with me, and I sensed her silent need for a friend, a friend who loved her no matter what.

Blissfully, I lay against her warm silky coat and let the stars of happiness cluster around us. After that night we always slept together with our soft paws intertwined. Jessica liked to lie with her chin on my neck and I loved to feel her there. Together we made a kind of music, love music made of little purrs and sighs and squeaks. Sometimes I slid my paw around her glossy back, and when the morning sun shone through the window, I lay dreaming, watching the colours of the sun glint on her black fur.

Winter passed, and when spring came I was the boss cat. Jessica was now very flirty with me. She provoked me into wild chases, through the raspberry canes and up the cherry tree and over the garage roof. We mated all over the place, on the neighbour’s lawn, in the vegetable garden, even in the middle of the road. But the best time was on top of the tumble drier in the utility room, when it was running. Ellen opened the door and saw us. We froze, squared our eyes, and continued. Ellen got the message, smiled and left us alone.

A month or so later Jessica became fat and heavy with my kittens.

Soon she was too fat to crawl under the sofa. Being pregnant calmed her down. It calmed everyone down, including me. Jessica was contented. She left the postman alone, set up a new refuge for herself under Ellen’s bed, and on a hot night in June, Jessica gave birth all by herself to three silky kittens. My children.

Ellen immediately moved them all downstairs to a basket in the kitchen, but Jessica insisted on moving them back, carrying each kitten in her mouth carefully up the stairs. She always left the little tabby one until last. It was a girl kitten, fluffy and very beautiful with tinges of silver and gold in her fur.

‘This is a special kitten,’ said my angel, ‘she’s come here to heal, like you, Solomon.’ So, in those moments before Jessica came back for her, I gave the tabby kitten lots of love and purring. One day she opened her baby blue eyes and looked at me as if she wanted to fix me in her memory forever.

It was the last happy day I remember. The house felt sunlit and peaceful. Ellen and Joe were friends, and John was playing happily in the garden.

And that was the day the bailiff came.

I was feeling fragile because a few days ago Joe had taken me to the vet who had put me to sleep and done something to me to stop me making any more kittens. It was painful, and humiliating, and I felt depressed afterwards, despite understanding the reason. I’d agreed this in the spirit world. Being a full tomcat would distract me from my true path. I had agreed to love Ellen and help her through a difficult time, but if I’d known how difficult it would be then I might not have volunteered. Ellen had let me have my fling with Jessica first. She’d wanted Jessica to experience the joys of motherhood and for John to see the kittens born and growing up.

That was Ellen’s idealistic dream.

On that warm June day my angel had alerted me at dawn. She’d shown me a picture of a man in a grey suit inside a large building with ‘County Court’ carved in stone letters over the door. The man had been writing Ellen’s name and address on a form. My angel told me that today he was coming to our house. Ellen didn’t know. I had to be there. To stay calm and keep purring. ‘Remember you are a healing cat,’ she said.

Joe had gone out and I had to sit up all day watching, even though I wanted to lie down after what the vet had done. By lunchtime I was worn out. No one had come. Ellen was pottering about the garden while John was splashing and squealing in a big water tub on the lawn. Eventually I fell asleep, curled up on the sunny doorstep. In my dreams bees were humming over the flowers, swallows twittered overhead and the long grass at the edge of the lawn was full of chirping grasshoppers. As I dreamed about the spirit world another sound dragged me back, heavy footsteps coming nearer. I opened one eye and saw a pair of gleaming shoes on the doorstep.

‘Hello puss!’ A man’s hand reached down to stroke me. The bailiff!

Compared to a tiger a cat is very small. So it’s no good acting like a tiger and attacking people. Cats have to be subtle and artful.

I displayed my hostility to the bailiff, completely ignoring him by staring into the distance with no response to his attempt to stroke me. After what the angel had said, it was surprising to find the bailiff was an ordinary human. But he was acting sinister.

His neck was locked stiff, his eyes icy cold and his heart encased in metal. I could hear it ticking as he knocked at the door.

Ellen opened it, carrying John who was wrapped in a blue bath towel. Her innocent eyes looked enquiringly at the bailiff.

‘Double glazing?’ she smiled. ‘No thanks.’

‘Mrs King?’

‘Yes. That’s me. And this is John.’

John didn’t look happy, even though Ellen was bouncing him about to try and make him laugh. His solemn eyes caught mine. He knew. The bailiff’s frozen aura was obvious and menacing to him.

‘Mrs Ellen King?’

‘Yes.’ The smile was shrinking on Ellen’s face.

‘And your husband is Mr Joseph King?’

‘Yes?’

The bailiff showed Ellen a card.

‘I’m a bailiff from the county court. I have a warrant to enter your property and seize goods to the value of seventeen thousand pounds, a debt your husband owes to the bank.’

I watched Ellen’s aura splintering. It was alarming. John chose that moment to start crying, and this upset Ellen. She screamed at the bailiff and her eyes were two cracks of blue fire.

‘How dare you come here, threatening us? Can’t you see I’m a mother with a small child? It’s not my debt, it’s HIS! I know nothing about it!’

I wormed my way into the hall and sat at Ellen’s feet, puffing myself up protectively. How I wished I was a dog, an Alsatian or a Rottweiler. It’s terrible having to hiss when you want to bark.

The man kept coldly repeating the same words, his voice a monotonous chant against Ellen’s hysteria and John’s crying. However, as Ellen’s distress grew, it was John who calmed her down by putting his fat little arms around her neck.

‘Mummy, talk nicely.’

Ellen’s legs were shivering. The bailiff’s gleaming shoes were squeaking across the doormat. My angel stood in the hall with a golden sword in her hand but no one except me could see her. Jessica was bolting upstairs with yet another kitten swinging from her mouth.

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