More Cats In The Belfry

  'You could never do that on your own,' said Louisa, and she was right. Neither could I be sure of getting a donkey that was colic resistant. So I gave up the idea, and the grass in the field beyond the cottage, where I kept the caravan, grew long with nobody to eat it, and I had to keep it cut down with the hover-mower so that I could drive the car in to hitch up when required, and when I found that riders were getting into the field through the gap at the far end, cantering down the mowed section and jumping the pole across the entrance into the lane, I got annoyed. The horses' hooves made deep indentations in the surface that became a quagmire when it rained and, in dry weather, a rocky, pot-holed area that was hard on the car's suspension. When I found the pole broken one day I'd had enough. I put up a notice saying that the land was private property and that riders jumping horses or ponies in it were trespassing and would in future be prosecuted without further notice.

  The result was amazing. This was years after the incident of Solomon and the kipper. By this time there were two riding schools in the village and several more, from neighbouring villages, who came over to trek in the forest, and the day after I put up the notice the girl in charge of one party appeared at the cottage door to apologise for the fact that two boys who rode with her had been going regularly into the field and jumping the pole. They'd ignored her instructions not to do it, she said, but now they'd seen the notice they were scared of being prosecuted and she'd come to plead on their behalf.

  I wasn't going to prosecute anybody, I told her. The notice was just to keep people off, and I didn't suppose those two were the only ones who'd been doing it. Well, she'd told their mother about it, she said, and she thought I'd be hearing from her. With which, vastly relieved to hear that her riding school wasn't about to appear en masse in a magistrate's court, she departed and the next thing was a call from the boys' mother apologising for their behaviour, saying that she'd stopped their riding for a week, had told them she'd sell their ponies if they did it again, and felt terribly embarrassed about what they'd called me.

  'Called me?' I echoed. 'But I've never spoken to them. I don't know your boys – and I'm sure they aren't the only ones who've been jumping in there.'

  Their riding teacher had told her that they'd sworn at me, she insisted. Had actually repeated what they'd said, and she wasn't having them use that sort of language to anybody. She was sending them to apologise in person, and would I please tick them off thoroughly when they came.

  That evening two small boys appeared, each clutching a shop-wrapped sheaf of flowers which I guessed had come out of their pocket money. Eyes down, avoiding looking directly at me or they'd have realised I wasn't the person they'd sworn at, they apologised, said they'd never do it again, and shot off up the hill, obviously glad to get away without being clapped in jail.

  I never did find out who it was they'd sworn at. Probably Miss Wellington, I decided. I could imagine her remonstrating, in her role of protector of the valley, with anybody riding rough-shod over my field. What I couldn't understand was her not telling me about it. Always ready with what she'd said to people and what they'd said to her was Miss W. Always keen to be seen upholding the right. I can only imagine the language they used was such that, being a lady, she couldn't repeat it. I've always longed to know what it was.

  Summer also brought the visitors – readers who, passing through Somerset en route to Devon or Cornwall, wrote to ask if they could come to see the cottage and the cats. Most of them hadn't seen Tani before, and were upset to hear that Saska had died. But all of them were entranced by Saphra – the way he welcomed everybody as his friends – and all of them were intrigued by Tani, who would hide for ages on a chair tucked under the big oak table, come out eventually, when she saw Saphra getting all the attention, to rub against a hand or two herself, and then, in the middle of being made much of, would creep across the carpet, flat on her stomach, and take refuge on her sanctuary chair again.

  'Why on earth does she do that?' people would ask.

  'She thinks you're white slavers,' I would explain solemnly – much, I feel sure, to Tani's satisfaction. 'She's always expecting somebody to kidnap her.'