adventures

where to begin. 'Hello,' she settled on. 'I just wanted to say thanks very much, whatever sort of
god you are. Or the Goddess! Goodness, if it's you, I'm sorry for taking your name in vain all
these years. It's very good of you to take me despite everything, and I now believe in you, and
will admit to any sins that you want to hear about, and sort of throw myself on the mercy of the
court and everything. Thank you for having me.'
She waited, expecting a response.
When it came, it was from the other side of the meadow.
'Hel-lo!' The voice was fruity and jolly, very clubbishly male and English. Bernice turned, rather
worried, despite her bright smile, that God had turned out to be an Englishman after all.
But the figure sitting on the stile, his hand on his chin, wasn't God. Or at least, if it was, everybody
was completely wrong about every sort of religion.
It was a cat in a hat. A seven-foot-tall, fully clothed cat, in a vast Cavalier hat with a peacock
feather. The rest of his clothing comprised a big red coat with tails (that presumably concealed his
own), another of those fabulous shirts, a dirty great scabbard, and a pair of big-thighed britches.
He was smiling at Bernice and striking a thoughtful pose. 'I say,' he continued, 'I didn't expect you
to be awake.'
'No,' muttered Benny, 'neither did I.'
The mancat leapt up from the stile and marched over to the oak tree. He did have a tail, Benny
noticed, and it was swinging proudly to and fro. 'Thought I'd leave you to get some kip, while I
satisfied myself about breakfast.' He grinned a predator's grin, behind which could be heard distant,
echoing twitters.
'Indeed.' Benny brushed down her doublet, wondering why she had come into this story in the
middle. If she told this big cat that she wasn't whoever it thought she was, but was actually a
dead person, would it still be as friendly? She decided to play it by ear. 'So. What shall we do
today?'
'Well,' the cat purred, putting its paw around her shoulder. 'You had some very strange ideas
about that last night . . .'
'I did?'
'Oh yes! Before you fell asleep, you said to me, Wolsey –'
'Wolsey!' Bernice was startled. Cat and person heaven at the same time sort of thing, then? In
period costume?
But it was him. She could see that now. His colouring was exactly right. He had that little dent
on his brow where he'd leapt at a holorecording of one of the Three Pronged Tenors (hoping to
carry the little Italian man back to his basket and eat him), but had instead just bashed his head
on the player unit.
'Yes, dear, Wolsey. Who were you expecting, Michael Aspel?'
'Who?'
'Oh, you have had a rough night. I'm Wolsey! Wolsey, your oldest, dearest friend! Listen . . .'
The cat leant on the tree and picked his teeth with a flourish of his claws. 'I'd do anything for you,
you know. Anything.'
Bernice was about to answer that she didn't doubt that when, to her surprise, Wolsey started
to sing.
'I'd do anything, for you, dear, anything, for you . . .'
Bernice could only gawp as her former pet swung himself around and about the tree, hopping
up into the lower branches, giving sly little waves to birds in their nests, singing all the while. At
the end of the song, he dropped on to all fours beside her, rubbed himself against her legs (which
was, in the circumstances, thoroughly disturbing), and bounced up into an ornate, hat-doffing
bow.
Bernice clapped a little to make him feel appreciated. She wasn't used to her associates
launching into production numbers offhandedly. 'I believe you, Wolsey,' she told him, wondering if
she could somehow discover just what was going on here. 'So if you'll do anything for me, tell me
this: what strange ideas was I entertaining last night?'
'Why, you were ready to give up all thought of becoming Lord Mayor of London!'
Bernice found herself smiling in a rather dangerously giddy way. 'Surely not?'
'You laid your little head down on your little sack, gave a little sigh, and told me your little