`Long life, good health and much comfort to you,' Peter said as he had been taught, to the ginger cat with light green eyes, squatted behind the iron rail in front of No. 11, with its tail neatly wrapped around it. This he knew was the cat of Mrs. Bobbit, the caretaker. He had seen it there often and had even stroked it. But now he went up and touched noses.
The ginger said, `Well spoken, youngster. It's nice to find somebody left with manners these days. You've been properly taught. Remember, there's nothing quite like manners to get you on in the world. I've been very cross this morning, and would as soon have knocked you ears over tail as not, until you spoke so softly. Wuzzy is the name. I suppose you've seen Mr. Black?'
Jennie told their names. She was nearly bursting with pride at the praise Peter had earned from the ginger- coloured one.
Wuzzy said to Jennie-'Jennie Baldrin, eh? That's Scottish. But there's more to you from the look of you. Good breeding. Egyptian, probably-from your ears. I'm such a mixture nobody can say where it started. Come back and tell me all about you after you're settled …'
`Now THERE,' said Jennie Baldrin firmly, `is one of the nicest cats I've EVER met. I must have a long talk with her,' and she looked so pleased and gay and cheered that Peter was indeed glad that even for just a little he had managed to take her mind off poor Mr. Grims.
As they went on, they were conscious of a soft call from someone above somewhere, giving them greetings, long life and milk with every meal. They looked up to see a tortoiseshell cat ensconced in the bay window of No. i8.
Do stop a minute,' she pleaded. `I'm so bored. You two look as though you've been places. ('Haven't we just,' was Peter's thought to himself.) My name's Hedwig. I've got every thing in the world, and I'm very unhappy. I belong to a childless couple.'
'Oh dear,' Jennie sympathized. `That can be just too bad’.
'It is,' said Hedwig, `believe me. Carry me around all day. On my back in their arms just like a baby. And cluck and coo and make noises that I can't make head or tail out of. I've a basket with a blue ribbon, and pillows and scratching-posts and toys, just drawers full of things. And I'm so sick of them all. I used to be pretty handy in an alley myself before they picked me up. If I can get out for a few minutes later. I'll be over to the bombed house. I'm dying to hear how it is on the road.'
`You see,' Jennie remarked to Peter, as they went on towards the top of the square, `it isn't all cream and chopped liver . . .'
They continued and met a stunning, rose-coloured, pedigreed Persian who talked of nothing but show business and Blue Ribbons; a long-haired grey named Mr. Silver who assured them that there was nothing like belonging to a bachelor for the very best kind of life; and three assorted tabbies who lived with the two spinsters said if you didn't mind too much not being allowed up on things, there really was nothing like living with two old maid sisters because nothing ever changed or happened to frighten or worry one.
And in this manner it was that Peter, accompanied by Jennie Baldrin, went all the way around Cavendish Square and made the acquaintance of the friends and neighbours living there and was accepted by them as one of them, as Jennie had wished it, and having been so, he came at last to the street that led to the Mews.
Now, strangely enough, he was no longer in a hurry as he had been before, but paused for a moment at the entrance to the narrow little pocket or blind alley, as it were, that was the Mews. Yet for all of being a cat, and understanding them better than he had ever before, the thought that soon he would be able to see his mother and father made him very happy. He said to Jennie Baldrin, `We did it, Jennie. Here it is. And just down there is our house …'
Jennie's sadness had returned, for she had grown to love Peter very much. She said, `Yes, Peter. And perhaps just down there a little way is where you and I will have to part.'
'Oh, Jennie!' said Peter. 'Jennie dear! Don't you know that whatever happens, I'll never leave you? Never, never, never!'
But Jennie was a better prophet than she knew. Except that it didn't at all turn out as she thought it would, that which awaited them at the tiny, narrow Mews….
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE: Reunion in Cavendish Mews
And now that they were there at last, Peter found that he did not quite know what to do, or rather, that he really had no plan.
For this was not like a regular visit where you went up to the front door and rang the bell, and when someone came to answer, you sent in your card with a message scribbled on it 'Mr. Peter Brown, late of No. 1A Cavendish Mews, solicits the honour of an interview with his mother and father, Colonel and Mrs. Brown.' Or you didn't even go bursting through the front door, granting that it was off the latch, shouting 'Mummy! Mummy! I'm home. I'm back again. Have you missed me?'
He couldn't even reach the doorknob, much less the bell. He had the shape and form of a large white cat and had lost the power to speak to human beings, though he could understand them, and even had he been able to talk to his mother and father or Nanny, who was afraid of cats to begin with, the idea of trying to persuade them that actually he was Peter to whom something very odd had happened did not seem to him to be very sensible. He might have been able to explain it to someone of his own age without any difficulty, but a grown-up would be more likely to say: `Stuff and nonsense. Small boys don't turn into cats,' and there would be an end of it.
But now that the moment had come he thought it might be nice if they just went and sat in front of the house for a while and looked. Perhaps his father was home and he could see him through the window on the ground floor if the curtain was not drawn, or his mother and Nanny might come in or out of the house and he would have the opportunity to observe that they were well and in good health, and above all to show his mother to Jennie Baldrin. He very much wanted Jennie to see how beautiful his mother was. And that is what he decided to do.
`It's there,' he said, `the little one on the far side of the Mews.' It was easy to point out to Jennie because it was such a small one, no more than two storeys high and rather huddled next to its neighbour, a much larger house of white granite that had been repaired recently, and into which some new people were to move just about the time whatever it was had happened to him to cause him to be changed into a cat.
Theirs was a pretty house, and had a beautiful black door framed in creamy wood, and on it his father had had fastened a shiny brass plate with his name on it-'Col. A. Brown' because people were always having trouble finding the Mews, much less anyone who lived in it.
Yet now, even before they crossed the street, Peter could see that there was something odd about the door, or rather different, yes, and something wrong with the sitting room window too, giving on to the street, which always boasted of stiff, starched, lacy curtains through which one could just see the pie– crust table on which stood the small bronze statue of Mercury.
Peter saw now what was different. The brass plate was no longer on the door, nor were there any curtains in the window, or any furniture whatsoever in the room, for one could now look right in and see that it was empty. But in the corner of the window was a small white card with some black lettering on it, and what it said was that the premises were vacant and to let, and interested parties should address themselves to Tredgemore and Silkin, in Sackville Street, or inquire of the superintendent. It was quite clear that the Browns had moved away and no longer lived at No. 1A Cavendish Mews, and as to where they had gone there was not one single, solitary clue.
Peter's first reaction was that he was not at all surprised. They always seemed to be moving from one place to another. He remembered that, and it had something to do with his father being in the Army and shifting his station.
His second emotion was one of bleak disappointment. It had not seemed so bad being a cat, particularly after Jennie had found him and taken him under her protection, and their adventures together he had enjoyed thoroughly. But suddenly he became aware that always in the background of his thoughts had been the comforting fact that no matter where he was, or what happened, his parents were there, living in the little flat in the Mews, and when he did think about them he could imagine just what it was they were doing. Above all it held out the promise that he could see them again any time he wished to go back, even though they could not recognize him.
