“Well, just a taste of fish,” Minette replied, enjoying the envious look on Tompkins’ face.
“Did you see any one there?” he asked next.
“Yes, a very grand cat, so beautiful and sleek, she was very kind to me and asked me to come again.” (Oh, Minette! what terrible stories!)
Poor Tompkins was so jealous he could have cried, and when Minette sat purring in the basket with such a superior look on her face, he felt he could have scratched her.
“Never mind,” he told himself, “it will be my turn next.”
CHAPTER IV
THE KITCHEN KITTENS
His chance came that same afternoon. Minette, tired out with her exciting adventure and with all the stories she had told about it, was having a sound sleep, no one was about and the door was open. Tompkins crept through it and down the passage. He was making for the kitchen but on the way he heard a strange noise. It came from a little room next to the kitchen and it made his little heart beat and his tail swell out to twice its size. This curious sound was just the kind of noise that kittens make when they are in the middle of a furious game. Tompkins listened outside the door. “Oh,” he thought, “if I could only get in and join them! what fun it would be, and what an adventure to tell Minette!” and he gave a little plaintive miaou just near the crack of the door. There was a silence for a second, then he heard scratchings inside and a voice called out in cat language, “You push hard and we’ll pull, the door isn’t fastened.” So Tompkins squeezed hard against the door, and at last there was a crack just big enough for him to creep through.
Inside Tompkins saw, to his delight, three small kittens. They were about his own age too, and had got hold of the waste-paper basket with which they were having a splendid game. Next to a ball, I believe, kittens love nice rustling paper, and they were tearing and rumpling these to their hearts’ content.