As I made my way back along the cobbles towards the cafe I saw a figure standing in front of the bay window. She had one hand pressed against the glass, shading her eyes from the bright reflection as she peered inside. Dropping to my haunches, I crept closer, my hackles rising as soon as I noticed the familiar shopping trolley by her side. When I was a couple of feet away, the old woman noticed my movement at the edge of her vision and spun round to face me. Sensing hostility and alert to possible danger, I stopped mid-step, one paw hovering off the ground, tail twitching as she glared at me across the cobbles.
Without saying a word, the old woman grabbed her shopping trolley and thrust it forward with both hands. Its wheels scraped on the ground as it lunged towards me. I darted effortlessly out of its path and watched the trolley wobble, before falling sideways, landing on the street with a thud.
‘Hey, what do you think you’re doing?’
The woman and I both turned in the direction of the voice. Sophie was walking up the street, a pint of milk in one hand. Her hood was pulled up, but I could make out her angry expression underneath. In my confusion I assumed that her words were addressed to me, but to my surprise the old lady answered.‘I’m … I’m not doing anything – it … it slipped,’ she stuttered defensively.
Sophie strode towards her with a look of incipient fury and the old woman began to shuffle backwards. The alarming thought crossed my mind that I was about to witness a physical assault. When Sophie reached the upturned shopping trolley, however, she stopped. I instinctively stepped behind her ankles for protection.‘Haven’t you got anything better to do with your time than try to hurt people’s pets?’ Sophie demanded.
‘It just fell over. I didn’t mean to … ’ the woman muttered, unconvincingly.
Sophie lifted up the shopping trolley by its handle, standing it upright in front of its owner.‘Well, it’s not fallen over any more, is it? So you can go now.’
The woman mumbled something indistinct that might have been an apology. Without looking at Sophie, she grabbed her trolley by the handle and turned to leave.
‘Nosy old witch,’ Sophie muttered as we watched her scurry away down the street. To my surprise, she then bent down and stroked me. ‘Don’t worry about her, Molly. She can’t hurt you.’
The whole incident left me baffled and unsettled. I had become accustomed to the way the old woman scowled at me through the window, but it had never crossed my mind that she might want to hurt me. Bad-tempered but harmless was what I had considered her, but Sophie’s reaction made me wonder if I had underestimated her. My disquiet about the old woman was offset, however, by the turnaround in Sophie’s attitude towards me. After so many weeks of antagonism, to feel protected by Sophie was a joyous relief. I purred as she stroked me, arching my back and rising onto my tiptoes at the touch of her hand.
I stayed close to Sophie’s ankles as she pushed the caf? door open.
‘Got the milk, Mum,’ she shouted, and Debbie came downstairs, dressed in her decorating overalls with her hair tied back. Full of gratitude, she took the milk and disappeared into the caf? kitchen, while Sophie loped upstairs to the flat.
I jumped up onto the caf? windowsill to wash and think. Why had Sophie not mentioned the incident outside to Debbie? And why had the old lady tried to mow me down with her trolley in the first place? I recalled the time I had seen her accost Sophie outside the shop, and the look of angry indignation on Sophie’s face afterwards. She hadn’t told Debbie about that, either. I began to wonder if there was more going on with the old woman than I had realized and if, unwittingly, it involved me.
My thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the caf? door opening. It was Jo, carrying two large paint tins. ‘Four litres ofMolly’s Blushes!’ she announced.‘Just the thing for a hangover, eh, Debs?’
Clutching her mug of tea at last, Debbie turned on the radio and soon she and Jo were happily rolling paint onto the walls, transforming them from dirty white to warm pink. I prowled around the caf? while they worked, playing with some crinkly cellophane wrapping that I found in the fireplace.
After a while I began to feel light-headed. I had been fighting a nagging queasiness all morning, which I attributed to the paint fumes. I sat down at the bottom of the stairs, trying to master my discomfort, when two things happened at once: Sophie ran down the stairs behind me, and Jo dropped the lid from a tin of paint, sending it clattering to the floor. Panicked, my fight-or-flight instinct kicked in. I bolted towards the caf? door but, in my nauseous state, it was not until I reached the doorstep that I noticed that it was shut. I turned on my heels and made for the windowsill. It was as I leapt up onto it that I heard Debbie shout, ‘No, Molly – stop!’
Only then did I become aware of the sensation of wetness underneath my paws. I sat down on the windowsill and lifted up my front pad. I could smell a strong chemical odour, and saw that my paw was dripping with pink paint. A quick check confirmed that my other paws were similarly affected. I looked across the caf?, noticing for the first time the plastic paint-tray that Debbie had placed on the floor near the stairs. In my panic I had run straight through it, leaving a trail of pink paw prints behind me on the flagstones.
‘Oh, Molly!’ Debbie sighed, her voice a mixture of irritation and concern.
I looked at her sheepishly.
Jo started laughing, a nasal snigger that she tried to stifle, but which soon turned into a throaty cackle.‘So much forMolly’s Blushes.’ She said. ‘Molly’s Footprints would be more accurate.’ Sophie, who had watched the scene unfold from the bottom of the stairs, started to giggle too.
Seeing the reaction of the other two, Debbie couldn’t help but smile. I lifted one my paws to start licking off the paint. ‘Oh, don’t let her lick them!’ Debbie cried.
Sophie sprang across the caf? and sat down next to me in the window, trying to distract me from the urge to clean my dirty paws. Meanwhile Debbie ran into the kitchen, emerging with a damp cloth.
‘Hold her still, will you, Soph?’
Sophie gripped me gently by the shoulders, while Debbie lifted each paw in turn to wipe the paint from them.
‘You know what, Deb – I reckon you should keep them,’ said Jo, looking at the trail of pink paw prints. ‘They actually look pretty cool. They can be adesign feature.’
‘Yeah, right,’ Debbie laughed.
‘She’s right, Mum,’ Sophie agreed. ‘Keep them. They’re funny.’
Debbie had finished wiping my feet and looked at the pink trail that criss-crossed the floor.‘Seriously?’ she repeated, as if she suspected they were both in on the same joke.
‘Why not?’ Jo replied. ‘You wanted to stand out from the crowd, didn’t you? I bet there aren’t any other caf?s in Stourton with their very own paw-print trail.’
Debbie looked unconvinced, and stood up to take the cloth back to the kitchen.
The smell of paint on my paws had intensified my queasiness. I jumped down from the window and picked a careful route across the caf?, avoiding the trail of damp prints. Desperate for some fresh air, I stood at the door hoping to catch somebody’s attention. ‘Would you like to go out, Molly?’ Sophie asked, her voice sounding uncannily like her mother’s. I chirruped gratefully as she pulled the caf? door open for me.