“That’s fast,” Toulouse called after him, “but taking stairs one at a time is for beginners!” Then Toulouse launched himself off the top of the staircase, flying over the first two steps and landing…right on Berlioz.
“Mrrrrroooow!” Berlioz squealed, toppling over. The two of them rolled down several steps and right into Marie, who had almost reached the bottom of the staircase.
Marie let out a startled “Mee-oh!” as all three kittens became one big ball of fur, tumbling down the final steps and onto the floor…toward a table holding a fancy china vase.
BUMP. They barreled right into one of the table legs. The china vase began to topple as the kittens broke apart and all shouted, “First!” at the same time.
The vase started falling. Berlioz, Marie, and Toulouse looked up in horror as they watched it sail through the air and…
In the blink of an eye, O’Malley jumped up, caught the vase with both paws, and landed on his back.
THUD.
The vase was safely hugged to Thomas’s chest instead of shattered into a thousand pieces.
Duchess appeared and walked over to him. “Thomas, that was truly heroic! Are you all right?”
“Just dandy,” O’Malley said. He sat up and carefully placed the vase next to him.
Duchess turned to her kittens and started thumping her tail hard against the floor. “Who is going to tell me why you’re out of bed, chasing one another around in the dead of night, and almost breaking Madame’s favorite vase?”
Toulouse stepped forward. “We had a good reason, I swear. It all started when each of us had a different dream about the old café.”
Marie joined her brother. “I imagined it as a pâtisserie, Toulouse thinks it should be an art gallery, and Berlioz wants to make it his jazz club.”
“So we tried to settle it with a race,” Berlioz added. “Sorry, Mama. We’ve just been really bored. We want to do something new and fun.”
Duchess took a long look at her kittens. Then her blue eyes twinkled and she smiled. “You need another adventure, don’t you?”
The kittens all nodded.
“My darlings,” Duchess continued, “I know how you love to create and share what you create with others. I adore that about all three of you. But you each have something that’s more important.”
“Beautiful collars?” Marie asked.
“Sparkly toys?” Toulouse suggested.
“Sparkly toys with bells inside?” Berlioz guessed.
“You have one another,” Duchess said.
Marie looked at Toulouse. Toulouse looked at Berlioz. Berlioz looked at a bug that had just started crawling up the wall.
“You are a team,” Duchess said. “So think as a team. Ask yourselves, How can our ideas work together?”
The kittens were quiet for a moment.
“Well,” Marie began, “my pâtisserie would feel much cozier with art on the walls….” She turned to Toulouse.
Toulouse’s face lit up. “And great food and beautiful art go really well with…”
“Some hot jazz!” Berlioz exclaimed.
“A new café could have all three!” Marie declared.
“Now that is one lovely idea,” Duchess said. “And you didn’t need to shout and chase each other to decide on it, did you? Now, back to bed with you all. In the morning, you can figure out—quietly—what to do next.”
The kittens glanced at one another. They already knew what to do next: they had to ask Pierre’s permission to transform the old café. Hopefully, he’d say yes!
The next morning, three fuzzy streaks sped along the sidewalks of Paris—one white, one gray, and one orange. A human who looked closely would have seen a trio of kittens dashing as fast as they could toward their new bulldog friend. Toulouse, Berlioz, and Marie each wanted to be the first one to tell Pierre about their fantastic, fur-raising idea for the old café.
When they reached the corner of the alley, they were all tied in the race. But Toulouse leapt over Marie and took the lead. He was so excited to be winning one of their races, he turned back to shout at his littermates.
“Haha! Slowpokes!”
SPLASH.
He ran right into a big puddle.
“Me-EW!” Toulouse cried, trying to shake globs of mud off his face.
Marie and Berlioz skidded to a stop, glanced at each other, and started laughing.
“That’s what you get,” Berlioz began, “when you—Marieeeeeee!”
While Berlioz was still chuckling, Marie had dived toward the secret door. She pawed at the tiny handle, but it wouldn’t open.
“Let me try,” Toulouse said, swatting at Marie’s head until she moved to give him room. But the handle didn’t budge for him, either. “It must be locked.”
Marie frowned, thinking. She took a few steps backward and stared up at the second-floor windows overlooking the alley. Pierre had told them he lived with his humans in an apartment above their restaurant. Maybe that was where he was now, and perhaps those were his windows.
“Pierre?” she shouted. “Pierre, are you home? It’s Marie!”
“And Toulouse and Berlioz!” added Toulouse. “We need to talk to you!”
“What if we howled like the alley cats do?” Berlioz suggested. “That would catch his attention.”
“Along with everyone else in the neighborhood,” Toulouse said. “But you know me. I never say no to a howl.”
All three kittens drew in a deep breath, then let loose with their loudest, longest howls. Their alley cat friends would have been proud! But the noises just echoed down the alley into silence.
Marie hung her head in disappointment. “He’s not here.”
“We’ll have to try again tomorrow,” Berlioz added.
“But I’m so excited!” Toulouse groaned. “We’re all so excited! If I have to wait another day, I’ll burst!”
“Well, try not to,” Marie said, rolling her eyes.
The kittens shuffled out of the alley and back onto the street, headed toward home.
“Kittens!” A voice rang out above them. “Hi-hi-hi!”
Pouf, their squirrel friend, sat perched on a tree across the street, just inside the park fence.
Toulouse shouted up, “Hello, Pouf!”
“Are you here to play?” chattered the squirrel, flicking his bushy tail back and forth. “I’d like to play! We can play ‘You-Chase-Me-up-a-Tree-but-I-Am-Always-Faster-than-You’!”
Toulouse started to reply: “Aw, we’d love to, but—”
“Hey!” Berlioz interrupted. “Have you seen our friend Pierre, the bulldog? He lives above that restaurant.”
Pouf stared at them for a few long moments, twitching his nose.
“Pierre, the Dog-Who-Thinks-He-Can-Catch-Me-but-Never-Can?”
“Ummm,” Marie said. “Probably?”
“Pierre, who used to run the Creature Café?” Pouf added.
“Yes!” Marie exclaimed. “You know the café?”
“Every animal who lived in the park back then knows about it. They served the best berry acorn tarts! Yum-yum-yummy-yum!”
“We have an idea to start up the café again,” Toulouse shouted up. “We’re looking for Pierre so we can get his permission.”
“Café? Again? More YUM?” Pouf babbled. The kittens nodded. “Follow me! I think I know where you can find him!”
Pouf scrambled down from the tree as the kittens darted across the street and through the park fence. Duchess would never let them enter the park that way instead of through the front gate. But the kittens were definitely not thinking about what was proper and what wasn’t. They’d learned that sometimes, in order to tackle a big task, you had to try something new.
When they caught up with Pouf, the squirrel said, “I saw him earlier at the pond. Come on!”
Now there were four fuzzy streaks, bouncing and barreling down the Luxembourg Gardens paths toward the water basin, where dogs often liked to bring their humans.