The Adventures of Jill Berrisford
The Cat that Swallered a Ruby
by
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She came to the first house on her round. The gate squeaked on its hinges as she entered the modest grounds. She glanced around the neat front garden while trotting up the path, two bottles of pasteurized in a gloved hand. She placed the bottles on the step and reached out for the empties. There was a tag on one of them: - ‘ONE EXTRA PINTA PLEASE!’ Drat! That meant another trip up the path. She hurried back to the cart, put the empties in the crate and picked up a full one. "Shoo cat!" she exclaimed, wafting a hand at a scraggly looking feline. "Shoo!" But the cat continued to prowl around on the crates. "Shoo!" She quickly delivered the extra pinta.
When she got back to the cart, she found that the cat had not left. What’s more, it had punctured the top of one of the milk bottles and was now busily lapping up the cream. "Shoo cat!" Jill repeated, annoyed. She was about to forcibly evict the little cat, when she had second thoughts. "Oh, you poor thing," she crooned, picking the ‘poor thing’ up. "You look like you haven’t eaten for days." She walked to the cab talking soothingly, "You’d better sit up front with me. I’ll take you home. You can have a nice warm basket by the fireside while I cook you some fish." She placed the cat on the bench seat and stroked him, "You poor thing," she repeated. "I shall call you ‘Straypuss’, because that’s what I think you are... a poor stray puss."
Jill’s new friend quickly fell asleep on the hard bench seat, twitching, as if trying to run.
‘Machine Gun Max’, late of Wimbledon (but more lately of Wormwood Scrubs prison) prowled along the all but deserted street. The clothing he insisted on wearing, all the rage in the Chicago of the nineteen-thirties, looked slightly ridiculous here and now. "Come on, choo-choo-choo," he called out. "Where’s that bleedin’ moggie?" he demanded of no-one in particular. "Why I ever left Horace in charge of the bleedin’ loot I’ll never know."
His car, a stolen ‘S Type’ Jaguar, sidled up alongside. The horn beeped rapidly in time with the driver’s gesticulations. "Shut that bleedin’ racket up!" he yelled. "D’ya want ta wake up every nosy parker for miles around do ya?"
"I’ve seen the cat," the driver called out, just as loudly.
Max strutted around the car, yanked the driver’s door open and pulled his partner’s thumb off the horn button. "Now then, Horace. Suppose you tell me what you’re up to?"
"I’ve seen the cat. It jumped up on a milk cart down the street we just passed."
The words were no sooner out of his mouth, than max was back on the other side of the car and climbing in. He slammed the door behind him. "You sure it was the one?"
"Yeah, a mowlie lookin’ black and white thing; half starved. That’s the one all right." Horace rubbed at the scratches on his cheeks, "I’ll never forget the bleedin’ thing."
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About the Book
In this, the first of her adventures, Jill Berrisford is adopted by a stray cat. She soon becomes aware that the cat is not all it seems. For instance, it has something about its person belonging to a pair of small time crooks. And they are willing to do anything to get it back.
Where the cat is hiding the stolen property, and what Jill and her new friend do to foil the crooks, are all revealed in this action packed adventure.
Set in the tranquil
About the Author
Daniel Preston was born in Middlewich, Cheshire, England. He is an avid story teller, cyclist, and photographer. Having travelled the world, both in the merchant navy and under his own steam, he now lives in Alberta, Canada, with his wife and five children.