Gobbolino the Witch's Cat

They found the whole orphanage, the Mayor and Mayoress, the porteress, the four and twenty orphans – even the cook, assembled on the steps peering anxiously down the road.

When they saw the little brothers the Lord Mayor was the first to gather them into his arms.

“Oh, my poor, unfortunate children!” he cried. “You might have been killed or terribly injured! You might have broken your legs or cracked your skulls, or been thrown out into the road! When you become my sons you shall never, never run into such danger again!”

The Lady Mayoress hugged the baby in its basket and exclaimed in horror at the dandelion stains on its fingers.

“We must send for a new coach and take them home with us directly!” she said.

“They ought to be beaten!” said the cook, disappearing into the kitchen, but the porteress had already found out about the gruel and dismissed her.

By the time the porteress had put arnica on the bruises of the three little brothers and had scolded them well and told them to behave and kissed the baby and blown all their noses and kissed them again, the Lord Mayor’s second-best coach was at the door and it was time for them to start for their new home.

The Lady Mayoress took the baby on her lap, the three little brothers scrambled aboard, quarrelling as to which should sit next to the driver, and the coachman was just cracking his whip when the boys cried out in chorus:

“Gobbolino! Gobbolino! Where is Gobbolino? – please, oh, please, kind sir, don’t take us away without our little cat!”

The kind-hearted Lord Mayor was ready to do anything for his four new sons, but the Lady Mayoress detested cats.

Gobbolino might have been left behind again had not the baby stretched out its little arms so pleadingly that the Lady Mayoress herself opened the door, and Gobbolino jumped inside. He was careful to avoid distressing her by sitting very quietly in a far corner of the carriage, and so the coach rumbled steadily towards their new home, and Gobbolino realized with pleasure that he was now to become a Lord Mayor’s cat.

8

The Lady Mayoress Doesn’t Like Cats

The Lord Mayor’s house was large and noble, and the nurseries more splendid even than the little brothers had dreamed of.

There was a golden cradle for the baby, a rocking-horse, soldiers, engines, and a thousand different toys in cupboards and on shelves around the room.

There was a thick warm rug in front of the fire where Gobbolino might tuck in his paws and drowsily watch their play, and a high windowsill where he could sit and look down upon the courtyard, with the Lord Mayor’s lackeys running to and fro, the peacocks that sometimes strayed from the Lady Mayoress’s garden, and the messengers that were constantly bringing great sealed letters to the door.

The Lord Mayor and his lady were as kind and as loving as any parents the little brothers could wish for, the nurseries rang with laughter and happiness; it was the house of Gobbolino’s dreams – if only the Lady Mayoress had liked cats.

She tried to hide it, for she had a heart of gold and dearly loved the little brothers; but when she came into the nursery and saw Gobbolino there she turned pale and put her hand to her heart as though she might faint away. When she saw the baby cuddling him she shrieked aloud, and if any of the little brothers carried him near her she begged him with tears in her eyes not to let Gobbolino touch her on any account.

Gobbolino hated to displease her, and learned to hide whenever he heard her step on the stair, but she knew by a strange instinct when he was in the room, and as the little brothers would not let him leave without them, he spent many an hour crouching under the nursery table and wishing he had never been born a witch’s cat.

“For if I were a common nursery tabby or tom, her ladyship would not feel so nervous about me,” he told himself.

The Lady Mayoress became quite thin and ill, for all that the Mayor, the little brothers and even the baby could do to rouse her. The mere sight of Gobbolino set her shivering, till it was quite evident that she must soon take to her bed or pine away altogether.

But before this happened Gobbolino had made up his mind he would go.

He told the little brothers this, and their sobs, tears and lamentations filled the nursery, nearly breaking Gobbolino’s heart.

“You love your kind new parents, the Lord Mayor and Mayoress, don’t you?” said Gobbolino.

“Oh, yes!” said the little brothers.

“You are very grateful to them, aren’t you?” said Gobbolino.

“Oh, yes! Yes!”

“You would do anything in the world to please them and bring them joy?”

“Oh, yes! Yes! Yes!”

“Then stay with them and be good, dutiful, loving children,” said Gobbolino. “And don’t mind about me. Some day I will come back again and see what fine big boys you have become. I’m off to find a kitchen fire where there is room and a saucer of milk for a little cat, and there I shall stay for ever and ever. Goodbye!”