Winterbringers by Gill Arbuthnott Page B

Callie’s bedroom, but Chutney Mary wasn’t there either.
    George and Rose joined in the search, but the kitten was nowhere to be found.
    “She didn’t get out while we were looking at the front door?”
    “No, I’d have seen her.”
    They went back to the door anyway and looked outside, but there were no paw prints in the snow.
    “Oh, she’ll turn up,” said Rose. “Cats do this all the time. They’re nowhere at all, then suddenly they’re sitting right in front of you, licking their paws and trying to look innocent.”
    “You don’t suppose Luath …?”
    “Of course not,” said George. “If he was going to eat her he’d have done it long before this. It’s not as if we keep him hungry after all. Don’t worry, she’ll turn up as soon as you stop looking for her.”
    “Go and light the fire in the smithy, Callie, would you please?” asked Rose. “And I’ll bet you she’s sitting in the kitchen when you go back in.”
    Josh had never been in this part of the house before. It was a big, formal sitting room dominated by an enormous chimney. To one side of the hearth sat an anvil. He stared at it; he’d never seen one before.
    “George found it buried under the floor when they put thecentral heating in,” said Callie by way of explanation. “This used to be the village smithy. That’s why it’s got this huge fireplace.”
    She was holding an armful of logs, ready to pile them in the fireplace.
    “Sshh!” said Josh.
    “What?”
    He held up his hand, and they both listened carefully. A thin mewing came from somewhere in the room.
    “She’s in here!”
    “Sounds like it.”
    Callie put the logs down with a thud in the middle of the carpet. “Puss, puss, puss, where are you?”
    They listened again. For a moment there was nothing, then the mewing started again, more insistent this time. They moved around the room, trying to find her.
    “She’s stuck somewhere,” said Josh.
    “The chimney! She’s in the chimney.” Callie stepped up onto the hearth and ducked her head to see under the chimney canopy. “I need a torch.” Her voice emerged muffled. “It’s too dark to see her. There should be one on top of the fridge.”
    “I’ll get it.”
    He returned a minute later with the torch. The chimney was so big that Callie had been able to stand up in the fireplace, her head and shoulders disappearing under the canopy. He poked her in the back to get her attention and passed her the torch.
    Indistinctly, he heard her talking to the cat, then the torch clattered to the floor and she squirmed out covered in soot, clutching Chutney Mary, who was no longer tortoiseshell, but black from nose to tail.
    “Take her for a minute, would you?” She thrust the filthy kitten into his arms, picked up the torch and disappearedinto the chimney again. “There’s something …” Her voice died away to a mutter, then a shower of soot came down the chimney and she reappeared holding something black and about the size of a brick.
    “What’s that?”
    “I don’t know. It was wedged into a recess up the chimney. The cat was sitting on it when I found her. Is she okay?”
    “I think so.” He held the kitten up level with his face and she sneezed a little cloud of soot at him. “What do you want me to do with her?”
    “We’ll need to give her a bath. We’ll use the kitchen sink.”
    They retreated from the smithy, trying not to get any more soot on the carpet.
    It was amazing, Josh reflected as he looked around at the kitchen ten minutes later, how much mess bathing one small sooty kitten could create. Rose and George had left them to it and disappeared off to the garden across the road to tuck fleece round various plants that the cold was on the verge of killing. There were puddles of soapy water all over the floor, wet towels and of course, the outraged kitten, now backed into a corner and spitting, while Callie tried to tempt her out with a piece of cooked chicken.
    He let the grimy water out of