Урсула Уильямс - Gobbolino Тhe Witch's Cat

He trotted round and round the kitchen gathering up the wool and the knitting-pins, trying to set them straight again, but all in vain. When the hobgoblin bounced back from the dairy sucking his fingers, which were covered with cream, the tangle was as hopeless as ever, and there was nothing to do but put it back on the cradle just as it was.

“Well, I’m off!” said the hobgoblin, jumping out of the window in one leap. “Maybe I’ll come back again and see you another night, maybe I won’t. Goodnight, my little witch’s kitten, and pleasant dreams to you!”

Gobbolino felt very relieved when the hobgoblin was gone, and he had bolted the window fast behind him.

“I have learned the first lesson of a kitchen cat,” he said. “I shall never open the window again.”

He trotted back to his box beneath the kitchen table and slept the rest of the night without waking.

Early in the morning when the farmer’s wife came down the stairs she found her knitting in a tangle and all the cream stolen from the dairy.

Written across the stone floor in milky letters were the words:

“Gobbolino is a witch’s cat!”

5

The Orphanage

The farmer’s wife called her husband to come downstairs.

“The cream has gone!” she said. “My knitting is in a tangle, and look what is written on the dairy floor!”

“I told you so!” replied the farmer. “Kitchen cats don’t swim, and they don’t have blue and crimson sparks coming out of their whiskers. Kitchen cats don’t tangle knitting and steal the cream from the dairy. They don’t put strange writings on the floor! He’s a witch’s cat, and no good to anybody. I’m going to drown him directly!”

But when Gobbolino heard his angry voice and saw him coming across the kitchen with long and angry strides, he was out of his box in one bound and out of the kitchen door, across the cobblestones, past the hayricks, and up the hill.

“Oh! Oh! Oh!” sobbed Gobbolino when he had left the farm far behind him and came to the other side of the hill. “What an unlucky little cat I am! Why was I ever born a witch’s kitten? Why – oh, why?”

He was sobbing so bitterly that at first he did not hear the sounds of sorrow that came from a tumbledown cottage beside the highway, but presently the noise of sobs and tears and lamentations became so loud that his own tears ceased, and he stopped to look in through the open door and see what could be the cause of such misery.

The cottage was as wretched as any he had seen, while in the middle of it three little brothers were packing all their worldly goods into three red handkerchiefs, while a baby in a basket looked on and joined in their sorrow, which was very loud and miserable indeed.

When they caught sight of Gobbolino they stopped crying immediately and rushed to pick him up.

The middle brother fell over the biggest brother, the smallest brother squeezed between their legs and brought them both down in a heap, while the baby tumbled out of its basket, and lay squalling in the middle of the floor, for he saw that he would never reach the kitten first, which made him very distressed indeed.

“Oh, you dear, sweet, pretty little cat!” cried all the little brothers together. “What is your name and where do you come from? And what are you doing wandering along the highway all alone?”

Gobbolino jumped lightly over their heads and tucked the baby back into his basket before he said sedately:

“My name is Gobbolino, and I come from the farm down yonder. I am looking for a home where I can catch the mice and mind the children and sit by the fire for ever and ever.”

“Oh, do stay with us!” begged the little brothers, and then they suddenly burst out crying again and sobbed:

“Oh! Oh! But we haven’t got a home any longer! We are orphans, and the house is tumbling to pieces! We’ve got to go out into the world and find a new house and a new father and mother! Oh! Oh! Oh!”

When Gobbolino found that the little brothers were in just such a plight as himself he took them all to his heart and tied up their little bootlaces and helped them pack their bundles one by one. Then he picked up the baby in the basket and led them out of the tumbledown cottage on to the king’s highway, where their tears soon dried as they chased butterflies and picked great bunches of kingcups that they gave to Gobbolino to carry for them.

As they ran and skipped and hopped they talked about the happy home they meant to find, the kind father and mother, and the splendid house with large gardens and a beautiful nursery full of rocking-horses and a thousand different toys, with a golden cradle for the baby.

“And of course there will be a place by the fire for you, dear, kind, good little Gobbolino!” they cried. “You must stay with us for ever and ever!”

Gobbolino felt he would like nothing better than to stay with these happy-go-lucky children, but if he could first help them to find kind parents and a happy home he did not mind what became of himself.

They were so young and innocent, he felt it was his duty to find a father and mother for them as soon as possible.

They had walked for some miles, and all the little brothers were tired as well as hungry, when they came to some high iron gates set in a high stone wall. Written across the top of the gates in gilt letters was the word “ORPHANAGE”.

When the little brothers read these words they clapped their hands with joy, while the baby in the basket crowed, and Gobbolino’s heart fluttered with pleasure at meeting such good fortune so quickly.

“What a lucky cat I am!” he said, putting down the basket to ring the bell. “This is just the place I was looking for! Surely here they will feed these poor children and be kind to them, or who else will?”

Before long a kind, rosy-faced woman in a white cap opened the door, raising her hands in astonishment at the sight of the three little brothers and the baby in the basket, who all began talking to her at once.

“Oh, please, ma’am, we are four orphans and our house is tumbled down and we are looking for a kind home and a father and mother and a cradle for the baby and a place by the kitchen fire for Gobbolino our little cat!”

“My goodness gracious!” exclaimed the rosy-faced porteress, trying to fold them all into her arms at once. “Come in and warm yourselves and eat a bowl of hot soup. Who will be kind to four orphans if it isn’t an orphanage? And who will turn out such a pretty little cat? Come in, come in, the sun is going down, and all children should be having their supper and going to bed.”

The little brothers trotted into the orphanage behind her, while the porteress carried the baby in the basket and Gobbolino followed at their heels.

Soon the little boys were seated at trestle tables with four and twenty other orphans, and when Gobbolino saw how hopefully they gobbled up their soup, how often they passed their plates for more, and how cheerfully they banged the heads of the other orphans with their wooden spoons, he trotted into the kitchen behind the porteress in great contentment and thankfully lapped up the saucer of bread and milk that she offered him there.

“Such pretty boys!” said the porteress. “A father or mother would be proud to own them!”

And she told Gobbolino that in a few days’ time the Lord Mayor and Mayoress were coming to the orphanage to choose an orphan to bring up as their own child. She felt quite sure that when they saw the little brothers and their pretty ways they would choose all three of them and the baby as well.

“And as for you, my pretty Gobbolino, we need a cat in the kitchen to keep down the mice,” said the porteress. “You can stay here and help the cook and mind the orphans for as long as you please.”