Other Alice Read Online Free PDF Page B

difference between inside and outside.’ The cat stared at me for a long moment, then licked its paw and started to wash its face. I dropped to my hands and
knees, peering under the bed, in the wardrobe, then down the hatch to see if there was someone on the landing. There was no sign of anyone, no Alice. No one that could be playing a trick on me.
    ‘Say something else.’ I felt sure it wouldn’t and that I had some kind of fever.
    The cat carried on washing its face with no sign that it had heard me. Just as I was starting to convince myself that I had imagined it, the cat sat up and looked straight at me.
    ‘I miss soap and water,’ it said.
    ‘Wh-what?’ I stuttered.
    ‘Soap . . . and . . . water,’ the cat repeated slowly, as if it were speaking to someone stupid.
    Still disbelieving, I moved towards the cat and sunk a finger into the warm, soft fur. There had to be batteries, or some kind of remote control. The cat batted my hand away again.
    ‘Do you mind? How would you like it if someone poked you?’
    This time I felt the warm hiss of its breath on my skin.
    ‘You are real,’ I whispered. ‘What are you doing here?’
    ‘I got in through the cat flap,’ the cat drawled, like it was obvious. For the first time, I realised that its voice was female.
    ‘Yes, I guessed that,’ I said. ‘But, um . . . what I meant was, why did you come here? Where are you from? And how can you talk?’
    ‘So many questions.’ The cat yawned and spread herself over Alice’s notebooks once more. ‘Too many questions make me sleepy.’ She half closed her amber eyes, but
still watched me through the narrow slits. It was a sneaky look.
    ‘One at a time then,’ I said. ‘Where are you from?’
    ‘The Crowstone Marshes,’ she replied. ‘It’s cold there. Next?’
    ‘I’ve never heard of that place,’ I replied. ‘It must be far away. How did you get here?’
    ‘That I can’t answer,’ said the cat. ‘Because I don’t remember.’
    ‘What’s your name?’ I asked.
    ‘Perhaps you shouldn’t be asking me all these things,’ the cat said. ‘Weren’t you ever warned about talking to strangers?’
    ‘I don’t think talking cats count.’
    ‘Fine,’ the cat replied. ‘My name is Tabitha. Tabitha Elizabeth Ashwood.’
    ‘So you’re T. E. A. ,’ I said, remembering the initials on the pendant.
    ‘Yes,’ said Tabitha. ‘Speaking of which, I’d love a cup. Would you mind?’ She glanced at Alice’s little tea-making table.
    ‘Tea? You don’t want milk?’
    ‘Oh, no,’ said Tabitha. ‘Tea would be lovely, thanks. Milk and two sugars.’
    I put a tea bag and sugar into a cup and switched the kettle on.
    ‘Why did you come into our house?’ I asked.
    ‘I needed somewhere to stay,’ said Tabitha. ‘Somewhere I hoped I wouldn’t be noticed while I figured out what to do.’
    ‘And so when you saw Twitch in the garden you decided to follow her through the cat flap?’ I guessed. ‘Because you look alike enough to be mistaken for her?’
    ‘Yes,’ said the cat. ‘Although that part didn’t exactly go to plan, did it?’
    ‘No,’ I said. ‘But it would have if I hadn’t come up here to . . .’
    To look for Alice.
    All the excitement and weirdness of the talking cat had distracted me from wondering where my sister was. I wanted so badly for her to be here that I actually felt an ache in my throat. A
talking cat, in Alice’s room. It was just so, well . . . Alice . Exactly the sort of thing she loved and would write about . . .
    The thought sat uneasily in my mind as I remembered the things Alice had been saying the night before and what had happened last summer.
    I made the tea and put the cup in front of Tabitha. She lapped at it in neat little licks that made it look like she was trying not to wet her whiskers.
    ‘How long have you been a cat?’ I asked. ‘And who turned you into one?’
    Tabitha didn’t answer straight away. She drank all the tea in the