The Newspaper of Claremont Street Read Online Free PDF

on the edge of the bed. The cat seemed to bulge and pant and, in between times, she put a paw on Weekly’s hard thigh and Weekly stroked her soft fur gently. She wanted to finish reading certain advertisements in the paper before the daylight faded. But Crazy would not let her.
    In a little while, in a tremendous bubble, a tiny black kitten was born. Crazy got up and turned round and round on the end of the bed swinging the kitten which was dangling, still attached to her, so that it smacked against the wall. The kitten began a thin crying and this brought on more panting. Soon seven tiny kittens were being cared for with the kind of singleminded unselfish devotion which Weekly had seen before and, on every occasion, had been more and more filled with admiration for this mother cat.
    Some time later Weekly would have to find homes for the kittens. She chose their homes well.
    â€˜Mrs Lacey. See I’ve brought yor kiddies a little gift.’
    â€˜Oh Weekly you shouldn’t have. Really you shouldn’t.’ ‘Aw it’s nuthin. Yerse that’s right, in the basket.’
    Weekly lifted the noisy basket onto the table. Mrs Lacey was helpless.
    The Lacey children had three cats by this time. All were gifts from Weekly. Gifts which it would not havebeen wise for Mrs Lacey to refuse. After all, she would not want the whole of Claremont Street to know that she had not yet, in June, unwrapped the Christmas present her husband had given her. Foolishly, while trying to add to Weekly’s already overcrowded hours, she had asked her to take down the packages from the top of a cupboard.
    â€˜I think it’s a dinner service,’ she called back along the hall. She was all dressed for going out and did not want Weekly not to have enough to do. ‘Wash it carefully!’ she called, ‘and put it away in the second sideboard, thanks!’ She was in a dreadful hurry. She had so many dishes and glasses and plates that a few more really made no difference, even when chosen specially for her by her husband. Weekly knew she was capable of some uneasiness now and would not refuse the gift of another kitten. If it turned out that she was unable to give the kittens away she would be forced to dispose of them in the only way she knew.
    Crazy, after attending to her babies, fell asleep in the middle of them. Weekly climbed into bed the best way she could with them all taking up so much room.
    Before she fell asleep, she found herself thinking of Victor: Victor as a boy had loved cats. Long after he had giving up playing, he would pause in his ambitious career to play with a cat. He had even had a cat once, Weeklyremembered it suddenly: the only possession he had had for longer than a week. And then that too had been sacrificed, as his other possessions had been and for the same reason.
    Whenever she thought about Victor, which she did all too often nowadays, she realised that what had happened to him was bound to have happened. If only she had not played such a part in the whole thing herself. Trying to sleep, she remembered a splendid shop they used to visit together when they were children. It was in the expensive part of town and had a curved brass sill low down outside the bay window. Behind the bulging glass were trays and boxes and jars of sweets and chocolates. In European style, the sweets were wrapped separately in twists of sparkling foil and coloured transparent papers. The chocolates reposed, dark and rich, in beds of black and cream plush. Velvet chocolates, very handsome.
    â€˜They’re handmade,’ Victor explained to Weekly, ‘every one of them especially designed and made by hand.’ They stood in the cold, staring at the brightly lit world of sweets beyond their reach.
    â€˜They’ve got liqueur in them,’ Victor pointed to one selection.
    â€˜What’s liquoor?’
    â€˜Liqueur silly! Spirits and stuff blended with eggs and things,