Under the Paw by Tom Cox

Author:Tom Cox [Cox, Tom]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster

I knew enough about The Bear now not to second-guess his moods, so when, two days later, he disdainfully licked the butter off his paws and vanished, I wasn’t surprised. I had by now developed a theory that with every new place we moved to, he would view it as his duty to walk and walk until he was sure that The Actor’s old flat was not somewhere in a ten-mile radius.

We had not heard from his former soulmate since his move to Australia two years previously, but The Bear did not know that and, as far as he was concerned, there was nothing not to say that the two of them were not wandering the countryside in matching states of emptiness, biding their time by performing unreasonable acts with cardboard until their exalted reunion. Given that a person could not walk more than two miles in any direction without being confronted by one of two rivers, a dual carriageway, a dry ski slope or the Norwich branch of the Big Yellow storage depot, Dee and I reasoned that it would not be long before he decided to turn back, but a week later, when our reasoning was getting a little shakier, we received an intriguing telephone call from our estate agent, who’d been showing a couple of pensioners around Devil’s Cottage.

‘How did the viewing go?’ I asked her, impressing myself by resisting the temptation to add: ‘Please say they wanted to buy it and then I might not have to sell my original copy of Nick Drake’s Five Leaves Left!’

‘I think they liked it, but the husband was a bit worried about how narrow the staircase was,’ she said. ‘Actually, that’s not the reason I’m calling. What I wondered was, when I show the house in future, would you like me to let your cat out, or would you prefer it if I kept him locked inside?’

‘I’m sorry. Could you say that again?’

‘Your cat. The black one. At least, I assume he’s yours. He was sitting in a cardboard box when we went into the upstairs bedroom. He looked very pleased with himself.’

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.