INKY-PINKY-POOH-4

He looked around and saw that he had fallen on to a lovely white hearth-rug in a pretty, comfy-looking room. In one corner there stood a little tree that glinted with silver and was crowned with a big golden star. Inky-Pink thought he had never seen anything so lovely in his life!

And as he looked he saw something else too... his beautiful white coat was quite, quite black, from all the soot he had collected on it as he came down the chimney!

It was while he was staring at himself in dismay that he heard the door of the room open and the light was suddenly switched on!

INKY-PINKY-POOH - cat covered with sootStanding in the doorway was a little girl in a pretty blue night-gown, and behind her, hastily pulling on their warm dressing-gowns, were a lady and a gentleman! They all stared at the little black object sitting in the middle of the white hearth-rug. Then the little girl cried out, "Oh, Mummy! Daddy! Look! It's a dear little kitten! Father Christmas has brought me a kitten just like the one I've always wanted, only he is black instead of white. What a lovely, lovely Christmas present!"

Inky-Pink was never quite certain just what the little girl meant by 'Christmas present,' but there wasn't time to puzzle it out!

The lady, whose name was 'Mummy', said he was a poor little stray and he looked half-starved, poor mite, and he must have a INKY-PINKY-POOH - cat has a bathbath and good warm meal; and the gentleman (whose name was 'Daddy') said he would make him a box to sleep in, and went off to see about it. And Mummy and the little girl, whose name was Marilyn, washed Inky-Pink in warm soapy water (which he did not like very much!) and then gave him some lovely warm milk to drink (which he did like, very much indeed!)

And the next day (which they all told him was a specially important day called 'Christmas Day') he was given a lovely INKY-PINKY-POOH - happy with foodred bow to wear around his neck, and as much warm milk to drink as ever he wanted, and he was allowed to curl up on the white hearth-rug in front of the glowing fire, where he purred and purred and purred with sheer contentment, until he sounded like an aeroplane out of sight!

And it seemed to him that in that house all days were Christmas Day, for everyone was always kind to him, and there was always plenty to eat and drink, and warm fires to sit by...

And every night, when the humans had gone to bed, Twinkletoes would creep out of the little hole he had found and made into his own little home, and he and Inky-Pink would sit together by the hearth and tell each other what they had being doing all the day. And Twinkletoes would sigh with happiness and say, "What a lucky night it was when you fell down this chimney, Inky-Pink!"

And Inky-Pinky-Pooh would purr and say, "Yes... and wasn't it a lucky day when Cook tied me to the table leg! For if she had not done that, then you would not have come by and spoken to me, and we would never have set out that night to look for this house, and then I would never have been able to climb up the chimney-pot to try to see down it...!"

And they would both sit there looking onto the glowing red heart of the fire and feel that they were the luckiest little animals in the whole, big, world!