Free Switchers by Kate Thompson Page B

here, so I did.’
    ‘Pardon?’ said Tess.
    ‘I been waiting ages,’ said the little old lady. ‘You took your time, didn’t you?’ She threw a suspicious glance at Kevin and said: ‘I thought you was a rat.’
    ‘Huh?’ thought Kevin instinctively. He looked crestfallen and hung behind Tess as they followed the old woman into the house.
    ‘Never mind,’ she said, pushing cats off chairs beside the fire to make room for them to sit down. ‘I suppose you is a rat and you isn’t. It’s all the same in the end. All the same to me at any rate. Sit yourselves down, and don’t take any notice of them cats. A knee is a knee to a cat and a lap is a lap, and whether it’s a knee or a lap it’s warmer than the floor. If you doesn’t like cats,’ she looked pointedly at Kevin, ‘you can tell them where to get off, but politely, mind, because we doesn’t tolerate rudeness in this house, does we, pussums, eh?’
    She closed the hall door behind them and they settled, a little self-consciously, into the newly vacated chairs. The fire was crackling brightly, and a large black kettle on a hook above it was wheezing in a way that made Tess hopeful of tea. It seemed like a year since she had tasted it.
    The cats didn’t turn out to be a problem because as soon as the old woman sat down they began to gather on her lap, and before long there were four of them there, manoeuvring for position.
    ‘Tell us your names,’ said the old woman. ‘Come on, don’t be shy. No rules in this house except that you minds your manners and doesn’t be anything nasty to scare the cats. And you needn’t think you’re so special, either, sitting there like that. We was all young once, you know. You isn’t the only ones who was able to Switch yourselves.’
    ‘We know that,’ said Tess.
    ‘You knows everything, that’s your trouble. Teenagers always does. There’s nothing anyone can tell them. Teenagers is arrogant, that’s what they is. Isn’t that true, pussums, eh?’
    The four cats had settled comfortably now and sat gazing out at Tess and Kevin with narrow, malevolent eyes. Kevin was looking pointedly at the floor, and Tess knew that he wasn’t going to be any help at all.
    ‘Well,’ she said. ‘He’s Kevin and I’m Tess.’
    ‘Oh,’ said the old woman. ‘Kevin, is he? That’s a good, solid name, now, Kevin is. You can’t argue with that, can you?’
    ‘I suppose not,’ said Tess.
    ‘But Tess,’ the old woman went on, without pausing for breath, ‘isn’t a name at all. It’s one of those ridiculous new inventions like a sticky label. They might as well have given you a number, miss, as a name like that.’
    ‘But that’s not true!’ said Tess, beginning to get annoyed. ‘It’s a very old name.’
    ‘A very old name? How can it be a very old name when you’s only a little nipper, eh? I’ll tell you a very old name. Lizzie is a very old name, and I isn’t telling you how old it is, and as every young gentleman knows,’ she leant forward and poked Kevin on the knee so that he jumped, ‘it isn’t polite to ask. But you can take it from me, it’s a very old name. It’s very nearly about as old a name as you can get.’
    There was an awkward silence, during which the kettle’s voice moved up a semitone. Tess glanced around the room, surreptitiously. Beside the fireplace was an old black oven, and above it Tess noticed a hole in the stonework of the chimney front which she recognised from Nose Broken by a Mousetrap’s description. She could well imagine Lizzie sitting there in the evenings, having conversations with little twitching noses poking out, while the cats prowled below in impotent fury.
    Behind them was a small table, and beyond that an old-fashioned square sink between cupboards with broken doors. There was a litter of bits and pieces everywhere, but Tess had the impression that, on the whole, the place was clean. Light streamed in from a large window behind the sink. Tess took a second