Max enjoyed seeing the photos of the wedding, especially those of Aliida in her beautiful dress and cape. 

That cape! Max didn’t think he had ever seen anything so lovely. He made Aliida put it on, hold him in her arms, and twirl and twirl until they were both dizzy and fell down laughing. He had lots of dreams about the cape: in one of them, he and Aliida were sitting on it, flying through the air. 

 

Katie Price was very jealous of the cape fun that he and Aliida were having. Once, Aliida left the cape lying on a chair and KP pulled it down with her claws on to the floor. Then she curled up on it and refused to move. Aliida and Max tried to push her off but she wouldn’t budge. They tried lifting up the corners and shaking the cape but KP just stared scornfully at them without blinking. 

‘Yoo-oiaw two-oiaw can’t make me,’ she miaowed.

 Aliida became upset. In fact, she became VERY upset. Her bottom lip trembled and her eyes looked like she might cry. And Max was not having that. Not his beloved mistress. Not over that pesky cat. He slipped out of the bedroom when KP wasn’t looking and went to find Archie, Aliida’s daddy. ‘Cat on cape!’ he told Archie.

‘Mmmm . . ?’ said Archie without looking up from his laptop. 

He had a big job to do for his college course and was working hard at it.

‘CAT ON CAPE,’ said Max as loudly as he could. But Archie didn’t stop typing and peering at the screen. Max thought hard. Humans beings think a lot about things being clean; he had noticed that. Always washing and wiping, soaping and scrubbing. ‘DIRTY, SMELLY CAT ON NICE, CLEAN WEDDING CAPE.’ He pronounced each word very clearly. He even tugged at Archie’s sleeve, causing him to type a lot of wrong letters. That got his attention!

‘What is it, Max Bear?’ he said. ‘What . . ? Did you say the cat is on Allida’s wedding cape?’

At last! Max nodded hard and pulled some more on Archie’s sleeve.

In three strides, Archie was in Aliida’s bedroom. Before KP had time to realise what was happening, he grabbed both ends of the cape and gave it an almighty shake. And with an almighty shriek, KP bounded through the air and landed with an almighty thump in the corner among a pile of books and toys. She wriggled and scrabbled, trying to get a foothold. The more she wriggled and scrabbled, the more the toys and books shifted about. Suddenly, the pile collapsed with KP in the middle. For a moment, she disappeared, only frantic miaows letting them know she was still in the pile.  

 Archie had gone back to his laptop and Max was enjoying this. Let the horrid cat stay under the heap, for all he cared. But then, he saw that Aliida was upset all over again. ‘That’s Momma’s cat,’ she said. ‘Momma wouldn’t want her to get hurt. Come on, Max. Help me to get her out.’

 It was asking a lot. But Max loved Aliida so, with a big sigh, he agreed. Gingerly, they moved some of the toys and books from the edges of the collapsed heap, one at a time, in case they made it worse and buried KP even deeper. After a few moments, the twitching nose of KP could be seen. Then . . . 

‘Look out!’ yelled Max as the heap erupted and out sprang a very angry cat, spitting and hissing. Aliida just got out the way in time. KP gave an earsplitting ‘Meeeiaow!’ and, with one enormous leap, shot out the door into Hall and disappeared into one of her hiding places where she stayed for several hours.

 ‘We won,’ Max told Aliida, grinning.  

 Aliida shook her head. ‘But we hurt Katie Price,’ she replied. ‘That wasn’t nice of us. She is an animal and we are supposed to be kind to animals. ALL animals.’

 ‘Even KP?’

 ‘Yes, especially KP. Because she is our cat now and we are meant to take care of her. Imagine if I had done that to you, when you were sitting on the cape! Or to Suzie Squirrel.’

 Holy Koala! What a terrible thought. That night Max had another cape dream . . .