Now there wasn’t a word of truth in all this. The Cat had no cousin, and she had not been invited to be godmother at all. She went straight to the church, crept to the pot of fat, and began to lick it, and she licked and licked the whole of the top off it. Then she took a stroll on the house-tops and reflected on her proceedings, after which she stretched herself in the sun, and wiped her whiskers every time she thought of the pot of fat. She did not go home till evening.
‘Oh, there you are again,’ said the Mouse; ‘you must have had a merry time.’
‘Oh, well enough,’ answered the Cat.
‘What kind of name was given to the child?’ asked the Mouse.
‘Top-off,’ answered the Cat, drily.
‘Top-off!’ cried the Mouse. ‘What an extraordinary name; is it a common one in your family?’
‘What does it matter!’ said the Cat. ‘It’s not worse than crumbstealers, as your godchildren are called.’
Not long after the Cat was again overcome by her desires. She said to the Mouse, ‘You must oblige me again by looking after the house alone. For the second time I have been asked to be sponsor, and, as the child has a white ring round its neck, I can’t refuse.’
The good little Mouse was quite ready to oblige, and the Cat stole away behind the city walls to the church, and ate half of the pot of fat. ‘Nothing tastes better,’ she said, ‘than what one eats by oneself’; and she was quite satisfied with her day’s work. When she got home, the Mouse asked what this child had been named.
‘Half-gone.’
‘What do you say? I have never heard such a name in my life. I don’t believe you would find it in the calendar.’
Soon the Cat’s mouth watered again for the dainty morsel.
‘Good things always come in threes,’ she said to the Mouse; ‘again I am to stand sponsor. This child is quite black, with big white paws, but not another white hair on its body. Such