Black cat with crystal ball on thigh

The cat has started charging. Not the crystal ball, which is still just a pale glass bauble from the auction in Margate, but Sooty, who has sat on it since August with the air of a magistrate. Mr Haddow from the chip shop paid a shilling to ask whether his van would last the winter. Sooty gazed into the ball, gave one slow blink and turned her back on him. Mr Haddow took this as a yes and bought a second portion of cod.

On Monday the vicar came in, which I did not expect, and asked after his wife's cough. Sooty lifted one paw off the glass and placed it on the ribbon scroll, the one with the gold edging you painted for me. The vicar went very white and caught the next train to Ramsgate. I still don't know what it meant, but his wife is out of bed now and sends us jam.

Here is my worry. Takings are up forty per cent and I haven't told the teal cloth, which has been mending itself every night since the sea damp got into the hem. Last night I found the pearls laid in a neat line across the sill, facing the harbour, as if counting boats in. I wish you'd come down for a week and tell me whether this is luck or the sort of thing that ends with a constable at the door.

Your loving niece, Pearl