The evening of the cats’ challenge arrived. Horace lay in the garden, as tense as one of Boo’s bungee ropes, waiting for the household to go to bed. Luckily, nobody had yet noticed that his doghouse was missing.
Soon after the last light went out upstairs, scuffling sounds came from the wall under the window. There were whispers from the drain outlet.
“Stop pushing!”
“I’m not pushing! I’m pulling!”
Tickety and Boo emerged. Boo was dragging a long trail of bungee ropes, while Tickety held a pair of Joshua’s swimming goggles.
“If you haven’t got a racing helmet, you should at least wear goggles,” she told Horace.
“Okey-doke.” Horace strapped them on over his nose. “Right. Let’s head for the Houndmobile!”
The hamsters hitched a lift on Horace’s back as he trotted off. First he went next door, putting his paws up on the windowsill to look for Kimi.
There was no sign of movement in her tank.
“She must be asleep under the sawdust,” said Tickety. Horace tapped on the window, but nothing stirred.
“How can she sleep?” cried Boo. “I’m so excited, I’ve not been able to sleep all day!”
“Never mind. We don’t need her,” said Horace, although he was disappointed. He had hoped Kimi would come to cheer him on as he won the race.
When they reached the Houndmobile, the other dogs were already waiting eagerly for him. Horace leapt up into the dog-house and started the engine.
“Come on, Silverside! Engine noises,” he said.
“Sorry, I forgot.” Silverside began to growl.
“Not so loud,” advised Horace. “We don’t want to go too fast just yet.”
The Houndmobile set off slowly towards the supermarket.
The dog-house still wobbled on its perch on top of the lawnmower, despite being tied on with Boo’s bungee ropes. And Horace found it quite hard to see where he was going, what with the door of the dog-house being rather narrow, and Joshua’s goggles being a little small for him.
He dismissed these minor worries. Those cats were in for a big surprise!
Sure enough, when the Houndmobile chugged into the car park, the crowd of cats arrayed along the wall all stared in disbelief.
Their jaws dropped: their necks craned; their eyes popped.
And then they broke into the most hideous caterwauling Horace had ever heard.
“They must be scared stiff of us!” he decided.
Two cats pointed trembling paws at the Houndmobile and then fell off the wall backwards.
“They’re terrified! They’re shaking at the sight of us!” said Horace joyfully.
“Actually,” said Tickety, “they’re– oh, never mind. Where’s the starting line?”
The starting line was a row of bollards. A crowd of dogs had gathered there to watch from a gallery of shopping trolleys, well away from the hateful cats.
Thirty eager tongues hung out at the sight of the Houndmobile. The dogs drooled.
“Great lightning stripes!” they barked.
“Mega tail-fins!”
“Love the goggles, dude!”
“Way to go! Let’s show those cats who’s boss!”
With some difficulty, Horace lined the lawnmower up by the bollards.
“Who are we racing against?”
No sooner had the words left his mouth than the answer came.
With a roar far louder than any that Silverside could produce, a black Siren Sprinter rolled into the car park. It was as sleek as a shadow. The black cat, wearing sunglasses, lounged in the driver’s seat.
From the audience of cats came a cheer.
“Pibbles!” they yelled. “Go, Pibbles!”
Pibbles pushed his sunglasses up and stretched. “Ready to roll, mutt? Two circuits of the supermarket. Marmaduke there will drop the flag on the count of three.”
Horace adjusted his goggles and fixed his eyes on the ginger cat holding the flag.
“Get ready to growl for all you’re worth, Silverside,” he muttered. “One, two–”
There was a black blur beside him as the Siren took off.
“You didn’t wait for three!” yelled Horace.
The lawnmower lurched forward. The engine chugged. Silverside growled mightily. Yet the Houndmobile went no faster than a terrier could trot.
“What’s wrong with it?” yelped Horace. He opened the throttle as far as it would go, but it made little difference. The doghouse began to slip backwards off the lawnmower. Horace had to clutch it with one paw and try to steer with the other.
Meanwhile the Siren had sped right round the supermarket once and was coming up behind him for the second circuit. It roared past with the cats all yowling encouragement.
“Go, Pibbles, go!”
“We’re going to lose!” groaned Horace.
All of a sudden, the Siren’s sound changed. The engine note became harsh and high. It screamed and rasped and grated.
White smoke began to seep out from the bonnet. With a grind and crunch of gears, the car stopped dead.
The cats yowled again – this time with horror. Dashing over to the car, Demon yanked the bonnet open. A huge cloud of smoke billowed out and enveloped her.
“Gearbox failure! It’s leaking oil all over the place,” snarled Pibbles, before he began to cough. Soon he too was lost in the smoke.
None of the cats noticed a long, thin ribbon of black and white that crept unobtrusively out of the smoky cloud. It slithered over to Horace and his Houndmobile.
“Keep going!” hissed Kimi. “You can win this!”
“Win! Win! Win!” barked Ragbag, and all the watching dogs joined in.
But Marmaduke the ginger cat leapt in front of the Houndmobile, waving his flag furiously.
“Back to the starting line,” he snapped.
“You’ve got to let us finish the race!” cried Horace. “You’ve broken down. We can keep going!”
“That was just a practice lap,” snarled Marmaduke. “We’ll bring our other car out for the real thing.”
“You never mentioned a practice lap!” protested Horace.
The dogs howled. The cats yowled. But there was nothing else for it. The cats stood in his way, and would not let him drive on.
Glumly Horace steered the Houndmobile back to the line of bollards.
“Here’s our reserve car,” announced Marmaduke. Around the corner rolled a red Siren Sprinter, even sleeker than the first.
“Do you think we can do this?” asked Ragbag doubtfully. Horace took off his goggles and scratched his head.
“I don’t know. I’ll have to drive like I’ve never driven before,” he said.
“We should scrag that car!” squealed Boo. “Rip its tyres off! Paint over its windows! Stuff dandelions into its engine!”
“No chance,” said Kimi. “I’ve done my bit. My teeth are still aching from biting through the oil seals.”
“I don’t want any cheating,” Horace told them sternly.
“But then how will we win?” croaked Silverside. “I’m hoarse. I can’t growl any longer!”
“I’ll get all the other dogs to growl,” suggested Ragbag, and she bounded off to tell them.
“We might need to do more than that,” sighed Horace.
Regretfully, he began to unstrap the bungee ropes from the dog-house. He gave them back to Boo, who scampered away with them.
“Give me a hand, Silverside,” said Horace, and he began to lift down the dog-house from the lawnmower. “This keeps slipping. It’s a shame, but we’ll go faster without it. We need to streamline.”
Tickety carefully folded the tail fins back. “There,” she said. “That should help too. Good luck, Horace!”
“Get ready to growl!” barked Ragbag at the audience.
“Get ready to lose!” jeered the cats.
Pibbles was installed in the new red Sprinter. Its engine revved.
Two dozen dogs growled in answer.
And then a deep, stern
bark rang out across the car park, louder than any of the other dogs.
“Halt! Just stop right there, you canine criminals! You’re nicked!”
Chapter Nine