Miranda the Great by Eleanor Estes Read Free Book Online Page B

this great epic was that Miranda and Punka were not going to come home with them. Claudia stretched out her arms. "Miranda, come on. Come on," she implored.
    But Miranda shook her head and said, "Woe-oh-woe!" And Punka said, "Wah."
    Tears streamed down Claudia's cheeks. She flung her arms around Zag. "Well, anyway, we still have you, Zaggie. We did find you."
    "We really found them all," Lavinia said gently. "And Miranda loves you as she always has. But she has adopted all these kittens, promised to be a mother to them, and you know what a good mother she has always been, a marvelous mother. She can't go back on her word."
    "I know," said Claudia sadly.
    They prepared to leave. It is very hard, when you have finally found your two lost cats that you have raised from kittenhood, to go away and leave them again. Marcus picked up Zaggie, big though she was, not to lose her again. "You weigh a bit more now than you did when I brought you under my tunic from Spain, eh, Zag?" he said.
    Silence had descended upon the arena as they turned to leave. Suddenly Miranda came bounding up. She had some tiny thing in her mouth, its little hind legs all scrunched up, its mouth drawn back in a funny little grin. She placed the kitten at Claudia's feet. Then she turned and shot like a comet back into her adopted domain, the domain of the cats of the Colosseum of whom she was queen.
    Claudia picked up the little kitten. It was golden, too, just like Miranda, all gold, a miniature Miranda. "It's one of her own new little kittens," Claudia said. "I'll name you
Parva
Miranda, little Miranda, after your mother."
    Claudia ran back to thank Miranda. There she lay in the little ticket room with her other three kittens cuddled beside her. Some little orphan kittens were trying to get some milk, too, and Punka made them line up. It was remarkable how well Punka managed kittens. She had a real gift.
    Miranda looked up at Claudia proudly. Her eyes were deep dark pools, wise and knowing. Claudia stooped down and kissed her on her head. "Sweet Miranda. Brave Miranda," she said. "You are great, Miranda, you are Miranda the Great, aren't you? You want to come with me, don't you? But you can't, because you have to be the mother for all these kittens, and queen besides. But I'll take good care of this little one that you gave me. I'll feed her little drops of goat's milk from a leaf of a mulberry tree, the way I used to feed you when you were little. Remember?"
    A tear rolled down Claudia's cheek and fell on Miranda. "But we'll come back and visit you, bring you a little fish, enough for all, something special that you always loved ... we will ... yes, we'll come back and say
'Ave!
Hello!'"
    "But now," said Lavinia, "it is time to say 'Vale.'"
    "
Vale,
Miranda," said Claudia. And then she was struck with a really happy thought. "Maybe, some day, when these little kittens, your own and the rescued ones, are a little bigger, maybe you will come home and say '
Ave
' to us, pay us a little visit? Maybe you will even stay a little while, will you, Miranda?"
    It seemed to Claudia that Miranda smiled and nodded her head, as though she were saying, "Why, yes, I might."
    Claudia and her mother and her father, with Zag held in his arms, a huge armful, started to leave. Claudia made her kitten wave to Miranda. "She knows she could come with us, she and Punka. She wants to, but she just can't."' Claudia was still trying to convince herself that this was what Miranda and Punka truly wanted. Before departing, the family turned for one last look at the majestic Colosseum.
    There it stood and would stand like this, probably forever. By the light of the moon in some of the broken-down places, they could see the silhouette of a cat. A faint south wind wafted the sound of muted music to them, a rising and falling, crescendos and low moaning tones as of a multitude of cats. Were they really hearing this? Or was it the remembered music? Whether they heard it now or not did not