When I made a surprising discovery in my home, I wondered what on earth was going on. By Donna Hibbert, 39
Two pleading faces looked up at me, but I was determined to remain firm.
I shook my head.
‘No,’ I said to my children, Ebony and Jack. ‘We’re not getting another cat.’
Over the years, we’d had four cats.
But, as much as I loved each one, I’d found it too upsetting when they’d died.
So I’d vowed no more.
But Ebony, 11, and Jack, eight, had other ideas.
‘Please, Mum,’ they begged. ‘Please!’
They kept at it until I started to feel my resolve weakening. And, eventually, I found myself saying: ‘Oh, all right then.’
Within weeks, we were driving to a farm to pick out a ball of fluff from a new litter.
The kittens were only seven weeks old and they stole our hearts so, instead of choosing just one, we went home with two brothers.
We named them Harry and Luna.
They were chalk and cheese.
Harry was good-natured and loved a snuggle, but Luna was skittish and made a run for it if Ebony or Jack approached him.
‘I don’t think he likes kids,’ I said to them, laughing.
But he had a thing for me, climbing up on to my shoulder.
Gradually, both cats settled into their new home and became familiar with using the cat flap to go in and out.
But it wasn’t just themselves they brought in from the outside.
One morning, I came down the stairs before leaving for work as a teacher, to find something lying on the mat.
I bent down and picked up a tatty crisp packet.
I thought: How has that got there?
Then a loud meow from Harry startled me, and the penny dropped.
He’d brought it in through the cat flap.
‘You thought you were bringing me a present,’ I laughed.
But he didn’t stop there.
Days later, I found him with a pouch of cat food in his paws. But it wasn’t one I’d bought. He must have pinched it from somewhere.
And then Luna got in on the act.
I found him hiding under the table, guarding a sock.
‘Did you find it?’ I asked. ‘Or pinch it from a washing line?’
Over the following weeks, I cracked my cat burglars’ code.
Whenever I heard Harry’s piercing meow or saw Luna was being secretive under the table, I knew they’d been up to no good.
And I never knew what I’d find next.
'You’re a bad influence'
One morning, two towels lay on the carpet. They certainly weren’t ours.
On another occasion, I came downstairs to find six sausages from the butcher.
‘Crikey,’ I said to my partner, Ollie. ‘The cat must have gone into somebody’s house to steal them.’
‘Why on earth are you doing this?’ I asked my light-pawed duo, bewildered.
None of our other cats had ever brought anything in except the odd bird or mouse.
But Harry and Luna were out burgling on a regular basis.
A couple of T-shirts arrived, then a slipper, a school top, another slipper, and then yet another slipper.
‘I’m going to have to find out who they belong to,’ I said to Ollie.
I’d asked around in our village of Darley Abbey, Derbyshire, but people shook their heads.
How far had the cats been roaming?
‘People must think they’re going crazy,’ I said to the kids. ‘They must be scratching their heads trying to work out where their stuff has gone.’
Desperate to find where the contraband had come from, I clicked on the Spotted page of the village Facebook community and uploaded a photo of the towels.
Is anybody missing these? I wrote.
I explained about my kleptomaniac kitties and a message arrived from my next-door neighbour: They’re mine. I thought I was going mad.
She said a top had been swiped from her washing line, too.
But though they’d been rumbled, my cats weren’t ready to give up their life of crime and, one morning, a red designer shoe was waiting for me.
Size seven, I thought. A perfect fit!
‘If you’d brought me the other one, I’d have had a lovely pair to wear,’ I said to Harry.
Back I went to the Facebook page to try to reunite it with its owner.
But as fast as I managed to return items, more arrived — gloves, scarves, more towels, more and more socks, an empty purse and even a thong, which was too saucy to go on Facebook!
When Ebony turned 18, our naughty duo became a trio when we bought a new kitten, Padme, for her birthday.
She fitted in straightaway by learning to snaffle clothes from my dryer.
‘You’re a bad influence on your new sister,’ I said to Harry and Luna.
Even after we moved house, their thieving exploits continued and now I reckon my cats have taken items worth around £300.
But I can’t be cross for too long. As cat burglars go, they’re purr-fect!