At last Terri and I were left on our own and we both let out loud sighs. Then we giggled at each other as we collapsed into dining chairs. Cruella wouldn't have approved! Elroy appeared and he quickly made some room for us amongst the carnage of the table and, a few seconds later, two of his perfect-looking place settings had magically appeared. You could tell he'd done this sort of thing before.
Plates of the salad appeared in front of us. It had roast watermelon and goat's cheese in it which sounds like a pretty freaky combination but was really delicious. Then he stepped across to the sideboard and looked at the open bottles. "Red wine?" he asked, "or white?"
I looked at Terri and shrugged. I'd enjoyed a couple of glasses of wine with Master but I didn't know much about it - apart from the fact that, if I drank too much, I started falling over and taking my clothes off.
"One of each," Terri suggested. "We can share. That way we can try them both and still follow the rules."
It was a plan.
When he was done, Elroy disappeared upstairs to help with the coffee so we had to help ourselves from the dumb waiter. That wasn't too much hassle, particularly as he'd turned on a binger on the thing that let us know when there was even more food for us to stuff into ourselves!
Fish followed the salad - a piece of delicately poached trout. For the first time, as the plate was set in front of me, I got to see how pretty it was. There was just the fish and a few small vegetables and a squiggle of sauce but it was simply beautifully presented.
This was followed by a small plate with some quail's eggs which were served with a funny squidge of carrot baby-food. It sounds a bit funny but it tasted delicious.
Then the sorbet appeared. When I'd been doing my 'dumb waiter' job, I thought the idea of a pudding in the middle of the meal was a bit funny but, when I tasted it, I found it was quite sharp and nothing like as sweet as I'd expected - not really a pudding at all.
And, at last we came to the main course: some little pieces of melt in your mouth tender lamb with some tiny, weeny baby onions and, this time, cauliflower baby food. I'm sure the chef had a good reason for this baby food thing he had going on but, to be honest, I could have done perfectly well without it. There was also some weird licorice flavoured gravy on the plate but I left that well alone.
And as we ate, Terri and I talked.
I told her all about how I managed to find myself living as a kitten for an international drug smuggler and she was such a sympathetic listener that I even found myself telling her about the horrible, scary, finger choppy bits which I'd assumed that I'd never even hint at to another human being.
And as the tears began to well in my eyes at that dreadful memory, she reached out and put her hand on mine and it all felt just a little bit better.
And, when I'd finished giving her my life story, she told me hers.
Theresa Fontana grew up in upstate New York. She had a younger sister and a baby brother. Her father was a businessman. Nobody ever said what the business was and she knew she wasn't supposed to ask about it. He was also a heavy drinker and, from time to time, when drunk, he'd hit her mum. Her mother had a full time job in a supermarket and another full time job trying to hold the family together in spite of her father.
For the first fourteen years and three weeks of her life, things had gone pretty smoothly. Then, one night, she was woken by her mother yelling at her father. She listened in shamelessly, of course... it would have been tricky not to because her mum was yelling so loud!
Apparently his business involved selling illegal drugs. He'd had some dealings with Mr Andretti and, because of some stupidly risky trades, and some bad luck when he was drunk, he'd ended up owing him much more than he could ever repay. There were going to be horrible consequences for him and the rest of them were going to be thrown out of their home.
Terri knew Mr Andretti a little bit from a couple of parties she had attended at his... well... mansion... and she knew he quite liked her. There had been the expensive silver crucifix he'd given her for her first confirmation and a couple of other little presents that had been just a bit too expensive and significant to have come from a simple colleague of her father.
She tossed and turned all night, unable to sleep, and then, at first light, she made a decision. She borrowed some money from her father's wallet and took a taxi out to Mr Andretti's mansion.
The first problem was getting past the guards at the gate but, by begging and showing them her crucifix, she persuaded them to make a phone call. Then another guard appeared in a car and took her up to the house. He showed her into a small drawing room and told her to take a seat.
Then he waited outside.
After about ten minutes Mr Andretti appeared and she stood politely to greet him. "Good morning, Piccolina," he said. He always called her that. He gave her a nod to tell her to sit.
She did but it just made her feel even smaller and more nervous... in the past he'd always been friendly and cheerful but today he wasn't like that at all. He was really quite a frightening man.
"Did your father send you?" he asked, sharply and with no warning.
"No, Sir. He doesn't know I'm here."
For the first time, Mr Andretti turned the full power of his personality on her and she knew for absolute certain that, if she'd been lying, she'd have dropped dead right there on the spot and gone straight to hell.
At last he gave her a nod, acknowledging that she was telling the truth. He sat down and smiled at her. "Then why are you here, little one?" he asked. His voice had gone all gentle again.
"My parents were fighting and I heard that you were going to... to hurt my father and that the rest of us were going to be thrown out of our home."
"Your father is owing me much money, Piccolina."
"I thought... I thought that, maybe, you would make do with me instead."
When he heard those words, he sat down and studied her for a long time. "Your father is a man without worth who would raise his hand in anger to your mother," he said at last.
She flinched when he said these words. Maybe they were true but it hurt to hear somebody else say them. At last she nodded.
"And yet you offer me your virtue in exchange for his well-being."
She hesitated for a moment before answering, "I'm not really sure what it means... and it's not just for him. The rest of us are going to be thrown out of our home too... and I'll do anything to stop that happening."
He steepled his hands on his chest and thought for a long time as Terri squirmed uncomfortably in her seat. What had she just promised? She had a fair idea that it had something to do with the sex thing but she came from a good Catholic home and didn't have all that much idea what that really meant.
"Your father is not worthy of you," he said at last. "Will you stay with me and be the nipotina, the granddaughter I always wanted? I will be your nonno, your grandfather, and your virtue I will keep safe for your future husband. In return, as long as your father does not trouble me again, I will not harm him, and your mother I will give money every month so she does not have to work. Is this acceptable?"
Terri thought about it though she knew she didn't really have any choice. "Can I see them again?" she asked.
"Your mother and the bambini, yes, of course. Your father... never. As I say, he is not worthy to be your father."
She thought about this then looked him in the eye and said, "I accept."
Six months later, her father was dead anyway, killed in a shootout when some minor drug deal had gone wrong. Nonno let her attend the funeral... to support her mother rather than to show respect for a man he despised. But Terri chose not to return home, even though Mr Andretti had given her the choice. She'd got used to the new life and she knew that Nonno liked having her around.
Life with Nonno offered luxury beyond her imagination. Anything she wanted was instantly hers... provided it met his rather strict 'acceptability' rules. Food was always excellent and travel was in his private jet between his three homes: the seaside villa near Napoli, the apartment in London, and the colonial style mansion in upstate New York.
But all this came at a price.
Nonno had strict rules about her behaviour and about who she was allowed to meet. There were people checking up on everything she did on her phone or computer... and she always had to have guards with her when she went out. He would never let her visit her friends... but her girlfriends could come and visit her.
And she learnt very quickly that she had no choice but to obey his rules, no matter how unfair or unreasonable she thought they were. After a couple of increasingly firm warnings, she'd got three strokes on the seat of her pants with a rattan cane. That had certainly made her think.
But, unfortunately, she didn't think hard enough. The next time, she got six strokes on her bare bottom.
She'd never broken his rules again.
She was looked after by a governess, the lovely Zi'Anna. Terri had always been a jeans and t-shirt kid but Zi'Anna didn't think that was good enough for Mr Andretti's Nipotina and taught her to take pride in her appearance.
She had a personal tutor and, for the first time in her life, there were people around who cared about her schoolwork so she started to make rapid progress. She came from an Italian American family so she already spoke the language a bit and, because Zi'Anna hardly spoke any English, she was soon completely fluent. She rarely spoke anything else with her Nonno.
By this time, we were both pretty much toying with our pudding, a totally amazingly peachy custard tart that somehow managed to taste of the smell of lavender. Strange as it might sound to anyone who knows about me and puddings, I just couldn't finish it.
I looked up at Terri and I knew she was sharing my pain. It was just so delicious but neither of us could eat another thing.
"So," she said, "Nonno's kind of adopted me as his Nipotina... his granddaughter. He takes real good care of me and most of the time he's just a sweet old man. I'm not saying he ain't real strict but he's always fair."
I nodded. No wonder Mr Andretti got on so well with Master. They sounded very much alike.
That meal was wonderful... not just the food, which was the best I'd ever eaten, but it was just so good to be able to talk to a normal person for a change... and to admit that I was in some kind of freaky weird relationship with somebody who treated me as a kitten.
And, because I was already thinking of Terri as a friend, the thoughts sort of came tumbling out of my mouth before my brain had anything to do with them. I heard myself telling her that I would never leave him... and not just because of the whole horrible finger choppy thing... but because I was falling stupidly but helplessly in love with him.
Luckily we had moved onto safer topics when the others appeared. I'd just told her about the whole 'human torpedo' thing with Cruella and we were giggling 'indecorously' together when we realised that we were being watched.
The two of us gave a co-ordinated guilty start and we tried to drop to our knees but were both a bit slow to move because we were totally stuffed after that enormous meal.
"Be relaxed, ladies," Mr Andretti said, looking across to Master to check that it was OK for him to be giving me instructions.
"They both look as if they are going to explode if they try to move!" Master agreed, making us all laugh.
He strolled over to the sideboard and poured a couple of glasses of something. Then Mr Andretti looked at him. "Would, perhaps, your gattina enjoy a small glass of Amaretto?" he suggested.
"Very small!" Mr Fussy insisted. "Her behaviour, when drunk, can be a trifle... interesting." He raised an eyebrow in my direction which made me squirm a little bit but, deep down, I knew I could trust him not to humiliate me by telling the story... but I also knew that I was going to have to tell Terri all about it later!
There were still plenty of people about but two adjacent sofa seats suddenly became free - funny how that happens when the two big bosses step into the room. The two men took their places and I knelt next to Mr Bossy.
Terri came across, handed me a tiny glass of the drink and then she knelt next to Mr Andretti and draped an arm across his knee as the two spoke briefly together in Italian. Meanwhile Master smiled affectionately down at me and ran a finger along the back of my neck, just above my collar, sending delicious shivers down my spine.
Then Mr Andretti raised his glass. "For the future," he said.
"The future," the rest of us echoed his toast.
Then I tried the Amaretto. Though not quite as spectacular as the Mango Bucks Fizz, it was truly delicious though a bit intense.
"Do you enjoy Italian eating and drinking, Piccolina?" Mr Andretti asked when he saw my reaction.
I met his eye, as Cruella had trained me. "I have not tried very much yet, Sir," I replied, "but I do like spaghetti carbonara and a few other things but I'm not terribly keen on the..." I'd forgotten the name of the squidgy thing spaghetti and glanced to Master who provided it for me. This caused a couple of laughs from the Italians around the room.
"That is a taste you must be acquiring," Mr Andretti said with a smile. "When your Master comes to visit me in Italy, you should accompany him," he told me.
"With your gracious permission, naturally," he added, looking briefly to Mr Bossy who gave a smile and a nod.
He returned his attention to me. "There you will enjoy the genuine Italian cooking and perhaps give company for my nipotina!" Again he stroked her cheek affectionately.
As the two men talked, I finished my drink but my eyelids were starting to get dangerously heavy. Master must have noticed because he smiled gently at me and stroked my head affectionately. "I have a favour to ask," he said to Mr Andretti. "My kitten is not used to wearing makeup. Could I ask Theresa to show her how to remove it."
"Of course," Mr Andretti replied with a huge smile.
So the two of us went up to my bathroom and it was like having a big sister to chat with as she showed me how to get the stuff off my face. And, of course, after Master's hints, I had to tell Terri about the first time he'd got me drunk and it was a good thing that we were in the bathroom because she laughed so hard that she had to rush over to the toilet before she had an accident!
And, when we were done, we lay on my bed together to chat for a while longer.
Then, in the morning, Master showed me the photo that, with Mr Andretti's permission, he'd taken of us two girls fast asleep on my bed. We were lying on our sides, as if we were looking at each other and, quite by chance, we both had a leg bent back. We were just as symmetrical as when we'd been kneeling by the lift.
And when he saw how much I loved the picture, he had a couple of prints made. He had one hung on the wall of my room and we sent the other one to Terri.