A BIRMINGHAM pensioner had the fright of her life when she awoke to find a fox had crept into the house and onto her bed.

Magistrate Mary Small, who has a phobia of foxes, shot from under the covers and ran down to her husband Tony thinking the furry intruder was a cat.

Tony went upstairs to investigate – only to find the cub cowering underneath a computer desk in a spare room.

“Mary was terrified,” said Tony, aged 69.

“She’s paranoid about foxes. It’s a good job she initially thought it was a cat.”

Not sure what to do, Tony, an amateur photographer, eventually managed to coax the cub downstairs and out of the front door of their house in Franklin Road, Bournville.

The couple, whose son Julian lives in Dubai with his three children, had discovered the fox last Sunday morning.

They said they thought it must have sneaked in through their patio door either the previous night or earlier that morning.

Mary, aged 68, said: “Luckily it did not bite and we managed to get it out of the house.