A moment later, Sir Rotherham's card no sooner left his paw than Leacock Hardesty erupted with, "Aha! You can't DO that!" and went on about the utter impropriety of forfeiting a nine of any color while a black ten resides in the queue. "Pay up! Pay up!" the others shouted immediately and Sir Rotherham had then to give tokens to Warburton Nines, who was acting banker at the moment, and replace General Chewings at the foot. The General then, advancing from the foot, was entitled to challenge Merchanty Swift for dealership and beat him badly with a throw of the dice. "He's out! He's out!" came the cry. And on it went like that. It's entirely uproarious, Mole Biscuits, and seems always to end in exhausting and somewhat breathless hilarity.
Having recovered from Mole Biscuits then, the membership was fortified with strong black coffee and cinnamon cheroots (which, unlike tobacco cheroots by the way, are not to be set on fire in order to be enjoyed) and the evening concluded with a somewhat fierce competition at poker.
Merchanty Swift, he of the steel nerves who can sell practically anything, was something of a legend at poker as well as at commerce. His primary competition within the club came from Warburton Nines, who was certainly formidable, but who, to be fair, had the unquestioned advantage of hardly ever saying anything to anyone about anything. Indeed, no one ever had the slightest idea what the Nines was thinking, let alone what cards he might be holding. And if that were not enough, he had an eye patch, didn't he?
They played five card draw with the dealer laying out, there being only enough cards in the pack for six players. The Mayor dealt first and as the opening bets were trickling in, he said, as casually as possible, "I do wonder about our situation at times."
"Situation?" Sir Rotherham said.
"Tottensea Burrows. Here. So close to The Cottage."
"Oh. That again."
"Well, we have no natural protections here, you see."
"Protections? From what?"
"From whatever," said The Mayor. "And if we were driven out, say...would we know how to provide for ourselves out there? Cards?"
"Driven out?" asked General Random Chewings. "Smoke and spinach! That'd take a bit of starting over now, wouldn't it? Two cards please."
"How should we be driven out?" Sir Rotherham asked with some indignation. "Two as well."
"Three cards please," Merchanty Swift said. "It only requires a cat, Sir Rotherham."
"I dare say!"
Umpteen Weeks took two cards, Hardesty one and Warburton Nines stood pat.
"Yes. One cat," Swift said. "You can ask my housekeeper about that. Are you betting, General?"
"Tuppence," Random Chewings said, tossing his bet into the pot.
Sir Rotherham folded.
"Hmm, that was brisk," Swift said and put in coins of his own. "Two and two more."
Weeks and Hardesty matched the bet. Warburton Nines said "Your pence, my shilling," and that was the end of that.
As The General shuffled the pack, Sir Rotherham asked, "What's this about your housekeeper, Swift?"
"Mrs. Nickelpenny lost her whole family to a cat, you know," Swift said.
"I dare say!"
"Mrs. Pockets did, as well—except for one little one. That would be Farnaby, of course."
"How really terrible it must have been for them," The General said compassionately. He stopped dealing and looked up.
"Terrible it was, General," Swift said sadly. "I came across them quite by accident—running for their lives from Flitch's Farm. It was ghastly—Mrs. Nickelpenny, mauled and bleeding, Mrs. Pockets, hurt as well and with a babe-in-arms at that."
"I didn't know they came from Flitch's." Leacock Hardesty said with mild surprise.
"Yes indeed," Swift answered. "Sweetcream Tunnels. Handsome place. Right up against the milking parlor at Flitch's it was."
"Bit like us then," The Mayor said, casually and not looking up. "Close on to humans, I mean."
"Yes," Swift said. "Too close in their case, as it turned out. Very posh while it lasted though—'peaches and cream' if ever there was. But then old Flitch took a turn, it seems. Fed up with field mice I suppose. Put in a grimalkin from the town and it was all up with Sweetcream Tunnels. Fierce old cat she was. Took them in twos and threes they said! A massacre beyond the telling—Nickelpenny and the two Pockets barely getting out with their lives."
The General resumed his dealing. "So you brought the poor things here and took them in."
"Yes. Though I only had employment for one of them in the end. But Mrs. Pockets is very resourceful and thought she might have a go at fixing up the old inn.
"And so she did," The Mayor said.
"And did it beautifully, too," agreed The General. "We're all very proud of her. Bets please."
"Thruppence," Sir Rotherham said grandly, rather pleased with himself. Terrible at poker, Sir Rotherham.
The final event of the evening was referred to as The Foundlings' Cut. It was seven-card stud, a game they picked up one night at The Silver Claw from a desert mouse who claimed to be in from Nevada. They had mixed feelings about the mouse, actually, but they liked his game and included it in their monthly routine. They set it up to require large and increasing minimum bets after each round. The pot, accordingly, grew often to ridiculous proportions, absorbing practically all the evening's winnings and sometimes a bit more than that. At the end, as one might guess, the money was set apart to be sent over to the foundlings on the following morning.
It was a nerve-racking affair, The Foundlings' Cut, and cheroots were sometimes gnawed to mutilation by the time it was over. Warburton Nines, who was dealing, turned up two red queens quickly and Umpteen Weeks looked good, right through, for an eight-high straight. The Mayor had a pair of threes and The General even less. Sir Rotherham showed early promise but faded in the heat. Swift came to the front with three tens showing (two blacks and a diamond), betting two shillings six, which sent Mayor and General alike out of the hand by the fifth card. Hardesty stayed with a possible flush but fidgeted badly and lacked authority.
The drama turned on the sixth card. Warburton Nines, icy and methodical, turned up a third queen! Spades. Umpteen Weeks looked severe and Leacock Hardesty unaccountably bit right through his cheroot. Swift hardly noticed, one might have thought, watching as he was for the fourth ten. But it was a six of clubs.
"Half a crown," Warburton Nines announced importantly. Swift shrugged and paid. Hardesty looked anxious and quit. Weeks made vague noises and dropped out, as well.
Nines dealt the last card—down—and looked at it. "Twelve shillings," he said, stacking the coins carefully and pushing them to the center of the table.
Swift looked at his card. "Up a quid!" he said brightly and with a hint of mischief.
Lightening from a clear sky, that was, to the dealer. And it showed on his face. But he got up the sovereign and more. "Add a guinea," he growled, throwing it in with as near a flourish as anyone had ever seen from Warburton Nines.
On they went—Nines and Swift—up and up. Witnesses disagree on the number of raises, but it was Swift who ended it.
"Let's have a look, then," he said simply and the room was certain they had finally seen to the very bottom of the Merchanty Swift nerves of steel.
When the look came, there was an audible gasp from the watchers. Warburton Nines did, in fact, absolutely, have the queens—all of them! The bystanders looked at one another, wondering. Did Swift have the fourth ten? Would he go quietly without turning over his cards? No indeed! He would show. And more than that, turning up the seven/eight/nine of clubs to go with his six/ten, he would win. Home and dry.
The room burst into a strange, spontaneous applause. No one knew why. Perhaps it was joy for the foundlings. The pot was, after all, as rich as anyone could remember. Yes. It was very good for the foundlings, that game. But it didn't do the Merchanty Swift legend any harm, either.
CHAPTER 9
Something About Me
At some point in this account, I suppose, I must pause to say one or
two things about myself. One does not wish to put oneself forward unbecomingly, but as you might question what the deuce I'm doing in this story to begin with, I think it only fair to say something by way of explanation. (Readers do have some rights, in my opinion.) And whatever I may have led you blithely to believe, linnets are not, after all, in the habit of consorting with field mice.
One may sometimes wonder at events. What if, for example, in one's childhood a certain lack of orientation led one to an unfortunate act? If one misstepped, say, when very young, not at all thinking to be reckless, could one, nevertheless, be thought of as "getting what was coming to him," as they say? Or might it have been a happy occurrence, after all—this misstepping? Might awful things sometimes provide the setting, so to speak, for things wonderful? So there's a question, isn't it?
I fell out of the nest. Now it's no good asking linnets about the meaning of a thing like that. Nothing against linnets. I am in a position to say that they are quite wonderful in their own way. It's just that there are certain things you ask linnets and certain things you might just as well not ask linnets. It's difficult to explain. Here:
A linnet knows the proper thing to do. If you were to suggest to a linnet that perhaps he should do something in a new or different way, the linnet would look at you in such a fashion as to make you wonder if he even heard what you said. And if he did hear you, and even if you could be sure that he understood you in some way, he wouldn't have the slightest idea how to push on to thinking about what you had just suggested.
I, myself, learned to think about things from the mice. An early experience in this education came when one of them asked my opinion about something. Linnets never ask you that. They do not have opinions. They know a thing or they don't. One may know the proper diet for nestlings or one may not. But there are no opinions about it. They don't think about things, you see, they know about things. They are hardworking and successful and very likeable, in my view, but they would never ask you what you think. It wouldn't occur to them.
The mice, on the other hand, are unendingly curious about what you think. And they often ask you in just that way. "Well, what do you think?"
To an unsuspecting linnet, such a question would be unnerving. Why would you want to know what was happening inside his brain? You might just as well ask him what was happening inside his gizzard. He wouldn't have the slightest idea about that either, and he would wonder, uneasily, why you cared.
You could inquire about the correct way to build a nest and the linnet would give you an excellent account. Or, "Where should one look out for stoneflies or onion thrips?" would be quite a comfortable question for him. He would be on home ground there, you see, and I don't doubt he would give you an extensive and well-organized reply. In fact, he would very likely offer to show you, in a practical way, how to go about finding stoneflies and onion thrips and any number of other things if you were interested and if he could spare the time. They are wonderfully helpful, linnets, but they do keep awfully busy.
When I was first asked by a field mouse what I thought about something, I stood, beak agape, and pondered the concept. Then, after a space, the question began to please me. I felt important for some reason.
"You must have an opinion," the mouse said to me, waiting.
I remember wondering if perhaps he was right. And if he was right, what must it be like? To have one, I mean. An opinion. In the end, I blurted out something. As an opinion, it wouldn't have amounted to very much, I think, but I was surpassingly proud of having had it and, moreover, I'm certain to have gone on about it at some length. It was thrilling!
I wouldn't have you think that linnets don't wish to talk. Indeed, they very much enjoy talking. It's just that they don't talk about ideas. Or the meaning of things. They talk about...things that have happened to them—or to someone they know. Incidents, in fact, are extremely interesting to them. If he took a green lacewing in mid-air, for example, or if she had some unpleasantness with a meadow pipit over a bit of nesting material, a linnet would tell you about it in fine detail. So you might overhear any one of them saying something like:
...It was brilliant. I saw the thing on an alder twig, you see. And just as I spotted him and was on my way, he flew. Now, whether he knew I was after him or just happened to fly at that moment I haven't the faintest idea. I don't know a thing about lacewings, do you? Anyway, I lifted high into the clearing and got above him. And when I fell upon him—why, you would have thought me a swallow!...
or:
…So I said to the pipit, 'Not while I'm about, you won't!' And she said to me, in the rudest sort of way, 'We'll see about that, then!' Well you can imagine how I felt, having gone all the way out there to find thistle down in the first place, and with all I've got to do these days I'll certainly have no patience with a meadow pipit who lives out there, for goodness sake, and can have any amount of thistle down for the taking whenever she wants it!…
So it isn't that linnets don't talk. Dear me! Very much to the contrary. But I must get on. I was speaking of falling out of nests.
I surely made quite a spectacle of myself, flopping about on the ground (my poor overworked parents being away shopping for insects at the time). I somehow succeeded, without plan, to flop and hop myself right out from under the beech tree, across the lawn and into the wisteria climbers at the base of the chimney. There I was then: frightened, shivering, eyes darting about—utterly devoid of any slightest notion what to do next. I can't think what should have become of me had it not been for a small "Hullo!" somewhere behind me.
I turned round. A mouseling of about my own age stood peeking at me from behind a vine root. He just watched me for a bit, his mouth hanging open with curiosity and his whiskers seriously busy at that little quivery thing they do.
"I'm Opportune Baggs," he said, finally.
I didn't say anything. I just stared at him.
"And you?" he asked.
I said not a peep.
"I'm a field mouse, as it happens," Opportune Baggs said.
I just stared. After quite a long time he said, "You might say something."
But I didn't. After another long silence he asked me if I wanted a biscuit. Receiving no answer, he disappeared down a hole which I hadn't noticed until he went into it. After a bit he returned with his mother. They both peered at me, their heads barely sticking up out of the hole.
"It's a baby linnet I believe," Mrs. Baggs said. "He's very frightened, the poor thing." Then, to me, she said, "Can we help you, dear?" I shivered and stared. "Are you from the beech tree, then?" she asked.
"He won't say anything, Mother," Opportune said. "I've tried ever so hard to get him to but he won't. Not a word."
"Is your nest in the climbers, dear?" Mrs. Baggs asked me. After waiting in vain for a reply, she said, "No. He isn't going to talk to us, is he?"
Just then I was startled by another voice from behind me. "What's this, then?" the voice said. I turned round to find a grown mouse almost upon me. I hopped away a little.
"It's a baby linnet, Papa!" Opportune said. "I found him. He's out of his nest."
"Yes. I can see that," said Mr. Baggs.
"He won't say anything to us," Opportune told him.
"No. He wouldn't, would he." said Mr. Baggs, sounding very wise.
"But why won't he?" Opportune asked.
"He's too frightened, isn't he?" Mr. Baggs said. "Besides, his mother may have told him not to, you see."
"Oh!" Opportune Baggs said respectfully, placing a paw over his mouth. He hadn't thought of that.
"Look," Mr. Baggs said, changing the subject. "We must get inside. You'll have to keep the children in for a few days I'm afraid, dear. There's a stoat about."
"A stoat! Where?" Mrs. Baggs asked, unsettled.
"Umpteen Weeks saw him this morning. In the bushes by the beech tree. He was cleaning out a linnet's nest, the stoat was."
Mrs. Baggs took in her breath sharply. They all looked at me. "Oh, the poor dear," she said
.
"Yes. Pity," Mr. Baggs said. "Well, we'd better get inside, I suppose."
"But what about the linnet?" Opportune said with alarm.
Mr. Baggs looked at me then. He scratched his head. He walked toward me a little, stooped awkwardly, and said, "Umm. Look, old chap. You really must stay out of sight for a bit. All right? And you won't be calling for your mum just now, will you? It's a bit risky, you see."
"Papa!" Opportune Baggs said, his alarm growing.
"Is there anything we can do, dear?" Mrs. Baggs asked Mr. Baggs.
He looked at her.
"Anything at all, do you think?" she said with a very earnest look.
Mr. Baggs looked at me, then back at Mrs. Baggs. He said, "What? What could we do? Surely you don't mean...."
But, of course, she did mean. Exactly.
CHAPTER 10
The Flying Mouse
A field mouse burrow is a very odd place for a linnet to be. Mr. Baggs thought so, too, though he was very kind to me and made the best of it. I sat in the corner of the kitchen and watched them eat their supper. I heard things being said like "May I have the jam pot, please?" and "Is there more tea then?" and "Stop staring at him. Opportune was staring at the linnet, Mother." and "Lower your voice, Arabella. Opportune, don't stare." and "But he stares at us, Mother. That's all he does is stare." and "That will be quite enough, young mouse. You are not to talk back to your mother."
The Linnet's Tale (A Mouse Story for Grownups) (The Tottensea Series) Page 5