Anton and Cecil

by Lisa Martin

  “That’s an interesting argument,” Anton said.

  The mouse pulled his tail round and used the tip to wipe the tears from his eyes. “You don’t mean it,” he said. “That’s the teasing way of you heartless felines. Soon you’ll be tossing me from paw to paw just for the sport of seeing a poor wee beastie in terror.” His tail was of no use against the steady flow of his tears and he let it go. “I’ll not run wild for your amusement,” he said, looking sullen, but still the tears poured down his face and his shoulders shuddered. “My dear brother did that, and to no avail.”

  “You need to stop blubbering or you’re going to drown in your own tears,” Anton warned.

  “Would that I could,” the mouse replied.

  What an odd mouse, Anton thought. Rodents weren’t generally thoughtful, and rats, as Anton recalled too well, were downright murderous. “So, you were close to your brother?”

  “We were different as night and day,” the mouse said. “Nobody would have taken us for brothers. He was a big mouse, and he had a fine, dark pelt, and he loved adventures, whereas I was always”—and here he sniffed and wiped his nose with the back of his front foot—“I was always what you see before you. But we were close. Oh, he was my dearest friend. We were close like that.” The mouse held up his foot and somehow managed to cross the two front claws.

  “I have a brother like that,” Anton said. Cecil appeared for a moment in his mind’s eye, just as if he were there before him, and Anton sighed as he looked back at the still sniveling mouse.

  “That’s fine for you,” the mouse said. “Nobody has eaten your brother.”

  “What was his name?” Anton asked.

  “Oh, lord of mice, what do you care what my poor dead brother’s name is? Just finish me off and be done with it, will you not?”

  “I’m going to tell you something that will surprise you,” Anton said. “I don’t really like the taste of mice.”

  “Right, shipmate. I’m sure you don’t. You’re just making the sacrifice for the good of the enterprise.”

  “Well, that’s just it. If the sailors find out, or that lady, if she finds out you’re here, they won’t feed me until I hand over your corpse. But if they don’t know you’re here and you’re the only mouse on board . . .”

  “I am that. The last of a fine clan.”

  “I’ll bet you could find enough to eat without the humans noticing you’re here.”

  “I’m a creature of great stealth and caginess. That’s how I’ve outlived my poor family.”

  “Well, then. If no one sees you, I’m not obliged to kill you.”

  “Are you not?” said the mouse. “Are you not obliged by the ancient enmity between our kind?”

  Anton chuckled. This mouse was a dramatic mouse. “What’s your name?” he asked.

  “My name is Hieronymus,” the mouse said proudly. “My brother was Geronymus.”

  “Her-on-i-mus,” Anton repeated. Even the mouse’s name was funny. “My name is Anton.”

  “I can’t say I’m pleased to meet you.”

  “Right,” said Anton. “The ancient enmity.”

  “I won’t deny that you’re an improvement over the last cat on this ship.”

  “What happened to him?”

  “He was a great brute, always getting himself into scrapes. Once, he got himself locked in the larder for two days. Would that they’d never found him. The ship got into some wicked weather and he was stupid enough to go aloft. A big wave came and pulled him off the ropes, dashed him on the deck, and before he could get to his feet, he was swept over the side into the deep blue sea.”

  Anton gasped. “Poor fellow,” he said. “That’s a terrible fate.”

  “Excuse me if I’m dry-eyed,” said Hieronymus. “He ate my dear brother before my eyes, and not in one bite, either.”

  “Yes,” Anton said. “That must have been traumatic for you.”

  “It was the worst moment of my life.” And the mouse burst into tears again.

  As Anton frowned at the mouse’s fresh waterworks, he felt a bit of moisture gather in his own eyes. Hieronymus had given him the thought that Cecil, who was so reckless, might have had some terrible accident back home, and Anton would have no way of knowing. “Please stop your crying,” Anton said.

  To his surprise the mouse nodded his head and said, between sobs, that he would try. When he could control his voice again, Hieronymus asked, “What’s your brother’s name?”

  “Cecil,” said Anton. “I got impressed on the wharf. He was far down the dock and I called to him from the ship, but I expect he couldn’t hear me.”

  As he spoke there was a shout on the deck, and the sailors began to stir in their bunks. “Look,” Anton said. “Just stay out of sight.”

  “You won’t see me, unless you’ve a mind to,” Hieronymus replied. “I generally stay here until the night watch goes on, and then I move out to that big rope coil up in the bow. I’ve a comfy nest there for sleeping, and if I can’t sleep, I like to see the stars.”

  A stargazing mouse. Anton chuckled. He knew he’d come to a low pass to have taken a mouse for a friend, but Hieronymus was clearly a very unusual mouse.

  In the days that followed, Anton established a routine on this new ship to which he had been delivered by a whale. It was much smaller than the Mary Anne, with a crew of only eight men, not counting the captain and his family. The captain’s wife took an interest in Anton and invited him into the family’s quarters, where she spent much of her time confined with the baby. Anton was wary of the baby, who charged at him on unsteady legs, but the lady was kind and offered Anton treats, a little milk in a saucer or a bit of meat or fish from her own plate. One day, when she found him curled up for a nap in a basket of clothes, she laughed, gently chasing him out. “You want a bed,” she said. On his next visit, she showed him a wooden box with one end open, in which she had placed a soft cushion. Now this is the life, Anton thought, as he curled up for a good long snooze. The top of the box had slats that let in light and air, but the sides were solid, so he felt safe and secret, comfy and warm.

  In the evenings, he visited the fo’c’sle for his dinner, after which he went out on the deck for a stroll, ending, when the night watch came on, with a visit to the rope coil in the prow and a conversation with Hieronymus the mouse. And could that mouse talk. He was a well-traveled, observant, witty, and lyrical mouse, a spinner of tales full of adventure, bravery, and narrow escapes. Many of his stories had been handed down in his family: the story of Great-Uncle Pyramus, who fell asleep in what he thought was an oversize basket and woke up high above the earth in a hot-air balloon; of Great-Grampa Maximus, who was making a nest in a wheat field when out of the woods came hordes of furious humans marching in long lines toward one another and firing rifles, charging and falling and firing until the air was all smoke, and the ground so thickly covered with the dead and dying that Maximus nearly drowned in a pool of blood; of cousin Minimus, who wound up somewhere miles inland and set up house in a big seashell because he loved to hear the sea when he was falling asleep; and of his own uncle Micromus, who, having perfected the art of springing traps with his tail, died suddenly when he bit into a brightly colored wire he thought might be useful for pulling free the cheese once the trap was sprung. Hieronymus was also revealed to be a thoughtful mouse. He had theories about why all animals could understand each other while humans could only talk to other humans, and why rocks sank if they fell off ships, but ships didn’t sink if you put rocks in them.

  Hieronymus wasn’t a bad listener, either. Anton told him about his adventures since he’d left home, about the vicious birds and about how he came to the ship on a whale. One evening he told the mouse about the eye he’d seen in the sky, most recently with Dave. “Do you know the expression, ‘Where the eye sees the eye, the lost shall be found’?”

  “Can’t say as I do. Is the eye a cat’s eye?” Hieronymus asked.

  “It does look like a cat’s eye.”

 
; “We have a different expression for that sky. We say, ‘Cat’s eye in the sky, a mouse will soon die.’ ”

  “No, really?” said Anton.

  “But I saw that eye once, with my dear father, and he said there was an old legend attached to it that came from before there were even cats in the world.”

  “There were no cats in the world?” Anton said wonderingly.

  “No, nor mice either. Just fish for some reason. But this eye protects cats; it’s special to them. That’s why no other animals eat them. No such luck for us mice. We must have been created by a very careless fellow indeed.”

  “The clackers were going to eat me,” observed Anton.

  “Well, in those days, when cats were new, they were really, really big. Now they’re a lot smaller. When humans started taking them to sea, the eye followed to watch over them, and it still watches them and protects them.”

  Anton puzzled over this information. A world without cats—he couldn’t make sense of that.

  The ship sailed on through good weather and bad, and the routine of the sailors hardly varied. We must be going somewhere, Anton thought. We can’t just sail forever. But whenever he looked out from the prow, the sea stretched out endlessly. He imagined Cecil raiding a crab party or boring everyone back home with his tales of schooner triumphs. How Anton would love to hear one of those stories right now.

  Then, one morning, something extraordinary happened.

  All the humans simply disappeared.

  CHAPTER 12

  Trade Winds

  In his new life on the pirate ship, Cecil found himself with quite a lot to do. Birds who landed on deck had to be chased off, as they made a terrible mess. If they perched up in the rigging, which they often did to taunt the cats below with cruel and tasteless jokes, then Cecil climbed the maze of ropes attached to the masts to reach them. Mice and rats who sneaked on board during raids had to be disposed of one way or another. And there was a surprising variety of beetles, worms, and spiders to be caught, batted into submission, and devoured; most of these were imported in the food and loot taken from other vessels. Cecil relished his duties, though once he was stung by what he thought was a small crab until Gretchen called it a scorpion, and his paw swelled up to a painful and tremendous size.

  Then there was the actual business of pirating, spurts of furious activity for the crew in the midst of long periods of idleness. Sometimes the target ship fought back, its great guns lobbing heavy balls of iron over to the pirate ship, where they landed randomly and sometimes did severe damage. During these occasions the cats found it best to scamper belowdecks and hide. Cecil learned to keep his guard up most of the time, since a passing crewman was just as likely to give a kick of the boot as he was a friendly pat, and one had to keep that knowledge foremost in one’s mind as a ship’s cat.

  One bright day when Cecil and Gretchen were dozing back to back in the sun on the roof of the map room, a pirate approached suddenly, scooped them up, and dropped them neatly into a crate, banging the lid shut with a mallet. Cecil sprang to his feet, yowling as he pushed frantically on the sides of the crate, to no avail. He ran in tight circles wildly until he noticed Gretchen just sitting, an expression of displeasure on her face. He stopped yowling and faced her. “Hey,” he said, breathing heavily. “Why aren’t you trying to get out of here?”

  She shrugged in resignation, looking moodily out through the slats of the crate. “They’ve done this sort of thing before. It means we’re headed into a port, and they don’t want us wandering off.”

  “Really? A port?” Cecil asked. He looked out as well, and sure enough spotted a dark lump of land in the distance, growing steadily wider. “This could be my chance,” he said, mostly to himself. “Maybe I’ll finally get some news about Anton.”

  Gretchen examined the pads of her front paw. “I hope so,” she said.

  The pirates had replaced the red pirate flags with less threatening blue-and-white striped ones, and once the ship was tied up at the dock they stomped down the gangplanks in high spirits. The sailor carrying the cat crate brought it to a side street set up with colorful stalls and strewn with chattering brown-skinned people. The air was warm and moist, and the only shade came from odd trees that had all their leaves bursting out at the top. Cecil and Gretchen’s crate was placed on top of another in the midst of a group of cages and boxes, each holding a creature of some kind. Some of the creatures turned to look at them with interest; others ignored them. The two cats huddled together in the back of the crate.

  “I was afraid of this,” whispered Gretchen. “They call this the ‘markit.’ ”

  “What’s that?” asked Cecil, his eyes darting all around.

  “People come to trade, you know, give something and get something else in return. The pirates love trading.”

  “What’s that got to do with us?” Cecil asked, looking at Gretchen nervously, but she only nodded grimly toward the man in the center of the cages. He was speaking rapidly to a strangely dressed sailor, handing him a box with three small turtles inside in exchange for a handful of brightly colored beads. “Oh,” said Cecil softly, slumping down. “Trading.” He turned to Gretchen again and whispered fiercely, “I thought they liked us!”

  She shook her head. “They like silver more.”

  Cecil glared through the slats. “Now you tell me.”

  The cats could still see the ship from their stall, and they watched in grudging fascination as the pirate crew circulated among many people on the waterfront, talking and gesturing, laughing and arguing. Each sailor seemed to have with him a pouch on a string containing items stolen on raids. They made exchanges with men from the town, who gave them back different items—bottles of liquid, knives or swords, or small pieces of round, flat, shiny metal. Gretchen remarked that these last were what they called “silver,” and the sailors valued them highly, privately counting and stacking them over and over. Cecil saw the captain himself offering the glowing white stone Cecil had brought on board in exchange for a very long cutlass, its blade flashing in the sun.

  The cats spoke to the other creatures near them, asking about Anton, the whale, the legend. Several seagulls perched on top of the stall swore they had seen the whale surfacing here and there, though Gretchen later discounted their story, as seagulls, she maintained, were notorious liars. An almond-eyed ferret recited the expression while standing on his hind legs in his cage, his skinny arms outstretched: “Where the eye sees the eye, the lost shall be found.” None of the others had more than that to offer.

  “Thank you so much,” said Cecil to each, his spirits gradually falling.

  No one had seen or even heard of Anton. An unnaturally large and menacing bird caged on the far side of the stall had been entirely focused on a small lemur in the crate just below it all day, clacking its beak repeatedly and muttering.

  “That’s a vulture,” Gretchen said.

  “Wow,” said Cecil wryly. “You really know your avian classification.”

  When a sailor traded for the vulture and set it on his shoulder, held there by a chain attached to its ankle, it looked at Cecil, nodded its head, and croaked, “Agggk. Dinner.” As its new owner strolled off, it swayed its huge ugly head from side to side cryptically.

  Cecil gulped and turned away. “Did you see the beak on that thing?” he asked Gretchen shakily.

  “Don’t worry about it,” said Gretchen. “They only eat stuff that’s already dead.”

  Whenever an interested trader passed the stall and looked in at them, the cats sprawled on their backs with their eyes half-closed, trying to look as unappealing as possible. Life was tolerable on the pirate ship—at least they had enough to eat—and they didn’t want to be separated at this point. Also, Cecil thought, if he got stuck on land he might never find Anton. So they tried their best not to be traded. During one of these episodes, as they lay stiffly in the crate, a low, rough voice spoke to them from very close by.

  “You’re not fooling anyone, you know. You
don’t look nearly bad enough.”

  Cecil and Gretchen lifted their heads and focused their eyes on a large golden-haired dog peering into the crate, tail wagging and pink tongue lolling. The cats stood and took a few steps backward.

  Gretchen seemed unable to speak, so Cecil responded. “Hey there, have we met?”

  “Name’s Remy,” said the dog happily. He was tall and muscular, with floppy ears and long, rippling fur. Cecil noticed that he wore a red headscarf tied around his neck. That looks so stylish, thought Cecil, though in the next moment he realized that some human must have put it on him. Then he thought the dog just looked like a clown.

  “Are you being traded?” Cecil asked.

  Remy woofed a short laugh, causing Gretchen to flinch. “Not a chance,” he said. “I’m with him,” and he gestured with his black nose back over his shoulder toward the market master. As he did so, the cats spotted a leather collar circling his neck, tucked under the scarf.

  “So,” said Gretchen, regaining her voice and stepping forward. “You’re not . . . free. Right? That man owns you?”

  Remy chuckled again as his deep brown eyes appraised the crate. “More free than you, eh? We don’t get that many cats in here; usually they’re pretty well-liked by their owners. Were you no good at your job on the ship?” He seemed genuinely interested.

  “We were great,” replied Gretchen pointedly, arching her back. “But it’s a crew of pirates . . .”

  Remy nodded and smiled. “Gotcha.”

  A small gray monkey began shrieking hysterically in a cage across from the cats. In a flash the dog darted to the monkey’s cage and issued several sharp barks and one long growl, frightening the monkey into cowering silence. Remy trotted back and sat next to the cats’ crate.