Mousemobile

by Prudence Breitrose

  Jake had lived here all his life, more or less, so he sat slumped in the passenger seat with his baseball-watching hat pulled way down over his ears. Joey and Megan slumped too, staying as far from the back windows as they could, just in case anyone who knew them from Fairlawn Elementary School or Garfield Middle School was around.

  As they drove, Uncle Fred started to explain why the Big Cheese had pretended to suspect his humans of the betrayal. But before he got properly into his story, there was agitation from the cage, and as they passed a row of streetlamps, Trey had enough light to read his boss’s signs.

  “Can we wait, please?” he asked. “My leader will have things to say about the events that brought us here, but for that he needs light.”

  So they talked about baseball as they skirted Greenfield and drove up into the woods on the other side, to the outdoor restaurant Joey had remembered. And, as he’d remembered, there were tables set deep enough into the woods for mice and humans to talk without bringing down a rain of EEEKs from other diners.

  Uncle Fred took orders from everyone and fetched a heaping tray of human food, plus a spare hamburger bun and a slice of cheese for the five mice.

  Make that four mice, because where was Larry?

  “He wanted to be alone,” said Joey. “I left him in the glove compartment of the RV. He’ll be cool.”

  “So who’s going to start?” asked Jake. “Who’s going to tell me what’s going on?”

  Both Uncle Fred and the Big Cheese had just taken a bite, which meant that the Big Cheese could answer first, because with MSL it’s no problem talking with your mouth full.

  “It’s complicated,” he said, and Trey swallowed his piece of bun fast so he could interpret. “Some bad elements among my followers seem to have rebelled against my authority and concocted a plan that involved closing Headquarters down.”

  “How on earth could they do that?” asked Joey.

  “Easy,” said the Big Cheese. “Someone reported to the county authorities that Headquarters was infested.”

  “Wow,” said Joey.

  “It was really scary,” said Megan. “The pest control guys came when we were bringing the mice out. We escaped just in time.”

  “Then,” continued the Big Cheese, “we were followed.”

  “By exterminators?” asked Jake.

  “No, by different humans,” said Megan. She told him about the couple in the little green truck who’d acted like they knew her—and had turned up again in Tracy even after they’d switched Mousemobiles.

  “But, but, but…” said Jake.

  “But what do humans in a truck have to do with exterminators?” said the Big Cheese. “What’s the connection? We don’t yet know the details. But thanks to the sharp eyes of Cleveland Mouse 47—Julia, as you call her—we believe we know the identity of at least one rebel.”

  He made some more signs, and Megan guessed he was pinning the blame on Savannah—but guessed, too, that Trey couldn’t bear to translate that part. And that the Big Cheese didn’t make him do it.

  “Wow,” said Jake. “But why would anyone rebel, sir? I thought all mice loved their leaders and obeyed them at all times. I thought that was built in, part of their DNA.”

  “So did I,” said the Big Cheese sadly. “It may be that contact with humans and human civilization has changed the mouse character. And that is indeed a sad and sobering thought.”

  “So what happens now?” asked Joey.

  “Our present strategy is to lull the rebels into a state of complacency,” said the Big Cheese. “Lull them into thinking that we blame Miss Megan and Mr. Fred, so they feel it is safe to make the next move. I expect those mice will soon reveal the goals of their rebellion, and the identity of any humans they have contacted. Then we can deal with that threat. But in the meantime, we have the principal rebel under close watch, so we can travel across this great land with no further surprises.”

  “To Cleveland?” asked Jake.

  “Indeed,” said the Big Cheese. “Tomorrow we will proceed eastward across the Cascades to the high desert of Oregon, then onward to the Rocky Mountains—”

  “Rockies, huh?” interrupted Jake, leaning forward. “What part of the Rockies did you have in mind?”

  The Big Cheese smiled, a paw pulling at each corner of his mouth. “Had we gone through Reno, we would have driven over a pass in southern Wyoming. From here, however, we will cross at a more northerly point, by way of a mountain pass not far from Camp Green Stars.”

  “And as long as we’re in that neighborhood…?” Jake prompted.

  “As long as we’re there, we can surely spare one afternoon for Miss Megan—for you all—to visit her parent.”

  “And, and, and?” said Jake, grinning now.

  The Big Cheese made another sign for “Smile.” “As I already told Miss Megan, her parent has proved herself worthy to be included in your little circle of Humans Who Know. Miss Megan has my permission to tell Ms. Susie the truth, whenever the time is ripe.”

  Megan couldn’t help it. Couldn’t stop her hand. Couldn’t keep one finger from reaching out to tickle the Big Cheese behind the right ear. That was weird enough, because touching the leader of the Mouse Nation was something you never, ever did. But what was even weirder was the fact that her finger almost bumped into another finger, as Jake had reached out to tickle the leader of the Mouse Nation behind the left ear, while Julia, Curly, and Trey looked on in horror.

  But the earth didn’t open up, nor did the sky fall, and the stars kept marching across the night sky as they always had, and the leader of the Mouse Nation looked as if he didn’t mind being tickled behind the ears, just this once. Didn’t mind at all.

  I could get used to this, he thought as Mr. Fred handed him a piece of crust from the apple pie that the humans were eating.

  A warm night. A moon just big enough to blacken the shadows of the forest. A million stars wheeling about overhead, the most stars he’d seen in years. The company of happy humans, humans he trusted to keep his nation safe. And hey, even that strange massage behind the ears had felt good. Yes, he could get used to this.

  True, there was one sliver of thought in his head that was sounding a warning note. As Mr. Fred offered him a second piece of piecrust, that sliver grew. What if he did get used to this? What if he and his followers started to enjoy luxuries such as piecrust, and everyone began to seek them out? How long before the discipline of the Mouse Nation broke down?

  He thrust that thought out of his head for now, because it wasn’t going to happen. He wouldn’t let it happen. He would be as firm as ever with himself and his followers. Just on this special night, this magical night in the forest, he had room for one more piece of piecrust.

  t was getting late, and Joey had fallen asleep on the bench, his head on his dad’s knee.

  “I guess we’d better get back,” said Uncle Fred. “See what your villains have been up to.”

  “There’s no hurry,” said the Big Cheese. “My villains aren’t going anywhere, at least not tonight. Indeed, even if they managed to escape from the vehicle…”

  He didn’t need to finish, as the humans visualized the swirling cats. You couldn’t have found any better jailers.

  “In fact,” the Big Cheese went on, “I believe we have time to take a slow route back to the barn. Few people will be about at this hour, and I have long wanted to view the historic sites of the earliest collaboration between our two species. Greenfield is, after all, a place of great significance to us.”

  “Yay!” said Megan. “And can we please start with the restaurant? That was significant, wasn’t it? The way mice helped my dad?”

  So that was the first stop on the tour of Greenfield. When Megan had arrived last fall, her dad’s restaurant had hardly any customers. Now, even late in the evening, the parking lot was stuffed with cars as diners lingered over their fresh-and-local desserts.

  “Careful, Megan,” warned Jake as they drove slowly by. He pulled his hat lower over
his ears as the door of the restaurant opened and a happy band of people emerged. Megan ducked down low because many of the regular customers would probably remember that fifth grader with the red braids who’d often sat at the little table by the kitchen last fall and winter, doing her homework.

  “Can I get out for just a minute?” she asked, when the people had driven away. She was feeling an almost magnetic pull to see her dad again. “Just to look through a window?”

  But the most Uncle Fred would do was to take a slow turn through the parking lot, which gave them the briefest glimpse of the chef, some strands of red hair escaping below his tall white hat as he helped his staff clean up after a day of cooking. Of course Megan longed to burst out of the Prius and rush in and hurl herself at him, and of course she couldn’t, but, as she told herself, she’d be here officially before long, and could hug her dad as much as she wanted.

  When the Prius reached Joey’s house, Uncle Fred parked a little way down the street, and all four humans tiptoed into the backyard, carrying the Big Cheese in his cage.

  “Here’s where I had to hold Joey’s cat in a cardboard box while the big mouse raid was happening,” whispered Megan. “While Trey was getting my Thumbtop back from Joey. Here’s the cat flap where the mouse army went in.”

  The light was on in the kitchen, and with the curtains only partly drawn, they could see Jake’s mom and Joey’s grandma and Megan’s stepmother’s Aunt Em, all in the form of one old lady who sat watching television, a familiar orange cat on her knee.

  Then the humans turned away to show the Big Cheese the window at the back of a house on the next street. The window of Megan’s room.

  To her surprise, the light was on, so she could look past the boughs of pine trees right into the room where she had spent so much time last year, gazing at the peeling brown wallpaper.

  Except that the peeling brown wallpaper was now history. She could clearly see her stepmother, Annie, at work on the walls, in the huge shirt she wore for painting, a brush loaded with blue paint in her hand. Megan felt so touched. Plainly, Annie was getting the house ready for her arrival, and wanted the room to look nice, finally.

  The new paint was one more thing to add to Megan’s good mood as they all crept back to the car and pulled quietly away. In a couple of weeks, Annie would take her up to her room, and she would act surprised and pleased and hug Annie to thank her for the paint, and this time she’d feel really at home with Annie and her dad, not like last year when they were sort of strangers, and…

  WHAM.

  “What the—?” exclaimed Uncle Fred.

  He had slammed on the brakes so hard that Megan’s seat belt almost cut her in two. Trey and Julia each grabbed a braid to keep from flying, and the birdcage swung wildly.

  “What the—?” echoed Joey.

  Uncle Fred backed up the Prius so it was level with the lamppost that had freaked him out.

  A flyer was stuck to it. A flyer with two faces—one of them very familiar.

  Megan’s face.

  The photograph from the Web site of the Mouse Nation. The picture that had been pasted to the wall, low down, in almost every department at Headquarters.

  And next to it a cartoon of a bearded man, the one Uncle Fred always used online because he was shy about letting people see an actual photo.

  With a telephone number.

  “You think…” began Uncle Fred. “You think Savannah is trying to pass herself off as human? Trying to pass herself off as Megan?”

  “But how could it be Savannah?” Megan wailed, “when no one has Thumbtops? How could she have told anyone that we’re here?”

  “Good question,” said Uncle Fred, then explained to Jake: “Every Thumbtop in the Mousemobile is under lock and key. Lock and toothpick.”

  “Indeed,” began the Big Cheese. “We took care to…”

  He was interrupted by a human sound he had never heard before. It was a wail from the back seat, almost a howl.

  “Joey?” said Jake. “What’s up?”

  Another wail. Then Joey found his voice.

  “I didn’t know,” he said. “I didn’t know all the Thumbtops had to be locked up. I left mine with Larry.”

  “You left your…?” began Uncle Fred.

  “He wanted to follow a game,” said Joey. “Little League. He said he could get it online. And I didn’t know!”

  There was silence in the Prius until the Big Cheese spoke.

  “Do you know what we mice always say at times like this?” he asked, as Trey translated.

  Even in her state of shock, Megan knew the answer. “It’s, ‘There is no disaster that mice can’t turn to their advantage.’ Right?”

  “Right,” said the Big Cheese.

  “And the advantage here?” prompted Jake.

  “The telephone number!” said the Big Cheese. “My operatives can easily trace the human who uses that number. Then we can instruct the mice in his house to find out everything about his goals and his plans and his contacts.”

  “First we have to take down all those damn flyers,” said Jake. “Because if Red sees them…”

  Megan imagined her dad finding his daughter’s face plastered all over town. Of course he’d freak out. Of course he’d call the cops. Of course they’d send out an all points bulletin for Megan and Uncle Fred, one that would mean they’d be hunted in every corner of America. Find that girl and the bearded guy.

  And if you find them, don’t be surprised if you also find at least 2,243 mice.

  No one talked much as Jake directed Uncle Fred to drive along the main streets of Greenfield, slowing as they passed a total of thirty-five lampposts that had flyers stuck to them, until Jake or Joey snatched them off.

  At last they made it back to the Mousemobile, and Joey and Jake sauntered over to it. While Jake shooed cats away, Joey carefully opened the passenger door. Then he reached into the glove compartment to scoop up Larry and the Thumbtop he’d been using, as if it were the most natural thing in the world that a boy would do for his mouse.

  guess you want to know what happened,” said Larry as Trey translated.

  Joey had placed Larry on the dashboard, where all eyes were upon him. “It was three–three in the fourth inning,” he continued, “and then—”

  “Hush,” said Joey. “Larry, that’s great, but hush. Your leader wants to know about something else.”

  Jake held out his hand to the cage and whispered, “Sir, be gentle with him” as he gave the Big Cheese a ride down to the dashboard.

  The Big Cheese reached out a paw and patted Larry on the head to show that what was coming was nothing personal.

  “Mouse,” he said, “we believe that you allowed another mouse, or mice, to use Mr. Joey’s Thumbtop.”

  “Was that a problem?” asked Larry, looking to Joey for guidance. “It was between innings.”

  “You couldn’t have known it was a problem,” said Joey.

  “You couldn’t have known,” echoed the Big Cheese. “But somewhere on that vehicle, at least one mouse is reaching out to humans who wish us harm. Did anyone else use the computer?”

  Larry crouched low, trying to make himself as small as possible.

  “You can tell us,” said Trey. “No one is blaming you.”

  “I thought it was okay!” wailed Larry. (You wail by ending your sentence with some quick pats on the right side of the mouth.) “It was that mouse with a bow, the talking mouse. She sort of rubbed against me as if she really liked me and said how big and strong I was, and she wanted to check her e-mail.”

  Larry put his face between his paws. Julia and Curly couldn’t stand it and rushed over to stand beside him, glaring at the humans defiantly. If one member of their clan was in trouble, they were all three in trouble. They’d all three take the punishment.

  “It’s okay, big guy,” said Trey, who, like Megan and Joey, had become deeply fond of Larry. Yes, he was a crazy sports nut—a sports bore, really—a one-track mouse, but there was not an evil h
air on his body.

  Larry ran along the dashboard to where Jake’s hand was resting.

  “Don’t let them send me into exile!” he said. “Please—not exile!”

  “There will be no exile,” said the Big Cheese, “if you tell us everything.”

  “She looked at her e-mail,” said Larry miserably. “Then she said ‘uh-oh’ or ‘yikes’ or something, as if she didn’t like it.”

  “Did she reply?” asked the Big Cheese.

  “Well, she wrote something.”

  “Was she alone?”

  “She was, at first. Then after she’d signed out, another mouse came over. She whispered something to him.”

  “Do you have any idea who that was?” asked Trey.

  “How should I know?” said Larry. “They all look alike. Except that this guy had a red thing around his neck.”

  “A director,” said the Big Cheese, and his gestures were slow and sad. “A member of my trusted inner circle. I suspected as much, though I didn’t want to believe it.”

  There was stillness in the Prius while everyone looked at him. He had plainly come to a decision.

  “I need to send a message to my Director of Security,” he said. “For obvious reasons, it will be safer to have a human deliver it. You will find him on guard, just inside the door. Tell him he is to bring the Director of Forward Planning and Talking Mouse Seven to me, under guard. And please bring Mr. Joey’s Thumbtop.”

  It was Jake who worked his way through the cats and used his body to block them out while he opened the door of the Mousemobile. The humans in the Prius watched as he reached in, turned on the interior light, then lifted up a mouse to whisper some instructions. He put the mouse back in the Mousemobile, then closed the door and waited, watching through the window. In less than two minutes he must have seen a signal, because he opened the door again, crouching down to let a platoon of muscle mice march up each arm. One platoon was using toothpicks to prod a mouse with a pink bow into walking ahead of them, while the other platoon shepherded a mouse with a red thread around his neck.