Emmy and the Rats in the Belfry

by Lynne Jonell

Emmy glanced at Sissy, who was smoothing her rumpled whiskers. It was true that it was dangerous to shrink or turn into a rat if Sissy wasn’t right there with you. You never knew if you could find her when you wanted to change back. “And you can’t put kisses in a bottle,” she said, finishing her thought aloud.

  “But you can capture Sissy’s kisses on a sticky-patch and release them when the patch is put directly on your skin! The ratalyst makes it possible!”

  “But why do you need us?” asked Joe.

  “Creating the sticky-patches is a matter of split-second timing, and it’s still in an experimental stage. If I have assistants, it’s easier for me to make observations and take notes.”

  “We’ll help,” said Emmy. “What do you want us to do, Professor?”

  “Careful, Emmy,” said Professor Capybara. “Hold her steady—that’s right. Cecilia, are you quite comfortable?”

  “Tell him if you aren’t,” said the Rat anxiously, watching from the countertop, his furry face lit up by the glow of the Bunsen burner.

  Sissy, held upside down in Emmy’s hand, twisted her neck to look up at the professor’s kindly, worried face. “I’m all right, as long as you hurry. The blood’s going to my head.”

  “Very well,” said the professor. “Joe, do you have the paper film ready? The rolling pin?”

  “All ready,” said Joe.

  “Raston, the timer?”

  “Check.”

  The mixture spooled down and spread out like thick honey, glistening and translucent on the shiny backing paper that was marked with grid lines. “Now, Joe!” said the professor.

  Joe slapped a sheet of thin, clear film on top of the goop and began to roll it out. The amber goo oozed out the edges and onto the steel plate beneath the backing paper.

  “Timer … now!” Professor Capybara pulled off the top film, revealing a flat, smooth layer of golden-orange slime, quivering slightly. “Emmy, Cecilia—go!”

  Quickly, carefully, Emmy held Sissy upside down over the slime and lowered her until her muzzle was almost touching the surface.

  “Whiskers!” said the professor.

  “Oh, that’s right,” said Cecilia, quickly bringing her paws to her face and pressing her whiskers upward. Emmy lowered her a fraction more, and she kissed the orange gel.

  “Why does Sissy have to hold back her whiskers?” asked Joe. “Is it just to keep them clean?”

  The professor’s pen made a scratching sound as he added to his notes. “No. We found that if anything else touched the goo besides Sissy’s lips, there were some unusual effects—” He looked up at the ceiling. “What was that?”

  All was quiet, except for the slight smacking sound of Cecilia’s kisses.

  “I didn’t hear anything,” Joe said.

  Raston sneezed. “Me neither. But my ears are all plugged up. I think I have allergies.”

  Emmy patiently moved Sissy along, square by square. Her arm ached, but she didn’t want to let the professor down. He thought she was responsible, at least.

  “Hey, guys!” Chippy’s voice sang out from a hole in the wall, and he scampered across the floor and up onto the countertop. “Need any help?”

  “Not really,” said Raston, keeping an eye on the timer.

  Chippy sniffed the air. “Something smells like—like—”

  “Chipmunk?” Raston suggested politely.

  “Like toothpaste,” said Chippy. “Sort of minty fresh.” He tipped his head back to watch. “Hey, why don’t you rig up a sling, Professor? Sissy could be suspended at the perfect height.”

  “It’s not a bad idea,” said the professor.

  “I could design one.” Chippy paced back and forth, his paws behind his striped back. “You could do more squares, faster!”

  Professor Capybara shook his head. “Cecilia can’t do too many in one day. The goop irritates her lips and makes them sore after a while.”

  “Time’s up!” said the Rat.

  “And now to cross-link the polymers with ultraviolet light,” said the professor. “Goggles, everyone!”

  A bank of tubular lights blazed on as the timer began to tick. And above the ceiling tile, in the space between the floors, a piebald rat stared through a small hole as if mesmerized.

  5

  “NO COOKBOOKS?” said the Rat, pacing the kitchen counter in the professor’s upstairs apartment. “No spices?”

  “Salt and pepper,” said the professor, handing out sodas from the refrigerator.

  “He’s got ketchup and mustard, too,” said Joe, peering in over the professor’s shoulder.

  Raston snorted.

  “And why would I need a cookbook?” Professor Capybara popped open a can for himself. “I just follow the directions on the box.”

  The Rat mumbled a word that Emmy didn’t quite catch.

  “Ratty, not everybody likes to cook—” Emmy began, but stopped at the sound of an engine’s sputtering cough. The door downstairs banged open, and Brian’s voice called out, “I’ve brought someone you know! Remember Ana?”

  Emmy glanced at Joe. Of course they remembered Ana. She had been the oldest of the girls they had rescued just two weeks before.

  The professor started down the staircase at once. “Welcome!” he cried, and Joe followed at a trot.

  “Come on, Ratty,” said Emmy. “Sissy’s downstairs with Chippy. And don’t you want to see Ana again?”

  “Oh, sure,” said the Rat. “Anything to get out of this excuse for a kitchen. Not one single cookbook! And look!” He pointed accusingly at a shelf. “Imitation chocolate!”

  A lady from the Children’s Home had come with Ana, and she was talking. Emmy, walking carefully down the stairs with the Rat on her shoulder, had no trouble hearing her.

  “Oh, my, such beautiful antiques, and decorated with such lovely—er, lovely—what are these creatures?”

  Through the open door, Emmy could see a thin woman with bright red hair pointing to the carved back of a chair.

  “Why, rodents, of course,” said Professor Capybara. “It’s the Antique Rat, you see.”

  “Oh!” The woman clapped a hand to her mouth and muffled a shriek. “I mean to say, how special!”

  “Do sit down, my dear Miss—I’m sorry, I didn’t quite catch your name?”

  “Squipp,” she said, clutching her elbows. “Gwenda Squipp. But we can’t stay long, Professor … Kippy-burpa, was it?”

  “Capybara,” said the professor, bowing slightly.

  “Ana just wanted to say thank you again and good-bye—Ana, dear, come and shake the professor’s hand. She’s ever so grateful that you rescued her from that terrible situation with the other little girls. Aren’t you, Ana?”

  Emmy, who had paused on the steps, caught Joe’s eye and grinned. They had been the ones to rescue the girls, but of course it had been safer to let Professor Capybara take the credit.

  A slender girl with watchful eyes moved into Emmy’s field of vision. “Thank you again, Professor,” she said in a clear, soft voice.

  “She’s recovered wonderfully well, considering,” said Gwenda Squipp, “and she’s had the best counseling the Children’s Home has to offer, haven’t you, Ana?”

  Ana turned slightly away. She pushed her long brown hair back from her eyes and blinked as she caught sight of Emmy on the stairs.

  “And the other little girls?” asked the Professor. “How are they, Miss Squipp?”

  “Oh, call me Squippy—all my friends do!”

  “Squippy?” said Raston into Emmy’s left ear.

  “As for the other little girls, they were all snapped up in a matter of days. Lots of loving relatives to take them in. We had a little more trouble finding people for Ana,” she added, squeezing Ana’s shoulder, “but we found some distant cousins at last, and she’ll be going to live with them very soon.”

  Ana ducked out from under the woman’s hand.

  “Don’t go upstairs, dear,” called Squippy. “Stay where I can see you. Just sit right ther
e with your friends while I talk to the professor.”

  “She won’t let me out of her sight,” muttered Ana, plopping down on the steps between Emmy and Joe. “It’s almost like being Miss Barmy’s prisoner again.”

  “No one is as bad as Miss Barmy,” said Joe with feeling.

  Raston flicked his tail. “Cheswick Vole isn’t much better.”

  “Watch your tail, Ratty, you’re tickling my neck,” Emmy said. “Listen, Ana, it’s going to be okay. You’re going to live with your relatives, aren’t you?”

  “They don’t really want me,” said Ana, flushing.

  Gwenda Squipp had taken the chair the professor had offered her, but she was still speaking in the slightly loud voice some grown-ups use when talking about children. “Yes, Ana and I will be traveling together tomorrow afternoon. A lovely, long trip on the train. And then she’ll settle in with a brand-new family—won’t that be special, Ana?”

  Ana’s long brown hair swung forward, hiding half her face. But the half that Emmy could see looked miserable.

  Emmy stood up and the Rat gripped a lock of her hair for balance. “Come on, Ana—Joe and I will show you the Sissy-patches. Maybe we can help Brian, too.”

  “What a lovely idea,” said Squippy as they passed. “It’s so important to be helpful, don’t you think, Prof—eeeeeeeek! A rat!”

  “Eeeeeeek, a Squippy!” said Raston. “Seriously, what does everybody have against rats?”

  “And now it’s squeaking at me! Ana, we must leave at once. This is not a safe environment for you!”

  “Calm yourself, my dear lady,” said Professor Capybara. “It’s a trained rat, perfectly safe.”

  “Really?” Gwenda Squipp gave the Rat a doubtful look.

  Raston promptly did a flip on Emmy’s shoulder, ending on one knee with paws outstretched.

  “Oh! Oh, my!”

  “I can sing ‘The Star-Spangled Banner,’ too,” said the Rat, burnishing his claws on his chest fur.

  Gwenda Squipp clapped her hands. “Look, it thinks it can talk! It’s so cute! Oh, Professor Burpybara, you simply must tell me about your training methods!”

  “Cute?” the Rat said in a strangled tone. “Now, listen, lady—”

  “So nice to meet you, Miss Squipp!” Emmy said loudly, waving as she backed away.

  Raston’s voice rose. “I may be exceptionally good-looking, and of course I do have remarkably perky ears—”

  “Shut up, Ratty!” said Joe under his breath. “Come on, Ana. You can help cut up the Sissy-patches.”

  “But I’m a manly rodent!” cried the Rat. “Handsome! Not cute!”

  Emmy sat on a high stool at the far end of the store and kicked her feet against the rungs. She tried to read the professor’s formula for Sissy-patches, but the jumble of numbers and symbols made no sense to her, and she put it back on the counter.

  Everyone else was busy. Brian was clinking among blue and green and golden bottles in a tall cabinet and making notes on a chart. Joe and Ana were cutting the Sissy-patches into neat squares. Chippy, gripping a pencil stub between his paws, was drawing a diagram of a sling that would hold Sissy. And Sissy, when she wasn’t being measured for the sling, was getting a reading lesson from her brother.

  “See? ‘S’ is for ‘Spiny,’ and ‘Squirrel,’ and … and ‘Schenectady’!” Raston sorted through old cage tags for more words beginning with s.

  “Schenectady,” Joe repeated. “I just heard that name somewhere.”

  “It’s where Ratty and Sissy were born, remember?” Emmy leaned forward. “That’s what the tag said—Shrinking Rat of Schenectady. The professor’s old lab was there, and Cheswick Vole was the lab assistant. It was Cheswick who went out and found Ratty and Sissy in their nest.”

  Ana looked up. “I’m going through that town,” she said. “Tomorrow, on the train. It’s one of the stops on the way to those people I have to live with.”

  “Haven’t you even met them?” asked Joe.

  Ana shook her head, looking miserable. “I wish I could just stay here.”

  Chippy put his pencil down. “Would you like to come to Rodent City for a visit? Mother invited you, you know. She wants to make you acorn cookies.”

  Ana glanced over her shoulder at Gwenda Squipp, who was still busily talking with the professor. “I wish I could. But we’re leaving tomorrow. And Squippy keeps an eye on me wherever we go.”

  Emmy swung her legs, thinking hard. Was there a chance that Ana could stay in Grayson Lake? Probably not, if there were relatives who would take her. And Emmy knew better than to ask her parents if Ana could live with them—not with the trouble Emmy had been in lately.

  But it was exactly that trouble that Emmy could not figure out. How had her room gotten so messed up? She certainly didn’t think she had been sleepwalking, but as Joe had pointed out on the way to the Antique Rat, she wouldn’t remember it if she had.

  Emmy slipped off her stool and stood by Brian. The tall cabinet was full of bottles and vials, each holding a colored liquid or powder and each with its own special rodent power. Would there be something in there that would cure sleepwalking? Who knew, maybe she could even find something that would help Ana.

  “Brian,” she began, when her eye was caught by a slender bottle half full of a silvery dust.

  She lifted it from its shelf and held it close to her face, peering inside. It was almost as fine as powder, and it glittered as if made up of very small, very shiny scales.

  “Scaly-Tailed Squirrel Dust,” she read from the label. “Suspension of Disbelief.” She passed it under her nose and sniffed. “It smells lemony. Like furniture polish.”

  Brian looked up from his chart. “Better not breathe it in, Emmy.”

  “But what does it do?”

  “I don’t know. You’ll have to ask the professor.” Brian bent over the chart again. “Maybe it means you stop believing—no, wait. You stop disbelieving—”

  Emmy wasn’t paying attention. All at once she was filled with a powerful sense that she could do something for Ana. In fact, her idea would not only make Ana happy, it would also impress Emmy’s parents! She set the bottle on the counter and ran across the room.

  “Professor,” she said, “I have a great idea! I’d like to have a good-bye party for Ana tomorrow morning. Right here, in the Antique Rat.”

  The professor beamed. “That is a good idea!”

  “Why, I don’t think—” began Gwenda Squipp.

  Emmy held up a hand to interrupt. It was the strangest thing, but she knew she could convince Squippy to agree. “I’ll plan it all. And I’ll buy the food and decorations, too.” She could afford it; her parents gave her a generous allowance. She would invite her parents to the party; they would see that she was responsible, and be proud of her.

  Gwenda Squipp blinked. “You seem very sure of yourself, young lady.”

  Emmy grinned at her, strangely confident. “But you’re going to say yes, aren’t you?”

  “Well … perhaps I should.”

  “Then it’s all settled,” said the professor. “We’ll hold it right before you and Ana leave on the train. All right, Emmy?”

  Emmy nodded. “But Ana has to come early. That’s part of the fun,” she added quickly. “Two hours early, at least.”

  “Well,” said Gwenda Squipp doubtfully, “I suppose I could arrange my schedule to come with her.”

  “Oh, you don’t need to do that,” said Emmy. “Please don’t bother.”

  “But I have to, dear.” Miss Squipp shook her head. “Children’s Home rules. Ana must always be accompanied, at least until she is delivered to her guardians.”

  Emmy thought fast. “But do you have to be in the same room as Ana? I mean, couldn’t she be upstairs while you were down here?”

  Gwenda Squipp frowned.

  “There’s a good reason,” said Emmy recklessly, filled with the happy knowledge that she would think of a reason. And then all at once, she did.

  Emmy whispered in
Squippy’s ear.

  Gwenda Squipp clasped her hands, sending her bracelets jangling. “How charming! I won’t ask one more question, not one!”

  “Wow,” said Joe, as the door closed behind Ana and Squippy, and Brian’s truck roared into life. “I’ve never seen you take charge like that before, Emmy.”

  “I don’t know what came over me,” Emmy admitted. “But it was like I already believed she was going to say yes! I just sort of told her so.”

  “What did you whisper to Squippy?” asked Joe.

  “I said Ana wanted to make her a very special surprise, and I was going to help, and we didn’t want her to see it until it was ready.”

  “Ana wants to give Squippy a surprise?” said Joe. “What?”

  “I made that part up,” said Emmy. “I mean, we’ll come up with some kind of surprise, but that’s not why we need the two hours.” She grinned. “I’m going to take Ana to visit Rodent City.”

  Brrriinnnngg! Brrriinnnngg!

  The professor stepped to the phone. “Why, yes, Mr. Addison, Emmy is here—just one moment.”

  Emmy took the receiver. “Dad?”

  Her father spoke forcefully. Emmy held the phone away from her ear, and Joe’s eyes widened as he listened.

  “Come back right now to clean your room, young lady. You’ll have a few more chores, too!”

  The droning hum of a dial tone filled the air. Emmy stared at the receiver in her hand.

  “So you weren’t sleepwalking,” said Joe slowly.

  Emmy put the phone back in its cradle as if it had been made of glass. “Somebody,” she said, “is out to get me.”

  6

  IT WAS ALMOST MIDNIGHT. All was quiet outside the Antique Rat as two rodents emerged from a hole in the crumbling foundation, sniffed deeply, and scuttled across the street.

  One of the rodents was dragging a plastic bag. It glinted briefly in the light from a silver moon, but when the moon slipped behind a cloud, the rats moved across the central patch of grass unseen, the bag bumping behind.

  They glanced at a police car that was parked outside a tall, narrow house, and slipped inside the building through a gnawed rathole. They paused at a small poster that had been affixed to the tunnel wall with a thumbtack.

  “It doesn’t look a bit like us,” said the piebald rat, shredding the carefully drawn poster with her claws.