by Lynne Jonell
Emmy didn’t say anything. An idea was nibbling at the edge of her mind …
Joe looked down. “No matter what we do, Gussie isn’t going to make it,” he said quietly. “But I don’t want her to die up here. So whatever we do, we’d better do it fast.”
In the darkness, something stirred and pulled away from Joe’s side. “Oh, no,” said Aunt Melly. “Oh, my dears—oh, Gussie.” She bent over, as if under a heavy weight.
Emmy shut her eyes, the better to concentrate as her idea took shape. She ran through the possible steps in her mind, one after the other. Could it work? It was complicated. Maybe if everyone helped …
There came another gust of wind and with it, a small dark creature blew in, fluttered briefly, and settled on the great bell wheel. “And so we meet again! Fortunato! And you have business for to discuss with Manlio, no?” The boss bat looked around, his eyes glinting. “Or there is maybe some other reason you intrude my belfry?”
“We need to know where you took Sissy,” said Joe.
“Cecilia,” Ana added.
“Ah, the sweet fuzzy one!”
“My sister,” said Raston, between his teeth. He leaped from Ana’s pocket to Emmy’s shoulder, where he could stare directly into Manlio’s small, bright eyes. “And we want her back.”
Manlio shrugged. “But this is impossible. I deliver the oh so beautiful Cecilia to the Mamma, I am paid, and this business, it is concluded. Now you want me to take her back? It is against all bat honor! It is against the postal code!”
Raston stiffened. “I don’t know where you took my sister, but it wasn’t to her mamma!”
Manlio’s small eyes narrowed. “Are you to calling me a liar?”
“If the shoe fits, Bat Boy!” said Raston hotly.
Manlio smiled, showing his pointed fangs. “And as for you, if you are to calling me Bat Boy one time more, I tell the boys to sprain your toes, no?”
Emmy covered Ratty’s mouth with a finger. “He’s sorry, Mr. Manlio—he didn’t mean it. But somebody lied. Because we found Sissy’s real mother, and she hadn’t seen her daughter for years.”
Manlio stared at them, expressionless.
“Who paid you?” asked Joe. “Was it a patchy-looking rat? Or a black rat?”
“A black rat,” said Manlio hoarsely. “Are you for to saying that the sweet fuzzy one, she is in danger?”
“Terrible danger,” said Raston with a sob.
“We need you to help us rescue her,” said Ana.
“We have to figure out how to get the aunts down from the belfry, too,” said Joe.
“I’m afraid,” came Aunt Melly’s quavering voice, “that we are causing a great deal of trouble.”
“Don’t worry, Aunt Melly.” Emmy leaned forward. “I have a plan. It might not work, but it’s the best I can come up with. Listen.”
Sometime later, Emmy leaned back. “What do you think?”
There was quiet in the belfry.
“I like it,” Joe said at last. He smoothed Aunt Gussie’s hair. “It can’t mess things up any worse than they already are, that’s for sure.”
“Except for you, Emmy,” said Ana. “I don’t know how you’re going to explain these things to your parents.”
Emmy sighed. That was the weak point of her plan.
“Explain things later!” cried Raston. “Rescue Sissy now!”
Emmy stroked his back with a soothing hand. The Rat was right. Rescuing people—and rodents—came first.
“I’m sorry to make you so responsible for us,” said Aunt Melly. “And we were the ones who got you into this belfry trouble, too. So it must be your choice as to what we do.”
Emmy winced. She was starting to hate the word responsible. But it sounded different, the way Aunt Melly used it. She didn’t mean just checking off a list of chores.
“Okay,” said Emmy with sudden decision. “Let’s try it. Ana, you’ll need your penlight. Ratty, start biting.”
“Oh, dear,” said Aunt Melly again, looking shocked as she shrank to a tiny version of a little old lady. “Must I really go all the way to a rat?”
“It’s better that way,” Emmy said. “Nobody thinks twice about a pet rat. But if anyone saw a tiny lady …”
“I understand,” said Aunt Melly, holding out an arm. “Just a little nip, though, Raston, if you please. And be very gentle with dear Gussie.”
“I’ll do my best,” promised the Rat. In moments there were two white rats on Joe’s knee—bony, desiccated, with patchy fur and loose folds of skin. One looked to be in a very deep sleep.
Joe bent over the sleeping rat, put an ear to her chest, and listened to the quick rasp of breath. “Hang in there, Gussie,” he whispered. “We’ll get you to Rodent City as fast as we can.”
“And when we find Della, we’ll use just one of her tears at a time,” said Aunt Melly. She looked up, smiling faintly. “I’m afraid we really were quite a handful as youngsters.”
“You think?” said Joe, forcing a smile. He tucked Gussie gently into his pocket and stepped over Emmy to get to the trapdoor. “Come on, Ana. Bring Melly and let’s get a move on. We’ve got a train to catch.”
“Look for a freight train!” called Manlio. “Tell the yard bats where you want for to go! Giovanni—hey, Giovanni!”
A sleepy-looking bat poked his head downward from the upper belfry. “Yes, boss?”
“You must for to bring them on the night freight—the one that will to pass through Grayson Lake, no? Stefano, at the station, he has the schedule. And then you must to wait for me and the boys. We’ve got a little, how you say, business first.”
Emmy watched Joe and Ana start down the ladder, carrying the shrunken aunts. She waited until the top of Ana’s head disappeared into darkness and she heard the door to the rooftop slide open.
“Okay, Ratty, my turn.” Emmy held out her finger. “Don’t chomp. Two bites, please. I’ll do my part better if I can scamper.”
She shrank like a collapsing balloon, her insides pulling together and the rest of her following. She had barely a moment to feel her legs as small as chalk sticks, and sense the sudden great loom of the bell overhead, when another small nip from Ratty transformed her into something furry with a sniffing nose, alert ears, a long tail, and eyes that were perfect for night vision. All at once she could hear much more bat noise, too. Clicks and peeping calls filled the air around her, higher pitched than she had been able to hear as a human, and louder, too.
Meanwhile, Manlio had been giving orders. “Ready?” he asked from the windowsill as he hooked two harnesses together. All around them, bats descended, wings fluttering like falling leaves. One by one, they hooked their claws around the long, looped filaments attached to the harnesses and squeezed through the window slats to wait on the sill outside.
Manlio strapped the dual harness on Emmy and Raston, gave a final yank to the buckles, and shoved the two rats out onto the narrow wooden sill.
The wind blew back their fur and pushed at their bodies like an unseen hand. Emmy teetered on the ledge, dug in her hind feet, and gripped Ratty’s paw, her small rodent heart pounding many times faster than a human one.
Raston swayed unsteadily.
“Don’t look down!” Emmy pitched her voice to be heard above the wind and the peeping bats.
Raston turned and said something that she couldn’t hear.
“What?” Emmy shouted.
“What if the harness breaks?” Raston clutched at Emmy’s arm, his mouth to her ear. “The buckles looked a little rusty! Maybe I’ll just go down the ladders after all—”
“Go! Fast! Rapido!” cried Manlio, and the cloud of bats slowly rose, taking up the slack filaments.
“Don’t unbuckle, Ratty, it’s too late!” Emmy cried. “Hang on!”
The slender filaments of fishing line tightened and pulled them off the ledge, their toes dragging. Emmy’s stomach flipped to her throat as they dropped like two stones, and her mouth opened to scream. But then the cloud of b
ats adjusted to the weight and they stopped falling, flying instead in fitful jerks as the bats fluttered and dipped, darting forward in a confused pandemonium of wings.
Emmy found herself grinning and unable to stop. She had always wanted to fly! And not in an airplane, either, but like this, blown about by the wind and soaring over rooftops on a starlit summer night.
“Whaf—ats—oop?” Raston’s question was half blown away by the wind.
Emmy leaned in close to the Rat’s ear. “What fat soup? What kind of a question is that?”
Raston shook his head and put his muzzle next to her face. “What if the bats poop?”
Emmy looked up involuntarily.
“Don’t look up! You might get it in your eye!”
Emmy looked down, grinning again. Between worrying about a breaking harness and what might land on their heads, the Rat was nervous enough for both of them. “Try not to think about it,” she said in his ear as they dipped lower, passing the train station and a pair of traffic lights blinking yellow. “We’ll be landing soon, anyway.”
25
SISSY HUNG UPSIDE DOWN in her own harness and waited numbly for Cheswick to pour the contents of the beaker onto the metal plate and roll it out. Soon, she knew, she would put her ulcerated lips on the amber goo and begin yet another round of kissing.
She was weary beyond exhaustion. The pain from her lips had spread past her muzzle, up into her head, and down her neck; the spots where the harness chafed had become oozing sores; and her tail was singed where Cheswick had been careless with the Bunsen burner. Worst was the knowledge there was no one here who cared about her at all, except for how they could use her. And it would never, never end.
There was no chance of rescue. No one knew where she was—except for Manlio and his bats, and they were paid by Miss Barmy. And before long, even the bats wouldn’t know, because Miss Barmy was planning a move.
“Hurry up with that, can’t you, Cheswick?” The piebald rat, lounging on the windowsill, swung one clawed foot over the edge and bobbed it impatiently. “Don’t we have a thousand patches yet?”
“Patience, my little lilac blossom,” said Cheswick, breathing hard as he pushed the beaker across the counter. “It’s difficult to do all this while I’m a rat. Everything takes much longer.”
“Well, turn human then,” said Miss Barmy, waving a careless paw. “Have the rat kiss you, I don’t care.”
“You won’t mind if I’m a grown human while you’re still a rat? Really?” The black rat blinked. “You won’t feel as if we’re somehow … unequal?”
“I’ve known we’re unequal for a long time, Cheswick. But you’re improving in many ways. I’ve quite liked you as a rat, you know.”
“That isn’t exactly what I—” Cheswick stopped, his pink nose quivering. “You’ve liked me as a rat, Jane?”
“Yes, yes, but go on, get kissed. I want you to pack up everything as soon as we have a thousand patches. Father has the money ready, and he’ll pick us up and take us to the airport in the morning. You can take me out of the country as a rat, and we’ll start over somewhere—”
“In the south of France!” gasped Cheswick.
“Paris is better,” said Miss Barmy. “I hear they have more mirrors. Go on, hurry up!”
Cheswick squared his fuzzy shoulders and reached to release the crank arm that held Sissy in place. He lowered her to the counter, where she lay on her side in the harness, unable to move but grateful that she was no longer upside down.
Cheswick pushed her into a sitting position and held on, his paws on her arms. “Kiss me, then,” he said. “Kiss me tw—Good heavens!” He peered into her face, looking shocked. “What happened to your lips?”
Cecilia stared at him. What did he think had happened? She looked pointedly at the amber goo in the beaker and blinked back the sudden tears that rose against her will.
Cheswick flinched, looking ashamed. “I couldn’t help it, you know. I had to get the patches made. You understand, don’t you?”
A wave of sudden anger washed over Sissy, leaving her trembling. It wasn’t enough that he tied her up and took her away from family and friends and used her cruelly. Now he wanted her to say that it was perfectly reasonable. If it wasn’t for the fact that she was tied up so tightly that only her paws were free, she would have scratched him.
Cheswick flushed pink from his nose to his tail at her scathing glare. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “But I simply must—” He stopped. “Oh, what’s the use.” He loosened her harness and bent forward. “Just hurry up and kiss me.”
Sissy shuddered. She didn’t want to kiss this evil man—or if he wasn’t evil, he was weak, and that was almost as bad—but she knew she would be made to kiss him in the end. So she got it over with, half wondering whether he would grow or stay a rat like Miss Barmy.
But apparently Cheswick Vole did not have the blocking hatred and resentment of his lady love. He turned first from rat to tiny human, then went from tiny to large as Sissy had seen so many times before. He slid off the countertop, a wizened, skinny man with trousers belted high and greasy hair combed over a bald spot on top.
“You were better-looking as a rat,” observed Miss Barmy from her windowsill.
“I know, dear,” said Cheswick humbly. He fumbled with Sissy’s buckles, turning his eyes away from her damaged lips. She whimpered a protest, for he had tightened the harness one notch past the usual, but he did not seem to hear.
“La la la la,” Cheswick sang under his breath. He cranked Sissy up, poured the goop, rolled it flat, and lifted off the top sheet. “Go ahead and kiss. It’s the last batch for a while,” he added in a low voice, reaching for the X-Acto knife to cut the squares.
Sissy was buckled so tightly that she could not bring her paws up to hold back her whiskers. And if her dragging whiskers ruined this set of patches, Miss Barmy would punish her.
Cheswick lowered and raised the rat and moved her steadily along with the crank arm, looking away all the while. Sissy, trussed so tightly that her arms were going numb, had never felt so helpless. Each kiss burned like fire. She could not use her paws to wipe the caustic goop away between kisses, and when a scab broke open on her lips, it took all her strength not to cry out in pain.
But though Sissy held in her cries, she could not stop her broken lips from bleeding, nor her tears from falling. And with her tears, the blood fell in droplets, splashing onto the goo and sinking into the patches without a trace.
It was dark in the boarded-up laboratory. The Bunsen burner, connected by a rubber tube to a gas tank beneath the counter, burned steadily, turned down low for the night. On the window ledge, Miss Barmy snored faintly.
Cheswick was still awake. He sat at the desk across the room, making tally marks on a sheet of paper as he counted the thousand patches he had stockpiled, and packed them in a carryall bag.
Cecilia had been taken out of her harness and put in a cage on the counter for the night. She peered through the bars at the final batch of Sissy-patches, cut and ready on the metal plate. Would Cheswick forget to pack them with the others? Maybe she could avoid punishment for ruining them after all.
She shut her eyes wearily, too tired and heartsick to care. If only she had not trusted Manlio—if only she hadn’t been so stupid about the letter! But she had so wanted to believe it came from her mother.
And now she was going away forever. Not only would she never see her mother—she would never see her friends or her beloved brother again. And what must Rasty think of her? Would he think that she was happily living with their ratmom and had forgotten her promise to send the bats for him?
Sissy felt a pain in her heart that was worse than anything she had suffered so far. She could not bear to think that her brother would believe she had abandoned him. If only she could give him a message!
She could. She knew how to write, now. But she had no pencil, no paper …
Sissy blinked. Had something moved, in the corner? She stared at the flap of
tar paper that covered the opening to the street. No, it was perfectly still. It must have been Cheswick’s moving shadow.
She shook her head impatiently. She had something more important to think about than shadows. She had her claws, and she had the bottom of the cage, and she had the whole night ahead to scratch out a message for Rasty. Someday, Professor Capybara would come back to his old lab, and sooner or later he would clean the cages. And when he did, he would find her message and tell Raston. Someday, her brother would know the truth.
Sissy had painfully scratched the first word—“Dear”—when she saw another moving shadow out of the corner of her eye, then another. She lifted her head, ears pricked and nose at the alert. There was a musty smell, somehow familiar.
Bats. Bats crawling in, moving crabwise along the baseboards, one after the other in single file. Bats that had carried her away, bats that could not be trusted—
Sissy nearly squeaked out loud as a fluttering shadow fastened itself to the side of her cage. There was a tiny click, and the door swung open.
“The lock, she does not exist that can stop Manlio!” whispered the bat, and his fangs gleamed as he grinned.
Sissy stepped back. “You lied to me!” she whispered.
Manlio put a wing to Sissy’s lips. “Hush, my sweet fuzzy one. The bad rats lied to me, and now I come to set you free.”
Sissy winced as his wing touched her fresh scabs.
Manlio turned her shoulders so that she faced the glowing Bunsen burner. “Mamma mia!” he gasped. “The poor sweet lips! I did not know the Barmy rats could to be so cruel! I was to believing what they tell me—it is only business, I tell to myself …” He patted her shoulder with his wing and ushered her out of the cage onto the counter, where a burly bat stood lookout, eyeing the Bunsen burner with interest.
“Keep the eyes open, Rocco,” murmured Manlio. “Is possible we can to do this quietly.”
A slender shadow scrambled up the counter leg, crouched with ears alert, and resolved itself into a soft gray rat with a white collar of fur around its neck. “Good to see you, Sissy,” whispered Emmy Rat. “Okay, let’s go.”