Mouse Mission

by Prudence Breitrose

  Megan and Joey took the elevator downstairs, hoping all was well, hoping they had not been disastrously dumb, letting themselves be cowed by a duke. They ran to the room where the first-aid supplies were kept. Yes, someone had opened a package of Band-Aids and left a tube of ointment on the counter. But no Chaz.

  As they hurried toward the servants’ hall, a sick feeling in Megan’s stomach grew with each step. Please, please, oh please let Chaz be there, she thought. Please, please, oh please let him be sitting at the table, stuffing his face with chocolate cake.

  John the footman was just coming out of the servants’ hall, brushing crumbs off his livery. “Hello there! You lookin’ for that Chaz? A bit late, ain’t you? He’s in the hands of the dreaded…”—he lowered his voice and crouched, looking furtively over a shoulder—“…the dreaded Peabody. Fuss about nothing, if you ask me. Wasn’t much of a cut, as far as I could see, but Mr. Peabody, he’s the only one what’s allowed to have a car up here at the house, so he took the kid to the doctor, him and his sister, Flo.”

  “Wait, wait—Mr. Peabody took him to a doctor?” asked Joey. “Which doctor?”

  “No, not a witch doctor,” said John, laughing. “Just a regular one.”

  Which made Megan mad. This was so much not the time for jokes. “Joey means where did Mr. Peabody take him?” she asked.

  “I don’t know, to be honest,” said John. “Closest doctors are about five miles away. One in Milford, and another in Shepton.”

  It was Joey who asked the crucial question. “Did Mr. Peabody tell Chaz’s dad where they were going?” he asked. “Did he tell the…Dr. Patel?”

  “I think he must have, don’t you? But come to think of it, they left in a bit of a rush. Maybe you’d better tell his dad yourself, so he won’t worry. Cheers!”

  John took off, leaving Joey and Megan to gaze at each other aghast. Aghast and guilty.

  t was all our fault!” Megan wailed.

  “Hey,” said Joey. “Blaming ourselves won’t help.”

  Trey had worked his way out of Megan’s pocket and up to her shoulder.

  “Stop,” he said. “Think. And get some help with thinking. Remember your secret weapon. There are more than two thousand eyes in this place, two thousand ears. Someone will know where Chaz has gone.”

  Of course. Mice.

  “I’ll go down to Mouse Hall,” Megan told Joey. “You tell his dad.”

  For a moment Joey hesitated. He so much didn’t like that division of responsibility. As he told Megan later, of all the things he’d done in his life, this could be the worst—telling a father that his son was missing and in the hands of the opposition. Whereas dropping down to Mouse Hall, handing over your problem to the mouse machine—that was so much easier.

  But Joey knew deep down that Megan would be a better ambassador to the mouse world. Mice on all continents adored her and would pull out the extra ounce of effort that could make all the difference.

  Joey was right to think that his job would be bad. Of course it was bad. How could it not be?

  He sprinted up the spiral stairs to his parents’ sitting room and there they all were, the ex-president and the experts. A footman and a maid were removing the tea things, so Joey couldn’t say anything yet. Instead, he circled the room, longing to see a flash of that dark red school blazer, or that black hair, longing to find that John the footman had been wrong. But there was no sign.

  He grabbed Jake and pulled him into the bedroom. Susie followed, and both she and Jake collapsed on the bed at the news. The last they’d heard was from Ken—that all three kids were safely in the duke’s apartment. But now, Chaz was gone? In the hands of Mr. Peabody and Aunt Flo?

  “But why!” wailed Susie. “As a hostage? To force his dad to give up?”

  “Or just to question him about Coconut Man?” asked Jake.

  “That’s what Megan’s finding out,” said Joey, “from the guys in Mouse Hall.”

  “We can’t wait for her,” said Susie. “We have to tell the president. Right now.”

  That was Joey’s cue to escape upstairs to his room. He really, really didn’t want to be around when Susie and Jake led the ex-president gently into their bedroom, and sat him down, and told him.

  Ex-President Pindoran wanted to call the police right then, of course. Jake and Susie tried to get him to hold off for a while, but they ran out of reasons for delay because they couldn’t mention mice, couldn’t ask him to wait until the guys in Mouse Hall told Megan where his son was.

  And they couldn’t stop the ex-president as he ran downstairs meaning to storm into the servants’ hall to demand that someone use the only phone in this palace to call the police.

  But the ex-president never made it. A minute after he’d set off down the spiral stairs he came back, his eyes wide.

  “It is too late,” he said. “We are locked in.”

  And indeed the ancient oak door was now shut tight, its lock strong enough to withstand a whole group of rain forest experts, all pushing together.

  It’s hard to surprise mice, and when Megan lifted the trapdoor and wriggled her way into Mouse Hall, she found they were expecting her. Yes, their scouts had seen everything. Heard everything.

  When Aunt Flo left the servants’ hall, she’d told her brother that young Chaz appeared to know a great deal about Coconut Man. Which meant that his father was not, after all, Dr. Patel from Fiji but was most likely Loggocorp’s worst enemy: the ex-president of Marisco, who still wielded enormous influence on the island.

  Mr. Peabody had promptly telephoned a senior executive at Loggocorp, who was now on his way. After the footman—a quilter in disguise—had collected Chaz from the duke’s apartment, the Peabodys had driven him away to meet this executive.

  “Their plans for young Chaz are unclear,” said the director. “The decision rests with the executive whom they will meet. They may simply try to learn from the boy what his father knows about the identity of Coconut Man, and of his descendants. In the worst case, they may hold Chaz as a bargaining chip, keeping him until the ex-president gives up his campaign to save the forest.”

  “A hostage?” squeaked Megan. “Then we absolutely have to save him! Where do you think they took him?”

  “We will soon be in a position to make that determination,” said the director, as Trey translated. “There is always a mouse on duty in Mr. Peabody’s car with a Thumbtop, to help us keep track of his movements.”

  Megan couldn’t help reaching out to the director in gratitude—but to do what? You don’t tickle directors behind the ear. You probably don’t even high-five them, with a tap against a paw. So her hand stopped in midair as the director pointed to one of the Thumbtops on the table.

  “All we can do now,” he said, “is to wait for our operative to report Mr. Peabody’s position.”

  It was only a few minutes but to Megan it felt like hours as she sat in a corner of Mouse Central, her head in her hands, waiting for the report. It didn’t help when a messenger mouse ran in with the news that he’d seen a quilter locking the massive oak door to the South Tower and making off with the key. Didn’t help at all.

  And it helped even less when a group of muscle mice trundled a packet of cookies toward her that they’d borrowed from the storeroom. Chocolate cookies. Chocky bickies. Megan thought she was going to cry.

  Then she sat up sharply, hitting her head on the ceiling but not noticing the pain because the mouse on Thumbtop duty was signaling to the Director of Security, his gestures crisp and somehow grim. Trey ran over to peer at the tiny screen, then sprinted back to Megan.

  “The good news is that he’s fine,” he said. “Chaz is fine. He’s in a cottage just outside this estate. They’re waiting for the big Loggocorp guy, who’s due to arrive in about half an hour. Look. These guys have brought up the map.”

  Megan ooched over to the big table to peer at the Thumbtop’s screen through her magnifying glass.

  It was the satellite view of Buckford Hall showi
ng its long, long driveway curling far across fields and woodlands until it joined the public road that encircled the grounds. Near where the driveway ended was a little lane with four cottages. And in front of one of them an exclamation point was flashing on and off. The precise location of Mr. Peabody’s car.

  Megan sat back, her mind racing. Her first thought was to find a phone and call the police. Or not? If only she could ask her mom, or Jake, if that was a good idea—if only they weren’t locked away, with no phones, no Internet. True, she could send a mouse up with a message, but that would use up precious time. And besides—

  “You can’t call the cops,” said Trey, reading her mind. “Think of all the lies you’d have to tell, starting with the lie about how you know where they took Chaz.”

  Yes, this was like the situation last August, when the Humans Who Knew had been more or less kidnapped by climate deniers. No way they could call the cops without committing a felony—lying to protect the secrets of mice.

  Now Trey climbed onto Megan’s shoulder and stroked her cheek.

  “It’ll be okay,” he said. “We can get him out ourselves. Do you see what those roofs are made of?”

  “Thatch?” said Megan, peering down again at the satellite picture.

  “And you know what lives in thatched roofs?”

  “Mice?”

  “You betcha. They’re mouse condos. Very desirable property. I wonder how many guys live there.”

  An IT mouse quickly found the e-mail address of the clan in the cottage and tapped out his question. How many mice? About a hundred in this roof, came the reply. Same number in the thatch of the other three cottages.

  With a mouse army that big, it should be possible to mount an attack so that a human could rush into the cottage and scoop Chaz up while Mr. Peabody and any other humans were squawking and EEEKing and trying to fend off bites. But it had to happen in the next half hour, before the Loggocorp man arrived and began asking Chaz about his dad’s hopes and plans for the forest.

  And which human could carry out the rescue?

  There wasn’t much choice, really. Megan noticed that hundreds of mice were looking at her, waiting. Trey ran up her arm to lean against her neck, as if that would lend her some of his mouseness, the part that thinks and acts at lightning speed in emergencies.

  “Let me see that map again,” she said.

  You could reach the cottage by road, of course, but there was a shorter way—a path that led through the woods. Megan recognized it as the trail she and Joey had ridden on yesterday. She could see the split where the right fork took off for the cliff overlooking the lawns and the left fork led to the road that encircled the estate, joining it near the four cottages.

  “How far is it through the woods?” she asked.

  A mouse did some quick measuring. Nearly three miles.

  Megan took a deep breath and reached up to the comforting form of Trey. No way she could run three miles in half an hour through a dark forest—not on her own legs. But she knew where she could borrow some.

  “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” asked Trey.

  Megan nodded. “You’ll come with me this time?” she asked.

  “Of course,” said Trey. “And we should probably take along one of these guys. A muscle mouse. Just in case.”

  At least ten mice volunteered for the job. Trey picked the one who looked strongest. Then the two mice walked ahead of Megan as she wriggled her way to the trapdoor, calling back over her shoulder, “Tell the guys in the cottage to get ready to attack. The signal will be someone whistling ‘God Save the Queen.’”

  he stable was quiet except for the soft munching of hay in the dusk, and Megan leaned against the wall for a moment to catch her breath.

  She looked at the row of horses. Most of them were full size, and there was no way she could put saddles on them, let alone climb up. It would have to be something shorter—one of the three ponies. But which one? She ruled out Petal, the pony Olivia had been riding, because who knew? It might be hard-wired only to obey Olivia. There was Snowball, Joey’s circular mount, but Megan remembered that it had been hard for Joey to find the accelerator before Snowball decided to wallow along in Prince’s wake.

  So there was only one option. Prince himself. He had plenty of acceleration and legs that could cover three miles in a flash. The downside? Well, that Prince was plainly the boss. He might or might not follow instructions. Might or might not try to kill her.

  Megan went up to Prince’s stall and gazed into his eyes. “Will you help me?” she asked. “Will you take me to Chaz? Please?”

  Of course horses are not mice, and though their brains might evolve at some point in the future it hasn’t happened yet, so there was no way Prince could understand. But at least he looked friendly now, his ears slanting forward as if he was eager for what came next, for anything that would break the monotony of the stable.

  Megan was glad that the groom had made her and Joey take off the saddles and bridles themselves, so at least she knew where they were stored. But she had no clue how the bridle went back on. In the half dark it looked like a jumble of straps and buckles that made no sense. She flopped down on the straw of Prince’s stall, hoping that nobody had pooped there.

  “There’s no way,” she said. Prince actually bent his head down to nuzzle the bridle in her hands as if he recognized that it was his ticket to an exciting night out. But he couldn’t exactly put it on himself.

  “Hey, you can’t give up now!” said Trey, rushing down her arm. “Put the thing down, and we’ll help you.”

  Megan laid the bridle on the straw and the two mice went to work, spreading it out so she could begin to see what went where.

  “This metal thing goes into his mouth first, right?” said Trey, patting the bit. “It must do. Then this strap would go behind his ears, so all you have to do is to buckle this strap….”

  It was worth a try. Prince let Megan open his mouth and slip the bit between his teeth. And he didn’t seem to mind when she bent his ears to push one of the straps behind them, before she did up the buckle. And he stood miraculously still while she put on the saddle and tightened the girth. So far, so good.

  She led Prince out into the stable yard, hoping his clop-clop wouldn’t alert anyone. Then she took a deep breath, stuck a foot in a stirrup and hoisted herself on top, which seemed to be Prince’s signal to do a pirouette, then another, and then to take off.

  Megan clung to the saddle as she had this morning, feeling she had no chance of slowing Prince down and not much chance of steering him in the right direction.

  “Trey!” she said. “Do something!”

  “It’s okay!” said Trey, holding very tight to a braid. “He’s heading for the woods!”

  And indeed they had soon left the half light of the evening for the deeper dusk of the woods, galloping along the trail while Megan hung on to the saddle and the two mice clung to braids that swung wild and free.

  There was just one problem. One little problem. When they got to the fork in the trail, they must absolutely not take the right turn that led back toward the house, as Prince had done yesterday. They must absolutely turn left.

  That fork was coming up fast, and Megan sensed that Prince was already thinking of veering to the right. She tugged on the reins to slow him up, with a stronger tug on the left one—and as they reached the fork, Prince came almost to a stop, prancing and pawing the ground.

  Was there a problem with the left trail? Something humans didn’t know about? Some long-leggity beastie that came out at night to frighten ponies?

  There was just enough light for Megan to see movement in Prince’s mane. It was Trey, climbing up to the pony’s right ear. Whatever he did worked, because Prince immediately took off to the left.

  Trey climbed back up to her shoulder and grabbed a braid again.

  “What did you do?” she asked. “Can you talk to horses?”

  “Course I can,” he said. “Doesn’t mean they understand. I j
ust said ‘Boo,’ right into his ear. Works every time.”

  Now Prince was traveling at a steady canter, and Megan began to get the hang of it. You didn’t have to hold on for dear life. Instead you could sit calmly on the saddle, move with the pony, feel you were part of the pony. And the pony seemed to approve, because when they came out of the wood his power steering kicked in, as well as the brakes, and he obeyed Megan’s commands when it was most important.

  There was just enough light for Megan to see the lane that ran in front of the four thatched cottages. She slowed Prince down so she could slide off him, and led him for the last few yards, walking on a grass verge that cut down on the clip-clop factor. Opposite the cottages she tied his reins to a small tree, then ran across the road to crouch down behind Mr. Peabody’s car.

  “Can you find out what’s happening?” she whispered to Trey.

  “Easy peasy,” said Trey. “Come on, big guy,” he called to the muscle mouse, and the two took off while Megan held her breath. Didn’t this sort of fairy-tale cottage always have a cat? Probably a black one, and a witch to go with it?

  Now she could see the faint outline of two mouse heads peering into the window beside the front door, a window with drawn curtains that left just enough of a crack for mice to see in. After they had peered, they listened. Megan could see that each of the two mouse outlines had an ear pressed to the windowpane.

  In a couple of minutes, Trey was back on her shoulder.

  “Chaz is in there, and he seems fine,” he said. “Mr. Peabody and Aunt Flo are feeding him cake, and Chaz doesn’t even look worried.”

  That was so good to hear. Good that Chaz wasn’t nearly as terrified as he ought to be.

  Megan realized that one of her shoulders was empty.