And even if he’s satisfied and doesn’t beat me up and then kill Drusilla as well, he thought, he’ll be back, of course, now that he knows where to come.
But to his great surprise, the tomcat did not jump into the tub but back down onto the floor instead and came to sit beside him.
“You’re a funny lad,” he said. “What’s your name?”
“Martin.”
“I’m Pug. I expect that means something to you?”
“No,” said Martin.
“Dulcie Maude’s never mentioned me?”
“No.”
“Typical,” said Pug.
He stretched and yawned, and Drusilla, peeping around, shuddered at the sight of those claws and teeth.
“Go on, then,” said Pug. “Stick her back in with the other one. There are plenty of other good mice on the farm.”
“Do you mean…you’re not going to kill either of them?” said Martin.
“No,” said Pug. “You can keep your precious pets.”
“I don’t understand,” said Martin, when he had carefully put Drusilla back in the tub. “Why have you spared their lives?”
“Because I like the look of you, young Martin,” said Pug. “You’re a strange boy—there’s no getting away from that. Whoever heard of a kitten keeping mice as pets? It’s enough to make a cat laugh! But you’ve got spirit, Martin, lad—I’ll say that for you—you’ve got plenty of courage. If you fancy keeping pet mice, then you shall, and woe betide the cat that tries to stop you. I’m proud of you, my boy.”
“I don’t understand,” said Martin again. “Why should you be?”
“Can’t a father be proud of his son?” said Pug.
9
It was love at first sight
“You’re my dad?” cried Martin.
“I’m your dad,” said Pug. “By the way, how many brothers and sisters have you?”
“One of each.”
“What color are they?”
“Well, Lark—she’s tortoiseshell and white. Like Mother. And Robin—he’s black.”
“And you’re a tabby. Like me.”
“Yes, Dad,” said Martin, feeling suddenly happy that it was so.
“And do they keep pet mice too?” said Pug.
“Oh, no,” said Martin. “They’re great mousers. Like Mother. And like you, I expect.”
“You expect right, my son,” said Pug. “Though actually I prefer rat-catching myself. More meat on ’em, you know. Ever thought of keeping a pet rat? I could soon pick one up for you.”
“Oh, no thanks, Dad,” said Martin. “I don’t fancy them. It’s mice I like. They’re so little and pretty—especially Drusilla. And you should have seen her babies! They were so lovely when they were born, all pink and fat and blind and naked.”
Pug licked his lips.
“What became of them?” he said.
“I let them go,” said Martin, “when they were big enough. Drusilla asked me to. They were getting too much for her.”
“And now she’s asked you to find her a husband?”
“Yes.”
“Typical,” said Pug.
“Well, she explained it all to me, you see.”
“Explained what?”
“About how you have to have a daddy as well as a mummy.”
“Ah, yes,” said Pug. “Just so. Well, now, we’d better go and see if you’ve picked the right kind for her.”
“Wait a minute, Dad,” said Martin hastily. “Let me go first. Let me explain things to them. Whichever the new one is, a buck or a doe, it’ll have kittens if it suddenly sees you again.”
“I see what you mean,” said Pug. “I’ll hold my horses, if you see what I mean.”
Martin jumped up onto the chest. Already the nest ball had been cobbled together again, and when he called her name, Drusilla came cautiously out of it.
“Has he gone?” she said.
“No,” said Martin, “but it’s all right, Drusilla—he won’t hurt you.”
“Won’t hurt me! He was within an inch of biting my head off! Phew, I thought I was a goner!”
“Yes, but you’ll be okay now. He’s my father, you see, and he’s agreed not to harm you—not to harm either of you. So tell me—did I choose right? Is it a buck?”
“Yes,” said Drusilla.
“Oh, goody! But do you think you’re going to like him? I can always change him.”
“You’ll do no such thing!” said Drusilla sharply.
She dropped her voice a little.
“Martin,” she said, “he’s the handsomest buck I ever saw. In fact,” she whispered dreamily, “it was love at first sight.”
How her moods do change, thought Martin.
“Ask him to come out, won’t you?” he said. “And then I can show him to my father.” And he called, “Dad!”
It took a little time for the sleek dark mouse to come out. Pug and Martin sat side by side and waited, while from inside the nest ball came the sound of muffled squeaks, as Drusilla strove to reassure the newcomer. At last she persuaded him, and they sat looking up at the cats, Drusilla confidently now, the buck in some agitation.
“Hello, hello!” said Martin to him in a jolly voice. “Nice to see you again! Allow me to introduce my father, Mr. Pug. Now then, Dad, this is Drusilla…”
“We’ve already met,” said Pug gravely.
“…and this is…?”
“Cuthbert,” said Drusilla.
“Bert,” gulped the dark mouse. “Call me Bert—all my pals do.”
“Take no notice of him, Martin,” said Drusilla. “His name is Cuthbert and Cuthbert he shall be called. It’s a name of distinction, don’t you agree, Mr. Pug?”
“Oh, certainly, Drusilla,” said Pug.
“So let’s hear no more of this ‘Bert’ nonsense,” said Drusilla firmly. “Is that understood, dear?”
“Oh, certainly, Drusilla,” said Cuthbert.
Martin caught his father’s eye. The look in it was one of rueful admiration.
“And now,” said Drusilla, “I’m starving and so, I’m sure, is Cuthbert. So come along, Martin, don’t just sit there. Stir your stumps and fetch us something really nice for supper.”
“Oh, certainly, Drusilla,” said Martin. “Are you coming, Dad?”
“No,” said Pug. “You run along, Martin, lad. Stretch your legs. Get some fresh air. I’ll mouse-sit for you, so you needn’t worry about anything happening to these two.”
—
But of course that was exactly what Martin did worry about. Already he had taken a great liking to his newfound father, but he didn’t kid himself that Pug was anything other than a ruthless killer. Will he be able to keep his paws off my pets, he thought frantically as he hurried to find food for them. Let’s hope they stay inside the nest till I get back or the mere sight of them might trigger him off. And the first thing he saw as he reentered the loft was his father sitting under the broken kitchen chair and licking a foot as though to clean it. To clean it of what? Blood?!
Martin dashed to the tub and peered in. There were Drusilla and Cuthbert, side by side, lapping daintily at a small pool of water.
Martin dropped in the food he was carrying and went to sit beside his father. The tomcat’s big front paws, he could see, were soaking wet.
“Hello, Dad,” he said. “Warm evening, isn’t it? Been for a paddle?”
“They were thirsty,” said Pug gruffly.
“But how did you know what to do?”
“She told me,” said Pug.
Martin lay down and began to purr loudly with laughter.
“And you can wipe that grin off your face, my boy,” said Pug, “or I’ll wipe it off for you.”
“Yes, Dad. Sorry, Dad,” said Martin. “And Dad…”
“Well?”
“Thanks, Dad.”
10
Mayday! Mayday!
During the next couple of weeks Pug paid a number of visits to the cart-shed loft to see this strange mouse-kee
ping son of his. Sometimes Martin was out, and then Pug would pass the time of day with Drusilla and Cuthbert. He was polite and seemed pleased to see them, the mice thought, though they noticed that he had a tendency to dribble.
During this time also, Drusilla grew noticeably fatter again.
“You’re putting on weight, Drusilla,” Martin said. “Am I overfeeding you?”
“Oh, for goodness’ sake, Martin!” said Drusilla in her sharpest voice. “I thought I’d explained all that to you. Tell him, Cuthbert.”
A look of smug self-satisfaction passed over Cuthbert’s dark and handsome features.
“We are having a family,” he said.
“Oh, of course!” said Martin. “How stupid of me! Congratulations, Cuthbert! What fun! When?”
“Quite soon,” said Cuthbert. “In about another week, I think.”
“Oh, good! Not long to wait,” said Martin.
“Not long to wait, did you say?” said Drusilla in an icy voice. “Well, I do hope that both of you can manage to be patient. It must be such a trying time for you, sitting around waiting. Especially when I’ve got nothing at all to worry about except giving birth to umpteen babies in a cold hard prison—with primitive sanitation and very little privacy—from which there is no chance of escape. What a lucky mouse I am!”
—
“Typical,” said Pug later, when Martin told him of Drusilla’s outburst. “You save her from being eaten by me, you provide her with a husband, and you feed them both on the fat of the land. If that’s not luck, I don’t know what is.”
“And she’s going to have more babies,” said Martin.
“Mm,” said Pug. He licked his lips. “When?” he said.
“In about a week,” said Martin. He looked narrowly at his father. “Dad!” he said. “You wouldn’t…?”
“No, no, Martin, lad,” said Pug, “of course not, seeing that they’re your pets. But all the same I think I’d better make myself scarce for a while. Out of temptation, you know. There’s nothing quite as delicious as…”
“Stop!” cried Martin hurriedly. “I can’t bear to think of such a thing. They’re so little, so defenseless…”
“…so tender,” said Pug. “Just so.”
He rose and stretched himself.
“See you around, my boy,” he said. “Hope everything goes smoothly.”
But it didn’t.
—
The very next morning, not long after Martin had brought the mice a nice breakfast—pig feed for Cuthbert, and for Drusilla (who had grown strangely choosy in her likes and dislikes) a ripe strawberry stolen from the kitchen garden—he was sitting and chatting to his pets when they heard the sound of footsteps in the cart-shed below, and then the noise of barking, and then a human voice.
“What’s all the fuss about, Bob?” said the farmer. “A cat up in the loft, is there?”
“There’s a cat up in the loft!” raged Bob the collie dog. “Oh, if only I could get up these steps!”
“Don’t worry about the dog,” whispered Martin up above. “He can’t get up the steps.”
“But the human can,” said Drusilla. “And he’ll be sure to find us. And then he’ll kill me and my unborn children, fated now never to see the light of day!”
“What about me?” said Cuthbert.
“Oh, and you too, of course!” snapped Drusilla. “Hurry, Martin! You must get us out of this death trap.”
Just then they heard the stairs creak as the farmer set foot on them.
Cuthbert’s nerve broke.
“Mayday! Mayday!” he squeaked at the top of his voice.
“Listen to that!” grumbled the farmer as he climbed. “Blooming mice!”
Martin thought desperately. He could not carry both at once. There was only one decision.
“Women and children first!” he cried, and quick as a flash he jumped into the bathtub, picked up Drusilla, and leaped out again.
Hastily, and as gently as he could, he dropped her in a far dark corner of the loft and ran back for Cuthbert. But Cuthbert was still in a panic, scurrying round and round the tub squealing “Mayday!” in a quite hysterical way, and it took Martin a little while to get hold of him.
When at last he jumped out onto the wooden chest with Cuthbert in his mouth, the farmer was already in the loft.
“Bob was right!” he said. “There was a cat up here. And a proper little mouser too, by the look of it, like all Dulcie Maude’s kittens. Good boy!”
He reached out to give the good boy a pat on the head.
Martin, thinking he was trying to take Cuthbert, growled fiercely.
Cuthbert, thinking the growl was directed at him, fainted clean away.
“That’s one mouse less,” said the farmer with satisfaction as he saw the body go limp in the kitten’s jaws. “I’ll leave you to eat it in peace.” And he turned and climbed back down the steps.
Martin laid the unconscious Cuthbert down and began to lick his face in an attempt to revive him.
At this moment Drusilla reappeared, waddling awkwardly across the floor of the loft (for she was very heavy with young). From her hiding place she had heard the kitten growling, and now, to her horror, she saw that he was, it seemed, nuzzling at the dead body of her mate as cats often do prior to consuming their prey.
“Murderer!” she screamed. “You have made me a widow and orphaned my unborn children! You, who pretended to be my friend!” And she turned and staggered blindly away.
11
Number Eight
“Hang on, Drusilla!” cried Martin. “You’ve got it all wrong! Cuthbert’s not dead, are you, Cuthbert?”
Or is he? thought Martin. Could he have died of fright?
“Speak to me, Cuthbert!” he cried.
But there was no reply.
Was it a heart attack perhaps? Had his heart stopped? How to restart it? He didn’t know anything about first aid, but Drusilla would, competent and self-assured as always.
“Drusilla!” he shouted. “Come back! Cuthbert may need mouse-to-mouse resuscitation. Come here quickly!”
But there was no reply.
Leaving Cuthbert, Martin began to look frantically for Drusilla among all the heaps and piles of rubbish and junk that covered the corners of the loft floor. But he could not find her.
At last he returned to see how Cuthbert was faring.
But Cuthbert had gone.
—
For the rest of the morning Martin searched for his mice, calling their names in vain. Wherever they were (and there were so many nooks and crannies and hidey-holes in which they could be concealed), they kept silent.
Sadly he gave one last long look into the empty tub, scene of so many happy hours of conversation, birthplace of the first litter of cubs bred by the world’s first mouse-breeding cat. Before long, he thought, Drusilla will have another lot of beautiful babies, all pink and fat and blind and naked. And I shall never see them, never watch them grow, never bring them their food and hear their squeaky little voices saying “Thank you, Uncle Martin.”
I could catch another mouse, I suppose, and put it in the tub, but it wouldn’t be the same. It couldn’t be the same as my Drusilla.
He could not rid himself of the sound of her voice when last he had heard it, when she had called him a murderer, when she had cried so bitterly at him, “You, who pretended to be my friend!”
“I am your friend, Drusilla. I always will be,” said Martin, but answer came there none, and, heavy hearted, he turned and left the loft.
For a while Martin returned each day, bringing offerings of food, which he left on the floor of the loft, but it was not touched. Drusilla and Cuthbert had emigrated. But where?
He made inquiries around the farm. “Have you seen my mice?” he asked, and got a variety of replies.
“Mice?” said a sheep (it may have been the same one he had met before—they all looked alike to him).
“Yes.”
“Field mice?”
&nbs
p; “Oh, don’t start that again!” said Martin.
A cow that he asked simply said, “No.” (It spoke with a broad accent so that the word sounded like “Noo”; perhaps it was “Moo,” Martin thought later.)
And when he went down to the pigsties and asked the boar, “Have you seen my mice?” the reply was “Oh, don’t be such a bore!” (which puzzled Martin rather).
Disheartened, he decided to skip the farmer’s daughter’s pets (they’ll only rabbit on at me, he thought) and, feeling thirsty, walked down to the duck pond for a drink. About the only good thing about losing his pets was that he needn’t wet his feet anymore.
As he crouched and lapped, a duck swam near.
“Have you seen my mice?” said Martin.
“Didn’t know you had a mice,” quacked the duck.
“A mouse,” said Martin. “Not a mice. You can’t say ‘a mice.’ I had two of them.”
“Two mouses?” said the duck.
“Oh, forget it!” said Martin crossly.
The duck shook its head and swam away, muttering “Mouses, mices, mices, mouses” to itself in a confused way.
Martin sat by the water’s edge while the little ripples that the bird had made broke against the bank and gradually died away, leaving the surface of the pond glassy and still. Into this mirror he stared moodily, wondering what to do next. He closed his eyes the better to think, and when he opened them again, there were two reflections looking back at him from the mirror. Behind his own tabby face was a similarly marked but much larger one.
“Dad!” cried Martin.
“Hello, Martin, lad,” said Pug. “Come to fetch a drink for your pets, have you?”
“Oh, no,” said Martin. “They’ve gone, you see. I’ve lost them.” And he told his father all that had happened.
“You haven’t seen them, Dad, have you?”
“Not that I’m aware of,” said Pug. “I don’t actually inquire a mouse’s name before I kill it, you know.”
Martin's Mice Page 4