A MOUSE'S TALE

by Pauline Dewberry

Ollie has a habit of bringing in little field mice and after he’s finished playing with them, he leaves them to their own devices. Some times one of the other cats will despatch the mouse to the great mouse hole in the sky, leaving the evidence for me to find the following morning, or – as happened in this case, the mouse lives to fight another day and he spends his freedom running from the dresser to the cooker and anywhere else where he won’t be caught.

Ollie rediscovered the mouse down beside the dresser and with one deft left hook he scooped it up and carried it over to the new tower by the window where their toys are kept. He plopped the mouse into the round circular toy which has a piece of scratch pad in the middle and a ball going round the outer ring – which the cats push round with their paws. 

Mouse was placed in the ring and began running for all his worth, Ollie obligingly pushing the ball further round the ring so that Mouse didn’t encounter it and was able to keep running. After probably running around this ring a couple of times, I believe Mouse was thinking to himself that there must be more to life than this – and Ollie, being adept at ESP, scooped Mouse up once again and plonked him under the dining room table, where Sam, Billy and Timmy were all hovering with open paws should Mouse have the temerity to make a bid for freedom.

In a daring move, Mouse threw himself into Fate’s hands and raced out from the dining table and found refuge under the Welsh Dresser, whereupon Billy, Timmy, Ollie and Sam all took up strategic positions waiting for Mouse to poke his nose out.

I went to bed and left them all to it, thinking that I would no doubt see Mouse in deceased mode on the kitchen floor the following morning when I got up.  But Mouse was nowhere to be seen, and instead, Timmy and Ollie after breakfast was dealt with, rushed to the cooker – where I was now stirring my porridge for breakfast – and began poking their paws under it.

After a while, with no mouse to be seen, they each went upstairs with all the other cats, and I was left in peace to enjoy my breakfast. But, fearful of what happened before when we were in this situation, I closed the dining room door first, and got the long slim flat stick and gently began to swish carefully under the cooker. An embarrassing amount of fluff came out, plus an old chip (french-fry) and then hurtling at break neck speed, Mouse ran straight towards a bowl of dried cat food. Fortunately, there was a curvy bit in the side of the bowl and Mouse ran and hid under the actual bowl.

Naturally I let out a piercing scream – well, you would, too, I’ll bet, if you were in my slippers and skimpy nightdress!  I managed to get the *Mouse Catcher in place and, carefully manoeuvring it alongside the curvy bit in the bowl, Mouse obligingly ran into it. I quickly checked to see if he was hurt in any way and then I released him into the garden, wishing him ‘God speed and a safe journey.’

Coming back into the dining room I noticed Billy and Timmy’s anxious faces at the glass-panelled door. Hearing my scream, they’d known immediately the cause and came haring down the stairs to investigate. Upon opening the door, they both ran straight for the cooker, bums in the air, paws poking underneath. For several days afterwards Timmy and Ollie both crouched around the cooker, poking, sniffing, to see if Mouse was still in residence. But Mouse was a free Mouse – he had been liberated to live another day!!!

© Copyright Pauline Dewberry 2005

If you missed the previous article, you may like to read it here:

http://www.thedailymews.com/articles/mousewhogotaway.htm

* The Mouse Catcher is, in fact, a plastic storage container that stands about 9 or 10 inches high and originally I kept the cats’  ‘sweeties’ in it. It’s useful for hospitalisation of the mouse to see if it makes a recovery from the initial shock of being captured and stalked.  I leave it in the bathroom, which is next to the kitchen, with the door closed, giving the mouse a few hours of quiet solitude to aid its recovery. 

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