Five Mice in a Mouse-trap Part 18

"Sure, ma'am, I have not seen the child this morning!" said Margaret.

"Why, I left him in the dining-room, finis.h.i.+ng his porridge!" exclaimed Fluff. "Isn't he there now, Auntie?"

"No!" replied Mrs. Wilton. "He is not anywhere in the house, and I thought he had gone with you. Where can the child be?"

Then there was a great hurry-scurry, in the house and out of it. All the other children were summoned, but none of them had seen Downy: so they all started off to look for him, Mrs. Wilton and Margaret, Nibble and Brighteyes, Fluff and Roger, all going in different directions, and callings as they went: "Downy! Downy boy! where are you, Downy?" but no Downy answered.

If people only knew a little more, how much better they would get on! at every step the children might have found out where Downy was, if they had only taken the trouble to listen. The old Drake quacked to them in his loudest tones: "down by the brook! down by the brook! stupid creatures! down by the brook!" the fir-trees on the lawn pointed their long green fingers towards the brook. The birds sang, the dogs barked, the leaves whispered, the hens cackled, and each and all said the same thing, over and over again! "Down by the brook! down by the brook!" and so the whole family looked on the beach, and in the orchard, and up and down the road, and all over the barn and the stable, and in the pig-sty.

If you will believe me, it was not till after a two-hour's hunt that they found the little fellow, curled up in the long gra.s.s by the side of the brook, fast asleep.

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You may imagine how Aunt Grace caught him up, and kissed and petted and scolded him all in a breath. But Downy struggled to get down, and cried out "Don't take my foot off! don't take my foot off! naughty Auntie!

a-a-a-ah! a-a-ah!"

"What is it, dear?" said his aunt. "Wake up, Downy dear! you have been asleep, and we all thought you were lost, and were dreadfully frightened about you. What is the matter with your foot, my precious?"

Downy rubbed his eyes and looked about him, seeming very much puzzled.

"Why, where'v ve ladder?" he asked. "And where'v my dolden puddin? I didn't want to tome down from de fun! a-a-a-ah! I want to be de King of Fiam, and wide on a white elephant!"

Well, they all told him he had been asleep and dreaming; and they petted and consoled him, and took him into the house, and Aunt Grace gave him an apple almost as big as his own head. But all day long Downy was very melancholy. He smarted under a sense of injury, and could not forgive his aunt for taking his foot off the ladder; and it was many a day before he forgot the golden pudding and the white elephant.

CHAPTER XIV.

UNDER THE SEA.

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THE four mice had been settled at Glenwood for more than two weeks before I was able to pay them one of my evening visits. Little Puff had been very ill indeed, and all my spare time had been devoted to her.

Besides this, there was a revolution in Meteoria (the place where the meteors come from, my dears), and numbers of the inhabitants had emigrated, and had been whizzing past my palace constantly, requiring my utmost care to prevent it from catching fire.

But the revolution was over in a week, and about the same time Puff began to be a little better. Then she went on improving so fast that I thought I really must go and tell her brothers and sisters about it. So off to Glenwood I went one fine night, where I was greeted, as usual, with a chorus of delight.

"Oh! Mr. Moonman!" cried Fluff, clapping her hands. "And we thought he didn't know the way here! How _did_ you know where to find us, Mr.

Moonman, dear?"

"Why, if you come to that," I replied, "there are very few places in the world that I cannot find, and Glenwood is not a very hard one to discover, my mouse. Now I have good news for you. I have just come from Puff's nursery; she sends her love to you all, and says she is nearly well, and wants to know what you have been doing all this time."

Then rose a clamor of questions from all sides, which I answered as best I could. Yes, she sat up every day, and she had broiled chicken for dinner, and dip-toast for supper, and Uncle Jack had given her a lovely new doll, with flaxen hair curling all over her head, whose name was Scarlatina Clematis Alfarata; but Puff called her Tina, "for short."

"Did I know that Downy had been ill?" Brighteyes asked.

"No I did not know it! What had been the matter?"

"Oh! it wasn't much!" broke in Nibble: "I don't see why they made such a fuss about it. I made a feast for him, because Aunt Grace wanted me to amuse him while she gave Brighteyes her French lesson; and I cooked the feast in Roger's little stove, and some of the black paint got into the food and made it disagree with him. Things are always disagreeing with people; I don't see why. People eat oil, and I don't see why they shouldn't eat paint; there's a great deal of oil in paint, Uncle Jack told me so."

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"Well," I said, "you might spread paint instead of b.u.t.ter on your bread, and see how you like it. Personally, I am inclined to take Downy's view of the matter. But now, we must not stop too long, for we have a long way to go to-night. I am going to fulfil my promise at last, and take you to see Patty! What do you say to that, all four of you?"

The mice did not say much that was intelligible, but their shrieks of delight, their jumping and clapping of hands, were quite satisfactory.

The big cloud was waiting outside, and the seven Winds were there, too, impatient for a frolic; so I tumbled my mice and their cousin mouse out of their beds and into their soft white carriage, and away we all went post-haste, or rather comet-haste, for it is a long way to the Indian Ocean. Merrily puffed the winds, and merrily chattered the five little ones; we told stories, and sang songs, and altogether the trip was made so quickly that we were almost sorry to hear the Winds talking Hindostanee to the waves of the great silent water over which we were sweeping. Down floated the cloud, down and down, until it rested lightly on a bit of smooth sandy beach.

"Out with you, mice of mine!" I said. So the mice tumbled out of the cloud again, and looked about them in much amazement and some terror.

"I fink I'm afraid!" said Downy to me, confidentially.

"Oh, no!" I replied. "You are not afraid. You are delighted, my dear, but you are delighted in Hindostanee, and that may be a different sensation from being delighted in English."

This explanation seemed to comfort the little fellow, so I turned to the elder mice and said, "Patty is expecting you to-night, so everything will be in readiness. All you have to do is to go out on that flat rock yonder, and wait till a fish comes and speaks to you. Then you must say--

"'Bobbily Bungaloo, Indian fish.

To visit your mistress is what I wish.'

"After that he will manage everything for you, and will take you at once to Patty. I shall wait here till you return, for going under the water is very apt to give me the asthma. Run, now, and be good, all of you!"

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It required some courage for the little ones to leave their old friend and start off on such a strange and out-of-the-way expedition; but Nibble and Brighteyes led the way boldly, and the three others followed, clinging closely to each other. They soon reached the rock, and found Bobbily Bungaloo swimming about, waiting for them. He greeted them kindly, and bade them follow him, and one by one they all disappeared under the water.

Of course, however, I can see perfectly well what goes on under the water. Dear me, yes! it would be a pity if I could not do that. I saw the mice go down, down, down, through the clear water. All around them swam myriads of fishes, all eager to greet the little strangers who had come so far. There were large fishes and small fishes, some all head and some all tail, some ugly enough to frighten one, and others so beautiful that the children were sorely tempted to catch them and carry them home. All were kind and friendly, and said many pleasant things, which Bobbily Bungaloo, who is a very learned fish, translated into English for the mice's benefit. At length they arrived at the bottom of the sea, and saw at a little distance before them, the palace of my cousin Patty.

As I may have told you before, this palace is simply a huge round pearl, hollowed out into many chambers. A more superb dwelling-place can hardly be imagined. It is really like a small moon under the water, so bright and beautiful is it. The children were speechless with admiration and wonder, as they well might be.

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"H'm!" said a fat oyster, opening her sh.e.l.l to peep at them, "I should think they had never seen a pearl before. My necklace also is worth looking at, if they only knew enough to look down."

But the mice had no eyes for anything except the pearl palace, especially as Patty herself now appeared in the doorway, waiting to welcome her little guests.

She kissed them all, and led them into a great hall, the walls and ceiling of which were of mother-of-pearl, while the floor was of pink coral, laid in a hundred beautiful patterns. At one end of the hall was a throne of pearl, and on this Patty seated herself, bidding the children sit down on some pretty pink coral stools beside her.

"Now, my dears," she said, "what shall Patty do to amuse her little friends? I think we will have some lunch first, for you must be hungry after your long journey. Then I will take you through the palace, and then you shall sail in one of my pretty boats. How does that programme please you?"

She rang a bell, and a tall merman in a splendid livery, glistening with pearl b.u.t.tons, made his appearance, carrying a huge silver tray heaped with sea-delicacies. The children were really hungry, and they soon found that the dishes were as good as they were strange.

"What _is_ this, Patty?" asked Brighteyes; "it is delicious, but I cannot imagine what it is."

"That," said Patty, "is a frica.s.see of sea-anemones. They are very nice, I think, and we cook them in a great many different ways. Nibble, there, is eating fried gold-fish, and Fluff and Roger are busy over a dish of scallops in jelly."

"Oh! how nice everything is!" sighed Fluff; "I wish I knew whether it were all real or not. Mr. Moonman always laughs at me when I ask him if I am dreaming him and all the good times we have with him. Are you real, Patty? do tell me!"

But Patty only laughed and said, "I am as real as a great many things in this world, dear child! Take some anemones, and don't trouble yourself about their being real, as long as they are good."

When the children had finished their lunch, she took Downy by the hand, and bade the rest follow her: and then she led them through the different rooms of the wonderful palace. Dear! dear! such a palace as it was! I really thought those mice would never get their mouths shut again, so wide did they open them in their amazement. The first room they went through was hung with green sea-weed, beautifully fringed, and the carpet was of softest moss. Here were sitting numbers of pretty mermaids, sewing and embroidering on great pieces of kelp, with needles made of the spines of some fish. They all nodded and smiled at the children, but did not speak, for they knew nothing but Hindostanee.