The Tale of Castle Cottage (23 page)

Treacle cleared her throat.
“I’m sorry, Crumpet,”
she said apologetically,
“but this sort of thing just isn’t my line, you know. I simply must get home to my kittens. You and Tabitha have much more experience of these matters than I do. Whatever you decide to do, you can count on my support.”
She left without another word.

Tabitha cocked her head.
“It must be nearly teatime,”
she said,
“and I’m sure I hear thunder. The Vicarage is quite a long walk, and I hate to get my fur wet. But do let me know when you’ve organized some sort of effort, will you, Crumpet? And please tell the Council that I wholeheartedly support whatever action you recommend. If it’s raining, I probably won’t come to the meeting.”

She walked to the door, adding carelessly,
“Oh, and I don’t recommend trying to scale fences. You’re not all
that
young, you know.”
And with that spiteful remark, she was gone.

Crumpet was still sitting in the dusky twilight of the old shed, smarting at Tabitha’s last remark, when Rascal pushed open the door and came in. He had just come from Jeremy’s house. He was still somewhat chagrined at the thought that the new baby was not to be called Rascal (with a capital
R
) and only rascal (with a small
r
, and prefaced by the words “sweet” and “dear” and “little”).

“I thought you were having a meeting this afternoon,”
he said, looking around the empty shed. He gave himself a shake, spraying drops everywhere. It was beginning to rain, and his coat was a bit damp.
“Where is everybody?”

“They left,”
Crumpet said bitterly.
“Tabitha and Treacle got a glimpse of the kind of horrid creature we are up against, and they were so frightened they bailed out.”
She reported on Mrs. Pemberton and the piratical rat who had sauntered across the back garden, as well as all the other break-ins and robberies around the village.
“It’s a crime wave,”
she said.
“Old Rooker’s gang, the rat told us. Something’s got to be done, Rascal. And whatever it is, it has to be
soon
!”

“You’re right,”
said Rascal in a thoughtful tone. He sat down on his haunches.
“Mustard and I caught one of those fellows last night, in the Hill Top chicken coop.”
He told her about the sneering, filthy, foul-mouthed creature that he and the old yellow dog had captured and executed.
“We thought he might be part of a gang, but we couldn’t wring anything out of him.”
He paused, assessing the situation.
“Well, old girl, I’d say we’re in a bit of a bind, wouldn’t you?”

Crumpet heard Rascal’s “we” and was immeasurably heartened at the thought that somebody was on her side. She had been feeling abandoned.

“A bit of a bind is right,”
she said.
“This is a brazen enemy. We are under attack. It was very bad last night—thefts all over the village—and I shouldn’t be a bit surprised if it’s even worse tonight. And if we don’t catch them quick, they’ll get dug in, and it will be even harder to get them out of here.”

“I wonder where they’re holed up,”
Rascal mused.
“Since they’re carrying off the stolen property, they have to have a hideout somewhere close by. Did you get any hint of that, when you were asking around about the thefts?”

“No. But I didn’t ask, either,”
Crumpet admitted, wishing she’d thought of it. Somebody might have been able to give her some information.
“But when you stop to think about it, there aren’t too many suitable places in the village. It’s hard to say how many of these rats there are, but judging from the number of thefts, I’m guessing at least a dozen. I don’t think a gang that size could slip into any of the cottages without attracting the Big Folks’ attention.”

“You’re right. But a barn is a different matter,”
Rascal said.
“They’re full of holes and cubbies and places where rats can hide.”

“Exactly,”
Crumpet said.
“Felicia Frummety is frightened of her shadow. Perhaps this gang has moved into the Hill Top barn.”

“Not there,”
Rascal asserted.
“Mustard may not see as well as he once did, but there’s nothing wrong with the dear old fellow’s sense of smell. There are no rats in his barn.”

“Well, there’s the Llewellyn barn at High Green Gate,”
Crumpet said.
“And the barn at Belle Green.”

“Not at Belle Green,”
Rascal barked firmly. That was where
he
lived. And even if he had been so careless as to overlook a bunch of hooligan rats holed up in his barn, the cow and pigs and chickens would certainly let him know about it.

“Well, then, that just leaves High Green Gate and Castle Farm,”
Crumpet said thoughtfully.
“And the stable at Tower Bank House.”

“What about that old ramshackle barn behind the post office?”
Rascal suggested.
“They might be there. Or in the shed behind Courier Cottage, where Mr. Sutton puts his extra patients when he doesn’t have enough room in the surgery.”
Mr. Sutton was the village veterinary and a good friend of all the animals.

“Right.”
Crumpet sighed.
“I know what we ought to do, Rascal. We ought to set up an overnight surveillance at every single one of these places and find out where the rats are hiding. Then we might be able to come up with some sort of effective battle strategy. But there aren’t enough animals to manage the surveillance, let alone conduct the war.”
She sighed again, despondently.
“Right now, there’s just you and me, Rascal. And we can’t be everywhere at once.”

“Well, you’re definitely right on that score,”
Rascal replied,
“although you mustn’t forget that I’m a terrier, and rats and foxes and such are my speciality
.
”
He got up and stretched, forelegs first, hind legs after.
“But I think I have an idea about a few friends who might help out. Let me do some checking, old girl, and I’ll get back to you.”

“But who?”
Crumpet asked. She picked up the list of names she had discarded earlier and glanced through it.
“I’ve tried and tried, and I can’t think of anybody who—”

“Later,”
Rascal said, on his way to the door.
“Don’t do anything until you hear from me.”

15

Rats!

 

 

Whilst Crumpet and Rascal were trying to come up with a plan, the rat in question—Jumpin’ Jemmy, who had stolen Mrs. Pemberton’s best cheese, peppers, and scone—had made his way through the back gardens and shrubbery and up the hill to the Castle Farm barn, where Rooker had installed his gang of rats.

When the rats took up residence in Miss Potter’s barn a few days before, the hideout was a dismal place, just a large cavern under the floor, with a trapdoor in the roof but no special amenities. It hadn’t stayed that way, however. Old Rooker’s gang was energetic, innovative, and well organized. They were used to moving into a place and making themselves at home. In this case, they had done some additional digging, so now their hideout under the barn floor featured a suite of quite comfortable rooms: one large room for rest and relaxation, a bunkroom, and a smaller room for a headquarters, where Rooker could meet with his lieutenants.

In fact, it was all quite cozy, especially the headquarters room, which was carpeted with a large piece of woven fabric from Bertha Stubbs’ sewing box. There was also a map table fashioned of a smooth strip of board set up on large wooden spools. It was lighted by a hanging oil lamp fashioned from a small bronze cup taken from the village shop and the chain from Mr. Leach’s gold watch. The watch itself, properly wound and hung on the wall, served nicely for a timepiece.

And of course, since these were thieves, there was a large bowl for the deposit of the money they had stolen and the empty silver snuffbox (taken from Mr. Dowling) for the deposit of jewelry. Mrs. Crook’s crystal pendant was there, along with a several rings, a set of studs, and a gold locket. The badgers’ silver spoons were there, too, waiting to be traded or sold.

Indeed, that would be the fate of most of the “hard goods,” as the rats called the money, jewelry, and other fine trinkets they picked up. Sully the Screed (a screed, in their parlance, is a writer or scrivener) kept the gang’s account books, carefully noting what each rat brought in and giving him credit for his booty. Once the rats had established themselves in an area, they contacted members of the local underworld (there always is one, you know) and began to sell and trade. Every so often, Sully sat down and counted up what they’d brought in, then divvied the proceeds equitably, every rat getting his share of the profits, based on what he had contributed. Even edibles were counted, since the provisions kept the gang going strong.
“An army travels on its stomach,”
Rooker was fond of saying.
“We ain’t no diff’rent from an army, boys.”

In the bunkroom, along two walls, there were tiers of bunk beds where the rats slept when they were off duty. The beds were padded with wads of soft cotton pulled from village mattresses and yarn and half-finished socks taken from knitting baskets all over the village, and there was a rug on the floor made from Mrs. Crook’s dishcloth (which she has not yet missed).

In the common room, there were tables where the rats could play cards and eat and drink, a few makeshift benches, and a couple of upholstered chairs stolen from Mrs. Braithwaite’s daughter’s doll house. There was a dart board on one wall and a long shelf where food and drink were set out as soon as they were brought in by the foragers. They had sausages and marrows from Lydia Dowling’s village shop, nuts from the pub bar and cheddars and goat cheeses from the pub kitchen, sticky buns from the bakery. There were meat patties and pickled pigs’ feet and ham croquettes (stolen from Elsa Grape’s larder), and apples and pears and nuts and raisins. The air was thick with cigarette and cigar smoke, several of the rats were singing a raucous ditty, and from the corner could be heard the clink of a game of pitch-and-toss.

There was a celebratory mood in the headquarters room, too, where Rooker and three of his henchmen were gathered around the table, under the overhead lamp. They were passing around a bottle of red wine, and chunks of cheese and pieces of scone littered the table. (Rats are not known for their tidy eating habits.) Jumpin’ Jemmy had just brought in the loot he had stolen from Mrs. Pemberton’s kitchen, along with a report on the three cats who had watched him from the shed.

“One was old, one was fat, and only one—gray, with a red collar—looked halfway fit.”
He gave the self-congratulatory chuckle of a rat who was mightily pleased with himself.
“Ye should’ve seen the look on the gray cat’s face when I tossed her a wink and a few choice words. She thought she’d come after me, too, she did, but I squirted right between the boards of the fence.”
He hooted.
“An’ her too big to squeeze thro’ the gap an’ not near nimble ’nuf to hop over the top.”

“Well, if that’s the top quality of cat hereabouts,”
Firehouse Frank said judiciously,
“we’ve lucked into a sweet spot to hang out for a while, boys. Fat cats, old cats, slow cats—just the kind o’ cats we like to see.”
Frank, like Jemmy, was a young rat, but he’d had a bad run-in with a tomcat in a dark alley and was lucky to get away in one piece. He wore a rakish black patch over his right eye—quite a handsome beast, I must say, if a bit piratical.

“Aye, but did ye hear that Big Bill Bolter got nabbed last night?”
Rooker asked somberly, puffing on a long-stemmed clay pipe.
“Worst luck fer ’im, I’m afeard. He’s gone, boys. Big Bill Bolter’s gone.”

“The devil ye say!”
cried Jumpin’ Jemmy, suddenly sobered. He picked up the bottle of wine and tipped it up.
“Where’d it ’appen? ’Oo done it? Not a cat, was it?”

“’Appened at the chicken coop at Hill Top,”
Rooker replied.
“Him and Nick the Knife was there, with their eyes on a tasty little yellow chick they thought to snatch for a midnight meal.”
He reached for the bottle, shaking his rattish head.
“Nay, ’t weren’t no cat, Jemmy. ’Twas two dogs did fer ’im. But Nick said Big Bill held loyal an’ true right to the end. Never chirped on us, not a word. Wouldn’t say where we’re holed up, although they twisted ’is tail ’n’ ears right off ’im, poor old sod.”
He lifted the bottle.
“’Ere’s to Big Bill, boys. No finer rat never lived than Bill.”

“No finer rat!”
they echoed, as Rooker drank. There was a moment’s silence as they reflected on the bravery of Big Bill Bolter, who had loyally refused to yield up their whereabouts. They were used to losing one or more of their number every now and then—rats who chose to live an outlaw life lived on the razor’s edge. But the loss was always felt with a pang, and a sharper one, this time, given the appalling violence of Bill’s end. And there was the terrible thought, in every rat’s mind, that
he
might have been in that chicken coop when the dogs came. Would
he
have died so valiantly, without chirping on his pals?

“
Two
dogs, ye say?”
Firehouse Frank asked nervously.
“We got us a dog problem, do we?”

“Nick says that one of ’em—the big yellow dog—is so old ’ee could barely see,”
Bludger Bob replied, tipping his black felt bowler to the back of his head. Bob, a scrawny brown rat with one missing front tooth, had been with the Rooker gang longer than any of them. His opinion was always listened to with respect.
“It’s the other we got to watch out for. Rascal, ’is name is. A Jack Russell.”
He said this deliberately, looking around the table to make sure they took his point.