Part 8 (1/2)

Hieronymus sat up on his hind legs and pressed his cheek against the rough wood of the barrel. He closed his eyes and said solemnly, ”I, Hieronymus, will gnaw a hole in this barrel. I swear by all that is sacred to the mouse I will not fail.”

And then, without another word to Anton, the mouse bared his teeth again and began to gnaw at the wood. There was nothing to do but stand by and cheer him on. Hieronymus gnawed and gnawed, pausing repeatedly to spit out the bits of wood pulp he dislodged. He gnawed until the sun was high in the sky, but there was only a slight dent in the wood. He plopped down on his side. ”I'll just rest a minute,” he said.

Anton examined the barrel. ”Maybe I can pull out these little slivers with my claws,” he said, and he tried, but with little success. Hieronymus got to his feet and was back at it, gnaw, gnaw, gnaw. The dent widened and deepened and the mouse's nose disappeared inside it. When he stopped again, the dent was a real hole. ”You're making progress,” Anton said.

Hieronymus leaned against the barrel, picking little bits of wood from his teeth with the tiny claws of his forepaw. ”My jaws hurt,” he said, but more as an observation than a complaint.

”If only you could have something to drink,” Anton said.

”Well,” replied the mouse. ”That's just the point, isn't it?” He returned to his labor.

The sun was sinking into the horizon, and Hieronymus was up to his neck in the barrel, when he braced his back legs against the side and carefully pulled himself free of the hole. He landed on his back on the floor, feet in the air, mouth open, eyes glazed. His mouth, nose, and chin were covered in blood.

Anton was horrified. ”You've got to give up. You can't go on. You're bleeding. You need to rest.”

Hieronymus looked up at him. ”I don't have to go on,” he said weakly. ”Look at the barrel.”

Anton bent down and put his face close to the tiny hole. The inside of it was pink with the mouse's blood. Pink? Anton thought. Then the pink turned pale and translucent. A drop of moisture formed at the edge of the opening and in the next moment, it ran down the side of the barrel to the floor. ”You did it!” Anton exclaimed. ”You gnawed all the way through the barrel!”

Mouse and cat sat watching a small pool of water gather in the shallow depression at the base of the barrel. Anton insisted Hieronymus have the first drink and he agreed, lapping at the thin film of moisture with his small, b.l.o.o.d.y tongue. He was content to rest while they waited for enough water to collect for Anton to have even a swallow. Licking water off a floor wasn't the best way to quench a thirst, but the slow drip from the bottom of the barrel guaranteed that they would be able to drink enough water to stay alive.

Furred animals, Hieronymus reminded Anton, could go without food much longer than they could without water, but after three days with not a bite to eat, Anton had begun to think otherwise. He had given up trying to open tins and jars and even the champion gnawer Hieronymus admitted defeat. ”They put the food in these things to thwart creatures like me,” he said, pus.h.i.+ng a tin of hardtack across the floor. ”It's diabolical.”

Anton settled on deck in the hopes that a flying fish might pa.s.s over, or that a bird would perch in the rigging low enough to be swatted down. ”There's nourishment to be had in chewing rope,” Hieronymus suggested. ”My mother told me that.” But though rope might keep a mouse alive, Anton found he couldn't chew it properly.

”It just makes me thirstier,” he said. Every few hours he went down to the larder to lap at the water trough. Each time he came up the steps, he felt a little weaker.

More days pa.s.sed, with the s.h.i.+p ambling through the waves, listing this way and that, the sails occasionally filling for a goodish spell, but no land or other s.h.i.+p was ever in sight. The days got warmer, and the sun got bigger, until the two furred animals were forced to seek out shade on the deck. The sea changed from brown to blue, and the waves thinned out until the surface of the water was as smooth as gla.s.s. The s.h.i.+p floated upon it, the sails hanging limply from the spars, as still as if it were at anchor. Anton and Hieronymus slept all day and pa.s.sed the night dozing fitfully, scanning the skies for some sign of life. Anton could barely raise himself to look over the prow, and he feared that if the longed-for fish or bird did appear, he would be too weak to catch it. ”I feel muddled,” he told Hieronymus. ”I can't think straight.”

One night Anton woke to the sound of human voices singing and a full moon bathing the still waters with pearly light. He lifted his head and sniffed the air. ”What beautiful music,” he said. Hieronymus, snoring mousily at the bottom of the coiled rope, didn't stir. Anton stretched his back legs, then arched his back, rousing himself, and made his way to the rail. What he saw made his jaw drop. The s.h.i.+p was surrounded by waves of glowing green gra.s.ses, swaying softly in the slight current of the water. It looked like electric seaweed! The voices seemed to come from out of the air, high and clear, singing a dreamy melody that made Anton feel, deep in his chest, something he hadn't felt in a long time: the first stirring of a purr.

”Oh, what is it?” he said. Then, toward the stern, he saw a pale hand moving among the glowing weeds, pulling something back and forth. Another hand appeared closer to the s.h.i.+p, and another farther to the prow, slowly, carefully pulling something through the waving gra.s.ses. It reminded Anton of the captain's wife, sitting at her dressing table at night, sometimes humming to herself.

”It's a comb,” he said. ”They're combing their hair?” And now, here and there among the waving green islets, pale faces appeared, human children's faces, all with the same sea-green eyes and pink rose petal lips, singing blissfully in the warm night air, combing their sparkling tresses, which flashed streaks of phosph.o.r.escent light across the water's still surface. Anton stood gazing in fascination at the pretty, joyful creatures. One of the children near the s.h.i.+p looked at Anton, smiled, and waved his hand, as if to say fare-thee-well. Then, raising his arms over his head, he dived down into the water.

Anton waved his paw back, leaning out over the rail to get a closer look. As the beautiful child slipped beneath the surface of the translucent sea, a big silvery fish tail flipped up behind him. One by one the strange night visitors turned from the s.h.i.+p and dived back into the sea, their voices falling away, their dreamy human faces disappearing, followed by a cacophony of slapping sounds as their flas.h.i.+ng silver tails propelled them down into the depths. Scarcely a minute later they were gone.

”This world is full of wonders,” Anton said. He stepped back from the rail, savoring the sensation of amazement, which, while it lasted, took his mind off his hunger.

”It is indeed,” said Hieronymus, who had come up behind him, rubbing his sleepy eyes with both his paws.

Anton took a step toward the hatch, but his back legs went out from under him and he fell on his side. ”That marvelous singing,” he said. ”Those pretty children, with their fish tails. What a magical night.”

”What children?” Hieronymus asked, eyeing his friend anxiously. ”What singing? I didn't hear anything.”

Anton groggily got to his feet, then sat down, hanging his head. ”I don't feel up to staying out tonight,” he said. ”I think I'll just go sleep in my bed.”

Hieronymus burst into tears. ”Oh, you're so thin and weak,” he sobbed. ”Now you're hallucinating. I'm afraid if you don't eat something soon . . .”

Anton looked up. ”Eat what?” he said. ”The rope's not doing much for you, my friend. You're all skin and bones.”

”It's true,” the mouse wailed. ”We're wasting away.”

”Well, you'll make yourself worse, crying about it.”

Hieronymus nodded, wiping his tears on his forepaws, then followed Anton's weaving trail down the gangway and into the captain's quarters. Anton settled himself on the pillow in the crate. ”I'm so tired,” he said. ”I think I may just go to sleep forever.”

Hieronymus sat down in front of him. ”I've been thinking,” he said. ”Clearly you can't go on much longer, nor can I. So the time has come for nature to take its natural course between us. I won't resist. I ask you, as a friend-for truly you've become that to me, though I never would have believed such a thing could happen-I ask you to make it swift.”

Anton contemplated the mouse dreamily. ”Make what swift?” he asked.

”I'm offering myself to you. As a meal.”

Anton chuckled. ”You must be joking.”

”I was never more serious,” said Hieronymus, sitting up on his hind legs to achieve maximum height. ”Why should we both die, if one might live?”

”Eating you isn't going to keep me alive,” said Anton. ”It would probably only make me throw up and waste more of my strength.”

Hieronymus considered this. ”Do you think so?”

”Nothing against you, but rodents always do make me sick. I can't bear the taste. And you're not exactly any cat's idea of a meal. There's no meat on you.”

”So you won't accept my offer.”

”You saved our lives, gnawing through that barrel. You said yourself, we're friends. Well, I don't eat my friends. Forget this idea of sacrifice. It's not in your nature. What would Great-Granduncle Portymus say?”

”You're right. I can't give up,” the mouse said. ”It's not in my nature. There must be a way to save us both.”

”If there is,” Anton agreed, ”I trust you to find it.” Then he yawned widely, showing all his teeth. ”I can't stay awake,” he said.

”I'm going back on deck,” said the mouse. ”I'll keep an eye out for fish.”

On deck Hieronymus found that the weather had changed, as so often happened at sea. The sky was cloudy, and the air had cooled noticeably. A light breeze played in the sails, not enough to fill them, but they rustled beneath the spars. As he looked up at the moon, which was shrouded in clouds, a thin beam of light broke through and seemed to shoot across the water to the s.h.i.+p. Then, as the mouse watched wide-eyed, the clouds parted, forming the pale lids of an enormous eye. It seemed to contemplate the s.h.i.+p, the deck, the mouse. Hieronymus felt the fur on his face tingle, and his spine shuddered. ”The cat's eye,” he murmured. What did it mean?

Where the eye sees the eye, he thought. That's what Anton was waiting for. It meant what was lost would be found. And weren't he and Anton lost? He rushed to the rail and looked out over the water, but it was dark, and though the moon shed upon it a pearly light, there was, as far as he could see, only water, water, and more water.

A profound sleepiness came upon Hieronymus as he turned back toward the cabin. He should tell Anton about this eye. He would want to know. Hieronymus made his way down the gangway and into the cabin, where Anton lay on the cus.h.i.+on snoring sonorously. ”Anton,” he said softly. ”The cat's eye.”

But Anton was deep in sleep and it seemed a shame to disturb him. I'll tell him when he wakes up, Hieronymus thought. I'm so tired all of a sudden. I may as well have a little nap. And so the talkative, brave little mouse, the last descendant of a n.o.ble clan, curled up between the paws of the cat and fell asleep.

CHAPTER 14.

Where the Eye Sees the Eye The small dinghy crew grunted in surprise, looked back at the Leone in the distance, then squinted again at the s.h.i.+p before them. It sat motionless in the channel, its sails hanging untrimmed. n.o.body at all was on deck-it appeared to the sailors to be completely abandoned.

”Er, what do we do now?” one of the men asked the first mate.