Fredric Brown - The Second Fredric Brown Megapack

Mitkey told him. The beady-bright eyes of Whitey grew brighter—and beadier. But Mitkey didn’t notice.

“Iff to der moon you are nodt going,” Mitkey said, “come down. I vill show you vhere to hide der vail inside.”

“Nodt yet, Mitkey. Look, at dawn tomorrow takes off der rocket. No hurry iss. Soon der brofessor comes home. He vorks around a vhile und dalks, und I listen. I learn more. Und a vhile he vill sleep before dawn, und then I eggscape. Iss easy.”

Mitkey nodded. “Dot iss smart. Budt do nodt trust der brofessor. If he learns you are now indelligent, he vill either kill you or make sure you do nodt eggscape. He is avraid of indelligent mice. Ach, vootsteps. Get back your cage in. Und be careful.”

And Mitkey scurried toward the mousehole, then remembered the piece of string and scurried back after it. The tip of his tail was just disappearing into the hole as Professor Oberburger walked into the room.

“Cheese, Vhitey. Cheese I brought you, und to put in der combartment of der rocket too so as you eadt on der vay. You haff been a goot liddle mouse. Vhitey?”

“Squeak.”

The professor peered into the cage.

“Almost I thingk you answer me, Vhitey. You did, yess?”

Silence. Deep silence from the wooden cage…

Mitkey waited, and waited longer.

No Minnie.

“Der yard she iss hiding in,” he told himself reassuringly. “She knows it iss dangerous to come in vhen iss light. Vhen dargkness comes—”

And darkness came.

No Minnie.

It was as dark outside now as it was within the wall. Mitkey sneaked to the kitchen door and made sure that it was open and that the hole was still there in the bottom of the screen.

He stuck his head through the hole and called, “Minnie! Mine Minnie!” And then he remembered she did not speak English, and squeaked for her instead. But softly so the professor in the next room would not hear him.

No answer. No Minnie.

Mitkey sighed and scurried back from dark corner to dark corner of the kitchen until he had reached safety in the mouse-hole.

Just inside he waited. And waited.

His eyelids grew heavy and dropped. And he slept, deeply.

A touch awakened him, and Mitkey jumped. Then he saw it was Whitey. “Shh,” said the white mouse, “der brofessor is asleep. It iss almost dawn, und he has his alarm glock set to go off in an hour yet. Then he vill find I am gone. He may try to catch a mouse to use instead, so ve must hide und not go outside.”

Mitkev nodded, “Smart you iss, Vhitey. But mine Minnie! She iss—”

“Iss nothing ve can do, Mitkey. Vait, before ve hide, show me der X-19 und how it vorks.”

“I show you quick, und then I hunt Minnie before der brofessor vakes. It iss here.”

And Mitkey showed him.

“Und how vould you reduce der power, Mitkey, so it vould not make a mouse quite so indelligent as ve are?”

“Like this,” said Mitkey. “But vhy?”

Whitey shrugged. “I chust vondered. Mitkey, der brofessor gafe me a very sbecial kind of cheese. Something new, und I brought you a liddle piece to try. Eadt it, und then I vill help you find Minnie. Ve haff almost an hour yet.” Mitkey tasted the cheese. “Iss nodt new. Iss Limburger. But hass a very vunny taste, effen for Limburger.”

“Vhich do you like bedder?”

“I dont know, Vhitey. I think I do nodt like—”

“Iss an acquired taste, Mitkey. Iss vonderful. Eadt it all, und you vill like it.”

So to be polite and to avoid an argument, Mitkey ate the rest of it.

“Iss nodt bad,” he said. “Und now ve look for Minnie.”

But his eyes were heavy, and he yawned. He got as far as the edge of the mousehole.

“Vhitey, I must rest a minute. Vill you vake me in aboudt fife min—”

But he was asleep, sound asleep, sounder asleep than he had ever been, before he finished the sentence.

Whitey grinned, and became a very busy little mouse.

The ringing of an alarm clock.

Professor Oberburger opened his eyes sleepily and then remembered the occasion, and got hastily out of bed. Within half an hour now, the time.

He went out behind the house and inspected the firing rack. It was in order, and so was the rocket. Except, of course, that the compartment door was open. No use to put the mouse in until the last moment.

He went indoors again, and carried the rocket out to the rack. Fitted it very carefully into place, and inspected the starter pin. All in order.

Ten minutes. Better get the mouse.

The white mouse was sound asleep in the wooden cage.

Professor Oberburger reached into the cage carefully. “Ach, Vhitey. Now for your long, long chourney. Boor liddle mouse, I vill not avaken you if I can help. More bedder you should sleep until der cholt of der stardt avakens you.”

Gently, very gently, he carried his sleeping burden out into the yard and put it in the compartment.

Three doors closed. First the inner one, then the balsa grating, then the outer one. All but the balsa grating would open automatically when the rocket landed. And the radio pick-up would broadcast the sound of the mouse chewing its way through the balsa.

If there was atmosphere on the moon. If the mouse—

Eyes on the minute-hand of his watch, the professor waited. Then the second-hand. Now—

His finger touched the accurately-timed delayed-action starter button, and then he ran into the house.

WHOOOSH!

Trail of fire into the air where the rocket had been.

“Gootbye, Vhitey. Boor liddle mouse, but someday you vill be vamous. Almost as vamous as mine star-mouse Mitkey vill be, some day vhen I can bublish—”

Now for the diary entry of the departure.

The professor reached for his pen, and as he did so caught a glimpse of the inside of his hand, the hand that held the mouse.

White it was. Perplexed, he studied it closer under the light.

“Vhite paint. Vhere vould I haff picked up vhite paint? I haff some, but I haff not used it. Nothing on der rocket, nothing in der room or der yard—”

“Der mouse? Vhitey? I held him so. But vhy vould der laboratories send me a mouse painted vhite? I tole them any color vould do—”

Then the professor shrugged, and went to wash his hands. It was puzzling, very puzzling, but it did not matter really. But why on Earth would the laboratories have done that?

But in the black compartment of the roaring, soaring rocket. Moon-bound and bust.

Doped Limburger cheese.

Black treachery.

White paint.

Alas, poor Mitkey! Moonward-bound, without a ticket back.

Night, and it had been raining in Hartford. The professor hadn’t been able to follow the rocket through his telescope.

But it was up there all right, and going strong.

The radio pick-up told him that. Roar of the jets, so loud he couldn’t tell whether or not the mouse inside was alive or not. But it probably was, hadn’t Mitkey survived on the trip to Prxl?

Finally, he turned off the lights to take a cat-nap in his chair. When he awoke, maybe the rain would have stopped.

His head nodded, his eyes closed. And after a while, he dreamed that he opened them again. He knew he was dreaming because of what he saw.

Four little white spots moving across the floor from the door.

Four little white spots that might have been mice, but couldn’t be—unless they were dream mice—because they moved with military precision, in an exact rectangle. Almost like soldiers.

And then a sound, too faint for him to distinguish, and the four white spots abruptly fell into a single file and disappeared, one by one at precise intervals, against the baseboard.

The professor woke, and chuckled to himself.