Terry Pratchett - The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents

He'd stared for too long. Malicia turned and her mouth opened in shock and horror as Sardines went into his routine. The cat saw her hand reach out for a pan that was on the table. She threw it, very accurately.

But Sardines was a good pot-dodger. The rats were used to having things thrown at them. He was already running when the pan was halfway across the room, and then he leapt onto the chair and then he jumped onto the floor and then he dodged behind the dresser and then there was a sharp, final, metallic… snap.

“Hah!” said Malicia, and Maurice and Keith stared at the dresser. “That's one rat less, at any rate. I really hate them…”

“It was Sardines,” said Keith.

“No, it was definitely a rat,” said Malicia. “Sardines hardly ever invade a kitchen. I expect you're thinking about the plague of lobsters over in—”

“He just called himself Sardines because he saw the name on a rusty old tin and thought it sounded stylish,” said Maurice. He wondered if he dared look behind the dresser.

“He was a good rat,” said Keith. “He used to steal books for me when they were teaching me to read.”

“Excuse me, are you mad?” said Malicia. “It was a rat . The only good rat is a dead rat!”

“Hello?” said a little voice. It came from behind the dresser.

“It can't be alive! It's a huge trap!” said Malicia. “It's got teeth!”

“Anyone there? Only the stick is bending…” said the voice.

The dresser was massive, the wood so old that time had turned it black and it had become as solid and heavy as stone.

“That's not a rat talking, is it?” said Malicia. “Please tell me rats can't talk!”

“In fact it's bending quite a bit now,” said the voice, which was slightly muffled.

Maurice squinted into the space behind the dresser. “I can see him,” he said. “He wedged the stick in the jaws as they closed! Wotcha, Sardines, how're you doing?”

“Fine, boss,” said Sardines, in the gloom. “If it wasn't for this trap I'd say everything was perfect. Did I mention the stick is bending?”

“Yes, you said.”

“It's bent some more since then, boss.”

Keith grabbed one end of the dresser and grunted as he tried to move it. “It's like a rock!” he said.

“It's full of crockery,” said Malicia, now quite bewildered. “But rats don't really talk, do they?”

“Get out of the way!” shouted Keith. He grabbed the back edge of the dresser with both hands, and braced one foot against the wall, and heaved.

Slowly, like a mighty forest tree, the dresser pitched forward. The crockery started to fall out as it tipped, plate slipping off plate like one glorious chaotic deal from a very expensive pack of cards. Even so, some of them survived the fall onto the floor, and so did some of the cups and saucers as the cupboard opened and added to the fun, but that didn't make any difference because then the huge, heavy woodwork thundered down on top of them.

One miraculously whole plate rolled past Keith, spinning round and round and getting lower on the floor with the groiyuoiyoi yooooinnnnggg sound you always get in these distressing circumstances.

Keith reached down to the trap and grabbed Sardines. As he pulled the rat up the stick gave way and the trap snapped shut. A bit of the stick spun away through the air.

“Are you all right?” Keith asked.

“Well, boss, all I can say is it's a good job rats don't wear underwear… Thanks, boss,” said Sardines. He was quite plump for a rat, but when his feet were dancing he could float across the floor like a balloon.

There was the sound of a tapping foot.

Malicia, with arms folded and an expression like a thunderstorm, looked at Sardines, and then at Maurice, and then at the stupid-looking Keith, and then at the wreckage on the floor.

“Er… sorry about the mess,” said Keith. “But he was—”

She waved this away. “OK,” she said, as if she'd been thinking deeply. “It goes like this, I think. The rat is a magical rat. I bet he's not the only one. Something happened to him, or them, and now they're really quite intelligent, despite the tap-dancing. And… they're friends with the cat. So… why would rats and a cat be friends? And it goes… there's some kind of an arrangement, right? I know! Don't tell me, don't tell me…”

“Huh?” said Keith.

“I shouldn't think anyone ever has to tell you anything ,” said Maurice.

“… it's something to do with plagues of rats, right? All those towns we've heard about… well, you heard about them too, and so you got together with thingy here—”

“Keith,” said Keith.

“… yes… and so you go from town to town pretending to be a plague of rats, and thingy—”

“Keith.”

“… yes… pretends to be a rat piper and you all follow him out. Right? It's all a big swindle, yes?”

Sardines looked up at Maurice. “She's got us bang to rights, boss,” he said.

“So now you've got to give me a good reason why I don't call the Watch out on you,” said Malicia triumphantly.

I don't have to, Maurice thought, because you won't. Gosh, humans are so easy . He rubbed up against Malicia's legs and gave her a smirk. “If you do, you'll never find out how the story ends,” he said.

“Ah, it'll end with you going to prison ,” said Malicia, but Maurice saw her staring at the stupid-looking Keith and at Sardines. Sardines still had his little straw hat on. When it comes to attracting attention, that sort of thing counts for a lot.

When he saw her frowning at him Sardines hastily removed his straw hat and held it in front of him, by the brim. “There's something I'd like to find out, boss,” he said, “if we're finding out things.”

Malicia raised an eyebrow. “Well?” she said. “And don't call me boss!”

“I'd like to find out why there's no rats in this city, guv,” said Sardines. He tap-danced a few steps, nervously. Malicia could glare better than a cat.

“What do you mean, no rats?” she said. “There's a plague of rats! And you're a rat, anyway!”

“There's rat runs all over the place and there's a few dead rats but we haven't found a living rat anywhere, guv.”

Malicia leaned down. “But you are a rat ,” she said.

“Yes, guv. But we only arrived this morning.” Sardines grinned nervously as Malicia gave him another long stare.

“Would you like some cheese?” she said. “I'm afraid it's only mousetrap.”

“I don't think so, thank you very much all the same,” said Sardines, very carefully and politely.

“It's no use, I think it really is time to tell the truth,” said Keith.

“Nonononononono,” said Maurice, who hated that kind of thing. “It's all because—”

“You were right, miss,” said Keith, wearily. “We go from town to town with a bunch of rats and fool people into giving us money to leave. That's what we do. I'm sorry we've been doing it. This was going to be the last time. I'm very sorry. You shared your food with us and you haven't got much, either. We ought to be ashamed.”

It seemed to Maurice, while he was watching Malicia make up her mind, that her mind worked in a different way to other people's minds. She understood all the hard things without even thinking. Magical rats? Yeah, yeah. Talking cats? Been there, done that, bought the singlet. It was the simple things that were hard.

Her lips were moving. She was, Maurice realized, making up a story out of it .

“So…” she said, “you come along with your trained rats—”

“We prefer ‘educated rodents’, guv,” said Sardines.