Margery Sharp - The Rescuers

Bernard shuffled his feet again.

“Suppose she doesn’t want, ma’am?”

“Then you must persuade her, my dear boy,” said the chairwoman. “If necessary, bully her! – What’s that you have on your chest?”

Bernard squinted self-consciously down. His fur was so thick and rough, the medal scarcely showed.

“The Tybalt Star, ma’am …”

“For Gallantry in the Face of Cats,” nodded the chairwoman. “I believe I remember the incident … A cat nipped on the tail, was it not, thus permitting a nursing mother of six to regain her hole?”

“She was my sister-in-law,” muttered Bernard, flushing.

“Then I can’t believe you’re not a match for Miss Bianca!” cried the chairwoman.

With that (after several votes of thanks), the meeting broke up; and Bernard, feeling important but uneasy, set off back to the embassy.

At least his route to the Boy’s schoolroom presented no difficulties. There was a small service lift running directly up from the pantry itself, used to carry such light refreshments as glasses of milk, chocolate biscuits, and tea for the Boy’s tutor. Bernard waited till half-past eight, when the last glass of milk went up (hot), and went up with it by clinging to one of the lift-ropes. As soon as the flap above opened he nipped out and slipped into the nearest shadow to wait again. He waited a long, long time; he heard the Boy put to bed in an adjoining room, and a wonderful rustle of satin as the Boy’s mother came to kiss him goodnight. (Bernard was of course waiting with his eyes shut; nothing draws attention to a mouse like the gleam of his eyes.) Then at last all was still, and forth he crept for a good look round.

In one respect at least rumour had not lied. There in an angle of the great room, on a low stool nicely out of floor draughts, stood a porcelain pagoda.

IT WAS THE most exquisite residence Bernard had ever seen, or indeed could ever have imagined. Its smooth, gleaming walls were beautifully painted with all sorts of small flowers – violets, primroses and lilies-of-the-valley – and the roof rose in tier upon tier of curly gilded eaves, from each corner of which hung a golden bell. Round about was a pleasure-ground, rather like a big birdcage, fenced and roofed with golden wires, and fitted with swings, seesaws and other means of gentle relaxation. Bernard’s eyes felt as big as his ears as he diffidently approached – and he himself felt a very rough, plain mouse indeed.

“Miss Bianca!” he called softly.

From inside the pagoda came the faintest of rustling sounds, like silk sheets being pulled over someone’s head; but nobody appeared.

“Don’t be afraid, Miss Bianca!” called Bernard. “I’m not burglars, I am Bernard from the pantry with a most important message.”

He waited again. One of the golden bells, as though a moth had flown past, tinkled faintly. Then again there was a rustling, and at last Miss Bianca came out.

Her loveliness took Bernard’s breath away. She was very small, but with a perfect figure, and her sleek, silvery-white coat had all the rich softness of ermine. But her chiefest point of beauty was her eyes. The eyes of most white mice are pink: Miss Bianca’s were deep brown. In conjunction with her snowy head, they gave her the appearance of a powdered beauty of the court of Louis the Fifteenth.

Round her neck she wore a very fine silver chain.

Bernard took two steps back, then one forward, and politely pulled his whiskers.

“Are you calling?” asked Miss Bianca, in a very low, sweet voice.

“Well, I was —” began Bernard.

“How very nice!” exclaimed Miss Bianca. “If you wouldn’t mind swinging on that bell-pull, the gate will open. Are there any ladies with you?”

Bernard muttered something about the chairwoman, but too hoarsely to be understood. Not that it mattered: Miss Bianca’s beautiful manners smoothed all social embarrassment. As soon as he was inside she began to show him round, naming every painted flower on the porcelain walls, and inviting him to try for himself each swing and seesaw. “Pretty, isn’t it?” she said modestly. “Though nothing, I believe, compared with Versailles … Would you care to see the fountain?”

Bernard nodded dumbly. As yet he hadn’t even noticed the fountain; it was in fact a staggering six inches high, made of pink and green Venetian glass. Miss Bianca sat down on a hidden spring, and at once a jet of water shot up out of the pink rosette on top. “There is a way of making it stay ,” she explained, “but I’m afraid I know nothing about machinery!” She rose, and the jet subsided. Bernard would have liked to have a go himself, but he was only too conscious that time was passing, and that as yet his message was undelivered.

Indeed it was hard to know where to begin. It was such a jump from Venetian glass fountains to the Prisoners’ Aid Society. Moreover, though he no longer thought Miss Bianca affected, in fact he liked her very much, he couldn’t for the life of him see her doing anything more strenuous than swinging on a gilt swing. And the turn the conversation next took fairly curled his whiskers!

“I see you’ve been decorated,” said Miss Bianca politely. (She was naturally familiar with medals, and orders and ribbands.) “May I ask what it is for?”

“Gallantry in the Face of Cats,” muttered Bernard. First to his chagrin, then to his astonishment, she burst into musical laughter.

“In the face of cats ? How very droll! I dote on cats!” laughed Miss Bianca. “Or rather,” she added sentimentally, “on one particular cat … a most beautiful Persian, white as I am myself, belonging to the Boy’s mother. I used to play in his fur; I’m told we made rather a pretty picture … Alas, he is no more,” sighed Miss Bianca, “but for his sake all cats will ever be dear to me!”

Bernard was absolutely speechless. He didn’t disbelieve Miss Bianca; he could, just, imagine some pampered lap-cat fat enough and drowsy enough to have lost all natural instincts. But what an appealing thought – a mouse going out into the world alone, on a mission of danger, not afraid of cats !

“My poor playfellow! Ah me!” sighed Miss Bianca tenderly.

“Look here, you’ve got to promise—” began Bernard; and gave up. There was a dreamy look in her eyes which warned him, though he didn’t know much about women, that it was the wrong moment to run cats down. Instead, he attempted to console her.

“You’ve got all this,” he pointed out, looking round at the swings and the seesaws and the fountain.

“And how trifling it seems!” sighed Miss Bianca. “How trifling it must seem, especially, to you , compared with the real and earnest life of a pantry!”

Bernard drew a deep breath. Now or never, he thought!

“Would you like to do something real and earnest too, Miss Bianca?”

She hesitated. Her lovely eyes were for a moment veiled. Then one small pink hand crept up to finger the silver chain.

“No,” said Miss Bianca decidedly. “I’m so fond, you see, of the Boy. And he is so attached to me , how many times have I not heard him call me his only friend! I feel so long as I do my duty to the Boy, my existence, however frivolous it may appear , is in fact quite earnest enough.”

“That’s one way of looking at it,” said Bernard glumly. (They should have sent the chairwoman, he thought, not him. The chairwoman could talk about duty quite wonderfully.) “All the same,” he persisted, “you’re not with the Boy all the time. You’re not with him now, for instance.” (There was considerable point in this; it is at night that mice most want to be up and doing, and are most bored by inactivity.) “Actually, now that you’ve no longer your, h’m, playfellow, I really don’t see how you occupy yourself.”