The Schoolmouse by Dick King-Smith

Author:Dick King-Smith [King-Smith, Dick]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780241421505
Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd
Published: 2019-09-12T00:00:00+00:00

‘No,’ said Flora. ‘You must remember, Buck, that I am a schoolmouse. I have an awful lot to learn.’

‘I don’t quite understand,’ said Buck.

There was a distant noise as the front door of the school was unlocked.

‘I can’t explain now,’ said Flora hurriedly. ‘I’ve got to go or I shall miss my lessons.’

Buck’s eyes glowed red in the darkness under the floorboards.

‘I shall miss you,’ he said softly.

NINE

In Which Robin Obeys Orders

Meanwhile back at the stack, the schoolmouse family had settled in. There was plenty of food, for in the straw were a great many grains of barley that the combine harvester had missed, and there was warmth and shelter among the bales. There was no shortage of comfort, but there was also no shortage of enemies.

Ragged Robin’s wound had healed pretty well, but each night the cry of the tawny owl reminded him of his narrow escape. Other visitors to the stack included foxes and an old tomcat living wild.

‘Just stay inside,’ said Hyacinth to the mousekins, ‘and you’ll be safe from cat, fox or owl. They cannot get in among the bales.’

But someone else could.

One night a week or so after the meeting of Flora and Buck, the straw stack was as usual a hive of activity. At the cold end of January, it was home to a wide variety of rodents, and in the dozens of runways between the bales lived rats, and voles, fieldmice, harvest-mice, and shrews, together with a good many ordinary housemice, and not forgetting the eleven schoolmice.

The tawny owl, looking down from its perch in an oak tree, saw a little animal at the base of the stack, scampering along the ground straight-bodied as though it had no legs. In colour it was a reddish brown with a white underside, and it was no more than eight inches in length. For an instant it paused at an entrance hole between two bales, one forefoot lifted, its short tail erect. Then, even as the owl launched itself, the weasel disappeared into the stack.

The owl circled and flew up again on to its perch and stood with its back against the trunk of the oak, listening. So sharp was its hearing that it clearly heard the sudden panic-stricken scurrying and scuttling within, and then a single terrified squeak that died abruptly away.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.