Runaway Ralph (8 page)

When Catso recovered from his surprise he was after Ralph, who dashed from behind the nails as the jar was sent rolling across the table. Crash! It landed on the floor and broke, scattering nails across the craft shop. Ralph leaped behind the supplies of beans and peas and hamster food with Catso after him. Jars crashed, bags tumbled and split as they fell. Crash! Bang! Smash! Noise and flying glass did not stop Catso. Ralph leaped behind the big spools of lanyard plastic. Catso knocked over the spools and the plastic unreeled, tangling about his feet.

While Catso freed himself from the plastic, Ralph found behind the worktable a slanting piece of wood that was a brace between the studs of the rough walls of the craft shop. Ralph ran down the brace as
Catso tried to squeeze his head between the edge of the worktable and the wall. He could get his head in the space but not the rest of his body. He pulled back his head and tried to reach Ralph with his paw. Ralph, however, was too far down the brace.

Next Catso leaped to the floor and ran under the table. Ralph scurried up the brace so that he was above the table and beyond Catso's reaching paw. Back to the tabletop went Catso and down the brace ran Ralph, once again beyond the stretch of those curved and groping claws.

Frantic with frustration, the cat sprang from the table while Ralph ran up the brace. Once more Catso reached and stretched and groped. Ralph's courage and confidence had returned. He advanced within half an inch of Catso's longest reach. Catso tried, but could stretch his foreleg no farther.

Ralph sat down, and said, “This could go
on all day. You might as well give up. You know I'm too smart for you.”

Catso, after one more effort to stretch farther, withdrew his paw, came out from under the table, and picked his way daintily and disdainfully through the jumble of seeds, nails, and plastic cord as if the mess was beneath his notice. He held his tail proudly erect, but he did not fool Ralph. That cat had been defeated.

Catso squeezed out the hole in the screen door. Ralph was safe! Safe and free. Now all he had to do was figure out how to get his motorcycle away from Garf, and he would be on his way back to the Mountain View Inn. In the meantime, he settled down to feast on all the seeds that Catso had spilled for him.

L
ana was the one who discovered that Ralph was missing. The morning after Ralph's escape she came running ahead of Aunt Jill to the craft shop. She stopped short when she looked through the screen door and saw the litter of nails, seeds, and plastic strewn about the worktable and on the floor.

“Aunt Jill! Aunt Jill!” she shrieked, even
though Aunt Jill was directly behind her. “Burglars have been here, and somebody stole Garf's mouse!”

Ralph crouched out of sight behind a fluff of dust in the angle where the brace joined the studding. He heard campers coming.

“Garf! Garf!” called Lana. “Your mouse is gone! Somebody stole your mouse!”

“Hey, look at the mess!” said Pete.

“The mouse cage is all bent,” observed Garf. “A thief wouldn't have to bend the cage to open it.”

“First a watch, now a mouse,” said another camper.

“A thief in our midst!” cried Lana, eager for excitement and mystery.

“All right, boys and girls, let's pick up the nails and seeds and roll up the plastic.” Aunt Jill's voice was calm. This crisis was not the first she had met at Happy Acres, nor would it be the last.

Then Ralph heard Garf's voice saying, “Look at that hole in the screen door. It's big enough for a cat to squeeze through.”

Good thinking, Garf, said Ralph to himself. He had picked up this phrase from the many schoolteachers who had stayed at the Mountain View Inn while on their summer vacations.

“I'll bet Catso got my mouse,” said Garf, adding sadly, “and he was such a good mouse, too.”

Ralph could not help being pleased by this compliment, and a little sad, too. Of course, he was a good mouse. He had known that fact all along, but hearing himself spoken of in the past made him feel that the world would have been a sadder place without him.

“Garf, you're a good detective,” said Aunt Jill. “Catso must be the guilty one.”

“Aunt Jill, you don't think Catso—
ate
the mouse, do you?” Lana was awed by the
enormity of such a crime.

“I hope not, for Garf's sake,” said Aunt Jill.

What about
my
sake? thought Ralph indignantly.

“We'd better look around,” said Aunt Jill. “Perhaps the mouse is hiding someplace.”

Instantly a mouse hunt was organized. Butterfly nets were seized, jars and boxes moved, craft materials lifted.

“Here, mousie, mousie,” called Lana. “Here mousie, mousie.”

As if I would come running, thought Ralph, huddled behind a dusty cobweb in the dark shadows.

“I guess he's gone,” said Garf at last. “The first and probably the last mouse I'll ever have.”

“Garf, I'm putting you in charge of repairing the hole,” said Aunt Jill. “Get a piece of screen and some wire from Uncle
Steve, and we'll make sure Catso won't come in here again. We wouldn't want him to annoy Chum.”

At that point the fur along Ralph's spine began to tingle.

“There's Catso now!” cried Lana. Ralph felt the slam of the screen door jar the building as Lana ran out. “Bad cat, Catso! Bad cat!” he heard her shout. The scolding did
Ralph's heart good.

Later that morning after his riding lesson, Garf returned with a piece of screen and some wire to repair the hole. His work was frequently interrupted as campers left the craft shop and drifted off to other activities. When Aunt Jill left, Ralph came down from his hiding place in a series of leaps. Through the screen door he watched Garf sitting on the step weaving the wire patch to the screen with a piece of thin wire, before he said, “Say, Garf, about my motorcycle—”

Startled, Garf looked up from his work. “You're alive!” His obvious pleasure was most gratifying to Ralph. “I thought Catso got you.”

“How come you believed Catso got me when you wouldn't believe Catso stole the watch?” demanded Ralph. “I can run and jump, you know, and a watch can't.”

“It just isn't logical for a cat to steal a
watch,” Garf insisted.

“If I show you where the watch is, will you believe me?” asked Ralph.

With a look of interest Garf sat back on his heels. However, he said, “I don't want to have anything to do with that watch. I don't want to be seen near it, or people will start saying I took it again. Most everyone's forgotten about it, and I want to keep it that way.”

“You don't have to go near it,” said Ralph. “Just watch me.” Flattening himself, he squeezed under the screen door, jumped down the steps, and ran out into the bamboo leaves. Suddenly, all bamboo leaves looked alike. Which leaf was hiding the watch? Ralph did not know. He looked under one leaf, and then the next. He heard Garf mutter, “Huh!” and return to his work. Over by one of the lodges Lana shouted, “Bad cat! Bad cat!”

Ralph pushed some leaves aside and crawled under others. Where was that watch anyway? There was no telling how many leaves had fallen since Catso had dropped the watch. Ralph crawled deeper and deeper into the leaves and was finally rewarded by the touch of metal against his paw.

Next Ralph grasped the buckle on the leather strap and tugged. The watch was heavier than he had expected, but it slid across the smooth inside surface of the leaf. Ralph waded up through the leaves, pulling with all his strength, and at last emerged, dragging the watch behind him. “See!” he said. “I told you I knew where it was!”

“Well, what do you know?” Garf sat down on the step to the craft shop. “You really did. How did the watch get there?”

“I
told
you,” said Ralph impatiently. “Catso picked it up in his mouth, carried it out here, batted it around awhile, and finally
dropped it where it slid under a leaf.”

“You know, I believe you're telling the truth,” said Garf with wonder in his voice.

“Of course, I'm telling the truth.” Ralph was indignant.

“But what good does it do me?” asked Garf. “You know I can't return it. And if I
said Catso stole it, people would laugh.”

This moment was the one Ralph had been waiting for. First he pulled some bamboo leaves over the watch to hide it before he faced Garf. “All right, let's talk business,” he said. “I return the watch and clear your name; you give me back my motorcycle.”

From the trampoline Ralph heard Lana say as she bounced, “Bad—dog—Sam! You're supposed—to be a—watch—dog!” She stopped bouncing and began to scold Sam. “You're a watchdog. Why didn't you watch what Catso was doing? Why did you let Catso get that poor little mouse?”

Garf thought awhile before he said, “Why do you want the motorcycle? The ground is pretty uneven around here.”

“Why do you want it?” countered Ralph. “You're too big to ride it. It is mouse-sized, not boy-sized.”

“I want it because I like to think about
motorcycles,” said Garf. “I push it back and forth and think about riding a motorcycle when I grow up.”

“I want it to ride,” said Ralph. “Now. Back to the Mountain View Inn. I want to go home.”

“The Mountain View Inn!” Garf was incredulous. “That's over a mile away. You'd never make it.”

Ralph recalled the long and thrilling downhill ride. He remembered how he had thought at the time that he would never be able to go back up the mountain road. “Maybe you're right,” he admitted.

“Of course, you wouldn't,” said Garf. He pulled the motorcycle out of his pocket and ran a finger over the front tire. “For one thing your tires would never stand the trip. They're wearing smooth. There is still a lot of mileage left in them if you ride on floors, but they won't hold up on a highway.”

“Oh.” Ralph had not considered the possibility of his tires wearing out.

“And another thing,” said Garf. “You'd probably get laryngitis from making a motorcycle noise before you were halfway there.”

Ralph was utterly dejected. “I suppose you're right.”

“Bad—Sam! Bad—Sam!” scolded Lana from the trampoline.

Ralph ducked under a leaf while some campers walked past. “What am I going to do?” he asked pitifully, as he emerged. “I can't stay here with the cats. I'm a hotel mouse. I'm not used to living on weed seeds out in the cold. When winter comes I'll probably die—if the cats don't get me first. I've got to try to make it back to the hotel.”

“You should have thought about things like that before you ran away,” chided Garf.

“I should, but I didn't,” said Ralph coldly.
“You don't have to sound like a grown-up.”

“Sorry,” apologized Garf. The dinner bell rang, and campers began to run toward the dining hall. Catso, avoiding Lana with a haunted look on his furry face, darted from one hiding place to the next, on his way to the kitchen door. Poor old Sam, so conscientious and anxious to please, padded dejectedly across the grass with his tail drooping. He had failed in his duty.

Ralph did not have much time. “Do we have an agreement or don't we?” he demanded of the boy.

“I have a better idea,” said Garf. “I'll take you back to the hotel myself when my family comes to get me. They'll be spending the night there before they come to pick me up the day after tomorrow. The camp doesn't serve us lunch on the day we leave, so I know we'll stop at the inn for lunch before we start for home. It's the only place around
here. I could easily take you along in my pocket.”

This offer was more than Ralph had hoped for. “But the motorcycle,” he persisted. “If I return the watch, will you give it back?” Ralph felt he would rather perish at Happy Acres Camp than return to the hotel without his motorcycle.

“How will you return it?” Garf was curious. “You couldn't get it up on the shelf in the craft shop or up on a desk in the office.”

“I didn't say where I would return it,” answered Ralph. “I said I would return it. I'll leave it somewhere where Karen is sure to find it.”

Garf thought this plan over. “But people might think I left it there.”

Ralph had an answer. “Not if I leave it someplace where the boys can't go.”

“You mean the girls' bathroom?” asked Garf, visibly impressed by Ralph's idea.

“Maybe,” said Ralph carelessly. “Or Karen's lodge. Or the girls' dressing room by the swimming pool. You better make up your mind or you'll be late for lunch.”

“It's a deal!” said Garf suddenly. “You return the watch by tomorrow, and I'll give you back your motorcycle. The next day I'll take you to the inn. But remember, no watch, no motorcycle.”

“It's a deal,” agreed Ralph, “and you might throw in a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for my dinner.”

“Would you care to shake on it?” asked Garf.

Ralph extended his paw, which Garf took gently between his thumb and forefinger. They shook. “I'll meet you by the bamboo tomorrow morning after breakfast,” said Garf, and he ran off toward the dining hall. “If you're not there, I'll come back later.”

I hope I'll be there, thought Ralph, who
knew that a night of peril lay ahead of him. A peanut butter and jelly sandwich would help to give him strength and courage.

Over in the dining hall the campers began to sing: