Tribb's Trouble (3 page)

Tribb tried not to think about the fact that the mice would still be alive. That he would find the little mice there, wiggling and struggling to get free from the gel. Thinking about this made him think about Suzy. Little girls loved cute, furry animals. She wouldn't care that they were
vermin.
She'd just hate to see the mice trapped and struggling. Tribb knew that he would have to hide the pads and mice before Suzy found them.

Luckily, Suzy was supposed to be coming home late from school. Suzy played the trumpet in the school band, and every Wednesday she had band practice. Tribb checked his watch as he pulled in the driveway: five-thirty. He wasn't worried.

Tribb went in the back door, which was closest to the kitchen, ready for the sight of stuck mice. The first thing he saw was Suzy, sitting at the kitchen table.

“I thought you had band practice,” said Tribb.

“Not this week,” said Suzy. “The music teacher's sick.”

“Huh,” said Tribb. “Okay, then.”

He took off his shoes, trying to act casual. Suzy seemed to be busy doing something. Tribb hoped she hadn't noticed the struggling mice that, he felt sure, were all around her. He didn't want to draw her attention to them.

He slowly looked down toward the pad he'd placed by the fridge. It was empty. That was a bit surprising. Tribb had figured the fridge pad would be the first one to grab a mouse. He looked next at the pad by the stove. Also empty. Tribb could feel his excitement fade. He looked for the third pad, the one he'd placed in the corner.

The pad was missing.

Then Tribb noticed what Suzy was doing as she sat at the kitchen table. She was tossing rolled up bits of paper at the wall. But what she was aiming for really got his attention. She had taped one of the mouse pads against the wall like a dart board. She was tossing the paper bits at the pad, trying to get them to stick!

“What the heck are you doing?” said Tribb. “That's for catching mice!”

“But this is fun!” said Suzy. “I'm really good at it.”

The pad already had about six bits of paper stuck in the gel. It looked like Tribb's face after he shaved. After he stuck bits of toilet paper to the cuts to stop the bleeding. In the middle of the mouse pad was Tribb's piece of cheese.

“That's the bull's-eye,” said Suzy.

“Come on, quit it,” said Tribb. He went over to the wall and took down Suzy's target.

“Aw, Dad!”

Tribb tried pulling the bits of paper off, but they wouldn't budge. He wished Linda were here to see how sticky the gel was. “This one's ruined,” Tribb said, giving Suzy a stern glance.

He decided he needed a beer and walked over to the fridge. As he went to open the fridge door, his sock foot landed smack on the sticky pad.

“Daddy!” said Suzy, as Tribb hopped around the kitchen. “You shouldn't swear!”

Tribb still had four sticky pads, and he gave them a couple of days to catch something. All they caught, however, was dust and a bit of pasta. It was a noodle that flew out of the pot when Linda was stirring too hard as she made dinner.

“Cool,” Suzy had said. “Do it again, Mom!”

On the third day, Tribb dumped the useless sticky pads into the garbage.

“I told you,” said his friend Peter.

“What's the next plan?” asked Linda.

Tribb went back to Home Depot. He wasn't as self-conscious this time, didn't think people were staring at him. Just another ordinary customer with a mouse problem, that's all he was. He stood
in front of the mousetrap display and considered his choices. He remembered something Suzy had said: “What happens to the mice when you catch them, Dad?”

Tribb realized she thought he was
catching
the mice, not
killing
them. He didn't want to upset her. So after a couple of minutes, he decided on the humane traps. They were like little square tubes with a hidden door that swung closed when a mouse came inside. Tribb didn't have a clue what he would do with a live trapped mouse. He just hoped he'd know when the time came. He bought five humane traps.

At home, Tribb took the traps out of their plastic packaging. They were more flimsy than he'd expected. Once he figured out how to set them, he needed some bait. In the fridge, he found some cheese wrapped in pink paper. The cheese looked different from the kind Linda normally got, and it was a bit smelly. Tribb thought the smell would probably make it good bait. He cut some small chunks off and placed them deep inside the traps. Then he cut some for himself, just to taste.

It was
good.
Rich and smoky. Tribb had never tasted cheese so yummy. He thought he'd ask Linda to buy some more, but then he looked at the label. This cheese cost three times as much as the cheddar they usually ate. So this was a one-time treat! Tribb cut a few more slices for himself. He reached up for a new box of crackers he found in the cupboard. Were those mouse droppings on the shelf? He didn't want to know. He put the crackers and cheese onto a small plate. Then he set the traps around the kitchen.

Linda came home from her nursing shift at the hospital about an hour later. Not long after that, Tribb heard her shout from the kitchen,
“Who got into my cheese?”

Tribb stepped into the bright light of the kitchen. He licked a crumb from the corner of his mouth and tried to explain. He told Linda about the new traps and how he'd needed cheese for the bait. He tried to make his eyes go wide with innocence. That trick had worked for Suzy when she got into the chocolate chips.

The look on Linda's face told Tribb that it didn't work for him. His wife was angry. “You needed
half
that cheese for the traps?”

“I tried a little bit, too,” said Tribb.

“A little?” said Linda.

“More than a little,” said Tribb. “It was
good,”
he added, in case praise would help.

Linda crossed her arms and huffed. “That was special cheese, Tribb. I bought it for when the school sale group comes over next Thursday.” Tears filled her eyes. She glanced at the cupboard. “I suppose you got into the special crackers, too?”

Tribb thought it best to say nothing. Linda looked terribly hurt; he didn't want to make things worse.

After a few seconds of looking at him, judging him, his wife shook her head and left the room.

Days went by, and no mice turned up in the traps. Linda kept finding mouse droppings around the food in the kitchen. She found even more in the cupboard under the sink. During breakfast, she would report her findings to Tribb. Then she cleaned the kitchen like a storm while he was trying to drink his coffee. He felt so bad about his wife working so hard, he offered to clean the kitchen himself. At this, Linda only made a snorting sound as she scrubbed.

There was one other reason for Linda's unhappiness. Her knitting was going slowly. Tribb thought he knew why.

At night, the family watched TV in the living room. Suzy would have her eyes on the show, and Tribb would watch Linda. As she worked on her knitting, she would shake out her left hand as if it hurt. She'd been going at it so long, Tribb figured, she was getting a strain injury. He sometimes saw injuries of that kind at the factory where he worked.

“You still have a lot of knitting to do?” asked Tribb.

“Mmm.” Linda's needles clicked through a purple hat.

“Does your hand hurt?” Tribb asked. “Is there anything I can do?”

Linda looked sharply at Tribb. “How's the mouse problem coming?”

“Working on it,” said Tribb. “Have to give it time.”

“How much time?” Linda asked.

“Not much longer.”

“Well, I'm glad you want to do something helpful,” said Linda. Her voice was light, but she seemed to be speaking with a stiff jaw. “And I think getting rid of the mice would be wonderful.”

“You guys are missing a great TV show,” Suzy said.

That night, after Linda and Suzy were in bed, Tribb stayed up by himself, quietly watching the late news. He sat still in his chair for half an hour. He was trying not to think about anything. Not the cheese disaster. Not the sight of his wife shaking out her sore hand. Definitely not the fact that the one thing his wife wanted him to do, he wasn't doing.

Then something in the hall caught his attention. Without moving in his chair, he turned his eyes toward the hall. There was a mouse, a big one, making its way to the kitchen. A mouse! Right there! Tribb pressed back into his chair in horror. He held his breath. The mouse was about the length of his finger. To Tribb, it might as well have been a rat. There was no doubt now that his house was infested. This was proof!

Tribb knew he had to do something.

Within his reach, on a nearby bookshelf, sat a tall brass candlestick. Tribb imagined using it to club the mouse to death. As good as that would feel, however, it seemed too drastic. Tribb also figured he had only a slim chance of hitting the mouse in one try before it scooted away. Worse, if he
did
hit it, he would have a horrible mess to clean up. Forget the clubbing.

What he needed to do was catch the mouse! Time was running out. He looked around the living room for some kind of container. On the small table by the couch sat the antique crystal candy dish from Linda's grandmother. Tribb knew he couldn't use that, so he kept looking around. But there was nothing else, and the mouse was getting away!

Tribb rose from his chair, slowly and with the greatest care. He reached across to the side table and picked up the crystal candy dish. As quietly as possible, he dumped the candy from it onto the couch. Wrapped butterscotches slid into the cracks between the cushions.

The mouse was just about into the kitchen. It had a few inches of hallway carpet to go before it got to the shiny, hard tile. Tribb eased forward on his sock feet across the living room floor. He set each step down softly. It was how he used to leave Suzy's bedroom when she was a baby, finally asleep.

Light shone from the bright kitchen. Tribb could see the mouse scurrying toward that light. And the tile. Soon it would be too late. He held the dish high, like a hat he was about to put on. When he got to within a few steps of the mouse, he dove. He went head first, as if he was diving into a pool.

Right in the middle of diving for the mouse with the crystal dish, Tribb realized it was a bad idea. A terrible idea. Diving toward a creature so small and low was actually more like falling. He was
falling
toward the mouse. And as he was falling, he was trying to aim a crystal dish! Trying to aim it at a tiny thing that zigged and zagged, this way and that! For a second, Tribb was sure he had the mouse right where he wanted it, and then he didn't. The second was over, the mouse was gone. And the crystal dish was heading down, down, down toward the hard, bright tile.

The sound of the smash was almost musical. First came a single, high-pitched note as the dish hit the floor. Then came small, tinkling notes, as the broken pieces of crystal flew across the tile. It ended with the sound of Tribb groaning.

Linda came racing down the stairs, startled out of sleep. Tribb could see her face from where he lay on the floor. She came to him, her eyes full of concern. That look soon changed to shock. Then to sadness.

She pointed at the piece of crystal that remained in Tribb's hand. “Was that …?” He could only nod.

“Oh, Tribb,” she said, her hand to her cheek. “What have you done?”

Tribb hardly slept that night. Linda lay beside him in bed, with her back to him. She wouldn't respond when he kept saying “Sorry,” over and over. He couldn't remember another time when his wife had been so upset, and he felt horrible. Tribb kept seeing Linda's face in his mind, her eyes filled with tears.

Maybe he was thinking too much, but he seemed to be stuck on a bad path. He wanted to make his wife feel better. Instead, he did things to make her feel worse. Tribb worried that if he didn't get off that path soon, Linda might just get fed up. And then what?