Anton and Cecil Cats at Sea Part 8

Hieronymus sat up on his hind legs and pressed his cheek against the rough wood of the barrel. He closed his eyes and said solemnly, "I, Hieronymus, will gnaw a hole in this barrel. I swear by all that is sacred to the mouse I will not fail."

And then, without another word to Anton, the mouse bared his teeth again and began to gnaw at the wood. There was nothing to do but stand by and cheer him on. Hieronymus gnawed and gnawed, pausing repeatedly to spit out the bits of wood pulp he dislodged. He gnawed until the sun was high in the sky, but there was only a slight dent in the wood. He plopped down on his side. "I'll just rest a minute," he said.

Anton examined the barrel. "Maybe I can pull out these little slivers with my claws," he said, and he tried, but with little success. Hieronymus got to his feet and was back at it, gnaw, gnaw, gnaw. The dent widened and deepened and the mouse's nose disappeared inside it. When he stopped again, the dent was a real hole. "You're making progress," Anton said.

Hieronymus leaned against the barrel, picking little bits of wood from his teeth with the tiny claws of his forepaw. "My jaws hurt," he said, but more as an observation than a complaint.

"If only you could have something to drink," Anton said.

"Well," replied the mouse. "That's just the point, isn't it?" He returned to his labor.

The sun was sinking into the horizon, and Hieronymus was up to his neck in the barrel, when he braced his back legs against the side and carefully pulled himself free of the hole. He landed on his back on the floor, feet in the air, mouth open, eyes glazed. His mouth, nose, and chin were covered in blood.

Anton was horrified. "You've got to give up. You can't go on. You're bleeding. You need to rest."

Hieronymus looked up at him. "I don't have to go on," he said weakly. "Look at the barrel."

Anton bent down and put his face close to the tiny hole. The inside of it was pink with the mouse's blood. Pink? Anton thought. Then the pink turned pale and translucent. A drop of moisture formed at the edge of the opening and in the next moment, it ran down the side of the barrel to the floor. "You did it!" Anton exclaimed. "You gnawed all the way through the barrel!"

Mouse and cat sat watching a small pool of water gather in the shallow depression at the base of the barrel. Anton insisted Hieronymus have the first drink and he agreed, lapping at the thin film of moisture with his small, b.l.o.o.d.y tongue. He was content to rest while they waited for enough water to collect for Anton to have even a swallow. Licking water off a floor wasn't the best way to quench a thirst, but the slow drip from the bottom of the barrel guaranteed that they would be able to drink enough water to stay alive.

Furred animals, Hieronymus reminded Anton, could go without food much longer than they could without water, but after three days with not a bite to eat, Anton had begun to think otherwise. He had given up trying to open tins and jars and even the champion gnawer Hieronymus admitted defeat. "They put the food in these things to thwart creatures like me," he said, pushing a tin of hardtack across the floor. "It's diabolical."

Anton settled on deck in the hopes that a flying fish might pa.s.s over, or that a bird would perch in the rigging low enough to be swatted down. "There's nourishment to be had in chewing rope," Hieronymus suggested. "My mother told me that." But though rope might keep a mouse alive, Anton found he couldn't chew it properly.

"It just makes me thirstier," he said. Every few hours he went down to the larder to lap at the water trough. Each time he came up the steps, he felt a little weaker.

More days pa.s.sed, with the ship ambling through the waves, listing this way and that, the sails occasionally filling for a goodish spell, but no land or other ship was ever in sight. The days got warmer, and the sun got bigger, until the two furred animals were forced to seek out shade on the deck. The sea changed from brown to blue, and the waves thinned out until the surface of the water was as smooth as gla.s.s. The ship floated upon it, the sails hanging limply from the spars, as still as if it were at anchor. Anton and Hieronymus slept all day and pa.s.sed the night dozing fitfully, scanning the skies for some sign of life. Anton could barely raise himself to look over the prow, and he feared that if the longed-for fish or bird did appear, he would be too weak to catch it. "I feel muddled," he told Hieronymus. "I can't think straight."

One night Anton woke to the sound of human voices singing and a full moon bathing the still waters with pearly light. He lifted his head and sniffed the air. "What beautiful music," he said. Hieronymus, snoring mousily at the bottom of the coiled rope, didn't stir. Anton stretched his back legs, then arched his back, rousing himself, and made his way to the rail. What he saw made his jaw drop. The ship was surrounded by waves of glowing green gra.s.ses, swaying softly in the slight current of the water. It looked like electric seaweed! The voices seemed to come from out of the air, high and clear, singing a dreamy melody that made Anton feel, deep in his chest, something he hadn't felt in a long time: the first stirring of a purr.

"Oh, what is it?" he said. Then, toward the stern, he saw a pale hand moving among the glowing weeds, pulling something back and forth. Another hand appeared closer to the ship, and another farther to the prow, slowly, carefully pulling something through the waving gra.s.ses. It reminded Anton of the captain's wife, sitting at her dressing table at night, sometimes humming to herself.

"It's a comb," he said. "They're combing their hair?" And now, here and there among the waving green islets, pale faces appeared, human children's faces, all with the same sea-green eyes and pink rose petal lips, singing blissfully in the warm night air, combing their sparkling tresses, which flashed streaks of phosph.o.r.escent light across the water's still surface. Anton stood gazing in fascination at the pretty, joyful creatures. One of the children near the ship looked at Anton, smiled, and waved his hand, as if to say fare-thee-well. Then, raising his arms over his head, he dived down into the water.

Anton waved his paw back, leaning out over the rail to get a closer look. As the beautiful child slipped beneath the surface of the translucent sea, a big silvery fish tail flipped up behind him. One by one the strange night visitors turned from the ship and dived back into the sea, their voices falling away, their dreamy human faces disappearing, followed by a cacophony of slapping sounds as their flashing silver tails propelled them down into the depths. Scarcely a minute later they were gone.

"This world is full of wonders," Anton said. He stepped back from the rail, savoring the sensation of amazement, which, while it lasted, took his mind off his hunger.

"It is indeed," said Hieronymus, who had come up behind him, rubbing his sleepy eyes with both his paws.

Anton took a step toward the hatch, but his back legs went out from under him and he fell on his side. "That marvelous singing," he said. "Those pretty children, with their fish tails. What a magical night."

"What children?" Hieronymus asked, eyeing his friend anxiously. "What singing? I didn't hear anything."

Anton groggily got to his feet, then sat down, hanging his head. "I don't feel up to staying out tonight," he said. "I think I'll just go sleep in my bed."

Hieronymus burst into tears. "Oh, you're so thin and weak," he sobbed. "Now you're hallucinating. I'm afraid if you don't eat something soon . . ."

Anton looked up. "Eat what?" he said. "The rope's not doing much for you, my friend. You're all skin and bones."

"It's true," the mouse wailed. "We're wasting away."

"Well, you'll make yourself worse, crying about it."

Hieronymus nodded, wiping his tears on his forepaws, then followed Anton's weaving trail down the gangway and into the captain's quarters. Anton settled himself on the pillow in the crate. "I'm so tired," he said. "I think I may just go to sleep forever."

Hieronymus sat down in front of him. "I've been thinking," he said. "Clearly you can't go on much longer, nor can I. So the time has come for nature to take its natural course between us. I won't resist. I ask you, as a friend-for truly you've become that to me, though I never would have believed such a thing could happen-I ask you to make it swift."

Anton contemplated the mouse dreamily. "Make what swift?" he asked.

"I'm offering myself to you. As a meal."

Anton chuckled. "You must be joking."

"I was never more serious," said Hieronymus, sitting up on his hind legs to achieve maximum height. "Why should we both die, if one might live?"

"Eating you isn't going to keep me alive," said Anton. "It would probably only make me throw up and waste more of my strength."

Hieronymus considered this. "Do you think so?"

"Nothing against you, but rodents always do make me sick. I can't bear the taste. And you're not exactly any cat's idea of a meal. There's no meat on you."

"So you won't accept my offer."

"You saved our lives, gnawing through that barrel. You said yourself, we're friends. Well, I don't eat my friends. Forget this idea of sacrifice. It's not in your nature. What would Great-Granduncle Portymus say?"

"You're right. I can't give up," the mouse said. "It's not in my nature. There must be a way to save us both."

"If there is," Anton agreed, "I trust you to find it." Then he yawned widely, showing all his teeth. "I can't stay awake," he said.

"I'm going back on deck," said the mouse. "I'll keep an eye out for fish."

On deck Hieronymus found that the weather had changed, as so often happened at sea. The sky was cloudy, and the air had cooled noticeably. A light breeze played in the sails, not enough to fill them, but they rustled beneath the spars. As he looked up at the moon, which was shrouded in clouds, a thin beam of light broke through and seemed to shoot across the water to the ship. Then, as the mouse watched wide-eyed, the clouds parted, forming the pale lids of an enormous eye. It seemed to contemplate the ship, the deck, the mouse. Hieronymus felt the fur on his face tingle, and his spine shuddered. "The cat's eye," he murmured. What did it mean?

Where the eye sees the eye, he thought. That's what Anton was waiting for. It meant what was lost would be found. And weren't he and Anton lost? He rushed to the rail and looked out over the water, but it was dark, and though the moon shed upon it a pearly light, there was, as far as he could see, only water, water, and more water.

A profound sleepiness came upon Hieronymus as he turned back toward the cabin. He should tell Anton about this eye. He would want to know. Hieronymus made his way down the gangway and into the cabin, where Anton lay on the cushion snoring sonorously. "Anton," he said softly. "The cat's eye."

But Anton was deep in sleep and it seemed a shame to disturb him. I'll tell him when he wakes up, Hieronymus thought. I'm so tired all of a sudden. I may as well have a little nap. And so the talkative, brave little mouse, the last descendant of a n.o.ble clan, curled up between the paws of the cat and fell asleep.

CHAPTER 14.

Where the Eye Sees the Eye The small dinghy crew grunted in surprise, looked back at the Leone in the distance, then squinted again at the ship before them. It sat motionless in the channel, its sails hanging untrimmed. n.o.body at all was on deck-it appeared to the sailors to be completely abandoned.

"Er, what do we do now?" one of the men asked the first mate.

The first mate glanced at the two islands and back at the ship in front of them. He nodded straight ahead. "Let us have a look aboard, shall we? Could be easy pickings, it could." The other men chuckled and resumed rowing. Strange islands gave them the creeps, but an abandoned ship-that was much more to their liking.

Cecil was infinitely relieved. As the s.p.a.ce between the islands came into view he had watched the Eye carefully. It had not moved and now was fixed directly above the ship. He felt sure it had been over the ship all along. From beneath the bowsprit, a blue horse's head and forelegs surged forward, so it was not the ship Anton had left on, but Cecil still felt strangely drawn to it. The p.r.i.c.kling feeling extended to his paws.

As they rowed strongly through the waves, Cecil was the first to notice something moving in the water near the ship, just below the surface, creating a shallow sort of current as it went. Whatever it was moved in a constant slow circle around the ship, the V in the water above it charting its path. Eventually a crewman saw it, too.

"What's that, eh?" he asked, craning his neck. "Not a shark I hope?"

Oh, cat's whiskers, thought Cecil with a pang in his belly. I know what that is.

"Dolphin, maybe?" said another.

On the next pa.s.s, the first mate saw what Cecil had already figured out.

"It's a whale," he said tersely. "Stop rowing. Be still."

The crew froze in mid-motion, no sound but the lapping of the waves on the sides of the dinghy. Cecil stood on his hind legs with one front paw on the edge, straining to see the whale, wondering if it could possibly be the same one he'd seen twice before. All the fur on his body felt like it was sticking straight out. The whale's huge head rolled into view, and it seemed to Cecil as if time slowed down. He saw the blue-gray skin and wide white jaw. He saw the deep blue eye with the crust of barnacles over it, looking out, finding him, filling him with that same sensation of wisdom and serenity that he remembered from that day on the schooner so long ago. The eye, thought Cecil with a kind of dreamlike clarity. Then the whale's eye looked straight up at the mysterious cloud-shrouded Eye in the sky. Cecil let out a little squeak. This is it! he thought. This must be the other eye! The messenger. Of course.

The whale turned and dipped below the surface again, the shallow current changing course and now moving directly toward the little boat. Suddenly the current vanished into a swirling eddy at one spot, and Cecil realized the whale must have dived straight down. One of the younger sailors stood up and screamed in terror, almost swamping them before the others were able to pull him down to his seat again. Cecil kept his balance and watched the water intently, trying to see under the waves.

The whale surfaced forcefully some distance behind them, and the panicked sailors paddled furiously toward the abandoned ship until they were even with it. Two pirates grabbed onto the ropes hanging limply over the side and shimmied up hand over hand, then secured more ropes and threw them over to the others. Cecil steeled himself to try another desperate rope climb, remembering all too well how the one on the side of the Mary Anne turned out, but the first mate swiftly slipped a hand under Cecil's belly, tucked him into his blue vest, and began to climb up. Shivering and grateful, Cecil looked straight up into the sky to see the Eye above them. The lost shall be found, he thought anxiously, and he wished with all his might that the old saying would turn out to have a little bit of truth to it.

Although Cecil was hopeful about the chances of something good happening on board, the crewmen were decidedly more wary, even fearful. They were a superst.i.tious lot in general, and an abandoned ship was an odd thing for a pirate. On one hand, there was n.o.body to have to fight and everything available for looting, which was good. On the other, there was the pesky question of why it was abandoned in the first place. Where could the crew have gone? Was there a battle with another vessel? A terrible storm? A plague? Or was it something even more sinister and mysterious-a creature from the deep with many eyes and long tentacles, attacking the ship and making off with every last pa.s.senger? They would never know, but these kinds of thoughts made the dinghy crew tread carefully about the ship, speaking in low voices and glancing behind themselves often.

Cecil, however, jogged briskly from deck to deck searching for evidence of any living being. As soon as he had wriggled out of the first mate's vest and dropped onto the wooden planking, he thought he caught a familiar scent. Very faint and washed out, but here somewhere. The main deck was curiously empty of the usual stacks of barrels and crates. A feeling of vague alarm grew in his brain with a fog of worry.

The pirates found a stash of shiny implements to eat and drink with and stuffed them into bags, as well as clothing and a few small swords. Cecil paced impatiently until they opened the hatch to the hold, but there was no smell of Anton down there, and Cecil began to wonder if he wanted to find his brother so badly that he had imagined the scent to begin with. In the galley, two crewmen were rummaging through the shelves when Cecil stepped in.

"Why, would you look a' that," said one, pointing to a tall water barrel with a wire clasp on the top. "Gnawed clear through, ain't it?" he said, fingering a rough hole in the face of the barrel. A pool of water had gathered on the floorboard.

Cecil stared at the hole in the barrel as well, with a sinking feeling in his bones. That looked like the work of some rodent to him. If Anton were here, he wouldn't have let mice run wild on his ship. Cecil turned and trotted up to the main deck again. He searched the map room, peered down into every coil of rope, even climbed the rigging all the way up to the crow's nest in case Anton had been stranded up there, but it was just as unoccupied as everyplace else. Cecil looked up and found the Eye again, floating mildly in the misty clouds. It seemed more distant now, though surely he was closer to it, and in his frustration he felt as if it mocked him with its presence. Where is he? he thought furiously at the Eye. Tell me what to do now! But the Eye merely glowed silently.

Making his way slowly back down the lattice of rigging, which was much more difficult than climbing up, Cecil crossed the deck and went back below. He could hear movement in the hallway of the officers' quarters. In the largest room, with piles of rolled-up maps on the table and a fine long coat hanging on a stand, Cecil found his rescuer and another sailor on their knees on the floor, trying to pry open a large sea chest.

"It's no use, sir," said the sailor, leaning back on his heels and breathing heavily. "We can't budge it."

The first mate rested one elbow on his knee and noticed Cecil sitting quietly in the doorway. "And what of you, Lucky Black?" he asked Cecil. "Where's your luck now, eh? Supposed to be findin' somethin', you are."

Cecil gazed at the man. He had no idea what he was saying, but it was clear that he was interested in the chest. Cecil stretched his neck, looking over the problem, and saw that the lid was carved all over with fishes, just like the one he'd once opened. To the surprise of the men, Cecil leaped on top of the chest and began pressing and pressing the fish with his paws. The first mate laughed and said, "Well, it seems our Black has gone fishing," but Cecil ignored him. Was it this one? Or this one, maybe near the corner, then, BINGO, he felt a fish give beneath his paws. The latch released, and as Cecil leaped back to the floor, the lid snapped open.

The sailor gave a shout. "I'll be shivered," said the first mate. "Did you see that? Black, you've got more than luck on your side. I'm thinking you've got brains."

Cecil could see the men were excited, but he had no interest in the chest. It had no scent of Anton. As they pulled the lid open and stood looking wide-eyed at the contents, Cecil hurried off down the hallway.

He pa.s.sed a bedchamber and stopped to look in. This one contained a larger bed as well as a smaller one to fit a tiny human. There were several tall pieces of furniture, with drawers on the front and bottles and containers lined up on top. Cecil didn't want to try to jump up on one of them blindly, but he saw a box standing on end in a corner that would give him a better view. He sprang up on the box, turning to catch his balance as it wobbled unsteadily under his weight. As he faced the room again he saw a flash of movement at the far wall. He snapped his head and focused his eyes-it was a cat! His heart pounded crazily in his chest. One, two, three seconds pa.s.sed before he recognized the feline, but it was not Anton. It was Cecil himself, his furry black reflection staring back at him in a "meer" like the one he had seen on the ship with Gretchen. The gla.s.s was attached to the wall across the room, and Cecil saw that he looked just as bad as he felt. He sat back slowly and began to breathe again, closing his eyes and dropping his head as disappointment poured over him in a great wave. It sure smelled like his brother in here, but he was nowhere in sight.

Maybe Anton was here, but he left with the others, Cecil thought. Maybe I'll have to find out what happened to them. He swallowed with difficulty. This could not be the end of his search-it would not be. He opened his eyes to try to clear his head and focus his thoughts, and was surprised to see a tiny flicker of light somewhere beneath him. It was strange, like a reflection in water, pale green and still. He shuffled his paws back and lowered his head, squinting down. There were narrow slats in the box, and it seemed like the glint of light was coming from inside, down near the bottom. Cecil lay one eye directly on the s.p.a.ce between the slats and peered in, and the pale green light blinked.

It was a green eye, looking up at him.

In an instant Cecil had bounded to the floor and dashed around to the open back of the crate. He stood with his legs wide apart to steady himself, gulping in air and laughing. "Hey!" he managed to gasp out, his eyes bright with tears. "Where have you been, little kit?"

Anton lay in the crate, his chest rising and falling, gazing intently at Cecil. "Wanted to see what it is they sing about," he whispered, smiling. He tried to get to his feet but slumped back into the cushion. Cecil realized with another shock how thin and frail Anton was. He stepped closer and touched Anton's nose quickly with his own, breathing in the familiar scent of his brother.

"Mother sent me to find you," Cecil said. "I promised her I would."

Hieronymus crept slowly out from between Anton's paws and tried to fix his eyes on the large cat looming above him. Cecil wiped his face with his paw and looked down at the mouse.

"What's this? A little snack," he said. He popped out his claws.

Anton held up a paw feebly. "That snack is a friend of mine. He saved my life."

"It's true," Hieronymus squeaked up at Cecil. "If not for me, he would have been a goner." Hastily, he retreated behind Anton.

Cecil looked back at Anton and nodded. How had a mouse saved his poor brother? It was a story he would want to hear. "Any friend of yours is a friend of mine," he said.

From down the hallway, they heard the shouts of the pirates: "Huzzah!" and "It's gold, it's pure gold," and then the stamping of boots going from door to door, the first mate shouting, "Lucky Black, where are you, lad? You're the hero of the day."

"He's a kindly one," Cecil said to Anton. "He actually saved me from drowning. We've got to get him to take you off with us."

Anton sat up, staggered out of the box, and sat down again. Cecil licked his brother's cheeks and forehead. "You've been too sick to clean yourself," he said.

The first mate looked in the door, and seeing the two cats (but not the mouse hiding behind the pillow), called out to his fellow pirates, who came ambling joyfully behind him, "Here's our hero, and he's found a poor abandoned chum." Cecil mewed and rushed to his boots, then back to Anton-lick, lick, can't you see he's my brother?-then back to the boots, meow, meow, meeeooow!

The first mate laughed. "I hear you, Black," he said. "We'll take your friend. The gold in that chest is heavy, but he don't appear to weigh much, so we'll squeeze him in." And with that the mate picked Anton up by his scruff, put him inside his vest, and strode out to the deck, where the pirates, having thrown down a rope ladder to the dinghy, were busily loading the sacks of gold doubloons they'd found in the chest. Cecil clambered down with a little help from the crewmen. No one saw the mouse who ran down a line at the stern and bolted under the seat, where he found, to his delight, an old sea biscuit, which he munched on joyfully all the way to the ship.

From a corner of the cage, Gretchen watched the two brothers squabble over the plan. Hero today, gone tomorrow, she thought. The pirates' grat.i.tude for the gold, like everything else about them, had proved fitful and unreliable. That first night they'd been so overjoyed, the cook had broken out three tins of the oily little fish and presented them in three separate pans. Hieronymus-that mouse!-insisted that Anton hide a few of his under the stove, as he was too weak to eat them all at once. For a few days, the cats could do no wrong, and every pirate hand was outstretched with a treat, every pirate's ugly face contorted in something resembling a smile when a cat came into view. Then the time came to divide up the gold, and no pirate was content with his share. Cats were no longer of interest, though they still got the dinner leftovers slapped down in one pan and all the dishwater they could drink. Another week pa.s.sed and open hostility was running rife in the crew-in the wrong place at the wrong time a cat could get kicked. No sooner had they spotted land than the captain gave an order and the friends found themselves, all three plus that mouse, in a cage in a sprawling animal market on the edge of a bustling port city. Again, thought Gretchen ruefully.

Anton had made a good recovery, though he was never going to be a big, strong, muscle-headed guy like his brother. He was quicker and smarter, Gretchen thought. He was a tough cat, not like a fighter, but like a survivor. Seeing them together again made her heart feel light and happy. The brothers, she called them in her thoughts. The brothers were bickering now. Cecil paced up and down, as much as he could in the narrow s.p.a.ce.

"You haven't been in a 'markit' like this before," he advised Anton pompously. "Gretchen and I have, and we know what to do."

"But . . ." began Anton.

"The thing to do is," Cecil continued, "whenever somebody comes by, lie down and act like you're sick or dying. That way we won't be traded away. We'll stay with the pirates. We need to stick together, not to be separated all over the world again." He stopped pacing and sat down to face them.

Anton tried again. "But, are we sure we really want to stick with the pirates? I mean, they don't seem overly fond of us-they're eager to trade us off at the first opportunity. Maybe we could find a better life than that." He noticed Hieronymus, who was able to slip in and out of the cage easily because of his size, trying to get his attention from the shadows.

"The pirates are fine!" Cecil exclaimed, pacing again. "Lots of food, lots of excitement."

"Lots of danger," Gretchen commented quietly, watching Anton. She felt oddly protective of him, something she wasn't used to feeling about anyone except herself.

Hieronymus sidled up next to Anton's forepaw, glancing nervously at Cecil before speaking. "I've examined the latch. It's made of wood, a wooden peg slipped through a hole in another peg," he explained to Anton. "I could try gnawing through it, if you think that might work." They exchanged a glance, almost a wink.