The Cat in Grandfather's House Part 26

"Don't eat any more," Hortense warned him.

"How could I?" asked Lowboy. "I'm not a storeroom or a wardrobe trunk!

Besides, your Grandmother has me half filled with her knitting and things. I must say I prefer cookies."

"I wish," said Highboy to Hortense, "that you hadn't packed away that last dress in my bottom drawer."

"Don't you see that you've grown small?" Hortense asked.

"Too small for the cookies," said Lowboy. "My clothes are so tight that I can't squeeze this last piece into my pocket."

"Now we're ready for the next part of the game," said Hortense, getting up.

"No running or anything like that," said Lowboy. "I can't do it."

"You'll only have to walk a short way, and after that it will be easy."

But Hortense had forgotten that to people as small as they had become, it was a long walk down the hall, and the stairs, and through the house.

"We should have eaten the cookies outside, of course," said she. "I didn't think."

However, following Hortense as leader, they finally reached the barn.

Hortense stopped at the door.

"How will we ever get onto their backs?" said she. "Of course, we should have climbed on first and then eaten the cookies. I'm managing this very badly. Perhaps," she added hopefully, "they'll be lying down."

As luck would have it, Tom and Jerry were lying down in their stalls, for they were still weary from their adventure of the night before.

Small as they were, Hortense and Highboy had no great difficulty in scrambling up Tom's side and taking a firm hold of his mane, nor did Jerry object when Andy and Lowboy mounted him. Tom looked at his riders in mild surprise, but made no move to get up.

"What next?" asked Lowboy.

"You'll see," said Hortense, who began to repeat the charm which Grater had spoken:

_Ride, ride, ride For the world is fair and wide.

The moon shines bright On a magic night, And Tom and Jerry Are able very To ride, ride, ride._

At the first words Tom turned reproachful eyes upon her.

"I didn't think it of you, Hortense," said he. "Jerry and I are worn out with riding, and here you abuse us, too."

"We'll be easy on you," said Hortense. "You have only to take us to the rock on the mountain side where the Little People dance. There you may rest until we return home. Besides, if we left you here Grater and Jeremiah might come and ride again."

"That is true," said Tom, "and another such ride as last night's would be the end of me."

"Quick then, to the rock," said Hortense, and in a twinkling Tom and Jerry were out of the barn and soaring high in the air over the field and the orchard, over the brook and the tree tops beyond. The moon shone full and bright upon them, and every one was so thrilled with its brightness that he felt like singing. Lowboy did break into a song, but Hortense silenced him at once for fear of frightening the Little People.

Over the tree tops they came and down towards the rock. Hortense could see the Little People dancing, but before Tom and Jerry could alight, the Little People had seen them and disappeared into the mountain.

"After them, quick," Hortense cried, slipping from Tom's back, and the others followed her as she ran into the entrance to the mountain.

The pa.s.sage was small and dark and wound this way and that. Soon it ended, and Hortense and the others came into the land where the blue moon was shining as before. But nowhere was there any sign of the Little People.

"What shall we do now?" Hortense asked when they had all stopped, not knowing what to do next.

"It's your party," said Lowboy. "You say what we shall do."

"There's a path," said Andy, pointing to a way among the trees.

"I believe," said Highboy, who had been looking around, "that these are raspberries on this bush. Um--um--good," and he began to eat as rapidly as he could pick them.

With difficulty Lowboy dragged his brother away from the tempting fruit and after Andy and Hortense, who had gone down the path. The path wandered every which way and seemed to go on forever.

"This isn't the way to the Cat's house at any rate," said Hortense, stopping to take breath, for they had gone at a rapid pace.

"What's that?" exclaimed Highboy.

All listened intently. There seemed, indeed, to be something moving among the bushes. Almost as soon as it started, the slight noise stopped, and they went on.

The path suddenly came to an end in an open place. Hortense and the others paused to look around, and as if by magic, innumerable Little People appeared on all sides--archers in green coats, armed with bows and arrows; pike-men in helmets and breastplates, and swordsmen with great two handled swords slung across their backs.

The captain of the fairy army, a fierce little man with a pointed mustache, stepped forward.

"Yield!" he commanded in a sharp voice. "You are prisoners! Bind them and take them to the King."

His men did as they were bid, and in a twinkling Hortense and Andy and Highboy and Lowboy found themselves with bound hands, marching forward, surrounded by the armed Little People.

"We are bound to have a trying time," said Lowboy, joking as usual.

"The King will try us."

Hortense and Andy were too depressed to enjoy jokes, and Highboy, with tears streaming down his cheeks, was composing a poem bidding a sad farewell to home and friends. Hortense could hear him trying rhymes to find one which would fit--"home, moan, bone, lone."

"Those don't rhyme," said Hortense irritably. "It must end with _m_, not _n_."

"But so few good words end in _m_," Highboy protested. "There's _roam_ of course. That might do. For instance,

If once again I see my home Never more at night I'll roam.

Not bad is it?"

Hortense thought it very bad indeed but didn't say so, for Highboy was finding pleasure in his rhymes and she hadn't the heart to depress him.

She held tight to Andy's hand and walked on without speaking.

They were marched into a little glade, brightly lighted with glowworms and fireflies imprisoned in crystal lamps. The Queen sat upon her throne, but the King walked up and down in front of his and tugged at his tawny beard, and he looked very fierce.

"Here are the prisoners, your Majesty," said the captain of the guard, saluting.

"Ha," said the King. "Good, we'll try and condemn them at once."

"Please, your Majesty," said Hortense timidly, "we've done nothing wrong."