Dick King-Smith's Book of Pets

by Dick King-Smith

  Contents

  1. Happy Mouseday

  2. Titus Rules OK

  3. The Jenius

  4. Funny Frank

  5. Dick and Dodo’s Book of Pets

  PUFFIN BOOKS

  Dick King-Smith served in the Grenadier Guards during the Second World War, and afterwards spent twenty years as a farmer in Gloucestershire, the county of his birth. Many of his stories are inspired by his farming experiences. He wrote a great number of children’s books, including The Sheep-Pig (winner of the Guardian Award and filmed as Babe), Harry’s Mad, The Hodgeheg, Martin’s Mice, The Invisible Dog, The Queen’s Nose and The Crowstarver. At the British Book Awards in 1991 he was voted Children’s Author of the Year. In 2009 he was made an OBE for services to children’s literature. Dick King-Smith died in 2011 at the age of eighty-eight.

  Discover more about Dick King-Smith at: www.dickkingsmith.com

  Some other books by Dick King-Smith

  BLESSU

  THE CROWSTARVER

  DINOSAUR SCHOOL

  DINOSAUR TROUBLE

  DUMPLING

  FAT LAWRENCE

  THE FOX BUSTERS

  GEORGE SPEAKS

  THE GOLDEN GOOSE

  HARRY’S MAD

  THE HODGEHEG

  THE INVISIBLE DOG

  JUST BINNIE

  LADY DAISY

  THE MAGIC CARPET SLIPPERS

  MAGNUS POWERMOUSE

  MARTIN’S MICE

  THE MOUSE FAMILY ROBINSON

  POPPET

  THE QUEEN’S NOSE

  THE SCHOOLMOUSE

  THE SHEEP-PIG

  SMASHER

  THE SWOOSE

  UNDER THE MISHMASH TREES

  THE WATER HORSE

  Chapter One

  After breakfast, Pete sat in his treehouse, thinking. It was Saturday and, for Pete, Saturday was Mouseday.

  At breakfast every Saturday, regular as clockwork, he asked his mum and dad if he could have what he most wanted in all the world – a white mouse with pink eyes.

  But the answers were always the same.

  ‘No!’ his mother said. ‘I’m scared of mice.’

  ‘No!’ his father said. ‘They smell.’

  ‘Why can’t you get it into your head, Pete,’ one or other or both of them would say, ‘that you are not keeping a mouse in this house? Ever!’

  So every Saturday, after breakfast, Pete would climb up into his treehouse, thinking …

  It’s no use, they’ll never let me, but I’ll keep on trying anyway.

  The treehouse was no beauty. Pete’s father had made it out of odds and ends of timber and put a tin roof on it. He had fixed it in a fork of the old apple tree. It wasn’t very big, but it had a door of sorts, and a kind of window. Inside there was an old folding garden chair for sitting on, and a shelf for keeping things on, and the whole treehouse was rainproof.

  Most importantly, it was Pete’s, and on its side was written in big black letters:

  On this particular Mouseday, Pete was thinking about the actual words his mum or dad always used. ‘You are not keeping a mouse in this house,’ was what they said.

  Suddenly he jumped up from his chair. Through the branches, he peered out across the lawn.

  ‘OK, so I can’t keep a mouse in that house,’ he said excitedly, ‘but what about in this house?

  Why not keep it here, in my treehouse? They would never know I had a mouse. I could make a nice cage for it and I could smuggle food up to it. We’d have a lovely time together, me and my secret mouse!’

  Pete sat down again and took from the shelf a battered little booklet. It was called Mice and How to Keep Them. He had bought it secretly a long while ago. He had read it from cover to cover, over and over again. Though he’d never owned one, there wasn’t much Pete didn’t know about handling and housing and feeding pet mice!

  There were pictures of all the many different colours and markings of mice, but the grubbiest page was the one about Pink-Eyed Whites, or PEWs as they were known to proper mice experts.

  Pete turned to the chapter on Housing, and studied it carefully for some time. Then he climbed down the rope ladder and went off to find his father.

  ‘Dad,’ he said. ‘Can I make something in your workshop?’

  ‘Depends,’ Pete’s father said. ‘What d’you want to make?’

  ‘Oh, just something I need for my treehouse. A kind of box.’

  ‘To keep something in, d’you mean?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Pete truthfully.

  ‘All right,’ his father said. ‘There are lots of bits of wood there, from that last set of bookshelves I made. I can’t help you – I shall be out for the rest of the morning – but mind you don’t hit your fingers with the hammer, and don’t cut them off with the saw either.’

  By the end of that morning, Pete had built a mouse cage. Like the treehouse, it was no beauty, but it was strongly made. Pete had followed the instructions in Mice and How to Keep Them. The cage had a wire top and, inside, an upper storey reached by a little flight of stairs: for this upstairs part, or bedroom, he had made a small, cosy nest box.

  After a quick check to see that his father wasn’t back and his mother wasn’t looking, Pete climbed up into his treehouse with his mouse cage. He proudly placed it ready upon the shelf.

  Much of the rest of the day was spent in preparing the other things that would be needed for his mouse.

  I must have a tin to store its food in, Pete thought. I’ll need some little bowls for it to eat out of and drink from. But I can’t ask Mum – she’ll want to know what I want them for.

  By bedtime, everything was prepared. The water bottle had been filled from the garden tap and the paste pots – thoroughly washed – stood ready on the sawdusted floor of the cage.

  ‘Did you make your box?’ Pete’s father asked at bedtime.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I’ve hardly seen anything of him,’ his mother said. ‘He’s been up and down that old apple tree all afternoon.’

  ‘That old treehouse,’ his father said, with a touch of pride in his voice. ‘A pretty good piece of work that, though I say so myself.’

  So’s my mouse cage, thought Pete, though I say so myself. There’s only one thing missing now …

  Chapter Two

  Buying the mouse, Pete thought, should be easy.

  First, he already had some money saved up, in a red tin shaped like a pillar box, which stood on the shelf in the treehouse.

  Secondly, the local pet shop was actually on his way to school. Every weekday, Pete and his friend Dave would stop and gaze in at the animals.

  Dave will have to know, Pete thought. I can’t keep it a secret from old Dave. And I can’t buy the mouse on a Mouseday – Mum and Dad would ask where I was going. I’ll have to get it on the way home from school.

  So, as they set out on Monday morning, Pete said to Dave, ‘I’m going to buy my white mouse today.’

  ‘With pink eyes?’ Dave said. He knew all about Pete’s ambition. ‘Are your mum and dad going to let you have one at last, then?’

  ‘No. They won’t know. It’s a secret,’ said Pete. ‘I’m going to keep it in my treehouse.’

  ‘That’s brilliant!’ Dave said.

  Pete couldn’t wait for school to end. When it did, he and Dave ran all the way to the pet shop. Inside, Pete looked around at the rabbits and the guinea pigs, the hamsters and the gerbils – until at last he saw in a corner a large cage with a number of mice running about inside it. Some were black, some were black and white, and some were gingery. But there was no white mouse with pink eyes.

  ‘Oh no!’ groaned Pete. He felt so disappointed.

  The pet-shop
man came round the counter.

  ‘What’s the matter, sonny?’ he said.

  ‘Are these all the mice you’ve got?’ asked Pete.

  ‘Yes. Why?’

  ‘I wanted a PEW.’

  ‘A pew?’ said the pet-shop man. ‘That’s something you sit on in church.’

  ‘No,’ said Pete. ‘It stands for Pink-Eyed White.’

  ‘Is that a fact?’ said the pet-shop man. ‘Well, in that case, I think you’re in luck. I seem to remember there’s one of those left.’ He opened the lid of the cage.

  In one corner was a big nest – a ball made of shavings and bits of straw and newspaper. The man opened it up with a finger.

  Inside were some mice. One of them, Pete saw with a thrill, was a PEW!

  ‘Did you want a buck or a doe?’ the pet-shop man asked.

  ‘I don’t mind,’ Pete said, ‘but I’d sooner have a doe.’

  The man picked up the white mouse gently, holding it by the root of its tail.

  ‘It is your lucky day,’ he said. ‘This one’s a doe.’

  ‘Oh, good!’ said Pete. He knew, from Mice and How to Keep Them, that it was only the bucks that smelled.

  The booklet also said that mice like canary seed, so he bought a packet of that too, and the pet-shop man provided a special little cardboard box for Pete to carry the PEW home in.

  When they reached Pete’s gate, he said to Dave, ‘Can you go and ring the bell and then, when Mum comes, talk to her for a bit? I don’t want her to see me getting up into the treehouse with this lot.’

  ‘What shall I talk about?’ said Dave.

  ‘Oh, I don’t know. Anything. Just keep her busy till I get back.’

  So Dave rang the bell and, when Pete’s mum came to the front door, he said, ‘Hello.’

  ‘Hello, Dave,’ said Pete’s mum. ‘Where’s Pete?’

  ‘Who?’ said Dave.

  ‘Pete.’

  ‘Oh, Pete,’ said Dave.

  ‘Yes. Didn’t he walk back from school with you?’

  ‘School?’ said Dave.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Dave. ‘School. Yes. He did.’

  ‘Well, where is he?’

  ‘Who?’ said Dave.

  ‘Oh, don’t start that again,’ said Pete’s mum. ‘Where is Pete?’

  At that moment Dave saw his friend running back across the lawn, making a thumbs-up sign.

  ‘Oh, there’s Pete!’ said Dave to Pete’s mum. ‘I’ve got to go. Goodbye.’

  ‘Where’ve you been, Pete?’ asked his mother.

  ‘In my treehouse.’

  ‘Well, I don’t know what’s up with your friend Dave. He comes and rings the bell and then talks a lot of rubbish. I couldn’t get any sense out of him.’

  ‘He’s like that, old Dave is,’ said Pete. ‘Can I have a biscuit, Mum?’

  ‘Can’t you wait till teatime?’

  ‘I’m hungry.’

  ‘Oh, all right.’

  When he got back to the treehouse, Pete put his PEW in the mouse cage. He filled one pot with birdseed and the other with water.

  The white mouse hurried around her home, examining everything with twitching whiskers. She climbed the stairs to her bedroom and inspected the bedding in the nest box.

  When she came downstairs again, Pete offered her a little bit of biscuit. She took it in her small pink paws and began to nibble at it.

  You look quite at home already, Pete thought. But you need a name. What shall I call you?

  The white mouse stared, rather short-sightedly, at him out of her large pink eyes.

  Some biscuits, like Digestives or Rich Tea, have their names written on them. Pete was just about to eat the rest of this one when he saw the name on it:

  ‘That’s it!’ Pete said to his PEW. ‘You’re Nice!’

  Chapter Three

  Some days later Pete’s mum said to her husband, ‘I’m a bit worried about Pete.’

  ‘Why?’ asked Pete’s dad.

  ‘This week he’s spent every spare minute up that apple tree. He’s got all his toys and books in his bedroom, yet he’s always in that treehouse.

  ‘And he talks to himself up there. I heard him when I was gardening yesterday.’

  ‘Probably had his friend Dave with him.’

  ‘No. I thought that, but I could see Dave over the fence, playing in his own garden. And that’s another thing – Dave came to our door last Monday talking a lot of rubbish. And it was just the same with Pete. I heard him saying, “Nice. Nice. Who’s a good Nice?” What sense does that make?’

  ‘I shouldn’t worry,’ Pete’s dad said. ‘He’s just playing some game.’

  ‘And another thing,’ said Pete’s mum. ‘He seems to be eating so much nowadays. He’s always asking me for biscuits, and yesterday I caught him with a handful of cornflakes. When he saw me, he stuffed them in his mouth. Dry cornflakes. I ask you!’

  Apart from that slip-up, Pete had managed to smuggle all sorts of food to Nice. As well as biscuits and cornflakes, he tried her with a number of other foods recommended in Mice and How to Keep Them – bread, cakecrumbs, and bits of carrot and apple and banana. He only gave her very small amounts, of course, for she was only a very small animal. But Nice ate everything he gave her and seemed, Pete thought, to be growing quite fat.

  She had also grown very tame. Pete would take her out of her cage and sit in his chair, and she would climb all over him, running up his arm and on to his shoulder and tickling his neck with her whiskers.

  At the end of the next week, Pete and Dave were walking back from school together. It was very windy – a southwesterly gale was forecast – and they battled along with their heads down.

  ‘How’s the mouse?’ shouted Dave.

  ‘She’s fine!’ yelled Pete.

  ‘Your mum and dad still haven’t found out?’

  ‘No! They never will!’

  Later, Pete climbed the rope ladder to give Nice her supper. The wind was stronger now and the branches of the old apple tree were whipping about. The treehouse creaked a bit in the gathering storm.

  Pete lay in bed that Friday night, listening to the wind howling outside. For a while he worried a little bit about Nice, in her cage in the treehouse in the apple tree, but then he fell asleep.

  Because it was a Mouseday morning, he slept late and, by the time he woke, the wind had dropped. But when he looked out of his bedroom window, it was to see a terrible sight.

  The apple tree had blown down in the gale!

  It lay flat, its roots exposed. Amidst its broken branches was the wreckage of his treehouse.

  Pete dressed and dashed downstairs.

  ‘Mum! Dad!’ he cried. ‘My treehouse is smashed!’

  ‘I know,’ his mum said. ‘I’m so sorry, Pete.’

  ‘Good job it happened at night, otherwise you might have been in it,’ his dad said. ‘You could have been killed.’

  Like Nice has been, thought Pete miserably.

  He walked across the lawn and stood by the fallen tree. The treehouse had completely collapsed.

  His father came to stand beside him, a billhook in his hand.

  ‘What did you have in there, Pete?’ he said. ‘Anything of value?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Pete. I don’t want to see her dead body, he thought. But I can’t just leave her there.

  ‘Let’s have a look,’ said his father.

  He chopped away at the tangle of branches until he reached the wreck of the treehouse. He wrenched off the battered tin roof. Under it was the garden chair (smashed), Pete’s pillar box (bent but with some coins still rattling in it), Mice and How to Keep Them (a bit bedraggled, but still all in one piece) and … the mouse cage. By some miracle it seemed to be undamaged.

  ‘What’s this?’ Pete’s dad said.

  ‘My mouse cage,’ said Pete.

  ‘Mouse cage? But you haven’t got a mouse.’

  ‘I have,’ said Pete. ‘Or rather, I had. I don’t want to see her, Dad.
Can you bury her for me, please?’

  He turned away.

  His father opened the lid of the cage.

  ‘Bury her?’ he said. ‘I don’t think I’d better, Pete. She seems to be as right as rain.’ He bent his head and sniffed. ‘Funny,’ he said. ‘She doesn’t smell at all.’

  By the end of that Mouseday, everything had been explained and everything had been arranged.

  There could be no rebuilding of the treehouse – and there was no other tree in the garden. Pete was to be allowed to keep his mouse cage on the workbench in the garage.

  ‘Just so long as I don’t have to come anywhere near it,’ his mother said.

  ‘It doesn’t smell,’ his dad said. ‘But one mouse is enough, Pete. You’re not to go buying any more mice. Promise?’

  ‘I promise,’ Pete said.

  Last thing that Mouseday evening, Pete went to the garage to make sure that Nice was all right.

  He opened the cage, expecting to see her come running downstairs for her supper, but there was no sign of her. Pete raised the lid of the little nest box.

  Inside was his PEW.

  But she was not alone.

  With her were six blind, fat, hairless babies.

  ‘Nice!’ said Pete softly. ‘Oh, very nice indeed!’