“Oh! Whiskerandos! Whiskerandos!” thought I, as, almost rooted to the spot with horror, I stood gazing on the pitiful sight. “I am glad that you are dead! oh, I am glad that you are dead! bravest, noblest of rats, they can torture you no more!”
The dogs showed by their impatient movements that they considered that their master took a great deal too much time in his survey of a lifeless rat I suspect that he only did so to tease and tantalize them, for suddenly raising Whiskerandos still higher, to give more force to his fling, he cried, “Now Carlo—Rover—Cæsar—who’s first!” and swung the body away towards the door behind which I stood a trembling, shuddering spectator!
But lo and behold! no sooner did the seemingly dead rat touch the ground, than he found life, strength, and speed in a moment! The dogs were after him like the wind, but the very force of the fling had given him a good start, and he was through the opening under the door, knocking me over as he pushed past, almost before I could recall my scattered senses sufficiently to understand that he was actually alive! I have some remembrance of the young man’s exclamation of amazement as the dead rat found his feet and disappeared,—his shout, and the yells of the disappointed dogs,—but I recollect no more, for I heard no more. Whiskerandos and I had a fair start, and we made the best of it, and scampered off as rats scamper for their lives. Well for us that that door was locked!—well for us that there were broken bits of bottles on the top! well for us that the hole was too small for the passage of any thing larger than a rat!
I do not think that we were pursued: perhaps the unlocking of the door took our foe too much time, perhaps he did not think it worth while to hunt down such ignoble game, or perhaps he considered (but this I much doubt) that the cleverness which a rat had shown in making so extraordinary an escape, entitled him to a little indulgence. But we ran as though a whole pack of hounds were behind us; we never paused to take breath or look behind us, till we had buried ourselves in a corn-field.
“And are you really unhurt?” I exclaimed, when we stopped at last, panting and exhausted.
“Unhurt? yes!—only bruised by the fling,—it was well that the yard was not paved with stones.”
“And you were really alive and had your senses while that savage was holding you up with your head hanging down! Why, you looked as like a dead rat as ever I saw one!”
“I was wide awake all the time,” said Whiskerandos, “but I knew that it was my only chance to feign death. This has been a narrow escape, Ratto; I was never so near being torn to pieces before, not even in my fight with the ferret!”
“I’ll never go near a house in daylight again!” exclaimed I, still trembling with excitement and terror. Whiskerandos appeared to feel the effects of the fright less than I did, though his danger had been so much greater.
“It is your thirst that makes you so nervous,” said he; “you have not yet recovered from our voyage on the barrel. There seems to be a wet ditch around this field; come and moisten your nose in the water.”