Then how those rats did scamper! They ran this way and that, across the floor, and up the wall, and under boxes and barrels. It seemed to Nig as if the cellar were full of rats. She caught one for her dinner. It was Duncie, of course; and then there were only nine rats in the family.
They were all more careful for a little while; but young rats are very venturesome, and it wasn't many days before they wanted to go down into the pantry.
Listen said he hadn't heard a sound all the morning, and so they decided to creep down very quietly.
The truth was that Mr. and Mrs. Barnes had gone away for a month, and the house was empty; but of course the rats didn't know anything about that.
There wasn't a single crumb on the pantry shelves, so they crept into the kitchen. Whiskers gave a long sniff, and before the others knew what he was doing, he was up on a shelf behind the stove.
"Come on, brothers and sisters," he squealed. "Here is something that smells good. It seems to be on the end of little sticks, but we can gnaw it off."
"Of course we can," cried Jumbo. "Let's all get to work." He tossed the matches around on the shelf, and the nine rats went to work with a will.
Suddenly there was a hot little flame. Spot's eye-teeth were very sharp, and he had lighted the phosphorus on the end of his match. The flame lighted another match, and a little fire was soon burning merrily.
It happened that Mr. Barnes had left a pile of old papers on the shelf beside the matches. They quickly took fire, and the frightened rat children fled in terror to the attic.
"Oh, Mother! Oh, Father!" they screamed, "something dreadful has happened in the kitchen!"