“Then listen, the pair of you. Jack writes: ‘Dear Minkie—I send the mongoose. He is very tame, quite a lovable little chap. You can let him run about the house at once if all the doors are closed. After a day or two he can go out into the garden safely, as he will always come back to his box if you leave it open. He is accustomed to my dogs, and there are terriers among them, so make Dan understand that the mongoose wants to play with him when he stands up as if he were going to box with his fore-paws. You may have more trouble with Tib, but she will soon learn to treat him as one of the family. For that matter, Rikki (that is his name) can keep either of them in order if he is not taken by surprise by reason of his friendliness with all my live stock. He will eat most things they eat. When the frost goes, and he can hunt in the garden, he will keep himself. Yours, Jack.’ So there! Just try and behave decently when I introduce Rikki.”
Dan’s growls died away in a sort of groan.
“I’ll have that buck nigger stroking me and saying ‘Good dog’ next,” he muttered bitterly. And then it was all I could do to keep from smiling when I saw Minkie open the cage and take the mongoose out, gripping Dan tightly lest his feelings should overcome him. Will you believe it, that queer-looking beast seemed quite pleased to see Dan! It jumped up and licked his whiskers, and tickled his ears with its little hands, while all poor Dan could say was “Gnar-r!” and roll his eyes wildly to see what it was doing, Minkie’s fingers being like bits of steel. At last, grief and curiosity conquered him. He sniffed it, and Minkie let go. The parrot, from the dining-room, guessed what was happening, and shouted “Hark to him, Boxer! Back to him, Bendigo! At him, boy! At him!” But it was no use. May I never have another night out if Dan and Rikki were not having a friendly wrestle on the hearth-rug in half a minute.
The mongoose had quick eyes. When it rolled over in the game it saw me. I must say it had some sense, too; it seemed to know that I was not given to any dog-foolery, and it squared itself for battle. Dan, thinking to show off, charged full tilt for my chair, so I determined to take a rise out of him. I began to purr, walked straight up to him, with my tail well aloft and the tip twiddling, and began to rub myself against his ribs.
You never saw a dog so taken aback. I’m sure he thought I was crazy, and even Minkie said softly:
“Well, I never! Is the ju-ju beginning to work already?”
Odd, isn’t it? She attributed my little joke to that chunk of ivory in her pocket. Anyhow, the mongoose took no liberties with me. When all is said and done, Dan and I are in one camp, and every sort of rat in the other—but I am surprised at Dan.
Now, parcels turn up so continuously at Christmas time that no one else was aware of Rikki’s arrival until he sat up and begged from Mr. Schwartz while our visitor was drinking his soup. The parrot was watching, and made a horrid noise at the right moment, just as Schwartz looked down and saw a pair of fierce red eyes glaring at him. The mongoose put on his best grin, which made matters worse. Schwartz nearly overturned the dinner-table. I would never have credited six feet of man with being in such a funk. Everybody was glad he expressed his emotions in German—he himself more than the others when he calmed down. Minkie nearly came in for a scolding, but the Guv’nor, who is a real sport, was soon taken by Rikki’s antics, and rather chaffed Schwartz about his alarm.
“That is all very well Grosvenor,” said Schwartz, “but you have not lived where poisonous spiders, centipedes, scorpions, and all sorts of snakes come prowling into the house. I have jumped for my life far too often to be ashamed of a momentary forgetfulness that I was in England. Moreover, I was not aware that Millicent was forming a menagerie.”
“I hope to have a monkey soon,” observed Minkie.