CHAPTER III
THE PLEASURES OF IMPRISONMENT
I was aroused from a sort of stupor between sleep and exhaustion by being picked out of my snug retreat and held up for inspection before a third person, a sweet-faced lady, whom I afterwards came to know well and love as the mother of my dear master, Jack Fortescue, and his brother Harry.
She looked at me pitifully when her son had quickly explained the events of the morning. Her fingers were long and slim and cool, and, poor limp little rag that I was, I never offered the slightest resistance to her gentle grasp. She took me straight through a side door into a long, low, shady building with wood-lined walls, and in a minute or two I was placed in a nest of soft hay in a good-sized box covered in front with close wire-netting. Too worn out to trouble my head about the amazing and perplexing change in my circumstances, I simply curled up with my tail over my nose and went sound asleep.
It was Jack who woke me. I must have been asleep for a long time, for now the sun was pouring in through the western windows. The first thing I realized was that I was desperately hungry, and that the little saucer which the boy had pushed gently into the cage had a most appetizing odour. But my sleep had given me fresh life and strength, and quiet as his movements were, I remember that I was desperately frightened, and cowered down, shivering, burrowing close in the hay.
Jack seemed to understand perfectly, for he closed the door again very softly and moved away. Presently the silence restored my confidence a little, and I ventured to peep out. The saucer was quite close to my nose, and, hunger overpowering my fright, I crawled up and tasted the mixture. It was bread and milk, soft and well cooked. I finished it very rapidly, and then, feeling much refreshed, went to sleep for a second time.
Once again before dark Jack came and fed me, and this time brought me a couple of ready cracked nuts, as well as the bread and milk.
Well fed and cared for as I was, I shall never forget the misery of that first night. I don’t suppose that at that very early age I actually remembered much of what had happened during the past eventful day. What I did feel was a sort of horror of loneliness. Instead of the whole five of us snuggling warmly together in our well-lined drey, I was here in this box, which was many times larger than our nest, absolutely alone. Every time I went to sleep I would wake up again with a start, vaguely feeling round for my mother and the rest, and shivering miserably in my unaccustomed solitude.
At last morning came, and it was hardly broad daylight before Jack arrived in his nightshirt and carried me off, cage and all, to his bedroom, where he put me on the window-ledge in the sun and offered me nuts. At first I was much alarmed; but he was so gentle that I gradually got over my terror, and sat up and nibbled the nuts fairly happily.
I will pass over the next few days. My new master fed me assiduously, and very soon I lost all fear of him, and the minute I saw him would make for the door of my comfortable little prison, and wait eagerly for the dainties which were sure to be forthcoming. Every morning he changed my bed and gave me fresh hay, which makes far the best bedding for any of our tribe. During the day my cage was brought down into the bowling-alley, where several other pets were kept, and at night Jack took me up to his room, so that I might not be frightened by servants dusting in the morning.
At last there came a morning when Jack’s hand, instead of offering me the usual nut, gently grasped me. Frightened, I turned at once and bit him sharply. I don’t suppose my small teeth did much damage, for he only laughed, and, lifting me right out of the cage, placed me on his bed. The white counterpane was so very different from anything which I had ever felt under my claws before, that at first I was too much surprised to move, and remained perfectly still. Presently, however, Jack popped a nut down in front of me. That, at any rate, I understood, so I sat up on my hind-quarters, cracked it, and, first carefully removing the brown skin from the kernel, made short work of the dainty.
Hoping for more, I gained confidence and proceeded to explore. First I caught my claws in the little projecting tufts of the counterpane, and heard Jack laughing gently as I shook myself impatiently free, giving a little squeak of disgust. Presently I discovered a cavity that looked dark and inviting. You know a squirrel’s besetting sin is curiosity. He always wants to know the ins and outs of everything. Any object which he has not seen before fascinates him, and I am afraid to say how many of my friends have paid for their inquisitiveness by getting into serious trouble. So I crawled down, and finding it delightfully warm and dark, made my way under the clothes to the very foot of the bed, where, as I was very comfortable, I went sound asleep.
On the next morning my master turned me loose again, this time on the floor, and after a fresh access of timidity I again found nuts. There were more than I wanted, so, obeying a natural instinct, I ate what I could, and hid the rest in various convenient receptacles.
Soon I began to look forward to my daily outing, and took great delight in exploring every corner of the room. I well recollect what a shock I got the first time I reached the window-sill. Outside was a great elm-tree, whose branches reached within a few yards of the window, and the sight of the green leaves waving gently in the early morning breeze roused in me strange longings. I made one jump, and striking full against the glass, fell back half stunned and terrified almost out of my wits at the strange transparent barrier. Jack picked me up at once, and placed me safe in the darkness and warmth under the bedclothes, where I had time to recover from my fright.
Soon he took to letting me out at bedtime, and I had a grand scamper before the light was put out. The window-curtains were my favourite resort. They were so easy to climb, and had such splendid folds and crannies for hiding nuts in. I would race across the curtain-pole, rattling the rings as I went, down the other curtain, round the room full tilt, and finish up with a good hunt in all the corners for nuts which I had concealed the day before and forgotten all about. I rarely went back to my cage to sleep, though it was always open and ready for me. A fold in the window-curtain was my usual place of repose, and another pet perch was an old band-box on the top of the wardrobe. It was half full of tissue paper, which possessed a strange fascination for my young mind. I tore it all up fine with my sharp teeth, and made a most delicious nest with the bits.
When the night was chilly I generally snuggled under Jack’s bedclothes, and always, first thing in the morning, so soon as daylight came, I would make for the bed, and working my way gently down between the sheets, curl up close against Jack’s toes. Sometimes he was so sleepy that he would not wake up and play when I wanted him to; then I would emerge on to the pillow and gently nibble the tip of his nose.
This never failed. ‘Confound you, Nipper!’ (he always called me Nipper), he would mutter drowsily, and then make a lazy grab, which I always eluded with the greatest ease, and with two bounds would land on the end of the bedstead, and, perched there, scold him until he sat up and threw a sock at me.
He was never rough, and never lost his temper with me, although I am sure that I was aggravating enough at times. It must have been trying when he pulled on his boots in a hurry and found a couple of nuts wedged tight in each toe. I do not think that a boy and a squirrel ever became better chums. We were simply devoted to one another. The only dull times for me were when Jack and Harry were busy with their tutor, during which hours I was usually in my box in the bowling-alley.
There, as I think I mentioned before, the Fortescue boys kept several other pets. There was a large white cockatoo with a lemon crest, named Joey, which frightened and puzzled me horribly until I came to understand its odd faculty of imitating every person and animal about the place. It would ‘miaouw’ like a cat, a most disturbing sound, for every squirrel hates cats next to hawks and weasels; would bark so realistically that Mrs. Fortescue’s white Pomeranian was always stirred up to reply, and the two would go on and on, the wily old bird always starting up afresh whenever the dog stopped, until poor Pom nearly had a fit and grew quite hoarse. I shall never forget the first time he imitated me to my face. It gave me a most severe shock, for he did it so well that for a moment I believed that one of my relations was actually in the room. One thing I liked him for: he was devoted to Jack, and invariably bade him a grave ‘good morning’ when he brought my cage down before breakfast. He lived on a perch, to which he was chained by one leg, and up and down this he would sidle by the hour, with one eye cocked for mischief. Sometimes, when all was quiet, he would talk to himself in a language quite unlike that which my master and his family used. The boys said it was some African lingo which Joey had learnt ages ago in his native land. Altogether a most uncanny bird!
Harry had a number of pet mice in wire cages. They were not the least atom like any of the mice I had ever seen in the wood. These were of the queerest colours—piebald—and some of them had marks on their backs just the shape of a saddle. Uninteresting I called them, but Harry was very fond of them, and used to take them out and let them run all over him.
In the darkest corner of the long, low room was the one creature that, from the first moment I saw it, interested me more than all the others put together. All day long it lay hidden in its hay bed and never moved, but slept quietly as a dormouse in its winter nest. In fact, I never set eyes on it at all until one night in August, when the evenings had begun to draw in and I happened to be left a little later than usual in the bowling-alley. No sooner had the room become dusk than I heard from the tiny cage a little twittering, more like a young bird’s voice than anything else, and presently caught sight of a dainty little head poked out of the hay, with two of the largest, most liquid black eyes I ever saw. I gazed in wonder, for the animal was so like myself that I felt sure it was a squirrel, though I had never dreamed that any squirrel existed so tiny as this.
Just then in came the two boys together.
HE IMITATED ME TO MY FACE
‘Hulloa!’ cried Harry, ‘Lops is awake. Bring Nipper to have a look at him, Jack.’
Jack took me out of my cage, and I jumped as usual on to his shoulder and nibbled his ear by way of a kiss. He walked across to the other cage and set me down in front of it.
‘Mr. Lops,’ he said with mock gravity, ‘allow me to introduce Mr. Nipper. This is a small cousin of yours, Nipper, and he comes from Mexico. As you see yourself, he’s a sad character—sleeps all day and only wakes up at night.’
I was so lost in surprise that I sat quite still, gazing through the fine wire mesh at my new acquaintance. I have always had a fairly good opinion of my own looks, as every well-bred squirrel should have, but, upon my word, he put me out of all conceit with myself. He was the tiniest, daintiest, quaintest creature I ever set eyes on. No bright red about him, but though his coat was darker and greyer than mine, it was as soft as fine velvet, and beautifully groomed. His head was perfectly shaped, his ears pricked like my own, and his eyes very large and amazingly bright. But the oddest thing about him were the folds of loose skin which extended in a thin membrane from all his four legs back to his body. When he jumped from the upper, story of his cage to the lower, they spread out almost like the wings of a bat; but when he was sitting still, they folded up so that they did not in the least spoil his beautiful shape. I must say that I felt quite envious, for I thoroughly understood that a squirrel built like that could jump ever so much further than I or any of my family could. We English squirrels can, at a pinch, clear as much as three yards in a straight line. We always spread our legs wide when we jump as well as keeping our tails stretched straight out, and that is why we can leap from great heights and reach the ground unhurt, for we drop parachute fashion. But as for these American cousins of ours, the flying squirrels, they can jump from the top of one tree, and sliding through the air like a soaring hawk, reach another tree fifty feet or more away at a height from the ground only slightly less than that of their starting-point.
Lops—which Jack said was short for Nyctalops, or ‘seer by night’—and I had many a chat afterwards. He told me of his old home in sunny Mexico, not a nest such as I was born in, but a cavity in the trunk of a vast live oak or ilex, from whose boughs long weepers of grey Spanish moss trailed towards the brown palmetto-stained water below; of the hot sun and of the furious tropical storms which lashed the deep river into white foam; of the paroquets, with their brilliant plumage of green and red and blue, which screamed harshly among the upper branches at dawn; of the rusty-hued water-vipers which coiled sluggishly on the steaming mud in summer. He told, too, of the perils from great hawks three times as large as any we know in England, from long, thin tree-snakes wrapped unseen round the branches; and I shuddered when he talked of fierce wild-cats as much at home among the tree-tops as on the ground. It must have been a wonderful country and a wonderful life, so different from our northern island as to be almost beyond my imagination to picture it. All day the land slept breathless beneath the blazing sun, with nothing moving except the birds, the fox-squirrels, and the lizards; and during those hours Lops and his family slept in the dark recesses of their wood-walled fortress; but when the sun set the forest woke to life. Deer came down to the river to drink; peccaries rooted in droves among the bases of the mighty trees; sometimes a great bear came prowling along, uttering now and then a deep ‘woof’ when any unaccustomed sound disturbed him. Up above opossums and racoons moved silently to and fro among the tree-tops; great owls whirled on soft wings, hooting dismally; while all night long—especially in the hot season—the endless chirr of crickets, the pipe of tree-frogs and the deep booming of bull-frogs filled the air with a never-ending concert. Other sounds there were, rarer, but far more terrifying. Enormous bull-alligators, floating like logs with only their gnarled heads and the ridges of their rugged backs above the water, would bellow with a roar that shook the forest; or, again, from some hidden recess of the deepest woods the blood-curdling shriek of the tawny puma would ring hideously through the night.
Poor Lops! Though cared for as few pets are—fed with dainty pecan-nuts and other delicacies from his far-off home across the ocean, and though he loved his mistress Mabel, Jack’s sister, devotedly—yet he was never happy as I was. The damp and cold of our climate oppressed him, and most of his time he spent curled up tightly among the soft bedding of his cage. Then, too, he was a creature of the night, and it was only after dark that he would wake and want to play—and at that time, except for an hour or two, there was no one to play with. I felt very sorry for him, and so, too, were Mabel and the boys. I am sure that if they could they would have set him free again among the great tropical forests that he loved so well, and always mourned for, though only I knew how deeply.
As for me, life ran most pleasantly. I grew plump on the good food I was supplied with. My coat became long and sleek, and my tail, which had been a mere furry appendage like that of a little colt, grew into a glorious brush of richest red-brown, long enough and thick enough to cover me completely when I curled up to sleep. Jack was very proud of my looks, and used to groom me all over with a little brush—a process which I soon grew very fond of. We two came to understand one another most marvellously. I could always tell him what I wanted, whether it was food, or a game, or to be allowed to creep into his coat-pocket and go to sleep there.
One day he opened my cage, slipped me into his pocket, and walked off, and when he took me out again I was out of doors once more!
I cannot tell you how it affected me. You know, we wild creatures—born wild, I mean—never quite forget our rightful heritage of freedom, and here, for the first time for many weeks, I found myself out in the open.
Jack was seated on a wooden bench under a clump of evergreen shrubs in the midst of a great expanse of smooth-shaven lawn. It was August now, and the sun poured down hotter than ever it had been in those June days in the wood. Big bumble-bees droned lazily by; a robin was perched on the bare ground at the foot of an arbor vitæ, cocking a soft round eye at us; all the subtle, fascinating odours of summer were in my nostrils. I gave one spring from his knee on to the back of the bench, and sat there, head high, snuffing the sweet air, and quivering all over with excitement. Jack never moved, and for the moment he passed completely out of my remembrance. My brain was crammed to bursting with half-forgotten instincts and remembrances which crowded in upon me.
So I sat for perhaps half a minute; then a little breath of summer breeze swayed a bough above me, and on the impulse I sprang. Oh, the delight of feeling it yield and swing beneath me! I darted inwards to the trunk, and with one clattering dash was up at its slender summit twenty feet above the turf gazing round in wild delight. When the first ecstasy had worn off, I set myself to explore, and, clambering down a little, jumped into the next tree. So for many minutes I exercised my new-found powers, taking longer and longer leaps, and enjoying myself to the top of my bent.
But the clump of shrubs was small, and soon I had exhausted its resources in the way of jumps. I looked around, and a little way off was a giant elm. Ah! that would give more scope; and with my head full of its possibilities, I turned and came down head foremost. Then, and not till then, did my eyes fall upon my master, who sat where I had left him, still as ever. He looked at me, but I would not heed, and dashed off across the lawn.
‘Hulloa, Jack! what price Nipper?’ came Harry’s voice from a distance. ‘You’ll never see him again.’
But the other only said, ‘You wait!’ and still sat stubbornly in his place.
With a rattle of claws on rough bark I was up the elm like a flash, and, half crazy with joy, went leaping and corkscrewing round and round, sending a couple of tree-creepers off in a terrible fright. I think they must have taken me for a cat. I played for a long time, and still Jack sat on the bench. He seemed to be deep in a book, and after a time I got quite cross at his apparent lack of interest in my proceedings. It was getting late, and the trees threw long, dark shadows across the lawn. The breeze had died down, and, except for the chirping of sparrows in the ivy and the low whistle of some starlings in the distance, all was very still. A sense of loneliness began to oppress me, and at last I came creeping down, and, reaching the lower branch, once more looked across towards my master.
‘Nipper!’ he called softly; and in a trice I was on the ground and lopping across towards him.
Suddenly, and without the slightest warning, there was a sharp ‘yap-yap,’ and a dirty white-and-tan beast rushed out of the shrubbery behind me. On the instant I was running for dear life.
I saw Jack bound to his feet and come tearing across towards me. But instead of running straight to him, I made for the nearest tree—a small ornamental evergreen. The dog—it was the gardener’s terrier—wheeled, and was after me like a shot. He was travelling nearly twice as fast as I, and his feet were drumming so close behind me that it seemed nothing could save me. Each instant I expected to feel those snapping teeth close upon me.
There was a sudden crash, and the sharp ‘yap-yap,’ changed to a terrified howl. Jack had hurled his book with all his might and with such good aim that the dog, hit full in the side, had been bowled completely over, giving me time to gain the shrub and safety.
‘Poor old Nipper!’ said Jack softly, as he picked me shivering out of the little tree and stowed me safely inside the breast of his coat. ‘We won’t run any more risks of that sort, will we, old chap?’
Indeed, the fright was so severe that I did not get over it for some time. It gave me a good lesson, and the next time my master let me out I did not venture far from him.
Soon after this I had another adventure which came very near to closing my career abruptly. One dull rainy morning I was loose as usual in Jack’s bedroom. Just as he had almost finished dressing, his brother, whose room was on the same floor, opened the door and called to my master to come and help him to find one of his mice which had got loose and disappeared. Jack ran out, carefully closing the door behind him, and leaving me to play by myself. A few minutes afterwards one of the maids, thinking no doubt that Jack had finished dressing and had gone down to his early morning lesson with his tutor, came in to turn the bed down and tidy up. She never saw me, and I paid no attention to her, for I was busy under the dressing-table with some nuts.
It was some minutes after she had gone away that I became conscious of an animal moving softly about the room, and a spasm of terror seized me, for though I could not see it owing to the hangings of the dressing-table, instinct—that sixth sense which informs us of danger—gave me warning of desperate peril.
Crouching back as near to the wall as possible, I lay there absolutely still, listening with beating heart to the almost noiseless footsteps which came gradually nearer and nearer. I could tell by the soft snuffing that the animal scented me, and terror almost paralysed me. Closer and even closer came the creature, and presently the hangings of the table rustled, and as they were pushed aside a whiskered head appeared, and two eyes that glowed luminous green in the dim light glared upon me. Stiffened in my corner I watched the cat crouch for a spring, her gleaming eyes fixed greedily upon me, while her tail waving quickly from side to side, made a soft tattoo on the carpet. Those cruel green eyes absolutely fascinated me, and for the moment I could not have moved even to save my life.
Suddenly came a loud crash. The door left open by the maid had blown to in the strong draught from the open window. The noise startled the cat almost as much as it did me, and for the moment she took her eyes off me. The spell was broken and I ran for dear life. As I passed under the hangings and out into the open I heard her heavier, larger body strike the very spot where I been crouching, and with another spring she came out from under the table and landed barely her own length behind me. One wild bound to the right and I was inside the fender; another, and my enemy’s outstretched paw actually grazed my tail as I bolted clean up the chimney, and a snarl of disappointed rage gave me the glad tidings that I was for the moment safe.
It was lucky, indeed, for me that the chimneys of the Hall were of the wide, old-fashioned brick type unprovided with dampers. Had it not been so, and had my refuge been the modern, narrow, perpendicular form of grate, it is certain that I should never have been alive now. As it was, the worn, old brickwork gave me footing of a kind, and I never stopped until I had reached the chimney-pot, which barred further progress. The soot nearly choked me, and made me cough and sneeze violently. My foothold was most precarious and I was in deadly terror that I might slip and go tumbling right back into the jaws of my enemy. Indeed, I have rarely spent a worse quarter of an hour than I did then.
Suddenly I heard the door below open. Sounds came to me almost as clearly as if I had been in the room.
‘Nipper! Nipper!’ I heard Jack call, but I was too frightened to come down.
‘Why, where on earth has he got to?’ my master continued in a surprised tone, and then I heard him moving about the room looking for me.
The cat, no doubt, had taken refuge under the dressing-table again when she heard the door open, for she knew as well as possible that she had no right in the bedrooms, her proper place being the kitchen. There was a rustle as Jack raised the hangings, and then he saw her.
For the moment there is no doubt but that he thought she had killed and eaten me, and grief and fury possessed him. I heard a smothered squawk of terror, and even in my plight rejoiced that my enemy was feeling a little of the fright she had given me. Then there was a crash. Jack had flung the beast clean out of the window into the elm opposite. I heard him go to the door again, and there was something in his voice as he shouted to his brother to come that made me shiver all over, but not with fright.
Harry came rushing into the room, and I am bound to say his voice was almost as queer as that of my master.
I was recovering slowly from my terror, and the sound of Jack’s voice was giving me confidence. Also my present refuge was horribly uncomfortable, and the black soot making me feel perfectly miserable, so I turned with the intention of making my way downwards again. You know we squirrels always descend head foremost, holding on with our hind-claws. But I had hardly begun my descent when a bit of hardened soot or plaster gave way beneath me. I made a desperate but quite useless effort to recover myself, and next thing I was sliding helplessly down the steep slope at a pace which increased with every foot I fell.
Thud! And I landed in the grate amid a perfect avalanche of soot. Jack, who was sitting on the bed looking more miserable than I had ever seen him before, sprang to his feet as if electrified, and cleared the intervening space with a bound.
‘Nipper, Nipper, is it you?’ he shouted, and regardless of his smart, clean flannel suit picked me up and positively hugged me in a transport of delight. Then he examined me all over to make sure that I was not hurt, and after that I was only too glad to be allowed to crawl into his pocket and feel that there, at any rate, I was safe.
The worst of it came after breakfast, for I was too filthy to be able to clean myself. Such a miserable, draggled little object I was, black as any sweep! My master got a basin of warm water and washed me all over—a process which I remember I strongly objected to, and resented by nipping his fingers sharply. But he was firm, and presently I was back again in my cage, which was placed before the kitchen fire, and Jack himself kept watch over me until, once more dry and clean, I was fit to return to the bowling-alley.
