house.
It was a very small stuffy fusty room, with boards, and rafters, andcobwebs, and lath and plaster.
Opposite to him--as far away as he could sit--was an enormous rat.
"What do you mean by tumbling into my bed all covered with smuts?" saidthe rat, chattering his teeth.
"Please sir, the chimney wants sweeping," said poor Tom Kitten.
"Anna Maria! Anna Maria!" squeaked the rat. There was a pattering noiseand an old woman rat poked her head round a rafter.
All in a minute she rushed upon Tom Kitten, and before he knew what washappening--
His coat was pulled off, and he was rolled up in a bundle, and tied withstring in very hard knots.
Anna Maria did the tying. The old rat watched her and took snuff. Whenshe had finished, they both sat staring at him with their mouths open.
"Anna Maria," said the old man rat (whose name was SamuelWhiskers),--"Anna Maria, make me a kitten dumpling roly-poly pudding formy dinner."
"It requires dough and a pat of butter, and a rolling-pin," said AnnaMaria, considering Tom Kitten with her head on one side.
"No," said Samuel Whiskers, "make it properly, Anna Maria, withbreadcrumbs."
"Nonsense! Butter and dough," replied Anna Maria.
The two rats consulted together for a few minutes and then went away.
Samuel Whiskers got through a hole in the wainscot, and went boldly downthe front staircase to the dairy to get the butter. He did not meetanybody.
He made a second journey for the rolling-pin. He pushed it in front ofhim with his paws, like a brewer's man trundling a barrel.
He could hear Ribby and Tabitha talking, but they were busy lighting thecandle to look into the chest.
They did not see him.
Anna Maria went down by way of the skirting-board and a window shutterto the kitchen to steal the dough.
She borrowed a small saucer, and scooped up the dough with her paws.
She did not observe Moppet.
While Tom Kitten was left alone under the floor of the attic, hewriggled about and tried to mew for help.
But his mouth was full of soot and cobwebs, and he was tied up in suchvery tight knots, he could not make anybody hear him.
Except a spider, which came out of a crack in the ceiling and examinedthe knots critically, from a safe distance.
It was a judge of knots because it had a habit of tying up unfortunateblue-bottles. It did not offer to assist him.
Tom Kitten wriggled and squirmed until he was quite exhausted.
Presently the rats came back and set to work to make him into adumpling. First they smeared him with butter, and then they rolled himin the dough.
"Will not the string be very indigestible, Anna Maria?" inquired SamuelWhiskers.
Anna Maria said she thought that it was of no consequence; but shewished that Tom Kitten would hold his head still, as it disarranged thepastry. She laid hold of his ears.
Tom Kitten bit and spat, and mewed and wriggled; and the rolling-pinwent roly-poly, roly; roly, poly, roly. The rats each held an end.
"His tail is sticking out! You did not fetch enough dough, Anna Maria."
"I fetched as much as I could carry," replied Anna Maria.
"I do not think"--said Samuel Whiskers, pausing to take a look at TomKitten--"I do _not_ think it will be a good pudding. It smells sooty."
Anna Maria was about to argue the point, when all at once there began tobe other sounds up above--the rasping noise of a saw; and the noise of alittle dog, scratching and yelping!
The rats dropped the rolling-pin, and listened attentively.
"We are discovered and interrupted, Anna Maria; let us collect ourproperty--and other people's,--and depart at once."
"I fear that we shall be obliged to leave this pudding."
"But I am persuaded that the knots would have proved indigestible,whatever you may urge to the contrary."
"Come away at once and help me to tie up some mutton bones in acounterpane," said Anna Maria. "I have got half a smoked ham hidden inthe chimney."
So it happened that by the time John Joiner had got the plank up--therewas nobody under the floor except the rolling-pin and Tom Kitten in avery dirty dumpling!
But there was a strong smell of rats; and John Joiner spent the rest ofthe morning sniffing and whining, and wagging his tail, and going roundand round with his head in the hole like a gimlet.
Then he nailed the plank down again and put his tools in his bag, andcame downstairs.
The cat family had quite recovered. They invited him to stay to dinner.
The dumpling had been peeled off Tom Kitten, and made separately into abag pudding, with currants in it to hide the smuts.
They had been obliged to put Tom Kitten into a hot bath to get thebutter off.
John Joiner smelt the pudding; but he regretted that he had not time tostay to dinner, because he had just finished making a wheel-barrow forMiss Potter, and she had ordered two hen-coops.
And when I was going to the post late in the afternoon--I looked up thelane from the corner, and I saw Mr. Samuel Whiskers and his wife on therun, with big bundles on a little wheel-barrow, which looked very likemine.
They were just turning in at the gate to the barn of Farmer Potatoes.
Samuel Whiskers was puffing and out of breath. Anna Maria was stillarguing in shrill tones.
She seemed to know her way, and she seemed to have a quantity ofluggage.
I am sure _I_ never gave her leave to borrow my wheel-barrow!
They went into the barn, and hauled their parcels with a bit of stringto the top of the hay mow.
After that, there were no more rats for a long time at TabithaTwitchit's.
As for Farmer Potatoes, he has been driven nearly distracted. There arerats, and rats, and rats in his barn! They eat up the chicken food, andsteal the oats and bran, and make holes in the meal bags.
And they are all descended from Mr. and Mrs. Samuel Whiskers--childrenand grand-children and great great grand-children.
There is no end to them!
Moppet and Mittens have grown up into very good rat-catchers.
They go out rat-catching in the village, and they find plenty ofemployment. They charge so much a dozen, and earn their living verycomfortably.
They hang up the rats' tails in a row on the barn door, to show how manythey have caught--dozens and dozens of them.
But Tom Kitten has always been afraid of a rat; he never durst faceanything that is bigger than--
A Mouse.
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