Mouse Trap 1/17/188x

Cyan and Tepic reached Ms Book’s house, with Ms Beatrixe Rouse close behind, after an interesting experience at the asylum, where Beatrixe had mentioned that they had better go say goodbye to Mr. Arnold. They knocked on the door and Mrs. Pritchard answered letting them in, but she stopped Ms. Rouse at the door.

“Huh, what do you mean I’m not allowed in?”  She argued with Miss Pritcard for several minutes while Tepic walked into the study where Arnold lay on the sofa; announcing themselves.  When he noticed that Bea wasn’t with them anymore he wondered aloud why she wasn’t being let in.  

“I think because She thinks the raven will get Arnold,” Cyan ventured.

“Well, just because she thinks that it’s gonna be true…..” Tepic began, but didn’t finish the thought.  Seemed clear to him that shouldn’t matter.  “An of all them as got a room at the Asylum, she’s probably the nicest…builds some real fun places too!  Though we still don’t know bout Tenderpaws.  Could be nice, if he wakes up….”

Cyan nodded, “Oh yeah she is the nicest.  No real harm to herself or others, but she is a bit out of it.”

“But but but….he’s coming tonight.” Beatrixe tried as Miss Pritchard led her down the street, “With the claws and the teeth and the…”

Tepic and Cyan heard what Beatrixe had said, and after a momentary pause where they looked at one another they went running for the door.  They slammed it behind them, passed Miss Pritchard, and caught up with Beatrixe who had started to head back to the asylum.  “Who is coming, Miss Bea?”

“The raven’s friend,” Beatrixe replied.

“Bird friends?” Tepic asked intently, “Cus ravens don’t have teeth…..”

“Oh no.” Beatrixe said. “Wolfy friend.”

Tepic leaned in closely,  “Wolfy friends…. like Tenderpaws?”

“Are you saying there’s a full moon tonight?”  Cyan asked, horrified.

“What’s a moon got to do with a wolfy?”  Beatrixe wondered, looking into the clouded sky above the city.  “Do they like cheese too?”

“Errrr…. it ain’t Tenderpaws as is coming, is it?”

“Tenderpaws?” Beatrixe shook her head. “No no…the man that worked for the beard man.”

Tepic didn’t like that news, and neither did Cyan, “Was he attacked by one of the wolfys?”

“Was he one of the ones as was bit by Tenderpaws when Mr Arnold had to go bring him back to the Asylum?”

Beatrixe looked like she was about to answer, and then stopped as her eyes widened in horror and then ran off shouting that Tepic and Cyan were totem poles.

After she was gone Cyan sighed, “I told you she wasn’t all there.”

“No…”  Tepic agreed.  “An that’s why maybe she knows stuff as is going ter happen….”

“Like Miss December,” Cyan said.  

“But…. yer know them fellas as was done in the other week, all clawed an stuff?”  Tepic whispered confidentially, remembering the first poor lad he had found.  “Recon that were a werewolf, an not Tenderpaws neither!”

Cyan agreed that was possible, and was about to say so when Tepic looked up, “Bother! Look up on the roof, through the glass bit, it’s that raven!”  The cub looked up and saw it through the upper roof which was made entirely of glass.  “Recon we should get inside, can’t throw stones with all that glass….”

Tepic and Cyan ran for the door, knocking and Miss Pritchard let them in.  They pushed inside just as the ravens darted for the open door which all three of them slammed shut.

—-

Miss Pritchard had given them their privacy once again, while she kept an eye on the birds on the glass ceiling.  Cyan asked grimly, “Why does he want arnold so badly?”

“Dunno, what ‘e told Miss Book don’t make sense, cus if he’s after them as is damed, ‘e ai’t got dibs on Mr Arnold, no way…..an takin Hoyt were wrong too……recon birdy might have got Cortman right.”

“Well, I suppose since Arnold constantly thinks he’s doomed… maybe that’s why the raven is after him…though I think he’s not very picky, just wants their souls.”  

“Ah, but Mr Arnold just thinks he’s gonna get knocked off, in that sense, not doomed as in ‘e goin ter the firery place dammed….an there is rules, yer know, can’t go gainst the rules, not even birdy…”

“Wouldn’t think he’s go to the firey place anyway… he is a hero after all.”  Cyan said with a wink to Tepic. “He doesn’t really play by the rules.”

Tepic and Cyan noticed that his eyes had finally opened and went to look, greeting first Arnold, and then Id when it denied that Arnold was awake.  “Look, yer do know yer the same person, deep down, don’t yer?”  It blinked once.  “Good, least that’s sorted….

“Now, Miss Bea were wantin ter see yer, cus she thinks there is a wolf bloke coming….”  Tepic stopped as he tried to think of a way to finish that.

Cyan interjected, “Is there another reason the Raven wants you besides just because you’re ‘doomed’.”  Tepic jumped in on that train of thought quickly, “And does the Mr. Arnold bit of yer think he is dammed?” Arnold blinked twice at Tepic, and then at Cyan four times.

They spent several minutes trying to find out what four blinks could possibly mean, establishing that there were rules the raven was following and that it had not broken them yet, and that the rules might be written down somewhere, before Tepic finally said, “There has ter be an easier way ter do this…..”

Id blinked once.  Cyan and Tepic just stared for a few moments and then the cheetah turned to his friend, “… I wish we would have asked that earlier.”

Tepic nodded in agreement, and then had an idea.  “Have yer seen them things as they use at the circus, in the Fortune Telling Booth?  The one with the pointer, as they use ter chat with dead people?”  Cyan nodded.  “But there is another one they use fer the same, a tray of wood, with all the letters on it and numbered.  Id can blink fer which letter it needs!”

The two got excited and Tepic began to run for the door, but then stopped and came back to see his friend once more, “Lets make certain of this…… Mr Arnold is NOT dammed?”  It blinked once.  “Good, knew he wern’t!”  With that the fox dashed off and returned about an hour later with what they needed.

The columns and rows were arranged in fives, with six blinks alone meaning Z.  Studying it the cat sent out one message, “Danger.”