The Hunt Affair

By M. Willow

This story follows The Victorian House Affair.

For those who did not read the first story:  Napoleon purchased a Victorian home in the suburbs of New York.   Illya and April are his two closest friends.

Illya drove to the house like a bat out of hell.  He was tired and bone weary from his long mission.  He was feeling old.  He longed to sit on the porch, with the sunlight streaming down on his pale skin, a cold glass of lemonade in his hand.  He couldn’t wait, so he drove like a bat out of hell.

Now he approached the house, a large bag of groceries in hand.  Napoleon never kept the place stocked.  The house would be empty.  He was assured of that.  Napoleon was staying at his penthouse apartment and April was on a mission.  Alone at last, he thought, as he crossed the threshold of the house, bone weary. 

He set the bags down, turned the security off, and started his check of the house.  He wanted to make certain that he was alone.  So first the drawing room, then the living room, then the library, and finally the kitchen.  All clear.  So much for the first floor.

He went to the second floor.  First Napoleon’s bedroom, then April’s bedroom.  Then finally his bedroom.  He went into the last two rooms which were empty of furniture and people.   All clear.  Now back to the kitchen with groceries and soon to the porch with the lemonade and the sun shining down on his pale skin.  

One hour later, he did just that.  He was in such a hurry that he hadn’t bothered to put away all of the groceries.  He realized that Napoleon would be so surprised to see his normally neat freak friend living like a bum.  He had left the cheese on the table and the crackers as well.   Oh well he thought, I deserve to be a slob now and then. Besides who would know?  He was alone and would be the entire weekend.  He smiled at the thought.  He would not even have to go into town.  He had everything he needed right here.  Unlike Napoleon, he did not desire to get to know old Roy at the general store, or Mabel, the woman who baked delicious cookies at the corner bakery.  Simply put, he had no need of friend or foe.  And in the immortal words of Greta Garbo, he wanted to be alone.

After a time, his bone weary body fell asleep.  He awoke to the falling sun and the coming of mosquitoes.  He went into the house.  He had decided to tidy the kitchen and then grab a book from the library and retire for the night.  It was early yet, but what the heck, he thought, he was bone weary and ready to sleep.  But to the kitchen first.  Slob or no slob, he could not think of leaving a mess in the kitchen. 

He walked through the house.  Alone at last.  No neighbors, friends, or enemies.  This is great.  He was so happy that Napoleon had decided to keep the house after all.  It had become a place to recover.

 He entered the kitchen.  Quiet as usual.  But then he heard a sound.  At first the sound was barely perceptible, but his trained agent ears heard it above the hum of the refrigerator.   Then the kitchen was silent.  Finally he heard a squeak.   What’s that?   Then he heard it again.  That’s when he realized he was not alone.  For there, sitting on the table, among the cheese and crackers, was a very content mouse.  So content, in fact, that he hardly moved when Illya entered.  

Illya stared at the offending creature.  Didn’t the mouse know that he wanted to be alone?  Didn’t the mouse know that he was bone weary, Illya thought while viewing the sight before him?  

The mouse continued to eat.   Apparently, the creature thought he had a right to the food.  Illya scanned the area.  Did the mouse have friends?  Would more come to eat?   Finally, he made a quick move, grabbing a bag as he moved.  He sailed across the table, bag open, in hopes of catching the intruder.   He sailed and sailed, finally landing in a heap in front of the refrigerator, his bone weary body hurting all over, the mouse nowhere to be seen.   

Illya looked about.  The mouse was nowhere in sight.  He looked in the bag as if the offending creature had somehow climbed in while he lay on the floor.  No mouse.  Finally, he stood up, still searching for the mouse.  The only thing that he found was the cheese and crackers scattered all over the floor.  Well, he decided, I’ll just starve the creature out.  And he sat about cleaning the floor with meticulous care.  Finally after an hour, the entire kitchen had been cleaned, waxed and sanitized.  Not a crumb could be found for man or mouse.

He climbed the stairs, his bone weary body screaming at each step.  Quiet sleep followed.

“Squeak, squeak.”  Then silence.  “Squeak, squeak.”  Then Illya screaming and clicking on the light, his eyes darting about the room.  He looked from one end to the other.  No mouse.  Maybe I dreamed it, he thought, then turned off the light, and went back to sleep.  

“Squeak squeak”.  Then silence.  “Squeak, squeak,” then Illya screaming about that darn mouse in Russian, French and maybe a few languages that don’t exist.  Then the light coming on quickly.  No mouse in sight.  He looked everywhere in the room.  Finally deciding that the mouse was searching for food, he screamed at the mouse.  “No food for you. So move.   I’m tired and bone weary, get out and let me sleep.”   Illya at once felt foolish to be talking to a rodent in the middle of the night.   He decided to try to go back to sleep.  In the morning, he would pay a visit to Old Roy at the general store and find some way of evicting his unwanted guest.  

The sun filtering into the bedroom awakened Illya at ten o’clock.  He dressed quickly and went to the kitchen for a bagel.   He was happy to discover that all was as he left it.   He reached into the refrigerator for the juice, then into the cabinet for the delightful bagels and discovered to his horror that the mouse had already had breakfast.  A hole was on the side of the package.  Illya threw the container into the garbage and stalked out of the house.  “How dare the horrible creature,” he mumbled.  A threat worse than Thrush had invaded his life.  He was determine to seek revenge.  “The mouse must die!”  He shouted, and dashed to the car.   Once again he drove like a bat out of hell.

Old Roy sat at the counter reading a newspaper.  He was a man of about seventy, with slate gray hair and a pair of glasses perched low on his nose. Old Roy never looked up from his paper when the Russian entered.  Illya cleared his throat.  Old Roy continued to read his paper.  Finally, Illya decided that he would have to say something or else wait for Old Roy to finish reading.

“Good morning sir, if I may ask your assistance.”

Old Roy kept reading.

“Sir, may I have your assistance?”

Old Roy kept reading.

Finally Illya banged his hand on the counter and Roy looked up.  “What the heck…”  What happened?”  Old Roy said with a heavy southern accent.

“Sir, I was trying to ask for assistance.”

“Then why the heck didn’t you say something, sonny?  Banging and carrying on.  That’s the problem with young folks, don’t know how to act,” he grumbled.

Illya frowned, but decided not to argue the point.  After all, it was the mouse that was his enemy, not Old Roy.    

“Sorry, do you have anything for mice?”

“Well, I heard they like cheese… maybe crackers.  I got that over in the ice box.  Help yourself.”  Old Roy returned to reading his newspaper. 

Illya hit the counter again and Old Roy’s dark blue eyes glared at him.  “No.”  Illya said slowly.  “I don’t want to feed the mouse.  I want to kill the mouse.” 

“Violent fellow ain’t ya? “ Well we got us some stuff that gets rid of varmint.  Old it is.  Most people up here just lives with em or makes their own concoction.”   

“Ok.  Where is it?”  Illya asked.

“On the third shelf, where else?”

Illya turned and walked toward the shelf.  A scan of the shelf revealed a small box with a picture of a mouse on the front panel. The box contained some poison and a trap.  He returned to the counter. 

“How much?”

“Mmm.  Let me see,” the gray haired man said slowly.   “Don’t sell much of this stuff, mind you.”

Illya could practically see the wheels turning in Old Roy’s head.  He looked the Russian over as if he could base the price on his appearance alone. Illya felt fortunate that his partner Napoleon was not there. Old Roy would probably charge forty dollars after seeing his expensive suit.   

Finally he spoke, “Fifty cents.”

Illya handed him a dollar and didn’t wait for the change.  He had a mouse waiting for him.   

He arrived at the house and set about feeding his new roommate.   Then he prepared some lemonade and went out on the porch to let the sun warm his bone weary body.  

Three hours later Illya entered the house.  He was feeling better.  The aches and the pains of his last mission had eased and his run-in with the mouse was becoming a distant memory.   He headed for the kitchen.  Earlier he had decided to just use the trap and not the poison.   He had put cheese on the trap and placed it in a corner next to the kitchen door. He was certain the mouse would take the bait and he would finally be rid of him.  Visions of reading a book and relaxing for the rest of the weekend danced before him.

He entered the kitchen.  That’s strange, he thought,   I put the trap in the corner but it is nowhere in sight.  He looked in the opposite corner.  He scratched his head.  The entire mouse trap was gone.  Where could it be?   He heard a scraping sound, and to his amazement, he saw the mouse dragging the trap across the floor with the cheese in his mouth.    Who ever heard of such a thing?  Mice where dumb creatures, easily captured.  This mouse seemed intelligent.  He was puzzled for a minute then scampered across the floor, his feet sliding on the newly cleaned linoleum.

The creature was running, desperately searching for a way out of the kitchen, Illya on his heels.  Suddenly the Russian observed a strange sight—the floor coming up toward him at forty miles an hour.   He fell to the floor with a resounding thud.   The mouse scampered out of the kitchen and into the hall.  Illya lay stunned on the floor, once again, courtesy of the mouse.   He moved to pick himself and felt an awful pain on his left hand as the mouse trap slammed shut. 

Illya was dumbfounded.  The mouse seemed to have supernatural powers.  He was not afraid of people.  He was capable of stealth.  He was capable of moving a trap across the floor without triggering it.  Maybe, it was a Thrush plot.  Then he caught himself.  I am getting tired. That last mission must have done more to me than I thought.   Rest, that’s what I need.  That’s why I came here and that’s what I will have, mouse or no mouse.  He retired for the evening.

It was morning.  Illya awoke to the scent of coffee and bacon.  He smiled to himself.  Maybe the mouse had learned to cook.  He rolled over in bed, still clinging to the strange world of dreams where reality has not taken hold.  Suddenly, his eyes opened.  Intruder!  He grabbed his gun and headed toward the kitchen.  What kind of criminal would come into the house and fix breakfast? He headed for the kitchen.

Within minutes he stood at the kitchen door and peered cautiously inside.  He found Napoleon preparing breakfast.  On a tiny table sat a cage with the mouse in it.   The mouse moved happily on a little wheel.  Napoleon looked up.  “It’s about time you woke up.  I’ve been here for hours.  Started to think you were dead then decided to cook some breakfast.”

“Napoleon what are you doing here?” he asked with exasperation as he entered the kitchen.

“Well, I came to check on my little friend.”  He indicated the mouse.

“What do you mean, ‘little friend’?” Illya asked suspiciously.

“My trained mouse.   Actually, I’m only watching him for a little girl who lives down the street.  He used to be in a circus.  Does all sorts of tricks. You should see him!”  Napoleon smiled broadly, then continued, “He got out of his cage somehow.  You let him out, Illya?”

Illya stared at Napoleon, his temper barely under control.  “Napoleon, I’m going to kill you, and I’ve got the poison to do it!”  He walked dangerously toward his partner.

“Why, Tovarish.”  Napoleon said incredulously.  “What’s the matter? It’s just a mouse.”

Fin