He died a hero.
Several members of law enforcement disguised themselves as thugs, like ourselves, in order to attend his funeral, even though this was not at all considered a polite thing for proper gentlemen to do. We didn't care. We were just glad they didn't try to arrest any of us.
"I can't believe 'e almost done it, I can't!" one mouse exclaimed. "H'it don't rightly seem possible!"
I elbowed the other henchmen standing next to me, and they nodded, grinning the whole time. Basil wasn't fooling any of us with that fake cockney accent of his. We had to be careful though. There was no telling what information he was trying to find for his next case.
We all hated Ratigan. His gentlemanly manners had fooled some of us into believing he would be a kind, gracious boss. Others of us had been forced to work for him. However, he kept us all in fear for our very lives. Very few of Ratigan's henchmen experienced longevity, for his violent temper caused the demise of far more felons than the gallows could even hope to claim. Above all, none of us dared to oppose him in any way.
Ewart had been the exception. Although he had come into the gang only a month before his death, he wasn't one to waste time. When he arrived, he was a petty thief, yet only days before his demise, he was assisting with some of Ratigan's greatest heists.
I wish I knew how it happened. We all did. However it might have occurred, we were all shocked when the boss ordered us all to step outside.
"This ungrateful imbecile," Ratigan began, "tried to kill me!"
We were struck with both pity and envy. The worse the betrayal against the boss, the more painful the death sentence would be. However, we all envied anyone who came up with any sort of plan to dispose of the boss. We all secretly hoped that someday, if we all put our heads together, we would be free of the world's greatest criminal mind, yet we knew this was impossible, for he was rightly called a genius. Whose wit could compare to his own? How could we ever hope to be rid of him?
We all wondered how Ewart had tried to kill Ratigan. Had it been poison? A knife? A gun? Something else?
"Since he believes in killing his own boss, I think he will be killed by his own friends!" Ratigan announced. "All of you must wound him, but the injury must not be fatal!" He grinned menacingly. "I shall be the one to give him the coup de grâce!"
Before any of us could do as Ratigan had said, Ewart slit his own throat with a dagger he had been concealed. He must have thought it would be a more merciful death than whatever the boss had in mind, and he was probably right.
Ratigan sighed. "Cook the body and feed it to the kitten!"
"How merciful!" Bartholomew exclaimed, turning to us as if he didn't notice Ratigan's raised eyebrows. "Isn't the boss merciful and gracious? If I were a criminal mastermind and one of my men had committed the disgraceful, unforgivable crime of trying to murder me, I'd make a public example of him! I'd send one of my henchmen to summon the other felons of London and make a speech about the shameful deed this man had committed! I'd do all of that before I disposed of his body so everyone could see him lying dead!"
Ratigan's grin became even crueler. "What an excellent idea! You do it!"
Before he started drinking, Bartholomew was clever. He had saved all our lives on more than one occasion, for he knew how to challenge the boss to a battle of wits….and WIN...without Ratigan ever once realizing that he had been challenged. For example, he had just gotten the boss to agree to give Ewart a hero's funeral rather than just disposing of the body in our typical manner.
Word must have circulated quickly that someone had tried to kill Ratigan. On the day of the funeral, criminals and law enforcement officials alike came to wish Ewart well a final time. Just as he had suggested, Bartholomew was told to make a speech about what had happened.
"We have all gathered here," he began, "because someone had the audacity to stand up to Ratigan. Can you only imagine if any of us were to stand up to him? What would happen if we all dared to come together and stop him?"
Lewis gasped.
"Ya think the boss knows what he really means?" Fidget whispered.
"I shall never forget the disrespectful way Ewart spoke of the boss," continued Bartholomew. "He once told me, 'Our boss is nothing but a vile, lowdown rat!' Of course, I replied, 'How can you possibly think that our boss is a vile, lowdown rat? Everyone knows that a sewer rat as contemptible as the one you describe would surely be a ruthless, vicious creature rather than a proper gentleman!'"
Henry's eyes widened. We all knew perfectly well that Bartholomew meant the phrase "Our boss is a vile, lowdown rat," just as he had meant his implication that Ratigan was a ruthless sewer rat. In fact, I doubted that Ewart had ever used the first three letters of Ratigan's name that way. I was pretty sure that Bartholomew was just using that as a clever alibi, and apparently, Henry was also getting that impression.
As if oblivious to his harsh words against the boss, Bartholomew calmly continued to address the crowd. "If I were to say that our boss is a malicious sewer rat, it would be the wrong description of him."
We all knew it meant that Bartholomew thought "malicious sewer rat" was too kind of a phrase to describe our boss, but he had made it sound like it was an undeserved insult for Ratigan.
"After all, we all know he's not…" Bartholomew paused briefly. "Not a rat."
That had been clever, yet entirely too bold. To Ratigan, not to mention most of the other rodents in attendance of Ewart's funeral, it had seemed as if Bartholomew had merely paused for breath, nothing more. However, those of us who knew him well were perfectly aware of his true meaning: His repetition of the word "not" was his way of forming a double negative, albeit one that sounded even worse than usual, grammatically speaking.
In some languages, a double negative in a sentence reinforces the point. For example, "I don't have nothing in my pocket," means "My pocket is empty." However, in English grammar, if you "don't have nothing," the two negatives cancel each other, and it means you "do have something." Thus by saying that Ratigan was "not 'not a rat,'" Bartholomew had actually been saying…
You get the idea.
"We have all gathered here," Bartholomew concluded, "because this mouse slit his own throat after nearly killing Ratigan. He chose to take his own life because he could hardly bear to face the boss after such horrendous plots of murder!"
If the law enforcement officials at the funeral had understood the true meaning of his words, Ratigan might have been arrested at once; however, Bartholomew dared not explain the details, that Ratigan would have brutally murdered Ewart as vengeance, or the boss might have committed one final muricide before being taken away.
"Actions speak louder than words, and this is not a time for words about Ratigan meeting his demise."
"Surely I heard wrong!" Bill whispered. "He can't be using that as a double meaning, as if he wishes the boss would die!"
"Ewart is dead," Bartholomew stated, "but a true killer still lives among us! The most abhorrent in all Mousedom!"
He meant Ratigan. We all knew it. However, he dared not insult the boss so directly.
"It is hatred, the same hatred that burns within us all. May we all be kept safe from this hatred that has destroyed Ewart."
He had been describing his own feelings toward the boss; however, he had mentioned hatred so shortly after talking about a murderer that Ratigan assumed he was using "a true killer" as a metaphor for hatred.
After everyone had left the funeral, Ratigan cooked Ewart's body and tried to feed it to his pet monster. The kitten refused to eat the dead mouse. Ratigan quickly began losing patience, which usually meant something cruel was about to happen.
"Felicia, you must eat this mouse," Bartholomew coaxed, "or your father will have to force you to eat seafood and poultry."
The boss raised his eyebrows, momentarily forgetting his frustration due to his growing curiosity. "Why in Moriarty's name would I do that?!"
"Everyone knows what happens when you make a kitten eat such foods. I certainly wouldn't have to explain such an obvious fact to a mastermind such as yourself."
"Naturally!" Ratigan rolled his eyes.
Rough translation: He didn't have the slightest idea what happens when a kitten is given poultry and/or seafood to eat, but he wasn't about to look incompetent in comparison to one of his henchmen. Besides, Bartholomew was a great favorite, so if he made such meals sound like some sort of threat to a cat, then Ratigan believed it was so.
"What does happen when you make a kitten eat fish?" I asked Bartholomew later.
He shrugged. "The kitten enjoys the meal."
"Are you a blooming idiot?!" Bill demanded. "You know why the boss got that kitten, and it wasn't for companionship."
"I've known I was an idiot since the first day I agreed to serve that murderous sewer rat!"
Since Bartholomew and Felicia were close, as an older brother looking after his younger sister, I felt bad for Bartholomew when the cat became a mouser.
"I always knew Ratigan would get to her eventually," he had remarked. "I just wish I could have her pull me into a hug a final time, like she did when she was a kitten, or that I could do one last act of kindness for her, something to make her purr again, perhaps having the chance to feed her again."
Forgive me, but I don't feel sorry for Bartholomew's eventual fate. It's hard to pity anyone who gets exactly what he wanted. Just before Bartholomew died, the cat pulled him close, although it wasn't exactly a hug, and he definitely fed her. She was purring up a storm when Ratigan wiped her mouth.
Whenever we henchmen spoke of how we feared for our lives, Bartholomew had always said he wished to go peacefully in his sleep of old age. While it didn't exactly happen the way he had in mind, his deathbed was all he had hoped it would be. He slipped off peacefully, oblivious to his coming death. Judging from his facial expressions, he died happy, and it seemed as if he felt very little pain, if any at all. At any rate, the worst was over in mere seconds.
Bartholomew had also declared many times that he would rather die than allow himself to live as an alcoholic, and that he hoped he wouldn't live to see the day Ratigan committed the ultimate crime: high treason. He also joked that rather than saying something sentimental on his deathbed, he hoped his final words were an insult to an enemy, just to break the monotony of the pattern. He definitely got what he wanted.
I don't pity Bartholomew; I envy him!
It's better than the fate I now face. I wasn't eaten by the cat. I survived Ratigan's reign of terror. I outlived my former boss! He died a few months ago, and I was tried for the crimes I committed during my time as a henchman.
Now I stand before several residents of Mousedom. They look up at me as someone adjusts my collar. Queen Moustoria herself has come to see me, as if I were an exemplary citizen about to make a speech, having gone from a lowlife henchman to a wealthy gentleman, but this is not so.
I stand before them on the gallows.