Chapter Three
A few hours later, and many states away, a telephone began to ring. It was a small telephone, and one that everyone prayed would stay silent. It had cooperated thus far, forgotten and gathering dust in a closet in a room that had been boarded off and abandoned. The only reason it was still able to ring was that animals are not as particular about phone bills as humans are.
Half out of fear of its being a real emergency, and half out of fear that a human upstairs would hear and tear up the floorboards, two mice were alternately (and frantically, to be sure) attacking the newly-plastered wall with their bare paws, desk chairs, and a coat rack. They were making a racket themselves, and a janitor mouse thrust his head angrily into the office.
"Hoy thar!" bellowed the scruffy, dusty mouse, bits of dried plaster still stuck in his fur. "Lay offit, I just got doon with et--beggin' yer pardon, Sir, Ma'am, but cut thet oot!"
Chairlady Bianca, normally sweet and polite, whirled about and pinned him with a glare as steely as any mousetrap. "Dead mice don't wear plaid, even if they are Scottish! If we don't get to that phone, the U.N. might call in exterminators!" With a squeak of disgust, the Janitor nodded glumly and let the Chairmice get back to destroying his morning's work. Bianca's companion laughed under his breath.
"What is it, darling?" the Chairlady asked, ripping out a chunk of the wall and casually sending it sailing into a wastebasket across the room.
"Three points! Well," chuckled Chairman Bernard, "not too long ago, I'd be the one fixing this wall again. Plus, you did say you were tired of pushing papers all day."
Bianca rolled her eyes. "I suppose that's why they call us Chairmice--we don't do anything but sit and sit--"
The mice heaved at the shifting section of wall and it fell open like a drawbridge. They landed in a heap together, rebounded, and fell all over each other again in their scramble for the phone.
They managed to pry the closet open after chipping through two decades' worth of paint along one side. Bianca grabbed the grimy, age-cracked receiver and held her breath as heavy footsteps sounded above in the United Nations offices. "Hello?" began a tinny voice through the telephone.
"Shh!" hissed Bianca. "Just a second."
A creak of floorboards and a knock sounded from above. "Must have been my imagination. Ever since that Pink Floyd concert, my ears won't quit ringing…" The human voice faded away as its owner walked off. The mice slumped gratefully in the bare, dusty room.
Bernard wrinkled his nose. "At least he's a Floyd fan. He'll probably go smoke something illegal and forget about us."
Bianca put the receiver to her ear again. "Rescue Aid Society here, though we were just about to need some rescuing ourselves--"
"Is that you, Bea?" came the tired voice on the other end.
"Gadget? Oh, heavens--it's been so long. Why are you calling on the disaster line? We didn't even know it was still in service!" A sound that was almost a laugh bubbled through the earpiece. "Are--are you all right, dear?" stammered Bianca, as Bernard pressed in close, cocking an ear to catch the conversation.
"Would I be calling the disaster line just to say hi?" groaned Gadget. "We need a doctor--medicine's just one of my hobbies and I don't think guesswork's gonna cut it this time."
"How awful! Who's hurt?" There was a rattle on the other end of the line, then silence. Bianca and Bernard regarded the handset with shock. "Gadget? Come on, say something!"
Artwork by Keith Elder
"Sorry, Bea," Gadget came in, rustling and faint. "Dropped it. Paws are thrashed. I've got a squirrel here with a broken leg and a good bump on his head. Some of it is my fault. I'm pretty banged up myself."
Bianca shook her head in wonder. There had been trouble with Rescues before, but seldom bad enough for a Ranger unit to report in. They were set up to handle their own problems, more or less--
Bernard grabbed the phone. "C'mon, Hackwrench, if it hurts to hold the phone, then let me talk at Chip or Monty." Bianca narrowed her eyes at Bernard but he cut her protests off with a raised finger.
Gadget's voice was nearly a whisper. "Wow. History lesson—Bernie, right?? Hey, you still the janitor? I've got a real mess here for you to clean up."
Gadget looked around, hollow-eyed, at the wrecked hideout. The huge security monitor screen was smashed and trailing wire. Shredded clothes were strewn across the floor (mostly her own, and the wreckers' choice of items was none too comforting). Half-eaten food was rotting in the corners. Burned-out pieces of furniture sagged with their skeleton springs showing through…and worst of all were the misspelled, rambling threats scrawled on the walls in blood-red letters. Beyond all her shock and sorrow, Gadget was truly grateful she hadn't been home when it happened--God, she might have been--
"Gadget?" crackled Bernard through the makeshift receiver Gadget had pieced together, thankfully startling her off that line of thought. "Where are you?"
Sprawled out on the floor of the empty office, Bernard and Bianca listened, more and more horrified, as that odd half-laughter came through again. It worked itself hoarse and broke into sobs. Gadget gave it a professional effort: "Rescue Ranger Outpost One, complete loss of equipment and personnel, get me a goddamned doctor."
Artwork by Keith Elder
Devin Packard didn't quite fit the bill. Damnation, especially by God, is something you have to work really hard at, and his circumstances could best be described as a run of bad luck. He was living out of a very large suitcase--as a packrat, the only thing he'd ever managed to keep organized. A cockroach had thrown him out of his apartment a week ago for back rent. The cockroach was one of those big hissing ones from someplace way down south, and until a week ago had been Devin's landlord. It would have been an easy matter for Devin to take the bug's head off with a single bite, but he hadn't, for three reasons. First, cockroaches have relatives everywhere. Second, he wasn't that desperate for a free meal yet. The last reason, which really counts for two, was that a cockroach can live for several weeks without its head, and no doctor on earth would put any living creature (with the possible exception of Rush Limbaugh) through that sort of crash diet.
Yes sir, Devin was a homeless packrat with an expensive education and no intentions of living with his parents again. Life with two professional thieves is never easy, after all. And med school--if a spleen went missing and reappeared in the cafeteria, or if someone switched Cantonese take-out menus for a professor's lesson plans, who did they immediately blame? Devin. Sure, right, blame the packrat.
The only switch Devin had ever pulled at school was turning his life around. Top of his class, charity work at the free clinic, gave blood without asking for any back…and still, everywhere he went, the questions were the same. "Weren't your parents the Perilous Packards? Cheese thieves extraordinaire? Hey, they putting you through college on that Gouda they grabbed?"
Devin could have had his pick of internships. The secret Animal Section at the Mayo Clinic, the noted Flight of Angels wing at Mount Sinai, or even the Thorn Valley Institute…they'd all fought, well, tooth and claw to snag him. But Devin knew that at any of those places, no matter how much he accomplished, his parents' infamy would follow him like the smell of Limburger left out in the sun too long. He wanted to go somewhere no one gave him a second look--somewhere he could blend in--and most of all, somewhere he was needed. The Big Three had all the whiz kids they needed--Africa, or maybe South America, that was the ticket. Some little backwoods place that would keep him very, very busy and leave him no time to get a swelled head.
When you're a restless, young, would-be hero of the furry variety, there's only one game in town. Devin decided that a week living on the streets of New York was enough primitive living practice, shook the change he'd panhandled out of his shoe and into his pocket, and knocked on the small but hallowed doors of the Rescue Aid Society. Off to see the world!
Button images by Keith Elder