The animals ran and bounced across the playground as fast as they could, fearing that the janitor and Miss Short might come chasing after them. It was only when they were outside the school gates that they dared to look around—but the playground was empty, and there was no one coming.
“We’ve made it!” Tumtum cried. And then all the gerbils started clapping and whooping—for it isn’t every day that a gerbil escapes.
The ballerinas whooped, too—but it was the General who seemed the most excited of all.
“We’re free!” he shouted, punching the air in triumph. “The enemy has been fooled! Oh, what a brilliant campaign! When the Royal Mouse Army hears about this, I shall receive another medal!”
“I say three cheers for Miss Tiptoe and her dancers,” Tumtum said chivalrously. But the General appeared not to hear.
Seeing as the mood was so festive, Nutmeg decided to invite everyone back to Nutmouse Hall. “We shall have a celebratory feast,” she announced eagerly. And they all thought this was a very good idea—especially the gerbils, for now that they had left the cage, they had no home to go to.
So Tumtum led the party back toward Rose Cottage. It was a slow journey, for everyone was rushing around in different directions, and Miss Tiptoe kept stopping to make sure that none of her dancers had been left behind.
By the time they crawled in under the garden door, it was nearly mid-afternoon.
There was no one around, so Tumtum led the party straight across the kitchen floor and under the dresser. Then he held open the gates while they all trooped into the broom cupboard.
When they set eyes on Nutmouse Hall the gerbils suddenly fell quiet. It was like a fairy-tale house, grander than anything they had ever seen, and the sight of so many turrets and windows overwhelmed them.
When Tumtum showed them inside they were even more astonished. For the gerbils had lived all their lives in one room— and the cage hadn’t been much of a room at that. But the Nutmouses had dozens of rooms, all stuffed with treasures. Wherever one looked, there were chandeliers, tapestries, pretty vases, silver candlesticks, and gilt mirrors. There was even a grand piano.
It was all so splendid that the gerbils, who were still naked, felt a little out of place.
But Nutmeg had an idea as to how to make them more at home. “I’m afraid the house is rather chilly,” she said tactfully, blowing on her paws. “I think I should find you all something to wear.”
“Something to wear?” they asked nervously. The gerbils had never worn anything except the fur coats they had been born in. The idea of clothes struck them as very strange.
But Nutmeg gave them no chance to protest and promptly shooed them all upstairs for a fitting.
She showed the lady gerbils into her bedroom and supplied them with pretty frocks and smart cashmere shawls. Then she took the male gerbils into Tumtum’s dressing room and found them each a fine tweed suit.
Once they were dressed in the Nutmouses’ expensive country clothes, the gerbils began to feel more sure of themselves.
“Hooray! You look much more civilized,” the General said approvingly as they strutted back into the living room. He barely recognized them from the scruffy little creatures he had shared a cage with.
And the gerbils barely recognized the General, for he had not only got dressed, but had brushed his tail, blackened his eyebrows, and oiled his whiskers. When he was staying in a smart house he always liked to look his best.
The gerbils and the General had a delightful time admiring each other in the living room. And meanwhile Nutmeg set about rustling up a celebratory feast from the odds and ends in her pantry.
She made a salmon mousse, a saffron risotto, a fish pie, a hash, a cockroach roulade, a trifle, a chocolate mousse, and a sponge pudding with a jug of hot molasses sauce to pour on top.
By the time she’d finished it was getting dark, so she served the meal by candlelight in the banqueting room. And she laid the table with all her best silver and crockery and damask table napkins.
This was a little confusing for the gerbils, who until now had always eaten from a trough. But the ballerinas showed them what to do, and explained how knives were for cutting with, and forks for spearing with, and spoons for spooning with— and the gerbils picked it up so quickly that before long one could hardly tell them from the mice.
Many courses later, as Nutmeg was serving coffee and mints, Tumtum tapped his glass with a fork, signaling for quiet. Then he stood up heavily and made an announcement.
“Until you find somewhere to live, you must all stay here with us,” he said to the gerbils, who were seated in a long line down one side of the table. “We’ve plenty to eat and drink, and we’ve sixteen spare bedrooms, nine spare bathrooms, a ballroom, a library, and a schoolroom!”
The gerbils raised their glasses and cheered. They were getting so used to all this fine living that their days in captivity already seemed a distant memory.
By now everyone was in such high spirits that no one wanted the party to stop. So after dinner the gerbils and the ballerinas danced together in the ballroom, and it was long after midnight when Miss Tiptoe finally took her charges back to school.
Once the General and the gerbils had gone to bed, Tumtum and Nutmeg made themselves a thermos of cocoa and went to sit in the library. They were unused to entertaining on this scale, and they were both worn out.
“Do you suppose the gerbils will ever move out?” Nutmeg asked, collapsing onto the sofa. She had become very fond of them, but there was a part of her that longed for some peace and quiet again.
“I’m sure we can help them find a proper home of their own,” Tumtum replied reassuringly. “Rose Cottage is much too small and crowded—there’s not an inch of space left to build in. But there are plenty of nooks and crannies at the Manor House that they could move into. I remember the General telling me about an airing cupboard that the present owners never use. He and Mrs. Marchmouse had been going to make their home in it, but they decided it was too big so they took over the gun cupboard instead. It might be just right for the gerbils.”
“Oh, Tumtum, what a wonderful idea!” Nutmeg said happily. “I’ll go up to the attic tonight and write the children a letter telling them that all the escaped pets are moving into a new home just down the lane.”
Once this problem was solved, the Nutmouses sat silently for a while, watching the fire flicker. They both felt very relieved that all the dramas had come to an end.
“We’re such humdrum mice, Tumtum,” Nutmeg said eventually. “It does seem unfair that we should have been dragged into another adventure quite so soon. I hope we don’t have any more.”
“Of course we won’t, dear,” Tumtum replied confidently. “Life will be a lot quieter once the General’s safely back in his gun cupboard.”
And Nutmeg hoped very much that Tumtum was right.