The curtain of water fell over Buffy and Gertrude. It almost pushed them to the ground. But they went right through it and found themselves in a large, dark cave.
“Hello!” Buffy cried, and the echo answered, “Ello, ello, ello!”
When her eyes had adjusted, she saw that the cave was full of beds, pillows and blankets.
A little mouse came up to her.
“But it’s you!” Buffy cried.
Yes, it was the sister she’d shared a bed with.
“I knew you were alive,” said her sister. “I was waiting for you.”
“My little sister,” said Buffy, crying and hugging her.
Gertrude saw that they were exactly alike, with the same expressions on their faces, the same voices and the same clothes.
“My mother! All my brothers and sisters!”
Yes, there was her mother in the dark cave. And there were her fifteen children. Half of them were big brothers and sisters to Buffy, but the younger ones had caught up, so now they were all the same size.
Buffy was still wearing her police hat. She rushed up to her mother and sniffed her.
“Oh, my mother’s own beautiful smell,” she said with a sigh.
“You’re alive!” said her mother joyfully. “Where have you been?”
“And what about you? Have you been here in the cave all along?” asked Buffy.
They hugged. Then they licked each other. Buffy was wet in the face and happy.
Now Gordon and Sune also entered the cave. They each held their breath as they ran through the waterfall.
“Terrible,” said Gordon, snorting. “You small police are very clever!”
“The cave was very close by indeed,” said Sune. “Just as I thought.”
They could see Buffy and her mother licking each other’s faces. Buffy’s police hat had fallen to the ground.
“Hmm, mice will be mice,” Gordon whispered to Sune. “We toads would never lick each other.”
Buffy rushed on and squeezed and licked all her siblings.
Gordon was very touched, but nevertheless tried to behave like a chief detective. He walked up to Buffy’s mother and took her solemnly by the hand.
“Pleased to meet you. My name is Chief Detective Gordon. I am a police colleague of Buffy’s.”
“Buffy? Who?” said her mother.
Of course, this mother didn’t know that Gordon had given her child the name of Buffy.
“Buffy, your lost child,” said Gordon. “She is certainly not a child any longer. She is the Chief of Police in the woods. A very important police detective.”
The mother began to cry with joy. “I’m so happy and proud. But how did you find us?”
“Normal police work,” said Gordon.
“We thought and then we wrote police poems,” said Sune standing next to him.
He had picked up Buffy’s hat and put it on his own head on top of his little police hat. So that no one would stand on it, he said.
It took some time for the four police to greet Buffy’s mother and all of Buffy’s brothers and sisters. But after sixty-eight handshakes, hugs or lickings, this was done, and they could all sit down on the beds holding each other’s hands and talking over the top of each other.
“Buffy,” said Gordon, “perhaps we could serve some little cakes. Buffy!”
No one was listening to him and he suddenly realized that here in the cave were a sea of Buffys! All the mice children looked exactly the same with matching clothes.
He tapped one of them on the shoulder. “Buffy?”
The little mouse nodded in surprise.
“Are you Buffy?
“Who’s Buffy?” said the mouse in exactly the same voice as Buffy’s.
Well, who was Buffy? He went on to the next.
“Buffy?”
“Yes!” said the little mouse. “Yes, I’d also like to be called Buffy.”
“Me too!” said the mouse sitting beside her.
“And me?” said a third. “Buffy is a beautiful name.”
“Hmm,” said Gordon. “It is probably not a good idea to all have the same name...”
How would he find his best friend among all these twins, a cave full of twins!
“Shouldn’t we eat cakes?” said Sune. “We can of course salute all the mice and then offer them cakes.”
Yes! If Gordon called out that all police officers should salute, they would discover the correct Buffy.
“All police, salute!” called Gordon, and the cave echoed, “alute, alute, alute!”
Four police officers stood up. And there was Buffy!
“Quick, put the hat on her,” Gordon whispered to Sune.
Then he gave a little speech.
“Dear mice, at our police station in the forest, we usually eat very delicious cakes. With us now we have almond dreams with a sprinkle of chocolate. We have strawberry whirls—with cream inside and half a strawberry on top. We also have sugar tops, made with wonderful deep-fried dough dipped in powdered sugar.”
“Warning, warning!” said Sune. “You have to wash yourself afterwards!”
“By the way, I have a lot of lovely hats for everyone in my backpack,” said Gertrude.
She shared out blue paper hats. They had writing on their gold stars. What did it say? Police perhaps.
When this was done, Gordon cleared his throat.
“Finally, everyone gets to choose the cake they would like!”
He opened the backpack and looked inside. There at the bottom was a shapeless blob. A cake blob. Water had got into the pack and everything had mixed together into a dough.
He sighed, but suddenly had a solution.
“I have a better idea,” he said. “Everyone gets a lump of cake, with a little mix of everything.”
He dug into his backpack and shaped lumps, as big as snowballs, one each for everyone.
“Strawberry almond with chocolate sugar cream,” he said.
Everyone was very pleased and satisfied.
