A Case for Buffy Read online

  “Except no one has such good hats as ours,” said Gertrude.

  Sleep long and warm.

  Howling wind. A crash!

  Snowflakes flying,

  Roof falling…

  Buffy started to tremble. Her memories were slowly coming back. Something terrible had happened after all. A catastrophe.

  “And now for the last police case,” said Gordon. “Old Grandpa Badger says ‘Snot child!’ to a little mouse. What does the little mouse do? Think now like real police.”

  “It wasn’t a nice thing to say,” said Gertrude with feeling. “Something needs to be done.”

  “Like what?”

  “Say, ‘Stupid nasty old man!’ and tell him off,” said Gertrude.

  “Or say that you’re very sad,” said Sune. “And start to cry.”

  Sharp claws—Fox!

  Running here and there.

  Waterfall, fir trees…

  Running all day

  Over snow, over mountains.

  Everyone’s gone!

  Don’t stop running…

  But where’s my little mother?

  “Now I remember everything,” cried Buffy. “Everything came to me in the poems.”

  Gordon got up and looked over her shoulder at them.

  “Fox?” he said.

  “Fox!” wailed both small, terrified police. “Was your mother eaten up?”

  It was quiet for a moment. It had grown dark outside the police station. And it had started to rain. Drops clattered on the roof.

  “Hmm, I don’t think so,” said Buffy.

  “Hope she survived,” said Gertrude. “Hope, hope.”

  Gordon read more of Buffy’s poem. He had a lump in his throat, but he coughed.

  “Waterfall and fir tree? And far away from here? Hmm, where could that be?”

  He unfolded the big police map. He looked carefully and found at last an island with fir trees and a waterfall. Cave Island, it was called.

  “That island, Cave Island,” he said quietly, pointing. “Isn’t that where the fox moved to when I drove him away?”

  Through the dark, over the mountain

  “But it wasn’t an island!” Buffy protested. “I just ran and ran over a really big field.”

  “That’s strange,” said Gordon. “Cave Island is the only place on the map with a waterfall and fir trees. And you can see clearly that there is water between here and there. Can you have forgotten the sea, do you think?”

  “No, I remember everything now.”

  Gertrude began hopping up and down. There was something she had to say.

  “Maybe the sea had frozen and you thought it was a field?”

  “Bravo,” said Gordon. “What luck that we have our small police!”

  He nodded. “That’s probably what happened. This all took place out there on the island. The same island that the fox moved to. Not good, not good at all…”

  “What shall I do?” Buffy asked in confusion.

  “Tomorrow we’ll come up with something,” answered Gordon.

  Gertrude yawned. This was all so exciting, but she was tired too.

  “Some of us must now go to bed,” Gordon said, and he patted Gertrude on the head.

  He went up to the attic to fetch the two small beds. He made them up for Sune and Gertrude.

  As far as the washing went, Gordon had a plan.

  The small police were each given a glass of milk and an evening cake: sugar cones dipped in icing sugar. After all that sugar they were forced to wash themselves, including the tail if they were a mouse. It was simple. Afterwards they brushed their teeth, put on their pajamas and snuggled into their beds.

  “I think I will also go to bed,” said Gordon. “Tomorrow we must talk about Cave Island and what we can do.”

  They all lay in the prison with their beds in a row.

  “Good night,” said Gordon.

  “Sleep well,” said Buffy.

  “Good night and sleep well,” said Sune.

  Gertrude said nothing at all because she was already asleep.

  Then Gordon turned out the light and sighed deeply. Yes, he was tired in fact.

  He lay there, thinking through the case. A whole small mouse family, almost a year ago, had had its nest destroyed by a hungry fox. The mouse mother and all her children had run in different directions. Had any of them been caught and eaten by the fox? Buffy, at least, had run and run as far as she could. She had run the whole day.

  What had happened then? Yes, he knew. Buffy had climbed a tree and taken nuts because she’d been so terribly hungry. Then Detective Gordon had spotted her and called, “Stop, in the name of the law!”

  What a terrible way to say hello to a mouse child who had fled through storm and snow from a ghastly catastrophe. How rude of him!

  But what had happened to Buffy’s mother? And to her fifteen brothers and sisters? It was a long time ago now. Perhaps one should simply hope that everything had turned out well…

  Gordon heard that the small police were sleeping deeply as they snored quietly. He also heard Buffy turn over in bed. Of course she couldn’t sleep.

  “Shall we have an extra cake, Buffy?” Gordon whispered. “A strawberry-crusted cake. Then we might find it easier to sleep.”

  Buffy sat straight up.

  “I have to go,” she said. “I have to rescue my mother.”

  “But,” Gordon said, “it’s so long since it happened!”

  “All the more reason to hurry,” said Buffy.

  “Buffy. You can’t go out looking alone.”

  “Yes, I can,” she said. “I am in fact Chief Detective.”

  “Then I’ll come too,” said Gordon. “But it’s dark!”

  “There are searchlights.”

  “It’s raining,” said Gordon.

  “We have raincoats.”

  “But who will look after the small police?”

  Gordon turned on the light. He found that Sune and Gertrude were sitting up in their beds, listening to every word.

  “We’ll come too,” said Gertrude. “I’m not tired any more!”

  “Me neither,” said Sune. “I’ve slept enough.”

  All the police and small police hurried out of bed and dressed. Out came proper raincoats. Out came an umbrella. Out came searchlights and the police hats.

  Gertrude stood looking at the pistol, which was kept in a glass case.

  “Shall we take the pistol? Bang, bang.”

  “Never the pistol,” Buffy and Gordon said at the same time. “It will never be used.”

  “No?” Gertrude was disappointed.

  Gordon took down the cake tins from the shelf. First he tried to put the tins into the big backpack, but they didn’t fit. Then he tipped all the cakes straight into the pack, taking an almond dream cake while he was at it.

  “Please hurry,” said Buffy. “We’ve no time to lose.”

  So they hurried out, and Gordon bumped into the hedgehog on its way into the police station.

  “Ouch,” said Gordon.

  “Very important,” said the hedgehog, “I must report a hare who was running so fast that I—”

  Gordon raised his hand. “Not now,” he said. “Important police investigation!”

  “We have to find a mother!” squeaked Gertrude and Sune.

  And off they went into the dark, making a beeline through the forest. The hedgehog could see how Buffy went first with a searchlight. Light played over the path. Then came the two young ones sharing an umbrella and holding smaller searchlights. And last of all, Gordon, carrying a very large backpack, and puffing.

  Lucky they had the small police with them, Gordon thought, otherwise Buffy would be running so fast he could never keep up.

  They went through the big forest and then the path led away up a mountain.

  “That’s the right way,” puffed Gordon, still last.

  Away from the forest cover, rain poured down on them and the wind took hold of the umbrella. The little ones
were almost lifted up and blown away. Gordon clasped the umbrella to his heavy body and the young police walked beside him so as not to get so badly wet.

  “It’s hard work being police!” said Sune.

  “And one is a little frightened of all the ghosts up here on the mountain,” said Gertrude.

  “Yes, one is a little scared,” said Sune.

  Gordon called out to Buffy that they must all sing a happy police song. It should be about how one must bravely keep moving forwards all the time. Carry on, carry on, and never give up, or something of the sort. Couldn’t Buffy quickly write a song like that?

  But Buffy could only think about her mother and how urgent their mission was, so this was the best she could do:

  Tramp, tramp, tramp and tramp.

  Tramp, tramp and trampety-tramp.

  The song was easy to remember and easy to sing. Buffy sang it first and the small police followed in their squeaky voices. Gordon hummed like a big bumble bee. It sounded very beautiful and comforting up there on the mountain.

  When all four had sung the song about fifteen times, they felt a little braver and a little more energetic. And then suddenly they weren’t going uphill any more.

  “We’re on top of the mountain!” said Buffy. “Now it’s downhill all the way to the sea.”

  The wind grabbed hold of the umbrella and tumbled it down the mountain.

  “We’ll get a bit wet,” said Gordon. “But we’ll be even wetter quite soon.”

  So they sang the song one more time, only faster now they were going down the hill.

  Tramp, tramp, tramp and tramp.

  Tramp, tramp and trampety-tramp.

  Tramp, tramp, tramp and tramp.

  Tramp, tramp and trampety-tramp.

  Tramp, tramp and trampety-tramp.

  And after that, another fifteen times. By then they were down the mountain, and in front of them was the sea. The sun came up after their long night of trudging. It stopped raining, but they were already soaked through. Away in the distance was an island. They could make out fir trees, a little mountain, and possibly a waterfall.

  Cave Island.

  A snuggly blanket

  They had a glimpse of Cave Island. But sea lay before it. The wind howled and the waves foamed.

  “How shall we get across?” Gordon asked.

  “We must get there,” said Buffy.

  “I can swim,” said Sune. “As a toad I float very well.”

  “I am also a toad,” said Gordon.

  “I can take a little mouse on my head,” said Sune.

  “Me too,” said Gordon.

  So the two toads went into the water, Sune with a splash and Gordon very slowly and hesitantly. He was a real coward when it came to swimming. With great reluctance he got wet to his belly.

  “Brrr. What did I say?” muttered Gordon. “We got wetter.”

  When he was in at last, the two mice stepped up onto the toads’ heads. Buffy on Gordon and Gertrude on Sune.

  The toads splashed away from the beach. They bounced in the wild sea and swam with determined strokes towards Cave Island.

  By the time the mice finally stepped onto land they felt very seasick.

  “That was—burp—horrible sailing on a toad—ulk— over the sea!” said Gertrude.

  The toads also clambered ashore. They weren’t seasick because they were used to water and waves.

  They were all freezing, but Gertrude had a dry hand towel in her backpack and when they had dried themselves off and hopped around a little they warmed up.

  There was a knobbly tree beside them on the beach with low-hanging branches. Buffy stared at it.

  “I recognize that!” she burst out. “It was here! At first I thought of climbing it to escape from the fox…”

  Gertrude took her hand. “Poor thing,” she said. “But how could you forget all that?”

  Buffy shrugged. “It was so terrible,” she said. “It was a shock when it happened. All of it. Maybe we want to forget the things that are most terrible. And then I met Gordon and I had work and a bed. And a name. And everything was so good… But how could I forget my mother?”

  Gertrude patted Buffy’s hand. “We’ll find her!”

  They made their way together to the middle of the island. Carefully, because the fox could appear at any moment.

  Buffy and Gertrude constantly sniffed the air. They had an excellent sense of smell compared to the two toads. But no, not even their noses could detect any traces of another animal.

  “No fox,” said Gertrude.

  “No mice,” said Buffy quietly. “It only smells of fir trees and ocean.”

  The island was completely quiet. No crows or gulls could be heard. No little birds either. If there were any animals they were hiding themselves well. There was no sound until they neared the middle of the island, when they heard the whoosh of a waterfall.

  It had rained all night so there was plenty of water. It fell over a step and foamed and sizzled into eddies below.

  “Was it here?” asked Gordon.

  “What?”

  “Was it here?” Gordon shouted louder over the noise.

  Buffy nodded, then headed down a slope towards a big fir tree. The others followed as Buffy slipped beneath its tight and prickly branches. And then she stopped. She stood absolutely still within the hum of the tree.

  “It was here! Our little nest was here beneath the fir.”

  She began to tremble. Gertrude took her hand again.

  Gordon went past them and looked down into an open hole at the roots of the tree.

  He stepped back and took a deep breath. “There’s only broken furniture left,” he said.

  He climbed awkwardly down into the hole. A broken bed. An empty jar. A torn-apart cushion with down still blowing around.

  Hmm, he thought. No dead at least. No bones, skeletons or other terrible remains.

  Buffy looked in.

  “There!” she cried. “That’s my bed! And there’s…”

  She scuttled down and scraped at one corner where there was a rag. Wet from the rain and dirty with earth. She pulled it into her arms and sniffed it. Great tears fell from her eyes.

  “…my snuggly blanket. It has my smell! This is my old blanket.”

  No tracks, no clues—but a thought

  Buffy held the blanket to her nose and closed her eyes as she rubbed it over her whiskers.

  This had once been her home.

  The roof was broken so you could see straight into the abandoned bedroom.

  It used to be so beautiful. Oh, now Buffy remembered everything. Everything she’d forgotten in shock came back to her.

  There was a small, well-hidden hole at the base of the fir tree. That was where you used to creep inside. Straight in, and a little to the left, was the toilet. A bit further on and to the right was the pantry, filled with nuts and nice small cones. In between was the big living room where Mama and all the young ones lived. All the beds were there in a row.

  It was so lovely. Two children to each bed. They slept top to tail, and before they settled down for the night they lay awhile teasing each other and playing. In the mornings they tugged at the covers, trying to get as much of them as they could. My cheeky sister, Buffy thought, and a tear ran down her cheek. Sister or brother—you had to wonder, since mouse children actually don’t have names.

  In the morning they all sat on the edge of the bed and Mama gave them each a nut. While the children ate, she sang one of the songs well known to mice. “Through Wild Snow, a Mouse on the Run” or “In a Corner of Our Home Are Seven Kinds of Cake.”

  Sometimes they went for a short walk after breakfast. That was before the fox appeared on the island.

  Once they met their father and they said hello nicely. But he was very busy and about to go away. Yes, that’s how it was in the world of mice.

  Then home they went. If Mama was still out gathering nuts, the children would bounce on the beds. High and higher. When Mama came home she was
a little bit stern.

  “I’ve told you before, you could hurt yourselves jumping on the beds. Let’s dance instead!”

  And so they sang the song “We Take Each Other by the Tail and Do the Circle Dance.”

  Sometimes Mama told them stories, like the one about the angry cat who was tricked by a tiny little mouse. The children hopped up and down in excitement. They longed for the end, when the cat fell in the water and the little mouse ran home with the cheese. They all laughed and clapped their hands.

  What a wonderful childhood Buffy had had. And how much she loved her mother.

  She started to cry when she realized everything the fox had destroyed.

  Gordon also felt very moved.

  “Imagine if the fox had got you! Then we would never have met. You would never have become such a clever police detective.”

  He cleared his throat and made a sort of speech.

  “When a child dies, it is not just a cute, loveable little one who goes. In that instant, a potential police detective also disappears. It is not only the child who disappears, but also what that child might have become. It is doubly tragic and sad when a young one dies.”

  He was inspired and began again:

  “In every child there is a whole world. The child must go on living. Otherwise there goes with it a world-famous singer, a sniffer, a talented stamper—and a dear friend and cake-eater also. And all the little one’s children and grandchildren disappear as well. Thousands of mice that will never live! A tragedy!”

  Sune gave Gordon a slight poke in the bottom. “But she isn’t dead,” he said.

  Gordon cleared his throat again.

  “No,” he said at last. “I was feeling angry about the terrible damage a fox can do. If we’d had our stamp here we would have certainly done some stamping!”

  Then he remembered that he himself, Gordon, had caused everything. He was the one who’d driven the fox out of his own police district. Hmm, very important: If you simply drive your danger away, it becomes someone else’s danger.

  Gordon went over to Buffy and hugged her and said in a choking voice: “I am so sorry your mother is gone. What sorrow…”