The Amazing Adventures of Freddie Whitemouse Read Online Free PDF

gratefully.
    They left the kitchen with Horatio still shouting orders at the last few unfortunate mice in the foraging party.
    The tunnel back to Freddie’s home was too narrow for two mice so they had to go in single file. Freddie led the way.
    ‘Why, if it isn’t Lavinia!’ exclaimed his mother when they emerged in the den. ‘How are you, my dear? And how is your dear aunt?’
    His mother was sorting out the booty brought back by the foragers, while the little mice crouched in a ring around her waiting for their supper.
    ‘She hasn’t been very well, Mrs Whitemouse, so she sent me to get some supper. Freddie has been helping me. He saved me from Horatio.’
    ‘I’m glad to hear it. That mouse will come to no good – frightening all the young ones out of their wits. Stay and have your supper with us, and I’ll find something nice
for you to take home to your aunt and then Freddie will see you safely home.’
    So that is what happened. Lavinia led the way, and Freddie, armed with a delicious potato crisp, followed. When they reached the passage to Lavinia’s home (which turned out to be No. 16,
Skirting Board East), she turned to Freddie and said, ‘I can manage perfectly well from here. Thank you so much for everything.’
    ‘Wouldn’t you like me to take the supper into your home for you?’
    Lavinia looked suddenly frightened. ‘Oh no. You see, my aunt wouldn’t like it. She might think you were . . .’ She stopped, her nose and her ears blushing again. ‘She
doesn’t like me bringing friends home. Not like your mother at all. She is so kind to everyone, isn’t she?
    ‘But thank you,’ she called as she disappeared down the passageway.
    Kind to everyone except me
, Freddie thought dismally as he ran home.
    But when he got back, his mother seemed in a good mood. The tiny mice were huddled together asleep in the Hat, and the slightly older mice were lying in neat rows; Mrs Whitemouse had counted
them to make sure they were all there, and they were. There was just space beside the Hat for her and Freddie.
    ‘Lavinia is a very nice, well-behaved mouse.’ She was whispering. ‘And ever since her aunt had that nasty accident, she has had to look after her.’
    ‘What nasty accident?’
    ‘She was caught by that horrible cat, who kept letting her go and then catching her again. One of her legs got broken. The dog chased the cat away, and Lavinia’s poor aunt crawled
home. But she hasn’t been in her right mind since. She won’t ever go out, and she won’t see any of us – only Lavinia.’ There was a pause, and then she added
(mysteriously to Freddie), ‘You could do a lot worse.’ She gave him an affectionate nudge with her nose and fell instantly asleep.
    He spent some time wondering what she meant, but was mainly just glad that she was being friendly again.
    He never knew afterwards whether he had had a dream about it, or whether it was some flash of inspiration, but he woke up the next day quite certain that he would go to the
sorcerer and ask to be a dog. Possibly it was his mother’s story about the dog saving Lavinia’s aunt from the cat; certainly his time in the dog-food tin had something to do with it.
Dogs did not have to hunt and struggle for food. They got fed from special bowls every day. They got taken about in cars, went for walks, even had games with balls and suchlike. They got stroked a
lot, and their owners kept telling them how good and beautiful they were. Put like that, it seemed a pretty good life.
    They spent hours asleep in special beds their owners got for them. A dog’s life was the thing.
    This idea became clearer and more urgent throughout the following day (his last before meeting the sorcerer). He spent it slaving away at enlarging the Whitemouse home – which meant
chewing away at floors and skirting boards and trying to get the younger mice to cart the chewed bits outside. It was a crowded, noisy and exhausting day, at the end of which he was