Runaway Ralph - Beverly Cleary [25]
Suddenly Ralph had an inspiration. He was about to take a terrible chance, but with no one to protect him from a sneaky cat, he had nothing to lose. Anything was better than cringing in a corner waiting for that beast to wash and comb every hair on his body.
Ralph took charge. He left his corner, sprang on his wheel, and raced so fast he looped the loop. That activity caught Catso’s attention all right! The cat sat there with his hind leg in the air looking surprised.
Ralph leaped from his wheel and faced Catso through his bars. The cat forgot about his grooming and, jumping to his feet, placed his front paws on the shelf and stared into Ralph’s cage. Hiding his terror, Ralph stared back.
“If there’s one thing I can’t stand, it’s a disrespectful mouse,” said Catso, and with a swipe of his paw sent the cage flying.
Ralph was prepared. He hung onto the bars and braced himself. Water splashed and seeds flew. One corner of the cage struck the worktable, jarring the bottom loose, exactly as Ralph had planned. The cage bounced and landed on its side. Ralph sprang out through what had once been the bottom. This accident was his chance!
Catso pounced, but before his paws could land on Ralph he was thrown off his aim by a sudden hissing sound from above. Startled, he missed Ralph’s tail by the width of a whisker. Ralph was startled too, but the unexpected noise did not prevent him from scrambling behind a jar of nails on the worktable.
When Ralph got up the courage to peek around the jar of nails, he saw Catso staring up at Chum’s cage. He heard the hissing sound again and knew that it must be coming from Chum. Good old Chum! Ralph hadn’t known that a hamster knew how to hiss.
When Catso recovered from his surprise he was after Ralph, who dashed from behind the nails as the jar was sent rolling across the table. Crash! It landed on the floor and broke, scattering nails across the craft shop. Ralph leaped behind the supplies of beans and peas and hamster food with Catso after him. Jars crashed, bags tumbled and split as they fell. Crash! Bang! Smash! Noise and flying glass did not stop Catso. Ralph leaped behind the big spools of lanyard plastic. Catso knocked over the spools and the plastic unreeled, tangling about his feet.
While Catso freed himself from the plastic, Ralph found behind the worktable a slanting piece of wood that was a brace between the studs of the rough walls of the craft shop. Ralph ran down the brace as Catso tried to squeeze his head between the edge of the worktable and the wall. He could get his head in the space but not the rest of his body. He pulled back his head and tried to reach Ralph with his paw. Ralph, however, was too far down the brace.
Next Catso leaped to the floor and ran under the table. Ralph scurried up the brace so that he was above the table and beyond Catso’s reaching paw. Back to the tabletop went Catso and down the brace ran Ralph, once again beyond the stretch of those curved and groping claws.
Frantic with frustration, the cat sprang from the table while Ralph ran up the brace. Once more Catso reached and stretched and groped. Ralph’s courage and confidence had returned. He advanced within half an inch of Catso’s longest reach. Catso tried, but could stretch his foreleg no farther.
Ralph sat down, and said, “This could go on all day. You might as well give up. You know I’m too smart for you.”
Catso, after one more effort to stretch farther, withdrew his paw, came out from under the table, and picked his way daintily and disdainfully through the jumble of seeds, nails, and plastic cord as if the mess was beneath his notice. He held his tail proudly erect, but he did not fool Ralph. That cat had been defeated.
Catso squeezed out the hole in the screen door. Ralph was safe! Safe and