Runaway Ralph - Beverly Cleary [6]
“The little fellow must have managed to get his motorcycle down the steps somehow,” Ralph heard Matt mutter to himself. “Now maybe I can get to sleep.”
I guess I showed you, thought Ralph grimly, as he mounted his motorcycle and sped off down the open road, off into the dark and scary night. So long, brothers, sisters, cousins! So long, Uncle Lester! So long, Matt! Ralph was on his way!
Pb-pb-b-b-b. Ralph bounced along the uneven driveway to the mountain highway, where he quickly discovered that one of the ribbons of concrete pressed smooth by passing tires made a good highway for a mouse. He then made an even more exciting discovery—gravity. With a good fast start he could coast downhill with amazing speed. The halls of the Mountain View Inn were never like this.
Ralph sped through a night that fulfilled his dreams of freedom. It was a night of danger and adventure. Once when Ralph was frightened by the headlights of an approaching car, he swerved to the side of the road, where he and his motorcycle were caught in the back draft of the passing car and tumbled about like old gum wrappers and tossed into the weeds. Afterward Ralph was alert when he heard a car approaching and got off the road and clung to a weed until the car roared past. He was exhilarated by this test of his skill. Toward dawn logging trucks began to rumble down the mountain, shaking the earth as they came. Ralph never had seen anything so terrifying as those great double-tired monsters with logs lashed to their truck beds barreling down the center of the highway, and he knew the time had come to hide for the day. He ate some dusty weed seeds, drank dew, slept under a leaf, and started off once more at nightfall toward the sound of the bugle.
Between cars and trucks Ralph tore along down the highway through the shadows of the night. This ride was the freedom he had dreamed of—speed without effort. Once the thought crossed his mind that if he should ever want to return to the Mountain View Inn, he could never make it back up the mountain under his own power. What a silly thought! Why should he ever want to go back to the inn when he could travel this way?
On the third night of Ralph’s journey, as darkness faded and the pine trees gave way to scrub oak, Ralph found himself out in the open where there were no sheltering shadows. A milk truck rattled past on its way to the Mountain View Inn. Blackbirds greeted the dawn with bursts of gurgling song, and not far away a rooster crowed. A pheasant flew low across the road, startling Ralph and causing him to collide with a piece of gravel. The road, which now followed an irrigation ditch, had leveled off, and Ralph had to produce his own power.
Pb-pb-b-b-b. As Ralph putted along on his motorcycle, daylight made him uneasy. He was looking for a place to hide when the notes of the bugle, so close he felt as if they might shatter him, burst forth in the lively morning tune. Before they died away, laughter and shouts filled the air. Medium-sized boys and girls! peanut butter and jelly sandwiches! Ralph had reached his destination.
Ralph wished old Matt could see him as he rode off the road and bounced onto a gravel lane that crossed a small bridge over the irrigation ditch. Ahead lay a number of low, weathered buildings surrounded by lawn and shaded by walnut trees. Boys and girls were washing their faces in washbasins set on benches.
A big brown dog, barking furiously, came bounding toward Ralph, who stopped, frozen with terror. The dog stopped, too, so suddenly he nearly sat down in the gravel. He recovered himself and approached, snuffling with his wet black nose. Ralph sat with his paws clutching his handle grips in fear while the horrible black nose sniffed him.
“And just who do you think you are?” asked the dog.
“Quiet, Sam!” yelled a boy.
“A m-mouse.” Ralph felt very, very meek.
Sam eyed Ralph with curiosity. “Where did you get