The Mouse and the Motorcycle - Beverly Cleary [25]
An aspirin, I must find an aspirin, thought Ralph, darting under the bed. He bumped into a dust mouse, which startled him, but he did not find an aspirin. He was in such a hurry he ran right over the man in the sleeping bag instead of taking time to go around. There under the dresser, gleaming in a shaft of moonlight, he saw a round white pill. He went closer.
Yes, it really was an aspirin tablet. At last! Ralph was positive it was an aspirin and not some other pill because it had letters stamped on it. Ralph could not read the letters, but he knew they stood for an aspirin. He had been warned about them often enough. Now all Ralph had to do was figure out how to get the pill upstairs to Room 215.
Telling himself that in spite of all that had happened that night, it could not be much past one o’clock in the morning, Ralph half pushed and half rolled the aspirin tablet around the man in the sleeping bag to the door. He shoved it under the door and with great difficulty squeezed under himself. The first-floor carpet was thicker and of better quality than that of the second floor.
Ralph worked his way with the aspirin down the hall to the lobby where the night clerk was asleep on a couch. The glassy eyes of deer heads mounted on the knotty pine walls seemed to stare at Ralph. So did the giant eye of the television set. Slowly he moved his precious load across the lobby to the stairs and there he stopped. How could he manage to get that aspirin up those stairs? He picked it up and tried lifting it, even though he knew he could not reach the first step with it.
The night clerk tossed on the couch and made a gobbling, snorting noise. Ralph dropped the aspirin in a panic and looked wildly about for a hiding place. With one terrified leap he dived under the grandfather clock between the elevator and the stairs. It was immediately plain from the dust that no one ever cleaned under the clock.
“A-haa. A-haa.” Ralph struggled to control a sneeze. Above him the works of the clock began to make grinding noises.
“A-choo!” The sneeze could not be held back.
Bong! The clock struck one thirty, forcing Ralph to clap his hands over his ears. How his famous ancestor, the one that ran up the clock, hickory-dickory-dock, stood the racket, he did not know.
Peeking out, Ralph discovered the night clerk had slept soundly through the din, so he ventured out from under the clock to continue his struggle with the aspirin tablet.
Since carrying the pill up the stairs was impossible, Ralph had to find another way. The elevator? Ridiculous. A mouse could not run an elevator. Then, quite unexpectedly, a whole plan of action popped into his mind. Ralph had a genuine inspiration.
First he rolled the aspirin to a safe place behind the ashtray stand beside the elevator. Then, empty-pawed, he climbed the stairs to the second floor and ran down the hall to Room 215, where he squeezed under the door. Keith was still half awake, his eyes glinting with fever under their heavy lids.
“Pst!” said Ralph. “I’ve found an aspirin for you.”
“Hm-m?” murmured Keith.
“An aspirin tablet. I’ve found an aspirin!”
“Where is it?” Keith was more awake now.
“Down on the first floor.”
“Oh.” Keith was obviously disappointed.
“Now wait,” said Ralph. “I can get it up here, but I’ve got to have some help. You’ll have to let me take your sports car.”
“You’re too young,” mumbled Keith.
“I am not.” And it was true that Ralph felt very much older than he had when he lost the motorcycle. “Come on. You need that aspirin, don’t you?”
“You already lost my motorcycle.”
“Oh, come on.” Ralph was growing more impatient as he felt the night slipping by. “If you won’t let me take the sports car, will you let me take the ambulance?”
“I guess so.” Keith did not feel equal to arguing with a determined mouse. He picked up his ambulance from the bedside table and set it on the floor. “Here.”
“One more thing,” said Ralph anxiously. “Do you think you could manage to open the door for me? I know