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Read Ebook: Tähtien turvatit 2: Aika- ja luonnekuvaus kuningatar Kristiinan ajoilta by Topelius Zacharias Hahnsson Theodolinda Translator
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Ebook has 1485 lines and 66800 words, and 30 pages
Translator: Ashman
Transcriber's Note:
CHAIN OF COMMAND
Illustrated by ASHMAN
"George," Clara said with restrained fury, "the least you could do is ask him. Are you a mouse or a worm?"
"Well, I have gone out there and moved it every night," George protested, trying to reason with her without success.
"Yes, and every morning he puts it back. George, so long as that trap is outside of our front door, I can never have a moment's peace, worrying about the children. I won't go on like this! You must go out and talk some sense into him about removing it at once."
"I don't know," George said weakly. "They might not be happy to find out about us."
That, George knew, was a misstatement. She could go on like this for hours. He stared at her unhappily.
"Yes, dear," he mumbled finally. "Well, maybe tomorrow."
"No, George," she said firmly. "Now! This morning. The very moment he comes in."
He looked at her silently, feeling harried and unsure of himself. After living here so long, they'd observed and learned human customs and speech--they'd even adopted human names.
"George," she pleaded, "just ask him. Reason with him. Point out to him that he's just wasting his time." She paused, added, "You're intelligent--you can think of the right things to say."
"Oh, all right," he said wearily. But once he had said it, he felt better. At least, he would get it over with, one way or another.
As soon as he heard the swish-swish of the broom outside his home, he got up and walked out of the front door. He saw that the trap was still off to one side, where he had pushed it the night before.
"Hello," he shouted.
Swish-swish-swish went the broom, busily moving dust from one part of the room to another, swish-swish-swish. The man looked tremendous from so close a view, yet George knew that he was just a little, bent, old man, a small specimen of the species.
The janitor stopped swish-swishing and looked around the room suspiciously.
The janitor looked down and saw the mouse. "Hello yourself," he said. He was an ignorant old man and, when he saw the mouse shouting hello at him, he assumed right away that it was a mouse shouting hello to him.
"My wife doesn't want you to put it by the front door any more," George said, still speaking loudly, so that the janitor could hear, but at least not bellowing so that it tore his throat. "She's afraid it might hurt the children."
"No," George replied. "They know all about traps--but my wife still wants it removed."
"Sorry," the janitor said, "but my orders are to put a trap by every mousehole. This is an atomic plant, and they don't want mice."
"I can't help it," the janitor snapped. "I have to obey orders."
"What will I tell my wife?" George shouted.
That stopped the janitor. He had a wife of his own.
"I guess I can take it up with the supervisor," he finally said.
The janitor picked up the trap and moved it over to the front door. He watched, interested, as George promptly pushed it several inches along the wall. Then he turned and busily swish-swished more dust around the room.
"Well, what did he say?" Clara asked George as soon as he came back into the house.
"Said he'd take it up with the supervisor," George said, settling down in an armchair.
"George," she ordered, "you get up this instant and make sure that he really does!"
"Look," George pleaded, "he said he would."
"He may have been lying," Clara said promptly. "You go right up to the supervisor's room and see."
So, George reluctantly heaved himself out of the chair and ran through the mouseways in the wall until he came to the mousehole in the supervisor's room.
At that moment, the janitor came in and the supervisor looked up, annoyed. He was a fat man, with stubble on his cheek, and he walked with a waddle.
"There's a mouse in room 112 who doesn't want a trap by his front door," the janitor said simply.
"You're crazy," the supervisor said.
The janitor shrugged. "What should I tell him?" he asked.
"Tell him to come up here and speak to me himself," the supervisor said, feeling very clever.
"I'm right here," George cried, stepping out of the mousehole and neatly side-stepping the mousetrap beside it.
"There he is now," the janitor said, pointing.
"My God!" whispered the supervisor, who'd had some education. "A hallucination."
"No, a mouse," the old janitor corrected.
"My wife wants the trap removed," George patiently explained. "She's worried the children might blunder into it."
"Sure," the janitor replied. "He's the one I was telling you about, from room 112."
The supervisor stood up unsteadily. "I don't feel very well," he said in a weak voice. "I think that I'd better talk this over with the Administrative Officer. It's a policy matter."
"You come along, too," he said hastily to the janitor, who had turned to leave. "I'll need all the support I can get." He waddled out, followed by the janitor.
He was a bit late, just in time to see the door close on the supervisor and the janitor.
The Administrative Officer looked down and saw him right away. He was a thin pale man with tired eyes.
"Go away," he said spiritlessly, "I've just told two people that you don't exist."
"But my wife wants that trap removed--it's dangerous for the children," George complained.
The Administrative Officer almost shouted to hell with George's children, but basically he was a decent man, even if an overworked one, and he caught himself in time.
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