The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents
Read The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents Online
Authors: Terry Pratchett
THE
AMAZING MAURICE
AND HIS
EDUCATED RODENTS
To D'niece,
for the right book at the right time
But there was more to it than that. As theâ¦
This was the plan:
Far below Maurice's paws the rats were creeping through theâ¦
The kid and the girl and Maurice were in aâ¦
Darktan was in a tunnel several streets away, hanging fromâ¦
“Hello? Hello, it's me. And I'm going to give theâ¦
Malicia looked at the open trapdoor as if giving itâ¦
When the three rats leaped, they were already too late.
“At last!” said Malicia, shaking the ropes off. “Somehow Iâ¦
Why am I doing this? Maurice asked himself as heâ¦
The rat king raged.
The crowd clustered into the council hall in the Rathaus.
O
ne day, when he was naughty, Mr. Bunnsy looked over the hedge into Farmer Fred's field and saw it was full of fresh green lettuces. Mr. Bunnsy, however, was not full of lettuces. This did not seem fair.
âFrom
Mr. Bunnsy Has an Adventure
Rats!
They fought the dogs and killed the cats, andâ
But there was more to it than that. As the Amazing Maurice said, it was just a story about people and rats. And the difficult part of it was deciding who the people were, and who were the rats.
But Malicia Grim said it was a story about stories.
It beganâ
part
of it beganâon the mail coach that came over the mountains from the distant cities of the plain.
This was the part of the journey that the driver didn't like. The road wound through forests and around mountains on crumbling roads. There were deep shadows between the trees. Sometimes he thought things were following the coach, keeping just out of sight. It gave him the willies.
And on
this
journey the really big willy was that he could hear voices. He was sure of it. They were coming from behind him, from the top of the coach, and there was nothing there but the big oilcloth mail sacks and the boy's luggage. There was certainly nothing big enough for a person to hide inside. But occasionally he was sure he heard squeaky voices, whispering.
There was only one passenger at this point. He was a fair-haired young man, sitting all by himself inside the rocking coach and reading a book. He was reading slowly, and aloud, and moving his finger over the words.
“Ubberwald,” he read out.
“That's âÃberwald,'” said a small, squeaky, but very clear voice. “The dots make it a sort of long âooo' sound. But you're doing well.”
“Oo
oo
ooberwald?”
“There's such a thing as
too much
pronunciation, kid,” said another voice, which sounded half asleep. “But you know the best thing about
Ãberwald? It's a long, long way from Sto Lat. It's a long way from Pseudopolis. It's a long way from
anywhere
where the head of the Watch says he'll have us boiled alive if he ever catches us. And it's not very modern. Bad roads. Lots of mountains in the way. People don't move about much up here. So news doesn't travel very fast, see? And they probably don't have policemen. Kid, we can make a
fortune
here!”
“Maurice?” said the boy carefully.
“Yes, kid?”
“You don't think what we're doing is, you knowâ¦
dishonest
, do you?”
There was a pause before the voice said, “How do you mean, dishonest?”
“Wellâ¦we take their money, Maurice.” The coach bounced over a pothole.
“All right,” said the unseen Maurice. “But what you've got to ask yourself is:
Who
do we take the money from, actually?”
“Wellâ¦it's generally the mayor or the city council or someone like that.”
“Right! And that means it'sâ¦what? I've told you this bit before.”
“Er⦔
“It is
gov-ern-ment money
, kid,” said Maurice patiently. “Say it. Gov-ern-ment money.”
“Gov-ern-ment money,” said the boy obediently.
“Right! And what do governments do with money?”
“Er, they⦔
“They pay soldiers,” said Maurice. “They have wars. In fact we've prob'ly stopped a lot of wars, by taking the money and putting it where it can't do any harm. They'd put up stachoos to us, if they thought about it.”
“Some of those towns looked pretty poor, Maurice,” said the kid doubtfully.
“Hey, just the kind of places that don't need wars, then.”
“Dangerous Beans says it's⦔ The boy concentrated, and his lips moved before he said the word, as if he was trying out the pronunciation to himself. “It's un-eth-ickle.”
“That's right, Maurice,” said the squeaky voice. “Dangerous Beans says we shouldn't live by trickery.”
“Listen, Peaches,
trickery
is what humans are all about,” said the voice of Maurice. “They're so keen on tricking one another all the time that they elect governments to do it for them.
We
give them value for money. They get a horrible plague of rats, they pay a rat piper, the rats all follow the kid out of town, hoppity-skip, end of
plague, everyone's happy that no one's widdling in the flour anymore, the government gets reelected by a grateful population, general celebration all around. Money
well
spent, in my opinion.”
“But there's only a plague because we make them think there is,” said the voice of Peaches.
“Well, my dear, another thing all those little governments spend their money on is rat catchers, see? I don't know why I bother with the lot of you, I really don't.”
“Yes, but weâ”
They realized that the coach had stopped. Outside, in the rain, there was the jingle of harness. Then the coach rocked a little, and there was the sound of running feet.
A voice from out of the darkness said, “Are there any
wizards
in there?”
The occupants looked at one another in puzzlement.
“No?” said the kid, the kind of “No” that means “Why are you asking?”
“How about any
witches
?” said the voice.
“No, no witches,” said the kid.
“Right. Are there any heavily armed
trolls
employed by the mail coach company in there?”
“I doubt it,” said Maurice.
There was a moment's pause, filled with the sound of the rain.
“Okay, how about werewolves?” said the voice eventually. The speaker sounded as though he was working through a list.
“What do they look like?” said the kid.
“Ah, well, they look perfectly normal right up to the point where they grow all, like, hair and teeth and giant paws and leap through the window at you,” said the voice.
“We've all got hair and teeth,” said the kid. “Is that any help?”
“So you
are
werewolves, then?”
“No.”
“Fine, fine.” There was another pause filled with rain.
“Okay, vampires,” said the voice. “It's a wet nightâyou wouldn't want to be flying in weather like this. Any vampires in there?”
“No!” said the kid. “We're all perfectly harmless!”
“Oh boy,” muttered Maurice, and crawled under the seat.
“That's a relief,” said the voice. “You can't be too careful these days. There's a lot of funny people about.”
A crossbow arrow was pushed through the
window, and the voice said, “Your money
and
your life. It's a two-for-one deal, see?”
“The money's in the case on the roof,” said Maurice's voice from floor level.
The highwayman looked around the dark interior of the coach.
“Who said that?” he said.
“Er, me,” said the boy.
“I didn't see your lips move, kid!”
“The money
is
on the roof. In the case. But if I was you, I wouldn'tâ”
“Hah, I just 'spect you wouldn't,” said the highwayman. His masked face disappeared from the window.
The boy picked up the pipe that was lying on the seat beside him. It was the type still known as a pennywhistle, although no one could remember when they'd ever cost only a penny.
“Play âRobbery with Violence,' kid,” said Maurice quietly.
“Couldn't we just give him the money?” said the voice of Peaches. It was a little voice.
“Money is for people to give
us
,” said Maurice sternly.
Above them there was the scrape of the case on the roof of the coach as the highwayman dragged it down.
The boy obediently picked up the flute and played a few notes.
Now there were a number of sounds. There was a creak, a thud, a sort of scuffling noise, and then a very short scream.
When there was silence, Maurice climbed back onto the seat and poked his head out of the coach, into the dark and rainy night. “Good man,” he said. “Sensible. The more you struggle, the harder they bite. Prob'ly not broken skin yet? Good. Come forward a bit so I can see you. But carefully, eh? We don't want anyone to panic, do we?”
The highwayman reappeared in the light of the coach lamps. He was walking very slowly and carefully, with his legs spread wide apart. And he was quietly whimpering.
“Ah, there you are,” said Maurice cheerfully. “Went straight up your trouser legs, did they? Typical rat trick. Just nod, 'cos we don't want to set 'em off. No tellin' where it might end.”
The highwayman nodded very slowly. Then his eyes narrowed.
“You're a
cat
?” he mumbled. Then his eyes crossed and he gasped.
“Did I say talk?” said Maurice. “I don't
think
I said talk, did I? Did the coachman run away, or did you kill him?”
The man's face went blank.
“Ah, quick learner. I
like
that in a highwayman,” said Maurice. “You can answer that question.”
“Ran away,” said the highwayman hoarsely.
Maurice stuck his head back inside the coach.
“Whadja think?” he said. “Coach, four horses, probably some valuables in the mailbags. Could be, oh, a thousand dollars or more. The kid could drive it. Worth a try?”
“That's
stealing
, Maurice,” said Peaches. She was sitting on the seat beside the kid. She was a rat.
“Not
stealin'
as such,” said Maurice. “Moreâ¦
findin'
. The driver's run away, so it's likeâ¦salvage. Hey, that's right, we could turn it in for the reward. That's
much
better. Legal, too. Shall we?”
“People would ask too many questions,” said Peaches.
“If we just leave it, someone
yawlp
will steal it,” wailed Maurice. “Some thief will take it away! Much better if we take it, eh?
We're
not thieves.”
“We will
leave
it, Maurice,” said Peaches.
“In that case, let's steal the highwayman's horse,” said Maurice, as if the night wouldn't be properly finished unless they stole
something
. “Stealing from a thief isn't stealing, 'cos it cancels out.”
“We can't stay here all night,” said the kid to Peaches. “He's got a point.”
“That's right!” said the highwayman urgently. “You can't stay here all night!”
“That's right,” said a chorus of voices from his trousers, “we can't stay here all night!”
Maurice sighed and stuck his head out the window again.
“O-
kay
,” he said. “This is what we're going to do. You're going to stand very still looking straight in front of you, and you won't try any tricks, because if you do, I've only got to say the wordâ”
“Don't say the word!” said the highwayman urgently.
“Right,” said Maurice. “And we'll take your horse as a punishment, and you can have the coach, because that'd be stealing and only thieves are allowed to steal. Fair enough?”
“Anything you say!” said the highwayman, and then he thought about this and added hurriedly, “But please don't say
anything
!”
He kept staring straight ahead. He saw the boy and the cat get out of the coach. He heard various sounds behind him as they took his horse. And he thought about his sword. All right, he was going to get a whole mail coach out of this
deal, but there was such a thing as professional pride.
“All right,” said the voice of the cat after a while. “We're all going to leave now, and you've got to promise not to move until we're gone. Promise?”
“You have my word as a thief,” said the highwayman, slowly lowering a hand to his sword.
“Right. We certainly trust you,” said the voice of the cat.
The man felt his trousers lighten as the rats poured out and scampered away, and he heard the jingle of harness. He waited a moment, then spun around, drew his sword, and ran forward.
Slightly forward, in any case. He wouldn't have hit the ground so hard if someone hadn't tied his bootlaces together.
Â
They said he was amazing. The Amazing Maurice, they said. He'd never meant to be amazing. It had just happened.
He'd realized something was odd that day, just after lunch, when he'd looked into a reflection in a puddle and thought,
that's me
. He'd never been
aware
of himself before. Of course, it was hard to remember
how
he'd thought before becoming amazing. It seemed to him that his mind had
been just a kind of soup.
And then there had been the rats, who lived under the rubbish heap in one corner of his territory. He'd realized there was something educated about the rats when he'd jumped on one and it'd said, “Can we talk about this?” and part of his amazing new brain had told him you couldn't eat someone who could talk. At least, not until you'd heard what it'd got to say.
The rat had been Peaches. She wasn't like other rats. Nor were Dangerous Beans, Donut Enter, Darktan, Hamnpork, Big Savings, Toxie, and all the rest of them. But then, Maurice wasn't like other cats anymore.
Other cats were, suddenly,
stupid
. Maurice started to hang around with the rats instead. They were someone to talk to. He got on fine so long as he remembered not to eat anyone they knew.
The rats spent a lot of time worrying about why
they
were suddenly so clever. Maurice considered that this was a waste of time. Stuff happened. But the rats went on and on about whether it was something on the rubbish heap that they'd eaten, and even Maurice could see that wouldn't explain how
he'd
got changed, because he'd never eaten rubbish. And he
certainly wouldn't eat any rubbish off
that
heap, seeing where it came fromâ¦.