The Cat Trap

Once upon a time, so mouse legend has it, a mouse, named Sorcio had a remarkable idea.

 

He had just been chased round about the kitchen of the house where he lived by a large and ferocious feline named Gatto and had barely made it back to his mousehole alive when, puffing and panting with exhaustion it suddenly occurred to him,

 

“What we mouses need is a cat trap”.

 

“A Cat trap?”, asked his mousewife as she was doing her mousework.

 

“Yes, it makes perfect sense, don’t you see? People make mousetraps to catch mice; why shouldn’t mice build a cat trap to catch cats”, he replied.

 

But it would take a lot of planning and hard work to build a cat trap, he thought and so Sorcio set to work scratching out a design  for his trap on the wall of his mousehouse.

 

“Now what do cats like to eat..apart from mice”, he thought, “Birds?...no…fish”.

 

He remembered having seen an old tin of tuna in the pantry that he thought might work very well as bait.

 

And he would need a large heavy box too, he thought, to fall on top of the cat and something to prop it up with.

 

Then, when Sorcio had finished designing his trap, he gathered together all his mouse neighbours to build it.

 

Twenty of the strongest mice were enlisted to carry the box and five to carry the stick for propping it up and another five helped to open the tin of tuna with a key and to shovel out the oily tuna with a table spoon onto a dish.

 

Then, when the trap was set up and the dish put in place, the mice all scurried back to their mouse holes to wait and watch to see what would happen.

 

Immediately, his nose twitching, the cat caught the scent of the oily tuna and started to feel hungry, licking his furry lips.

 

Then, following the smell, it led him to the kitchen.

 

“He’s taking the bait”, squeaked Sorcio excitedly to his wife as the cat entered the trap and started to nibble at the fish on the plate.

 

Unfortunately, something was wrong with the trap. The cat wasn’t knocking over the stick that would set it off.

 

But then, Sorcio had another clever idea.

 

Going into his mousehouse and rummaging through his things, he got out a small rubber ball and then, coming back out of his mousehole, he rolled the ball towards the stick, knocking it down just like a skittle.

Then, suddenly, the cat shrieking in surprise, the box came crashing down upon its head and it was so heavy that the cat couldn’t lift it to escape.

 

“Let me out! Let me out!”, howled the cat angrily, “Let me out or I’ll…I’ll…I’ll”.

 

But there was nothing the cat could do. He was trapped good and the mice knew it.

 

Oh what celebrations there were in the kitchen then.

 

Mice from the four corners of the house. Mice from the four mousetowns of parlour, kitchen, porch and hall gathered together to sing and dance and had a party, raising up Sorcio upon their shoulders and praising him loudly.

 

“We caught the cat. Caught it in a cat trap”, they chanted, “Who thought of that? Sorcio did”.

 

And, as well as partying, the mice also raided the pantry, eating all the food that they could lay their little paws on whilst squeaking with glee.

 

Oh, how happy they all were.

 

But then, something unfortunate happened.

 

You see, the mice ate so much food that they all became very fat; so fat in fact that they could barely walk, never mind run.

 

And, in the morning, when the owner of the house awoke and, entering the kitchen, saw what the naughty mice had done and heard, from inside the upturned box, the cat scratching and begging to be set free, he lifted the box up.

 

And, once free from the cat trap, the cat, hungry both for mouse and for vengeance, set about chasing the mice.

 

But, as I mentioned, the poor mice were so fat now that they were too slow to outrun the cat and even those who managed to reach their mouse holes were too fat even to fit through them.

 

One by one, the cat caught and ate up all the mice.

 

Only Sorcio and his wife, because they lived so nearby, survived but Sorcio, seeing how his idea had backfired so terribly, started to cry.

 

“Don’t worry too much dear”, said his mousewife consoling him, “It was a good plan but, as they say, even the best laid plans often go awry”.