Chapter 19 Doctor Dolittle's Zoo by Hugh Lofting
PROFESSOR FOOZLEBUGG'S MASTERPIECE
“Well,” sighed the Museum Mouse, “you can imagine how I felt. There I was with a whole family of youngsters, shut up in a glass case. I dare not show myself outside the nest, hardly, because even when that ridiculous Professor Foozlebugg had moved away with the fat woman, odd visitors in ones and twos were always browsing by and looking in. It would be difficult to think of a more uncomfortable, un-private home than ours had become.
“However, there were moments when that end of the hall was free from visitors and attendants. And during one of these I suddenly saw Sarsparilla with a wild look in her eye frantically hunting around outside for her lost family. Standing at the door of the nest, I waved and made signs to her and finally caught her attention. She rushed up to the glass and called through it:
“'Get the children out of there, Nutmeg. Get them out at once!'
“That was the last straw.
“Sarsparilla,' I called back, 'don't be a fool. Do you think I brought the nest and the children here myself? How am I to get them out? I can't bite through glass.'
“'But they must be fed!' she wailed. 'It is long past their morning meal-time.'
“'Bother their morning meal-time!' said I. 'What about my morning meal-time? They'll have to wait. We can't do anything till the museum closes to the public—at five o'clock. You had better get away from there before you get seen.'
“But Sarsparilla, like all women, was quite unreasonable. She just kept running up and down outside the glass, moaning and wringing her hands.
“'Can't you give them some of that stuffed duck there, on the shelf above your head?' she moaned.
“'I could not,' I said. 'Stuffed museum duck is full of arsenic. Don't worry. They can manage until five—the same as me.'
“Sarsparilla would have gone on arguing all day, I believe, if an attendant hadn't come strolling down to that end of the wing and made it necessary for her to hide.
“The rest of the day I had my hands full. For the children, having missed two meals, suddenly got as lively as crickets. They were all for climbing out of the nest—though they hadn't had their eyes open more than a few days. I could have slapped them.
“'Where's Ma?' they kept on saying. 'What's happened to Ma? I'm hungry. Where's Ma?—Let's go and find her.'
“I tell you they had me busy, yanking them down from the hole one after another. They didn't care how many people were looking in the glass case. All that they cared about was that they were hungry and wanted Ma—the stupid little things!
“Never was I so glad in all my experience of museum routine to see the attendants clearing the people out of the halls and locking up the doors. I knew all those old fellows in uniform well. It was a funny life they led—generally pleasant enough. One of the things they had to do was to look out for bomb-throwers. Why people should want to throw bombs or set infernal machines in museums, of all places, I don't know. But they do—or, at all events, it is always expected that they will. That's why the attendants won't allow visitors to bring in parcels: they are afraid they may contain dynamite.
“One of these old men regularly brought his lunch with him and ate it behind the stuffed elephant when nobody was looking—he wasn't supposed to, you see. And the few crumbs he left upon the floor were the only food that I ever managed to get inside the museum. As he changed his coat this evening some crusts fell out of the paper in which his bread and cheese had been wrapped. I knew that if I didn't get them that night the charwoman would sweep them up in the morning. But while I was still gazing at them hungrily out of my glass prison Sarsparilla came and collected them and brought them over to the case.
“'Nutmeg, I want to get these into the children,' she said.
“'Oh, for heaven's sake, have some sense!' I snapped back. 'The first thing we've got to do is to find a way in—or rather a way out.'
“'Gnaw a hole through the floor,' said she—'quite simple. You needn't be afraid of any one seeing you now. The night watchman won't be stirring for another hour yet.'
“'Don't you know,' I said wearily, 'that all these cases are zinc-lined? I can't bite through zinc any more than I can through glass.'
“That started her off again. She threw up her hands.
“'Why, the children will starve to death!' she cried. And she recommenced her running backwards and forwards like a crazy thing.
“I saw I wasn't going to get any helpful ideas from her so I began to look over the situation myself with an eye to working something out. First, I climbed all around the whole case, carefully inspecting the joints in the walls, the floor and the roof, to see if I could find a weak spot anywhere. Then I examined each shelf in turn to see if by chance I might come upon anything that could help me. And finally on the top shelf I discovered something that suggested a plan of escape.
“It was this: among the collection of birds' nests there were some of sea birds. These were set among stones, the way certain gulls and such build—just a rough hollow of twigs and seaweed laid on the shingle of the beach. Here Professor Foozlebugg had quite surpassed himself in the art of tastefully displaying specimens. He had the whole top shelf set out like a scene on a lonely island where sea birds would build. At the back there was a picture of the ocean painted, with lighthouses and sailboats and everything. And in front of this there were several stuffed birds and nests set among the stones of the beach. The stones were mostly round, of all sizes. And it occurred to me that I might very easily roll some of the larger ones off the top shelf. Then, if they struck something slanting when they reached the bottom of the case, they would fly against the glass wall and break it.
“I wasted no time in getting to work. It was necessary to prepare a bouncing place where the stone would fall if my plan was to be a success. I slid down to the bottom of the case and gathered together a large pile of stiff twigs which I took from the other nests. It was hard work, because most birds put their nests together pretty firmly. I made a frightful mess of the collection before I was done.
“In the meantime, not being able to keep the children in order while I was at work, I had let them follow their own sweet wills. Every one of the little beggars had got out of the nest; and now having seen 'Ma' outside the case, they too were running up and down alongside the glass and careering all over the place trying to find a way out. If Professor Foozlebugg had come in at that moment to inspect his latest work of art he would have had a great shock.
“Well, when all was ready I went down below and chased all the children up on to the upper shelves so they wouldn't get hurt by falling stones or flying glass. Then I explained to Sarsparilla, in shouts, what I was going to do.
“'Stand by,' I yelled, 'to get the youngsters to a place of safety. They're not easy to handle.'
“'All right,' she called back. 'I'll take three and you take three. And for pity's sake be careful how you get them through the hole in the broken glass.'
“Then, just as I was about to put my shoulder under the round stone and topple it down, there came another shout from my wife:
“'Look out!—Night watchman coming!—Hide the children quick!'
“It was all very well for Sarsparilla to say, 'Hide the children, quick!' They had no intention of being hidden. They had seen 'Ma' and they meant to get to her as soon as possible. And as soon as she disappeared again they went entirely crazy, rushing all over the place crying, 'Where's Ma gone? We're hungry. What's become of Ma?'
“Oh, dear! I never had such a time. I had no sooner caught a couple of them and hidden them behind a stuffed bird or something, before they would pop out again while I was running after the next pair.
“Luckily the night watchman was not a very wide-awake old man at the best of times, and as it happened to-night he did not swing his lantern near our case.
“When he had gone Sarsparilla showed up again outside the glass and I got ready to try my plan once more.
“Crash!
“It worked all right and no mistake. The stone knocked a hole in the front of the case big enough for a bulldog to get through. In fact everything would have gone splendidly if it hadn't been for those half-witted children of mine. With the crashing of the glass they just ran around like lunatics and we couldn't catch a single one of them. We had time to get away easily. But while we were still falling all over the place trying to get the family together, alarm bells in every corridor of the museum started ringing violently. The next thing, the night watchman came running through the hall shouting:
“'A bomb, a bomb!—Hey! Help!—Fire! Police!—A bomb's gone off somewhere! HELP!'
“'It's no use, Sarsparilla,' I said. 'We can't manage it now. Bring in one of those crusts of bread with you and come inside until the excitement dies down. Was any one ever blessed with such children? Help me get them into the nest quick. With you here, they'll be quieter and more manageable. Later, if luck is still with us, we may get away.'
“And we only just got those little nuisances stowed out of sight in time. In less than five minutes from the crash of the glass people began arriving on the run. First, a constable with a notebook from the beat outside the museum's main entrance. Then six firemen came rushing in dragging a hose. Next, the watchman's wife carrying bandages and a bottle of brandy.
“And all of them stood around the broken glass case asking about the 'bomb'—Yes, the watchman was quite sure it was a bomb—Look how it had wrecked all the nests inside!
“Then they gave their opinions, one after another: 'Russian nihilists'; 'suffragettes'; 'East End anarchists,' etc., etc. While all the time we who176 were responsible for the whole thing sat inside the home of the Three-ringed Yah-yah and listened to their silly chatter.
“Finally the great Professor Foozlebugg arrived on the scene, summoned from his bed—for it was now nearly midnight—by a messenger from the watchman. He nearly wept when he saw his latest work of art—his masterpiece—knocked all skiddle-daddle. He was much more upset about his beautiful scene on the seashore than he was over the museum's narrow escape from being blown up by an infernal machine. He was about to wade into the wreckage then and there and put it to rights but—fortunately for us—one of the policemen warned him off.
“'Don't touch it, Sir, please. With these infernal machines one never knows. A second, and more serious, explosion, Sir, is liable to follow the moment you lay a finger on it. We will get the bomb experts from Police Headquarters. They know how to handle these things, Sir.'
“Well, just that saved us from a pretty serious situation. After a little more discussion between the firemen and the constable it was decided to let well enough alone until the morning—when the bomb experts from Police Headquarters would take charge of affairs. Meanwhile the policeman, the firemen and the professor felt they might as well go back to bed. As for the old watchman, he was so scared of that second explosion that the policeman had spoken of, that the moment the rest of them had departed he locked up the doors and left that hall severely to itself.
“Which of course was exactly what we wanted. We had seven peaceful hours before us—before the charwoman would come to sweep—in which to do our moving. The first thing we did, after we had all the children safely lifted out through the broken glass, was to sit down in the middle of the hall and eat a hearty meal of the crusts which the old attendant had left behind. Then we herded the children down below by easy stages to the Stuffing Room. And there Sarsparilla kept them together while I hunted up a new home among the lumber and stuff with which the shelves were cluttered.
“But this time, you may be sure, I did not pick a bird's nest nor anything else that was likely to get put on exhibition while we slept.”