It's Saturday.
Chapter 12: An Errand Of Mercy
Owls! thought Ralph, as he clung to the Virginia creeper and filled his lungs with the cool night air that was such a relief after the stuffy drinking glass. I’ve always wanted to climb down this vine and explore the ground floor, he reminded himself grimly, and now I have to. Ralph had never before been outdoors beneath the moon and the stars. He felt small and frightened and alone. Slowly, paw over paw, he worked his way along the shoots and tendrils. An owl, uncomfortably close in a pine tree, hooted, and Ralph huddled shivering in the shadow of a leaf, aware that he was losing precious seconds. A night wind rattled the windows and the owl glided off across the parking lot. Ralph inched his way down the vine. It was a long winding route full of detours to the ground-floor window, which, to Ralph’s relief, was open. Upon reaching the sill, Ralph leaped to the floor of the room, in which three young men of college age were sleeping, two in beds and one in a sleeping bag on the floor. 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 you feel terrible, but it is the last thing I’ll ask. Honest. And I promise I’ll have the aspirin up here in no time.” Keith sighed but he slid his feet out from under the sheet and, hanging onto the bedside table, reached over and opened the door. Ralph was already seated in the white ambulance with the red cross painted on the side. “Wh-e-e. Wh-e-e. Wh-e-e.” He took the corner into the hall on two wheels and sped down the bare floor between the wall and the carpet until he came to Room 211. Here he slowed down and then went, “Wh-e-e! Wh-e-e! Wh-e-e!” good and loud. This carried him, as he had planned, to the elevator. It was a crucial moment. Now he would find out if his plan was going to work. The little dog in Room 211 began to whimper and then to bark just as Ralph had planned. In a moment the door opened and the man stumbled out with the little terrier in his arms. “Oh, all right,” he grumbled. “I’ll walk you. Shut up, will you?” Ralph waited, his paws tense on the steering wheel. The man walked groggily to the closed elevator door, where he managed, in spite of the wriggling dog in his arms, to push the button. Soon the elevator door slid open. Ralph knew that timing was important. The man entered the elevator. The dog barked. “Wh-e-e! Wh-e-e!” said Ralph hard enough and fast enough to shoot the ambulance at great speed across the yawning crack between the floor of the hall and the floor of the elevator before the man turned around. As the dog’s owner turned, Ralph.steered skillfully around his feet and parked the ambulance behind him. The man pressed the button, the doors closed, and the elevator actually began to descend. “Do you know what you are?” the man sleepily asked the dog. “You are a nuisance, that’s what you are. A four-footed, hair-covered nuisance.” The dog ignored his master. “I know you’re down there,” he yapped to Ralph. “If I could just get down I’d get you!” Ralph did not answer. He was taking no chances. He waited quietly inside his ambulance until the man had carried the dog out before he drove out of the elevator. He.jumped out of the ambulance, opened the rear doors, seized the precious aspirin, and boosted it inside. Slamming the doors, he ran around and jumped into the driver’s seat. There was not an instant to lose.“Wh-e-e.Wh-e-e.” The ambulance moved toward the open elevator, but unfortunately by this time Ralph was slightly out of breath. The front wheels of the ambulance caught in the crack between the floor of the lobby and the floor of the elevator. The ambulance was stuck. Oh, no, thought Ralph. Not now. I can’t fail now. “Wh-e-e. Wh-e-e,” he managed to gasp. The wheels spun but the ambulance did not move. Ralph jumped out, put his shoulder to the rear of the vehicle, and pushed with all his strength. Nothing happened. In a moment the man would be returning with his dog. Desperate, Ralph climbed back into the ambulance. He took a breath so deep he thought his lungs would surely burst. “Wh-e-e! Wh-e-e! Wh-e-e!” He made the sound hard and fast and high-pitched. The wheels spun. The ambulance moved, slowly at first, and then as the tires got a grip on the floor of the elevator, it shot out of the crack and across the elevator and hit the rear wall with a bump. Ralph collapsed over the steering wheel, limp with relief, just as the man came back through the lobby with his dog. “I guess some boy lost his toy ambulance,” muttered the man, more awake now, as he stepped in and pressed the button. Toy! thought Ralph indignantly. This ambulance is carrying medical supplies to the sick. “Boy, my foot!” yapped the terrier. “It’s that dastardly mouse. Let me down and I’ll get him!” Ralph did not try to answer. He was saving all his breath now to get the ambulance across that crack once more. The man slapped the dog lightly on the nose and said,“Be quiet! I took you outside, didn’t I?” Fortunately the elevator door stayed open behind the man as he walked out, so Ralph had no trouble driving the ambulance out and down the hall to Room 215. The door had blown shut but he did not care. He jumped out of the ambulance and ran around to the back, where he unloaded the aspirin, shoved it under the bedroom door, and squeezed under after it. “Hey, Keith! I’ve got it!” Ralph was filled with triumph. “I’ve brought you an aspirin!”