Lesson One

Lesson One

“Tipp pay attention!” Grandfather whispered, strongly.

Tipp stopped, but even so, his eyes wandered. “Where are we?”

“This is what they call the kitchen.”

“There are so many smells in here!”

“Yes, there are many wonderful smells, and foods too! But we must be very cautious. This is a dangerous place.”

“Why?” Tipp whispered.

“Humans come in here all the time, very fast, even in the dark! If they see us, they’ll put out traps or poison! We can’t even leave droppings here, so hold everything in! As long as they don’t know we‘re here, we can get wonderful, yummy crumbs and scraps!”

“Why don’t Mum and Dad come here?”

“They used to. Now they just want to stay safe to keep you safe.”

“So why did they let you bring me here?”

“They didn’t. I wanted to bring you before your friends decided to. I wanted to teach you how to be safe.”

Suddenly there was a sound, fast, coming from the hall.

“Don’t freeze!” Grandfather said quickly, “at any sound, hide!” he pulled Tipp under a large metal box, as the light flipped on.

The human came right over to it! As it grabbed things, lovely smelling crumbs fell to the floor, but the human didn’t notice. It left, turning off the light as it went.

After a moment, Grandfather said, “Good job! Now we can take this food and enjoy it in our safe place! Just don’t tell your parents!”

Off they went.

As David got back to the sofa he turned to Milly and said, “I swear I heard something. Do you think we have mice?”

“Of course not! We’d have seen some sign of mice by now if we did.”

“I guess you’re right!” David said, turning back to his cake and the television show.