Chapter I

T being the fashion of the day to present to the public divers affecting and pathetic histories, each vying with the other in veracity and profusion of incident, I am persuaded, dear reader, that the time is now propitious to recount the dramatic fortunes of Desbarollda, the waltzing mouse.

My instruction in her history is derived from unimpeachable sources, not hitherto available; much is lost through the interception of time and natural accident; but, from that which remains, the present work has been studiously and faithfully compiled.

The conventions of literary etiquette would demand (were I not already assured in my own right as to the fitness of my procedure) that I hereby acknowledge, with profound gratitude, the inestimable assistance afforded me by Monsieur Marcel Lapin; Mademoiselle Fifi Doris Cocquetreau; the concierge of the Pension Vive la France; and an elderly mouse of uncertain temper who vividly recalls many incidents of Desbarollda’s declining years; but whose name, upon his own vehement insistence, may not be disclosed.

As is not unusual in the case of the child prodigy, Desbarollda’s antecedents were of unspectacular origin; her mother was an ordinary field mouse who, by happy chance rather than design, married above her station; while her father, though coming of a family who had lived in the kitchen of the Duke’s castle for generations, was of the bourgeoisie.

His claims to individuality (from which, doubtless, sprang the seeds of his daughter’s subsequent aspirations) were an ability to read printed matter effortlessly, and the fact that he could, when he chose, speak with authority on seven different kinds of cheese.

When he brought his wife to live in the buttery, she found the new life strange and often terrifying at first; but, though humble, she was bright and adaptable; and by concerning herself only with her husband’s best interests, soon became accepted by his family, who had been disposed to look askance at her unsophisticated ways.

She had not been married a twelveweek, however, when tragedy overtook her.

Her husband, while browsing through a volume of Voltaire in the castle library—his scholastic mind preoccupied with the philosophy of the great savant—was observed, stalked, and subsequently eaten by the castle cat.

The sorrowful news was imparted to his widow by her mother-in-law, an imposing dowager mouse whose husband, while still in the full flower of his prime, had also been eaten by the castle cat.

The two bereaved mice wept together.

“You must display fortitude,” the dowager mouse exhorted. “It is a cruel world: only a stout heart and indestructible savoir faire will see one through it.”

“Ah, if it were only for myself that I were concerned,” replied the newly-widowed mouse, speaking with difficulty through her tears, “but I shall soon be a mother. I was merely awaiting a favourable opportunity to impart the joyful tidings to my husband.” Upon these unhappy reflections her tears fell anew, and the poor creature broke down completely.

“What a very different world it would be, were it not for cats,” pronounced the dowager mouse sententiously, shaking her head.