Mr. Mole 1; Cats 0

The Mole had been working very hard all the morning, spring-cleaning his little home.  ...  It was small wonder, then, that he suddenly flung down his brush on  the floor, said, "Bother!" and "O blow!" and also "Hang spring-cleaning!" and bolted out of the house without even waiting to put on his coat.  Something  up above was calling him imperiously, and he made for the steep little tunnel which answered in his case to the gravelled carriage-drive owned by animals whose residences are nearer to the sun and air.  So he scraped and scratched and scrabbled and scrooged, and the he scrooged again and scrabbled and scratched and scraped, working busily with his little paws and muttering to himself, "Up we go!  Up we go!" till at last, pop! his snout came out into the sunlight and he found himself rolling in the warm grass of a great meadow.

"This is fine!" he said to himself.  "This is better than whitewashing!"

--Kenneth Grahame, The Wind in the Willows 

I woke up last night with a start.  Loud thumping downstairs.  Years of experience taught me what to expect -- the game was afoot, and the cats were in hot pursuit.  Whatever it is, I prayed, just dispatch it quickly and keep it downstairs. 

But the pursuit lasted all night, and most of it was conducted in my bedroom.  I got up on a number of occasions and turned on the light.  Some poor prey was hidden back in the bookcases, and the cats -- doing their upmost, lying on their sides with front legs extended behind the books as far as they could go -- were not able to bring their quarry to the ground.  

I slept in snatches.  All in all, I was probably reduced to four hours of sleep, maximum.

The cats continued following the mouse from one hidden area to another, never getting their claws on him so far as I could see. I went to lunch about 11 a.m., and returned, not sure what I would find.   Please at leaast let the corpse be intact, I prayed -- not beheaded with quantities of rodent blood flowing across a carpet.

I wasn't prepared for what confronted me in the kitchen.  A small mouse, quite alive, daintily licking water from the cats' water bowl.  Pollux was asleep on the couch.  Castor was nowhere to be seen.  The mouse totally ignored me, even as I stood inches away from him.  

The mouse?  Well, it was the size of a mouse.  But with a very short tail, and odd looking forelegs.  Even its mouth was peculiar.  Could it be a mole, I wondered?  A very tiny infant mole?  It could, and I'm sure now it was.

If it had been a fast-moving mouse or rat, I could never have captured it.  But I approached it with a bath towel, and easily scooped the sluggish little devil off the floor.  It took three tries -- he was more wiggly and resistant, once in the towel, than he had seemed at first sight, but I evacuated him to a secluded part of the backyard.  Both cats still on vacation, fortunately.

The baby mole immediately began burrowing through the grass, and eventually under the grass.  Pollux chose this time to make a dramatic appearance, like the U.S. Cavalry, and my attention was diverted by the need to grab my wily and determined cat, take him kicking and screaming back inside, and close off his cat door.  Back outside, Castor then wandered onto the scene, but he was unaware of the drama happening within feet of himself.  Sure, let's go inside and check out breakfast, he suggested.

Finally returning to the backyard, I discovered that Baby Mole had dug a little tunnel, just barely underground, and I could still locate him by watching the disturbance as he inched his way across the yard.  He was headed for the hedge area, which was probably a good idea, as the soil there is looser and easier digging.  The last time I checked the area, there was no sign of my little friend.  

The cats -- "Our work is done!" -- slept all day, and I let them back outside at dusk.

No, it never occurred to me to flush Mr. Mole down the toilet.  Yes, I realize that adult moles play havoc on carefully tended lawns, but my lawn's not that carefully tended.  And unlike some conquerors, I don't kill my enemy's children, because some day they would otherwise grow up into adult enemy soldiers.  

I'm told that, while dogs often kill moles, domesticated, well-fed cats are more likely to play with them as toys than to actually kill and eat them.  So maybe his danger was less than I feared.  But I'm glad I didn't rely on that advice.

Moles eat prodigiously, and they continue eating and surviving underground in winter.  This little fellow was uninjured, so far as I could tell, despite his war with the cats.  And he was drinking water from a bowl, suggesting that he was weaned and able to find food on his own.  

I hope he builds himself a cozy mole-cave, beneath my yard or that of a neighbor.  And I hope that the trauma of this childhood experience will not discourage him from following the example of Kenneth Grahame's Mr. Mole.  I hope that some day soon, when the air is warm, the sun is bright, and the world is fragrant with flowers and grasses and opportunities for adventure, he will screw up his courage and venture to the surface.  And that he will look around happily at the world of nature and exclaim: 

"This is fine!  This is better than whitewashing!"