With a despairing effort, the fly flew directly into the smoke of the battle, and at that moment a mouse hid in a corner near an overturned cask shaking in all its limbs, its pointed teeth chattering with fright. Finally regaining its breath, it ventured to look around the corner. All seemed serene to the mouse, who saw no shadow of danger, although sounds of battle still ebbed and flowed on the deck below it, crisscrossed by shouts and orders, screams and groans, as the pirates and the sailors of the _Mirabelle_ doggedly fought on. The mouse wished to retake its own shape and continue its work with the magic knife which had been interrupted, it thought, too soon to have done any good. At last it decided to run along the deck near Claggett Chew's cabin. From there it hoped to reach the side of the ship nearest to the _Mirabelle_. As it slipped from its hiding place and began its run, it realized too late its mistake, and panic almost overcame it. For a cat had been crouched behind it and now gave a mighty pounce. One outstretched paw came down on the mouse's tail, but the mouse wrenched it free and desperate and panting, dashed into the first opening it saw. [Illustration] This proved to be no less than Claggett Chew's cabin, the door of which had been left open so that Osterbridge Hawsey could watch the fight with the least possible discomfort. He sat, somnolent, in a comfortable chair, his long legs stretched out before him, smoking a clay pipe. His attention wandering, as it so often did, he failed to see the mouse who ran under his legs into the shadow beneath them. The frantic mouse now determined, in the seconds left to it for decision, to attempt a bold move. In a flash--in fact, as a black cat with angry yellow-slitted eyes put its head around the door jamb--a jade-green parakeet with red and yellow breast feathers hopped onto Osterbridge Hawsey's ankle, and with a speed tempered by its most engaging ways, sidled up Osterbridge Hawsey's outstretched leg. The yellow-eyed cat made a dash with both clawing paws outstretched to fall upon the bird, but the parakeet fluttered into the air out of reach and came down higher up on Osterbridge Hawsey's knee. Osterbridge, startled from his daydream, shooed away the cat and got up precipitously enough to give it a kick which sent it miaowling from the cabin. Osterbridge, vastly pleased to see his green parakeet again, was wreathed in smiles. "Ah, now!" he exclaimed, holding out a condescending finger, "Petit Monsieur back again! How too simply enchanting! Just when poor Osterbridge was _so_ bored and had no one to talk to! Well, my pretty--" and both Osterbridge and the parakeet cocked their heads at one another--"and where have _you_ been, I wonder?"