Hesitating no longer, he ran into the trap, and, catching hold of the corner of the cheese with his sharp little teeth, gave it a quick jerk in order to detach it from the hook. Snap! He leaped round like a flash, but it was too late--_the door of the trap had closed behind him_. For an instant he scarcely realised what had happened; and then the hideous truth suddenly broke upon him in all its terrible reality. He hurled himself recklessly against the wires, but the cunning artificers of Birmingham had wrought them of the stoutest copper, and he only bruised his tender little body, and made no impression upon his prison. In pitiful distress he turned round and round, seeking in vain for some outlet. There was none; and Squarky-woo realized that nothing was now left to him except to face a cruel and painful death without disgracing his lineage. Meanwhile Mammy-ana had returned from her visit in excellent spirits, the cat at No. 4 having been even more badly bitten than rumour had related. So it had been in a very genial frame of mind she had run upstairs, laughing gaily to herself as she pictured the amusing incident. Her only regret was that she had not been present to listen to the cat's squeak. That would have been music indeed. Before going out, she had told Squarky-woo that he had better not leave the hole until her return, so she was very surprised, and not a little annoyed, to find that he had disobeyed her. "However," she thought, "he is probably only in the dining-room or the drawing-room, and I can't really be angry on such an auspicious occasion." She trotted off to look for him, still chuckling to herself, and no suspicion of the terrible truth entered into her mind. Indeed, it was not until she had thoroughly searched both apartments that she began to get a little uneasy. "Surely Squarky-woo could not have been so madly disobedient as to go down into the kitchen!" She inquired of one or two mice she happened to meet, but none of them had seen anything of her son; and one of them went so far as to remark that he thought she always carried him in her pocket. But Mammy-ana was in no mood for joking. A horrible fear was slowly tightening round her heart. She darted away to the head of the kitchen stairs, and peering down into the dimly-lit passage, called out nervously: "Squarky-woo! are you there?" A faint answering squeak echoed up the stairs. "Come up at once," she cried. There was a long pause, and then a feeble broken little sob: "Caught in a trap." The world seemed suddenly to reel round before Mammy-ana's eyes, and it was only with a super-verminous effort that she stopped herself from fainting. Sick with dread, she hurried downstairs, and, guided by the sound of Squarky-woo's voice, made her way straight to the kitchen. At the sight of her darling caught fast in the hideous engine of destruction, the last remnant of hope fled despairingly from her heart.