The Tale of Despereaux (19 page)

“PRINCESS!” Despereaux shouted. “Princess, I have come to save you.”

The Princess Pea heard her name. She looked up.

“Despereaux,” she whispered.

And then she shouted it, “Despereaux!”

Reader, nothing is sweeter in this sad world than the sound of someone you love calling your name.

Nothing.

For Despereaux, the sound was worth everything: his lost tail, his trip to the dungeon, and back out of it and back into it again.

He ran toward the princess.

But Roscuro, baring his teeth, blocked the mouse’s way.

The princess cried, “Oh no, rat, please. Don’t hurt him. He is my friend.”

Mig said, “Don’t worry, Princess. I will save the meecy.”

She took the kitchen knife. She aimed to cut off the rat’s head, but she missed her mark.

“Whoopsie,” said Miggery Sow.

“OWWWWWWWW!” screamed Roscuro.

He turned to look at where his tail had been, and as he did, Despereaux drew his needle and placed the sharp tip of it right where the rat’s heart should be.

“Don’t move,” said Despereaux. “I will kill you.”

“Ha-ha-ha!” Botticelli laughed from the sidelines. “Exactly.” He slapped his tail on the floor in approval. “Absolutely delightful. A mouse is going to kill a rat. Oh, all of this is much better than I anticipated. I love it when mice come to the dungeon.”

“Let me see,” said the other rats, pushing and shoving.

“Stand back,” Botticelli told them, still laughing. “Let the mouse do his work.”

Despereaux held the trembling needle against Roscuro’s heart. The mouse knew that as a knight, it was his duty to protect the princess. But would killing the rat really make the darkness go away?

Despereaux bowed his head ever so slightly. And as he did so, his whiskers brushed against the rat’s nose.

Roscuro sniffed.

“What . . . is that smell?” he asked.

“Mousie blood!” shouted one rat.

“Blood and bones!” shouted another.

“You’re smelling tears,” said Botticelli. “Tears and thwarted love.”

“Exactly,” said Roscuro. “And yet . . . there’s something else.”

He sniffed again.

And the smell of soup crashed through his soul like a great wave, bringing with it the memory of light, the chandelier, the music, the laughter, everything, all the things that were not, would never, could never be available to him as a rat.

“
Soup,
” moaned Roscuro.

And he began to cry.

“Booooooo!” shouted Botticelli.

“
Sssssssss,
” hissed the other rats.

“Kill me,” said Roscuro. He fell down before Despereaux. “It will never work. All I wanted was some light. That is why I brought the princess here, really, just for some beauty . . . some light of my own.”

“Please,” shouted Botticelli, “do kill him! He is a miserable excuse for a rat.”

“No, Despereaux,” said the princess. “Don’t kill him.”

Despereaux lowered his needle. He turned and looked at the Pea.

“Boooo!” shouted Botticelli again. “Kill him! Kill him. All this goodness is making me sick. I’ve lost my appetite.”

“Gor!” shouted Mig, waving her knife. “I’ll kill him.”

“No, wait,” said the princess. “Roscuro,” she said to the rat.

“What?” he said. Tears were falling out of his eyes and creeping down his whiskers and dripping onto the dungeon floor.

And then the princess took a deep breath and put a hand on her heart.

I think, reader, that she was feeling the same thing that Despereaux had felt when he was faced with his father begging him for forgiveness. That is, Pea was aware suddenly of how fragile her heart was, how much darkness was inside it, fighting, always, with the light. She did not like the rat. She would never like the rat, but she knew what she must do to save her own heart.

And so, here are the words that the princess spoke to her enemy.

She said, “Roscuro, would you like some soup?”

The rat sniffed. “Don’t torment me,” he said.

“I promise you,” said the princess, “that if you lead us out of here, I will get Cook to make you some soup. And you can eat it in the banquet hall.”

“Speaking of eating,” shouted one of the rats, “give us the mousie!”

“Yeah,” shouted another, “hand over the mouse!”

“Who would want him now?” said Botticelli. “The flavor of him will be ruined. All that forgiveness and goodness. Blech. I, for one, am leaving.”

“Soup in the banquet hall?” Roscuro asked the princess.

“Yes,” said the Pea.

“Really?”

“Truly. I promise.”

“Gor!” shouted Mig. “Soup is illegal.”

“But soup is good,” said Despereaux.

“Yes,” said the Pea. “Isn’t it?”

The princess bent down before the mouse. “You are my knight,” she said to him, “with a shining needle. And I am so glad that you found me. Let’s go upstairs. Let’s eat some soup.”

And, reader, they did.

BUT THE QUESTION you want answered, I know, is did they live happily ever after?

Yes . . . and no.

What of Roscuro? Did he live happily ever after? Well . . . the Princess Pea gave him free access to the upstairs of the castle. And he was allowed to go back and forth from the darkness of the dungeon to the light of the upstairs. But, alas, he never really belonged in either place, the sad fate, I am afraid, of those whose hearts break and then mend in crooked ways. But the rat, in seeking forgiveness, did manage to shed some small light, some happiness into another life.

How?

Roscuro, reader, told the princess about the prisoner who had once owned a red tablecloth, and the princess saw to it that the prisoner was released. And Roscuro led the man up out of the dungeon and to his daughter, Miggery Sow. Mig, as you might have guessed, did not get to be a princess. But her father, to atone for what he had done, treated her like one for the rest of his days.

And what of Despereaux? Did he live happily ever after? Well, he did not marry the princess, if that is what you mean by happily ever after. Even in a world as strange as this one, a mouse and a princess cannot marry.

But, reader, they can be friends.

And they were. Together, they had many adventures. Those adventures, however, are another story, and this story, I’m afraid, must now draw to a close.

But before you leave, reader, imagine this: Imagine an adoring king and a glowing princess, a serving girl with a crown on her head and a rat with a spoon on his, all gathered around a table in a banquet hall. In the middle of the table, there is a great kettle of soup. Sitting in the place of honor, right next to the princess, is a very small mouse with big ears.

And peeking out from behind a dusty velvet curtain, looking in amazement at the scene before them, are four other mice.

“
Mon Dieu,
look, look,” says Antoinette. “He lives. He lives! And he seems such the happy mouse.”

“Forgiven,” whispers Lester.

“Cripes,” says Furlough, “unbelievable.”

“Just so,” says the threadmaster Hovis, smiling, “just so.”

And, reader, it is just so.

Isn’t it?

THE END

Do you remember when Despereaux was in the dungeon, cupped in Gregory the jailer’s hand, whispering a story in the old man’s ear?

I would like it very much if you thought of me as a mouse telling you a story, this story, with the whole of my heart, whispering it in your ear in order to save myself from the darkness, and to save you from the darkness, too.

“Stories are light,” Gregory the jailer told Despereaux.

Reader, I hope you have found some light here.