I, Houdini
Lynne Reid Banks

The autobiography of a self-educated hamster

Illustrated by Susan Hellard

To Adiel (Mark), Gillon (Adam) and Omri (Guy). And also to the ‘Weissim’, especially David and Annette, without whom we would never have met Houdini.

Table of Contents

Cover Page

Title Page

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

MORE THAN A STORY

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About the Author

Also by Lynne Reid Banks

Copyright

About the Publisher

Chapter One

I am Houdini.

No, no, no. Not that one – of course not. He’s dead long ago. Besides, he was a human being and I am a hamster. But let me assure you, that as my namesake was no ordinary man, I am no ordinary animal.

Well, that much is fairly obvious, isn’t it? I mean, what ordinary hamster even knows he’s a hamster? What ordinary hamster can think, reason, observe – in a word, educate himself? Show me the hamster, anywhere, with an intellect, a vocabulary like mine! You can’t. Nor can you show me one which can live with humans on a footing of absolute equality because he can understand their language, and because, quite frankly, he has more brains in his head than most of them have.

I fear you will think me conceited. I assure you I’m not. It’s merely that I have a just and objective appreciation of my own exceptional qualities. It would be as futile to deny that I am exceptional, as it would be for an ordinary hamster to boast that he was my equal.

Besides, if I were conceited I would claim to be perfect. I don’t. Certainly not! I have my faults and weaknesses, my moments of frailty. I too have made mistakes, succumbed to temptations. But I think I may fairly claim to have built up my character, over the months of my long life, until not many fingers could be pointed at me in accusation. Indisputably I conduct myself with more wisdom, ingenuity and restraint than many of the humans I see about me – not that that’s saying much.

Here, then, is the story of my life so far. From it you may judge if I am not, in truth, as extraordinary in my ways as the Great Houdini was in his.

My birth and infancy are almost lost in the mists of memory. I think I may have begun life in a pet shop. It was certainly a large, cold, airy place, exceedingly smelly. Every now and then I catch a whiff which carries me back to those dimly remembered early days

– when a friend of my family brings a dog to the house, for instance, and once when I met a mouse, which I shall tell about in its turn.

At all events it was not a bad place, and I remember I had companions of my own kind there, who gave me warmth by day when we all cuddled up together to sleep.

It’s strange that, when I think now about living with other hamsters, I shudder with horror at the idea. With one exception I have never seen another hamster since I became mature. And believe me I never want to. If I ever did see one, I believe I would be overcome with rage, and fly to attack it. Why this should be, I don’t know, for I have a very calm temper as a rule, and despise those who lose their self-control (something I see all too often in this house, I regret to say). So, whatever I have to complain of in my life, it is not loneliness. I am never lonely.

My worst trial here was imprisonment. I say ‘was’ because luckily it happens less and less now. The Father is my worst enemy in this respect. He has very fixed ideas about ‘pets’ (as I suppose I must laughingly call myself, taking the human point of view). “Pets are all right in their place,” he keeps on saying. (He does tend to repeat things, a sign of a small mind). His notion of my place is, of course, my cage, and wherever and whenever he catches me, he grabs me up and stuffs me back through that dreaded little entrance-tunnel, and claps in the round stopper. He never seems to believe it when the boys tell him I’ve even found a way round that.

Anyway, it doesn’t worry me too much any more. The Mother, or one of the children, will soon take pity on me if I just go about it the right way, if I can’t get out by myself. So I just whip up the tubes into my loft, unearth something tasty from my store, and then curl up and go to sleep. I must say it’s quite cosy up there since they put the bits of flannel shirt in, though I much prefer my nest under the kitchen floor. One does tend to prefer a home of one’s own choice, arranged and decorated to suit oneself.

Here I go, rambling on about the present when I really meant to tell the story of my life. I just wanted to make it crystal clear that I am – well, shall we say, rather unusual? Rambling has always been one of my weaknesses, I just have to follow my nose wherever it takes me – and some fine scrapes it’s led me into, I must say!

Well, so I am, as I say, a rather extraordinary and quite exceptional ‘little furry animal’ as some people call anything smaller than a pony which runs around on four legs and can’t actually talk. I call them large hairless animals, and I try to use, in my thought, the same degree of superiority that humans do about us. I must admit that nothing infuriates me more than being treated as a pet, picked up, stroked (usually the wrong way), made to climb or jump or run or whatever it is my supposed owners want – and as for eating from their hands and all that sort of degrading nonsense, I’ve no time for it.

Mind you, my protest against this sort of thing is, nowadays, limited to trying to avoid it by escaping, which is my speciality (hence my name). I wouldn’t dream of biting, which I regard as very uncivilised behaviour. ‘Brain, not brawn’ is my motto. Besides, they’re so vulnerable with their bare skins, it’s not really sporting when you’ve got jaws and teeth like mine. I won’t say I’ve never bitten anyone, but the feeling of shame I had after letting myself go was awful, not to mention the disgusting taste…

Anyway, as I said, I was bought (it sounds so quaint!) from wherever-it-was and brought here at an early age. I wasn’t half the size I am now, and of course I was entirely ignorant. I didn’t even know that I was a hamster, let alone a golden one – I learnt that from listening to the children, whose speech I soon picked up just by keeping my ears open.

At first I was too agitated to learn anything, however. I well remember my first night here. They put me into a deep cardboard box with some water and grain in separate bowls. I don’t suppose they meant to keep me there.

They hadn’t bought a cage yet, which was silly of them, because inside ten minutes I had discovered that my claws could get quite an easy grip on the roughish sides of the box, provided I used the corner to give myself purchase as I climbed. It took three or four attempts, but I am nothing if not persevering and I was soon hanging over the top. It looked rather a long way to the floor (amazing, when I think of the heights I can jump now!) but even then I was no coward, and half-jumped, half-slithered down the outside, head first.

I was in a large, open area which I now know like the back of my paw, but which was a whole unknown world to me then. Like the idiot I am not, as a rule, I hadn’t stored any of the grain in my cheeks before leaving the box, and now I was free I could have done with a morsel of something, but it was too late to think of that. Escape was then, as now, my main objective, and I was about to sample my first taste of real freedom.

The area was a room which the Father uses as a kind of workshop. Apart from the kitchen, where my nest is, I think it’s now my favourite room in the house, because it is so beautifully untidy. It is full of things to explore and wonderful places to hide, and I spent the rest of that night doing both to my heart’s content. You must remember, I’d never been free before, and I’m certain that this first blissful taste of it was what gave me my life-long passion for escape, concealment and exploration.

I climbed into tool boxes and under heaps of sacking; clambered up a big soft mountain which turned out to be a battered armchair, and fell off into a wastepaper basket (fortunately wicker – those smooth-sided metal ones are death-traps to me). I ran behind huge bits of furniture and took a quick nap under a lovely warm radiator (after foolishly trying to climb up it and burning my paws. I was always very wary of sources of heat after that).

I made several attempts to climb the telephone wire, and got so exasperated because I couldn’t that I eventually chewed it right through. I chewed quite a lot of other things as well. I didn’t know any better in those days, or for quite a while afterwards, to tell the truth. I’m afraid those teeth of mine, with their constant need of being worn down lest they grow through my skin, led me to be very destructive when I was young. I’ve often made excuses for the Father’s intolerant attitude to me because of this. But of course I didn’t know anything about destructiveness then. When I saw something chewable, I just chewed, and I chewed a fair amount that first night, I can tell you. Apart from anything else I was trying to find something to eat.

Eventually the obvious solution occurred to me. I went back to the box. It wasn’t hard to find, even in that vast area, because of the delicious smells of food and water pouring over the top of it. I didn’t think I could climb back into it because the corners were the wrong sort from outside, but I walked round it and found they’d carelessly left it standing against a pile of telephone directories. Of course I was up these like a flight of steps, plopped back into the box, had a long drink and stuffed my cheeks till they would hold no more. It was a lot harder to climb out with all that load weighing me down, but determination won the day and soon I was safe and warm under the radiator having a good feast before settling down for my day’s well-earned sleep.

Well, I didn’t sleep long, needless to say. I had hardly dozed off before an appalling hullabaloo broke out in the vicinity of my abandoned box.

“He’s gone! Goldy’s gone!” shrieked Guy, who was then only five. He’d come to say good morning to me before going to school, and, finding me gone, fell into an uproar. Floods of tears, wails and cries – dear me, it was all very unpleasant and deplorable. I knew nothing about the modern child in those days and was both alarmed and shocked. (I seem to remember now that my Mother used to nip us if we so much as squeaked. Perhaps that’s why I hardly ever utter a sound.)

His two brothers, Mark and Adam (as I later learnt were their names) came running in, followed by the Mother. A search was put in hand, and I would have been speedily found if I had not scurried off, keeping to the wall which was luckily blocked in by furniture for most of its length, to a tailor-made hiding-place I had noted the night before. I had not chosen it for my day-nest for two reasons. One, I hadn’t known I was in any danger, so security had not seemed more important than warmth and comfort. Two, it was dirty. I never liked the smell of dust, and I am fastidious, so I have never ventured into dirty places except in an emergency. But this was one – I could see the Mother’s feet bearing down on me across the boarded floor – so I just slipped through a hole in the skirting and found myself in a draughty dark cave.

Instinct told me I was now perfectly safe. There were so many places I could have been concealed that, to the boys’ rage and dismay, the Mother soon told them that the hunt was hopeless. They were bundled off to school, bitterly complaining, and Guy still, alas, in tears. Later in my life I gained enough sensibility to feel uneasy if I had made any of the children sad, but at that time I had no room in my heart for anything but selfish satisfaction that I had evaded them.

I made a rough nest for myself in the inch-deep fluff, put my nose between my back legs and fell instantly asleep.

Chapter Two

I was captured again the same night.

I had made the mistake of de-cheeking all the grain I had brought from the box, under the radiator, where I had had to leave it when I ran to the hole. So when I woke up in the evening, I was starving. I remembered at once where the food was and, cautiously emerging from my hiding-place, crept back along the wall to reclaim my little hoard.

It was gone. True, I found two or three grains of wheat and one sunflower seed, which I gobbled up. There was still a strong smell of food, so I poked my nose out from under the radiator and saw a trail of grain leading temptingly off into the distance – right across the open floor. Fool that I was (then), I trotted obligingly out to collect up this trail, but was scarcely halfway along when I was pounced on.

I got the fright of my life, and I may be forgiven for trying to bite on that occasion – anyone would have done the same. But the Father (it was he who had trapped me) had a thick glove on, and my teeth were not then what they are now. Holding me firmly he carried me some distance and then put me down.

I stopped hissing (I no longer hiss when enraged, but most primitive hamsters do – it is a danger signal) and looked round. I was in a deep plastic bin with straight, shiny walls. I didn’t bother to entertain the Father, who was hanging over the top watching me, by trying to climb them – one look showed me it was useless. I simply crouched where I was, seething with fury. After a while the giant head above me vanished, and I heard his voice calling the children.

Soon their three faces were hanging above me. They were all grinning with excitement.

“How did you catch him, Daddy?” (Of course I didn’t understand the actual words then, but my imagination must be allowed some rein here.)

This question, put by Adam, was followed by a self-satisfied description of his brilliant coup by the Father. Meanwhile Guy’s little hand crept towards me, fingers temptingly extended. The middle one, as it approached my face, was just the perfect diameter for my mouth to enclose, and it must be remembered, in mitigation of the crime I then committed, that I had just been caught and imprisoned by one too big and well-gloved for me to revenge myself on. Nevertheless it was nothing less than wicked of me to sink my teeth into that little bare fingertip and I cannot now think of it without shame.

The truly awful shriek that followed simply shattered my nerves. I think it was the noise, more than the taste, that taught me my first lesson in manners. The Mother rushed in and carried Guy off. Adam and Mark began scolding me. The commotion was terrifying. Though I couldn’t then make out the exact words, I knew that everyone was angry with me, and that the Father was threatening me. All my own anger had melted away into fear and confusion.

I cowered down, but the inside of the plastic dustbin (that was where he’d put me) offered no hiding-place and I felt dreadfully exposed. Nothing is worse than having nowhere to hide. Even my eyes were hurt by the bright light, and I shut them. After a while the hubbub died down. I ventured to look up. The rim of the bin, far above me, was blank – all the faces had gone. I felt frightened and miserable. I ran round a few times and put my front paws up against those slippery unclimbable sides. No use. I crouched there, filled with a sense of hopelessness, for I had no experience to fall back on which might have told me what to expect.

I had fallen into a miserable half-sleep when something soft fell on me. Opening my eyes with a jerk of fright, I found myself covered with some light, soft stuff, which blocked off some of the light and gave me the feeling of being safe and hidden. I began at once to make a nest in it.

Once I glanced up. The Mother was hanging over the rim, watching me. She spoke to me, but not harshly. Considering I’d recently bitten her young one, I realise now she was showing a very forgiving nature. Also an understanding one, for when her natural anger cooled, she had realised what I needed most – bedding – and had given me some paper shavings.

Some time later she brought me a dish of food and some water, but by that time, I was comfortably asleep and I didn’t find it till I woke up in the evening.

Evenings are always my active time. I had had a good sleep, despite my upset, and when I’d had something to eat I felt ready for anything. And soon enough things started to happen.

Mark arrived. He was wearing gloves now, thick leather ones, though if he had but known it there was no need for them – nothing short of a direct attack on me would have induced me to bite him. Very cautiously he reached down and, after a short chase – I was not anxious to be picked up – caught and lifted me.

Now, I have said I don’t mind being held – not for long periods. But I don’t mind sitting in between two warm hands, well supported by the one below and gently stroked by the one above. This pleasant experience now happened to me for the first time. I was nervous of course, and trembled a good bit, but Mark has a feeling for animals and I sensed this at once, the way one can. He put his face close to me and his warm, boy-smelling breath came over me. I don’t know why, but being breathed on by a human gives one confidence, provided, of course, once does not instinctively sense danger. There was nothing menacing about Mark’s breath, and his face looked kind and interested.

We stared and breathed at each other for some moments. Then I tried to get away. I always do this after being held for a short time. It’s really no more than a natural restlessness. Mark endeared himself to me by understanding this. He relaxed his upper hand and let me run up his arm. He was wearing a woollen sweater which gave me ample footholds – I love climbing up rough knitted surfaces – and I was soon exploring his shoulders, poking my nose between his collar and his neck, and even sniffing around his pink ears. He wriggled and giggled. I suppose I was tickling him. After a while he lifted me down again, stroked me soothingly for a few minutes more, and then laid me gently on his knee.

Now it shouldn’t be thought that I had been deliberately lulling him into a sense of false security by not trying to escape before. I was too far from the ground then, and I knew it. But now he was sitting down and I had only to make a dash head-first down his trouser-leg and I was on the floor and running like mad.

Mark dived after me, but too late. I had dashed under the frill of a sofa-cover and by the time he had lifted it to peer underneath, I was already three pieces of furniture away, crouching beneath a desk. The next thing was an upright piano, but there was quite a gap between the desk and it, and I could see Mark’s shoes, turning slowly in the middle of the floor, watching for me to make a dash. I waited till the heels were towards me and then I ran. Ran! I skimmed. Mark just caught a glimpse of me and spun round, but too late! I was safely behind the piano and there was nothing he could do about it.

It was not a very well-made piano, and it was easy enough to get in through a hole in the back. The innards were fascinating, quite the most exciting playground I had even been in. Human athletes, whom I have seen on television, have gyms to exercise in, with all sorts of apparatus. Hamsters have pianos – at least, they should all have them, if humans were understanding enough or the hamsters themselves were cunning enough to escape and find them. I would certainly recommend a good upright piano to any hamster who fancied himself as an athlete.

It was in my piano that I first learnt muscle-control, agility, how to fall correctly, how to swing by front and back paws, how to jump horizontally, diagonally and perpendicularly and, of course, how to climb. I mean really climb, where some might find the going impossible. Nothing could be more useful, believe me, in the life of an escapologist who frequently has to fend and forage for himself. If I had not trained in the piano, I doubt if I could have navigated the vegetable rack, let alone climbed up into the biscuit drawer, three shelves up in the kitchen cupboard…But I must not get ahead of my story.

Well! If I had enjoyed my freedom in the Father’s workroom, how much more did I enjoy the fun of my freedom in the piano! I may say that before the night was out I had thoroughly explored most of its lower half, though I was not yet skilful enough to mount to its higher regions. I was fortunate in one thing. It should have been perfectly dark in there, for how could light get in? Yet it was not. Quite a lot of light filtered down from somewhere above, as if through a window, and, until the family (who had given up hunting for me) had gone to bed, switching off the lights, I was able to enjoy myself, clambering around swinging, diving, and so on, to my heart’s content.

When the darkness did come, I was able to come out of the piano (I was still small and supple enough in those days to squeeze through the holes around the pedals) and give the whole living-room a good going over before bedding down in the wastepaper basket among the bits of paper and cigarette packets. I was completely hidden and felt quite safe.

Alas! The short jump I had had to make to get down into the basket from the upholstered chair had misled me – I thought in my ignorance it would be equally easy to getout. But the sides of this container were not wicker, but metal, and thus in the morning I was speedily detected because of my frantic scrabblings among the rustling papers.

Back to the bin. But I was not in despair this time. Experience had taught me that opportunities for escape would present themselves if I waited patiently. And so they did.

Chapter Three

How I hated that bin! Even with the shavings, and various bits and pieces the boys put in from time to time, it was a loathsome dungeon to me. Not only could I not get out; I couldn’t see out. There was no way to take any real exercise; nothing to play with (I was still a youngster then, and needed toys) and nothing to do. No challenges. No opportunities. No amusements. Only – after that first, blissful outing – hope.

I was taken out fairly frequently, once the boys realised that that one bite had been an aberration. They all became fond of me (as I of them, in a way) and liked to take me out and play with me, especially as an alternative to helping their Mother, doing their homework or practising the piano. (I’m sorry to say not one of them is what I’d call diligent.)

But it was not every time that I could elude them. They were obviously pretty careful after my escape from Mark. I don’t blame them for that. It became clear to me from the beginning that our views and objectives were, and presumably always would be, quite different – even opposed. They regarded me as their pet, their plaything – their possession. They wanted to know where I was, to know that I was available whenever they wanted me. I knew myself to be a freedom-loving individual, belonging to no one. I wanted to be free, to live my own life in my own way. It wasn’t so much that I positively objected to being fed, petted and played with. I just knew, right from the start, that the whole business of my life was to be – escape.

The boys soon knew it too. That was why they changed my name. This happened after I’d been in the house about a week, and had escaped four times. The fourth time I ran away from Adam.

Adam, who is a bit of a fibber, will tell you I bit him. Nonsense. No need. Adam is a highly imaginative child – not a coward at all, but hampered by being able to picture to himself what may happen and how certain unpleasant eventualities would hurt. Thus one only has to give a sudden jump in his hand and he will drop one like a hot brick. Sometimes it’s enough to turn one’s head swiftly towards his thumb, without even baring one’s teeth…The thing is, not to do it when he is standing up, and always to be ready for the drop when he lets go.

I first tried this out when he had me in his bed one night. I think I dimly realised even then that he was disobeying his Mother, when he stealthily carried me up the darkened stairway into his room. There he switched on a torch under the bedclothes and trained it on me while I scurried about in the soft, warm caves, looking, as ever, for a way out. Finally he tired of this game and scooped me up in his hand, dangling me over the edge of the bed. That was when, sensing his slight uneasiness, I tried out my little jump.

It worked splendidly. In another moment I was on the floor – I landed quite well for a novice, rolling over once to break my fall – and the next second I was bolting for the fireplace.

What made me go for that, I don’t know. In a newer sort of house (such as I spent some time in later) I would have found my way blocked by some gas or electrical barrier. But this was an old house, and the original fireplaces were still there. No fire, of course; but a grate, and the iron bars the fire is made on. I got down through a broken bar and lay in the ashy darkness while poor Adam scampered round with his torch, fruitlessly hunting for me. I heard him desperately whispering, “Goldy! Goldy!” My sympathy was aroused, for I knew he would get into trouble; but I was not going to let myself be ‘binned’ again just for that.

I lay still. I’d learnt that they could often locate me by sound. After a while, the poor child crept back into bed. I heard him sniffing to himself a bit. Then the torch went off, and all was quiet.

I quietly climbed through the gap on to the bars, and from there I made my way to the corner at the back of the fireplace. The bricks were rough and covered with old soot and cinders clinging to the wall. Just for fun, I began to climb, all my four feet outspread, clinging with all my claws – rough surface or not, it was sheer. Up and up I climbed, until I found myself on a little sloping ledge. I didn’t realise I was right up inside the chimney. I could feel cold air coming down and, by looking up, I could see vast distances into a starry sky. I’d never seen outdoors before, even through a window. It frightened me – yes. But it intrigued me too.

I couldn’t sleep on this ledge, and I didn’t fancy climbing any higher, so I slid down again into the grate. Then I began to explore the room.

Young as I was, I knew where the entrance to the room was because of the draught of air blowing under the door. I knew that through there lay absolute freedom. I snuffled the length of the draught and, finding a crack that led upward, decided that was the place to chew. I settled down to it. The carpet was easy and I soon had a pile, almost as big as myself, of red fluff heaped around me. Finding this didn’t open the door, I began on the wood of the door itself.

A grown-up would have woken at the gnawing noise I was making, but Adam slept placidly on, snoring slightly. It was lovely to gnaw. I hadn’t realised the joy of it till I really got down to it. I loved the feeling of the hard, resistant wood, gradually being worn away by my teeth, and wearing the teeth away at the same time – something that must happen if my teeth, which grow all the time, are not to grow right through my cheeks and lips. I had no notion, of course, that I was doing any wrong. I gnawed until I had quite forgotten what I was trying to do. The gnawing became an end in itself.

At last I sensed that morning was coming. I was healthily and happily tired – and frightfully thirsty of course. I could smell water in the room and soon traced it to its source. It was on a wooden chair beside Adam’s bed. That chair was no easy matter to climb, for its legs were smooth and it had only one bar. Four or five times I fell back before I finally made it to the seat, but there was my reward – a mug of water. It was too tall for me to rink out of easily, so I stood erect and put my front paws on to the rim.

In another moment I was on the floor, soaked to the skin.

It gave me a fright, I can tell you. Of course I know better now than to tip a full mug of water over myself. And I hadn’t even had a drink! Luckily Adam sleeps like a log. Despite the clatter he just grunted, rolled over – and silence fell once more; so I was able to creep back to the leg of the chair and drink as much as I liked from the little trickle that was still pouring from above like a hamster-sized waterfall.

Feeling, despite my few blunders, quite satisfied with my night’s work, I now returned to the grate and made myself a scratch-nest among the ancient ashes, which were remarkably snug and comfortable. I could have done with some protection overhead when full daylight came and I can’t say I slept well. In any case I was soon woken by the most fearful hullabaloo. This was because Mark had found I was not in the bin. Suspicion at once fell on Guy (suspicion always tends to fall on Guy because he’s naturally mischievous) but Adam, though, as I’ve said, not an entirely truthful boy, was not one to stand by and see his little brother falsely accused. I’m pleased to say he owned up. After that the entire family descended on his room – and then the real ructions began.

I had already picked up some of their speech, so I can give more or less verbatim the scene that followed.

“Crumbs, what’s all this mess by the door?”

“Look at the carpet! He’s gnawed it right to the backing!”

“Never mind the damn carpet—” (this was the Father, fairly roaring with rage). “Look what it’s done to the wood!” (The Father always, I found, referred to me as ‘it’.) “Wasn’t it enough that we had to spend a fortune getting the telephone wire replaced? Are we going to have to have new carpets and new doors all over he house?”

“Adam, how could you?” (The Mother, very reproachful.)

Adam began boo-hooing. “I only wanted to play with him—”

“So why did you let him go, stupid?” This was Mark, very superior.

Then came the lie direct. Well, I don’t blame him. He was right on the spot, poor lad. “He bit me and I dropped him!”

“Let me see the place,” said the Mother, instantly concerned.

“Yeah, let’s see it – if it’s there,” said Mark in quite a different tone.

“It’s – it’s healed in the night.”

“Huh! A likely tale,” said the Father. “Now you children listen to me! That wretched little housewrecker (he meant me!) is to be found, caught and put in the bin. Furthermore it is to stay there until a cage can be bought for it.”

“Fanny’s giving us a proper hamster cage for Christmas,” said Guy. Fanny, I was to learn, was their grandmother.

I’d been trying to ignore the whole row and get to sleep till that point, but now I pricked up my ears. I didn’t like the word ‘cage’ one bit. Still…It had to be better than that vile bin.

“CHRISTMAS!” yelled the Father. “That’s three weeks away! The little beast (me again!) will bring the whole house down around our ears if we don’t do something about it before then!”

“Maybe we could ask Fanny to give it to us now.”

“Good. Do that. Buy it today. But meanwhile nothing – no playing, no television, no food – until that thing’s been caught and incarcerated in the bin where I can keep an eye on it!”

Well!

There wasn’t much option for me after that but to scuttle across the floor and let them catch me. Very self-sacrificing of me, wasn’t it? Still, knowing that a proper home was in the offing, and that in all probability my stay in the bin that day would be my last, I decided to be decent and spare the poor kids the useless agony of hunting for me.

I was rewarded for my noble action with the most ear-splitting shouts the moment they saw me. If only hamsters could cover their ears!

“Holy Mackerel! Look at him!”

“He’s not golden any more – he’s black!”

I hadn’t stopped to think what I must look like. All my fur was stained with soot and thick with ashes. The water had just made me look more filthy and bedraggled. Of course I should have taken time to clean myself before settling down to sleep. It was another useful lesson for me, and never since have I let a day pass without giving myself a thorough licking and grooming.

Mark was holding me in his hands and scolding me.

“You bad, bad hamster!”

I stared at him defiantly.

“We can’t call you Goldy any more. You’re not worthy of such a nice name.”

“I know what we ought to call it,” said the Father grumpily as he went out. “Housebreaker.”

“No,” said the Mother. “I know! Let’s call him after the great American escapologist – Houdini.”

And that’s how I got my true name. And when I found out about my namesake, believe me I was proud of it.

Chapter Four

Of course the children wanted to know all about Houdini, and so did I, as you may imagine. The Mother put them off for the moment, but that night, when they were ready for bed, she told them about him like a story. Fortunately I had given them the slip again by then and was under Guy’s bed (a nice low one, with a frill-thing right to the floor which he hates but I love) and heard all about my namesake.

Houdini, in case you don’t know, was an American of Italian parentage who began by doing conjuring tricks and ended up as the most famous escapologist of all time. An escapologist, of course, is someone whose profession is escaping. It’s an act, like an act in a circus or on the stage. His helpers would tie him up tight with ropes, chains and handcuffs, and so on, then they’d put him in a thick sack which they’d fasten at the neck; after that they’d wrap more chains round the sack, padlock them, and then – if you can believe it – they’d often hang him up by the feet a couple of yards off the ground. Then they’d give him the old ‘ready, steady, go’, the drums would roll, and in a matter of a few minutes somehow or other he’d have wriggled free. Don’t ask me how. Nobody ever really knew his secret. Of course he must have had flexible bones, and joints that would bend backwards, and he had a few obvious tricks like swelling himself up while they were tying him so the knots wouldn’t be so tight. Still, there was more to it than that – more than anyone ever found out.

One of the most extraordinary things he ever did was to go over a waterfall, tied up in a barrel. He even survived that, though he was bruised.

Naturally it was hard for me to understand all this at the time. I hadn’t then watched all the television, and seen all the pictures that I have now, which meant I really didn’t have a clue about handcuffs, chains, waterfalls, etc. But I realised that this human had been world-famous for the very thing I had already decided to dedicate my life to. I shuddered at the idea of being tied up or dangled in mid-air, and hoped nothing so terrible would ever happen to me; but I determined then and there that no matter what challenges faced me in the future, even those, I would try to overcome them. After all, I had one priceless advantage over the human Houdini. I had rodent teeth. Ropes would be nothing to me. And when it came to flexible bones, and being able to make oneself look bigger and then squirm through places you’d think a snake couldn’t get through…I betted I could hold my own in that respect with the greatest escapologist ever.

I was able to prove this, and a great deal more, very soon.

My new home arrived the following day. The boys came charging into the house with cries of “Where’s Houdini? We’ve got his cage.” But I was nowhere to be found, having, as I mentioned, got away the previous evening. I was, in point of fact, exploring a new room – Mark’s – and when I heard them tramping about looking for me I dived into a very small hole I’d noticed earlier, in the floor by the fireplace. I swear a fair-sized mouse might have got stuck in it, but I made myself into the merest thread of my former self and in a moment I found myself huddled in the deep dust between the joists.

These are long planks standing on edge which you’ll find between the floor of an upstairs room and the ceiling of a downstairs room. Between them are long spaces, roadways to someone my size, and as there were plenty of places where I could climb over the tops of the joists I had what then seemed like a huge playground.

For a while I rejoiced. They would never catch me now! How could they? There was only the one way in, and not even a child could get his hand through that! Happily and, I fear, smugly, I made a nest in a very warm corner near where I had come in (I like a bit of light). I did wonder at the time just why it was so warm; I didn’t have the experience to realise that that thick, long, hot thing nearby was a hot-water pipe. It was much too hot to touch, but it gave off enough warmth to make me comfortable and sleepy. I curled up and dropped off, not feeling the least bit guilty about the row that was going on about me overhead.

I woke up feeling distinctly uncomfortable. To begin with the heat had increased to a point where I had dreamt I was being roasted alive. I jumped up hastily and moved to a cooler spot. There was no light coming through the hole now, I noticed, so I decided that it would be perfectly safe to pop up and attend to my other discomfort – hunger.

I hadn’t managed to eat much the day before, what with one thing and another; that’s the trouble with escaping upstairs, there’s very little food lying about, and I hadn’t yet thought of leaving stores hidden in various strategic places all over the house. I realised I’d probably have to go downstairs to forage. I’d already seen the stairs, while being carried up and down them; they were thickly carpeted and I felt sure I could manage them all right, though getting back up might be a bit of an effort.

I returned to the spot, below the hole, where I had been sleeping. It was awful just standing there, right next to that pipe – if hamsters could sweat, I’d have been wringing wet. I looked upwards. I could just about see the hole. I stood up on my back legs idiotically convinced that if I stretched to my fullest height I would somehow miraculously find myself climbing out. But alas! The hole was a good twice or three times my height above me.

When I realised this I didn’t lose my head, at least, not until I had explored every possibility. I climbed on to the top edge of the nearest joist and ran to and fro, but it didn’t pass near enough to the hole. The only thing that did, was that wretched hot pipe. I could see an easy way on to that, further along, and once on top of it nothing could be simpler than to run to the hole and climb out – it passed just nicely under it. But who could stand on a thing like that? Even standing near it I felt my fur was scorching.

Now I did begin to panic. I’m ashamed to admit I felt really sick with fear. How would I ever get out? How would I live if I had to stay in here? My nose had already told me there wasn’t so much as a mouldy breadcrumb anywhere in the large space between the floors where I now grimly realised I was trapped. As for water! Not a drop of course. And wasn’t I beginning to be thirsty, what with the heat and my growing terror!

A grown-up hamster who’s got himself into a mess will, if he’s got any sense, at once sit down, partly to conserve energy and partly to think. I behaved ridiculously. I ran round in circles, I made funny little noises that I hadn’t known I could make; I climbed up on the joist and fell off it again; I even tried to climb the pipe, and hurt my paws of course. Oh, that pipe! It was maddening to see the way it lay, just beneath the hole, offering the perfect escape route, and yet – impossible to use.

At last I was fairly worn out. I couldn’t sleep, I was too distracted, but I did lie down, at some distance from the hole, and just stared at it in misery. I supposed I would just waste away there in the dusty dark, slowly starve to death and be found, perhaps, years later, a mouldering skeleton…If hamsters could weep, I would have wept, with frustration, fear and self-pity, though of course I’d brought it all on myself.

Morning came. A ray of light fell through the hole. I heard Mark moving about above me. And suddenly I knew what to do.

When I’d escaped before I had often been caught when accidentally or carelessly making a noise. Hamsters have no proper voice, as I’ve said, though they can utter faint squeaks and hisses; but their feet scrabbling on a hard surface draws attention to them. Now I had to draw Mark’s attention. But how? It wasn’t so easy in that hot hell-hole I’d landed myself in. The floor was thick with dust and I could walk there without a sound. The joists were the same. The pipe was metal and I could have made a terrific row on that, but…! So what was I to do? In a flash of genius it came to me.

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