I. In the Drain

STUART LITTLE

I. In the Drain
 

When Mrs. Frederick C. Little’s second son arrived, everybody noticed that he was not much bigger than a mouse. The truth of the matter was, the baby looked very much like a mouse in every way. He was only about two inches high; and he had a mouse’s sharp nose, a mouse’s tail, a mouse’s whiskers, and the pleasant, shy manner of a mouse. Before he was many days old he was not only looking like a mouse but acting¹ like one, too—wearing a gray hat and carrying a small cane². Mr. and Mrs. Little named him Stuart, and Mr. Little made him a tiny bed out of four clothespins and a cigarette box.

Unlike most babies, Stuart could walk as soon as he was born. When he was a week old he could climb lamps by shinnying up the cord.

Mrs. Little saw right away that the infant clothes she had provided were unsuitable, and she set to work and made him a fine little blue worsted suit with patch pockets in which he could keep his handkerchief, his money, and his keys. Every morning, before Stuart dressed, Mrs. Little went into his room and weighed him on a small scale which was really meant for weighing letters. At birth Stuart could have been sent by first class mail for three cents, but his parents preferred to keep him rather than send him away; and when, at the age of a month, he had gained only a third of an ounce, his mother was so worried she sent for the doctor.

The doctor was delighted with Stuart and said that it was very unusual for an American family to have a mouse. He took Stuart’s temperature and found that it was 98.6, which is normal for a mouse. He also examined Stuart’s chest and heart and looked into his ears solemnly with a flashlight. (not every doctor can look into a mouse’s ear without laughing.) Everything seemed to be all right, and Mrs. Little was pleased to get such a good report.

“Feed him up!” said the doctor cheerfully, as he left.

The home of the Little family was a pleasant place near a park in New York City. In the mornings the sun streamed in through the east windows, and all the Littles were up early as a general rule. Stuart was a great help to his parents, and to his older brother George, because of his small size and because he could do things that a mouse can do and was agreeable about doing them. One day when Mrs. Little was washing out the bathtub after Mr. Little had taken a bath, she lost a ring off her finger and was horrified³ to discover that it had fallen down the drain.

“What had I better do?” she cried, trying to keep the tears back.

“If I were you,” said George, “I should bend a hairpin⁴ in the shape of a fishhook and tie it onto a piece of string and try to fish the ring out with it.” So Mrs. Little found a piece of string and a hairpin, and for about a half-hour she fished for the ring; but it was dark down the drain and the hook always seemed to catch on something before she could get it down to where the ring was.

“What luck?” inquired Mr. Little, coming into the bathroom.

“No luck at all,” said Mrs. Little. “The ring is so far down I can’t fish it up.”

“Why don’t we send Stuart down after it?” suggested Mr. Little. “How about it, Stuart, would you like to try.”

“Yes, I would,” Stuart replied, “but I think I’d better get into my old pants. I imagine it’s wet down there.”

“It’s all of that,” said George, who was a trifle annoyed that his hook idea hadn’t worked. So Stuart slipped into his old pants and prepared to go down the drain after the ring. He decided⁵ to carry the string along with him, leaving one end in charge of his father. “When I jerk three times on the string, pull me up,” he said. And while Mr. Little knelt in the tub, Stuart slid easily down the drain and was lost to view. In a minute or so, there came three quick jerks on the string, and Mr. Little carefully hauled it up. There, at the end, was Stuart, with the ring safely around his neck.

“Oh, my brave little son,” said Mrs. Little proudly, as she kissed Stuart and thanked him.

“How was it down there?” asked Mr. Little, who was always curious to know about places he had never been to.

“It was all right,” said Stuart.

But the truth was the drain had made him very slimy, and it was necessary for him to take a bath and sprinkle himself with a bit of his mother’s violet water before he felt himself again. Everybody in the family thought he had been awfully⁶ good about the whole thing.

1 acting   

n.演戏，行为，假装；adj.代理的，临时的，演出用的

参考例句：

• Ignore her,she's just acting.别理她，她只是假装的。
• During the seventies,her acting career was in eclipse.在七十年代，她的表演生涯黯然失色。

2 cane   

n.手杖，细长的茎，藤条；v.以杖击，以藤编制的

参考例句：

• This sugar cane is quite a sweet and juicy.这甘蔗既甜又多汁。
• English schoolmasters used to cane the boys as a punishment.英国小学老师过去常用教鞭打男学生作为惩罚。

3 horrified   

a.(表现出)恐惧的

参考例句：

• The whole country was horrified by the killings. 全国都对这些凶杀案感到大为震惊。
• We were horrified at the conditions prevailing in local prisons. 地方监狱的普遍状况让我们震惊。

4 hairpin   

n.簪,束发夹，夹发针

参考例句：

• She stuck a small flower onto the front of her hairpin.她在发簪的前端粘了一朵小花。
• She has no hairpin because her hair is short.因为她头发短，所以没有束发夹。

5 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

6 awfully   

adv.可怕地，非常地，极端地

参考例句：

• Agriculture was awfully neglected in the past.过去农业遭到严重忽视。
• I've been feeling awfully bad about it.对这我一直感到很难受。