The rat was stubborn! Every day, Mom put medicine in the cheese for the rat, but the rat just ate part of the cheese and left the medicine part. It was a mystery how he knew just where the medicine was. The harder Mom tried to get the rat, the more difficult it became. Recently things were also beginning to disappear from the fridge as well. A pie piece was seen here, a bite there in the lasagna; the rat was becoming more of a monster. Berta’s Mom was at her wits’ end. Berta watched Mom’s growing efforts ending in distress every day. She wanted to help but was unable to do so. And very frankly, she did not even try. It was just a rat. How much trouble could it possibly be? A nip here, a bite there…it was just food! Nothing major was happening.
Slowly but steadily, Berta’s toys started disappearing; she started worrying. Her favourite red car, Mr dragon and now even her lights spinner…things were missing mysteriously from her toy box! One night, Berta woke up suddenly. She lay still hoping to fall back asleep, but just then she heard rattling from the fridge. Someone was trying to open the cheesecake box and that too rather noisily. That was unacceptable. How could someone eat her favourite cheesecake that she had been asking Mom to make for so many days? Getting up quietly, Berta tiptoed to the kitchen. Right there in the middle of her kitchen, was a big, fat and ugly looking rat. He was almost as big as a cat. He was trying to eat Berta’s cheesecake! Picking up the nearest heavy thing, a baseball bat, Berta crept behind him. She hit him hard and yelled, “No!” The stunned rat cried in pain. He turned around, staring straight at Berta. Eyes like red bulbs, teeth big as the TV-remote and claws that were as sharp as the kitchen knife…the rat looked ready to attack her! Berta was scared. But she remembered her missing toys and her cheesecake! It made her very angry that the cat-sized and horrifying rat was the one who was taking away her most important things. No longer scared, Berta yelled loudly and charged at the rat, swinging the baseball bat wildly in the air. She hit the rat again in his face, hard! He scampered to the washing area and scurried down the sewage hole. Quickly, Berta plugged the hole closing the only entry from which the rat could come back. Her cheesecake was safe. Now, Berta kept the sewage hole plugged every night.
