THE BLIND SIDE
I remember once when I was having dinner in a rather old hotel a mouse came promenading between the tables and I felt compelled to bring the fact to the notice of the waitress, who chose to regard it as nothing uncommon. The mouse was a sort of pet. On another occasion, on one of my very infrequent visits to the cinema, I saw a white mouse and gave the benefit of my observation to the management. An eyebrow was raised. Pink elephants might have seemed more credible, although it could not be
denied that I was quite sober at the time, even if I had claimed to have seen a white mouse. For these reasons, when I spotted the mouse emerging from the elderly lady's basket as she put it down to talk to an acquaintance, I said nothing. It was a field mouse, but I doubted whether the distinction would have been appreciated. The mouse scuttled a yard and then darted back to the side' of the basket, thinking itself hidden. I waited for developments. At length the lady moved. Her companion looked down. 'I think you dropped a potato,' she said as the mouse scampered into the gutter, and then she gave a sort of nervous squeak. By this time the fugitive had found a small culvert or drain coming under the flags and was safe. 'Did you sec that?' exclaimed the lady, getting her breath, but I had seen nothing. It had all passed on my blind side.
Previous page
