Wee Sweety Mice?

The house burglar alarm went off. I blinked at my watch, the strident tone banging in my ears. It was 3am? What? The alarm crashed on, bouncing off the walls. I got up, stumbled to the flashing panel by the front door and punched in my code. The alarm stopped, the tone still echoing around my head. What was happening? A burglary?  But I hadn’t put the alarm on. I glanced at the control panel, one red light was still flashing. It said ‘tamper’. I racked my tired brain, didn’t that mean the circuit was broken somewhere? Bloody hell, a burglar was preparing to break in? I put the outside lights on and peeked out, holding my breath. It seemed very still and quiet outside. I kept listening. The driveway was gravel and I’d hear any footsteps. Yet the night was dead quiet. The alarm must have scared them away.

Then I heard a scratching noise above my head. Were they on the roof? The scratching continued. It sounded far too slight for a person, was it a bird? I plucked up courage and went outside in my dressing gown with flashlight. Shivering, I shone the beam up into the night. The roof seemed clear. Back indoors, the scratching started again. Must be something in the loft, I thought. I climbed up through the hatchway, my flashlight beam glancing off the roof timbers. Quiet as the grave, nothing seemed to be there. If it was bird, I reckoned, it would have flapped to try and escape. I went back down and closed the hatch; nothing for it but to go back to bed, try to sleep and begin again in daylight.

I lay in bed but couldn’t relax. I kept listening intently for any noise. Soon the scratching started again. Then some scurrying. I gasped: mice of course. It was freezing outside and they’d found a way in to escape the cold. I sighed and turned over; the bastards had gnawed through my alarm cable, I’d sort them out in the morning. I slept fitfully and woke feeling burnt out. First thing, I went up in the loft again; an expanse of timbers and pink insulation, no mice to be seen. I drove into town after breakfast, to the hardware store.

‘I’ve got rodents in my loft’, I told the woman behind the counter.

‘Mice or rats?’ she said with a smile.

‘Don’t know’ I replied.

‘This kills both’ she said, handing me a yellow sachet. ‘You keep putting the bait down until they stop eating it.’

‘How long for?’ I said, holding the sachet gingerly at its corner.

‘Kills rats in a week’ she grinned, ‘mice take a bit longer.’

‘Mice are tougher than rats?’ I said, with a shake of my head.

‘The bait makes them thirsty’ she said, 'they go outside to drink and then the poison reacts.’

‘So they die outside?’ I said.

 She nodded, ‘it does cause them some pain.’
 

‘I don’t mind’ I said, and bought a supply of the sachets.