From Robinson Crusoe

Chapter 90 The Motherless Mouse
The white gravel on the hillside reflects the sunlight, making the entire hillside dazzlingly colorful. From a distance, it looks like a pool of water on the mountain.

It was the hottest time of the day, and all the chinchillas huddled in their caves to avoid the scorching sun.

Near the woods at the foot of the slope, the dense vegetation slightly weakened the power of the scorching sun and the temperature dropped slightly.

Lai Fu stopped beside a cave entrance, looked up at Chen Zhou who was carrying a load on his shoulder, and from time to time he lowered his head and scratched the ground with his paws. He looked very anxious, but did not bark.

This is the habit Chen Zhou cultivated for the rabbit when catching it.

Hares have keen hearing. When you approach one, even if one hears a loud bark or steps on a dead branch and it breaks, you may waste half an hour or even longer of tracking. Keeping quiet is the most basic requirement for tracking.

"Don't worry, they are hiding in the cave and won't run around."

Not long after, Chen Zhou walked to Lai Fu, put down the carrying pole, rubbed its head and comforted it.

Woof~
Lai Fu cried softly, patted the entrance of the hole with his paws, stuck his head out and tried to put his mouth into the hole, and his tail wagged even more vigorously.

"What? Is there something else in this cave?"

Feeling that Lai Fu's behavior was abnormal, Chen Zhou grabbed its neck and led it to the side of the cave, looking at the cave carefully.

There are many chinchilla shelters nearby, and a quick comparison shows that this hole is indeed different from the chinchilla hole.

The size of the cave entrance is smaller than that of the chinchilla cave. The surrounding weeds are sparse and the outer wall of the cave is not as smooth and clean as that of the chinchilla cave. There are even pieces of soil on the upper edge that have fallen into the cave. It can be seen that this cave has not been used for a long time or the creatures in the cave do not like to keep clean.

“Looking at the size of the hole, it’s probably not a chinchilla hole, and it’s even less likely to be a rabbit hole.

If it was a rat hole, there was no rat droppings or rat hair around it.

But there are only a few animals on this island that can dig holes, what could this be?"

Frowning, Chen Zhou couldn't guess what was hidden in the cave discovered by Lai Fu.

At this time, he really hoped that Lai Fu could be smarter and learn how to speak.

If it could really communicate, with its sensitive dog nose and excellent athletic ability, all the goats, wild pigeons and rabbits on the island would have nowhere to hide.

His curiosity aroused, Chen Zhou brought over a bucket of water and picked up a large wooden cup for scooping water, and prepared to start pouring the hole directly.

Before taking action, you still have to be prepared for the "cunning rabbit having three burrows".

Looking around, he found two cave entrances of similar size not far from this cave. He picked up some rubble to plug the two entrances, then covered them with some soil, and then returned to the cave entrance where Lai Fu was hiding.

"You go over there first, I'm going to start."

Worried that there might be poisonous snakes or insects hiding in the cave, Chen Zhou drove Lai Fu two meters away before taking action.

Afterwards, he did not stay facing the cave entrance, but squatted above the cave, stretched out his arms to keep a distance, then picked up the wooden cup and started filling it with water.

Although he is wearing leather boots and long pants, he has certain defensive capabilities.

But the potential threat of venomous snakes was really terrible. Chen Zhou had to squat when pouring water into the hole, and if he was not careful, he might still get bitten on his fingers or wrists. He did not dare to take such a risk.

……

Keeping a safe distance, they poured water into the hole cup by cup.

The dry soil absorbed the moisture, and the water seeped down as if falling into a bottomless pit, and there was no unusual sound at all.

The bucket of water was soon empty. Holding the large wooden cup, Chen Zhou even suspected the possibility that Fu had lied about military intelligence.

Even if the soil is short of water during the dry season and half of the bucket of water is sucked away, it is impossible that the remaining half bucket of water will not even come out, unless there is nothing in the hole.

"Laifu, are you sure? Are there really living things here?"

While carrying another bucket of water to the side of the cave, Chen Zhou asked Lai Fu.

But Lai Fu came closer again, wagging his big tail, as if to prove that his nose could not be wrong.

The weather has been hot recently, and Lai Fu has started to shed his hair. He has become a walking dog hair-making machine. Seeing that it was about to pounce on him, Chen Zhou quickly intercepted it, grabbed the dog's head and pushed it aside.

"Okay, okay, okay, I believe you!"

As he spoke, Chen Zhou picked up the wooden cup and continued to pour water into the cave.

The wooden barrel had thick walls, and although it had a wide mouth and a tall body, it could hold less water than a plastic barrel. After a few seconds, the second barrel was almost empty. The soil at the entrance of the cave had been completely soaked by water, and the yellow mud was pouring out of the cave, but no animals escaped.

Chen Zhou even lay down above the cave entrance, put his ear to the ground, and listened carefully for a while, but heard no sound.

Just as he was about to ask Lai Fu what was going on, he suddenly saw Lai Fu running to a blocked hole, barking loudly.

"Oh my goodness, he ran away!"

Chen Zhou quickly stood up, picked up the pickaxe and shovel, and dug the back road of another cave in advance.

Through a layer of soil and gravel, I could faintly hear anxious squeaking sounds from inside. It was completely different from the sound of a chinchilla and more like that of a mouse.

Lai Fu was still barking, so Chen Zhou brought a small wooden box and slowly pried open the sealed hole.

As soon as a little light appeared, a rat's head impatiently popped out of the cave, reached into the wooden box, realized something was wrong, and quickly retracted its head.

Chen Zhou was quick and picked up a stone to press down the back of the mouse's neck before the mouse could retract its head.

The mouse felt pain and was unable to move forward or backward, so it raised its head and was about to bite Chen Zhou's hand.

Seeing this, Chen Zhou not only did not let go to avoid it, but instead increased his strength and pressed down hard.

The end of the stone was already sharp, and the added pressure pierced the mouse's fur and broke its cervical vertebrae.

The mouse's nerve center was severely damaged. The mouse's body lost control and could no longer move. The sounds from its mouth became weaker and weaker, but its eyes kept glancing back, still trying to look back.

Wang!
Lai Fu's barking did not stop, which made Chen Zhou realize that there might be more than one mouse in the cave. He used a stone to press down the mouse's paralyzed body and moved it out. The small wooden box was still blocking the entrance of the cave.

After a while, he heard rustling sounds in the cave, accompanied by shrill and chaotic cries, as if a group of rodents were discussing countermeasures.

Then, a rat head as thick as a little finger popped out and looked around.

Lai Fu stopped barking at the right time, and all the noisy and terrible sounds in the little mouse's ears disappeared. It turned its head cautiously, looked back, then took a step and slowly crawled out of the cave and entered the wooden box.

During this process, Chen Zhou always slowed down his breathing and kept his hands steady. He did not allow any gaps in the wooden box, nor did he allow the box to loosen up and down, as if the box had grown out of the ground.

The little mouse exploring the way did not encounter any danger. It did not know where its mother had gone, so it crawled to the end of the wooden box on its own. After hitting the wall, it began to squeak again.

The other mice in the cave responded to its call and came out one after another.

Chen Zhou narrowed his eyes and counted the number of mice along the cracks in the wooden box.

"Two, three, four... eight, I've disturbed a rat's nest!"

After the eighth mouse also crawled into the wooden box, he waited patiently for more than ten seconds. Seeing that no new mice left the cave and the mice in the box also showed signs of returning, he quickly put away the wooden box, covered the lid, and held the whole box of mice with a smile on his face.

As early as the end of October, he came up with the idea of using rats to test poison because he could not eat seafood.

However, the subsequent mouse catching work was not smooth, but a little chinchilla was caught by accident.

The chinchilla has a cute appearance, but is rather picky about food. It will turn up its nose at unfamiliar food. And there is only one chinchilla. If it eats poisonous food, it will die, so Chen Zhou has been unable to use it to test poison.

Half a year passed in a flash. During this long time, he had tried wild lemons with rabbits and attempted to seize a live rat from Grapes, but none of them worked.

This is partly because people are busy at work and have no time to catch mice - live mice move quickly and are small in size, so unless they have mousetrap stickers or mouse cages, catching them is much more difficult than catching rabbits.

On the other hand, because there was enough food and the variety was rich enough, there was no demand for fish, shrimp, shellfish or wild fruits in the short term, so he shelved the "poison rat testing plan" for a long time.

I didn't expect that when I took Lai Fu out for a stroll today, I would gain such a harvest.

He put the wooden box containing the baby mice into the bucket and placed a few stone slabs on top of the box to prevent the mice from escaping. Chen Zhou crushed the mother of the baby mice to death with one foot and then rubbed Lai Fu's head.

"Good boy, you have done a great deed again, and it's worth it that I fed you so many rabbit sausages, bread, and seal meat.

Little Gray and Grape are no match for you.

As long as you make a move, they will all pale in comparison."

Lai Fu didn't understand what Chen Zhou meant by what he said, but he knew that his master was praising him.

So he sat upright on the ground, raised his neck proudly, tried his best to retract the tongue hanging from the corner of his mouth, and his face was full of pride.

(End of this chapter)