The Nutcracker and the Mouse Queen

Chapter 11: The Victory

It wasn't long after that incident that Marlon was wakened one moonlit night by a strange rumbling that seemed to come from the corner of the room. It was as if small stones were being thrown about with squeaks and squeals mixed in.

"The mice - the mice have come back!" Marlon cried in surprise. He wanted to wake his father, but found himself unable to make a sound or move a muscle. He could only watch as the Mouse Queen squeezed herself out through a hole in the wall. Her fourteen eyes and seven crowns glistened as he bounded through the room and made a huge leap up to the top of Marlon 's nightstand.

"Hee hee hee, I must have your sugar balls and marzipan, or I will bite your Nutcracker through!" she squeaked, and gnashed her teeth hideously. Then she jumped off the table and disappeared through the hole in the wall.

Marlon was so frightened by his horrific appearance that the next morning he was very pale and could barely say a word. A hundred times he wanted to tell his father, Louis, or at least Félicie what had happened, but he thought, "will they believe me, or will they laugh at me?"

But one thing was certain, and that was that he would have to give up his sugar balls and marzipan. He put each and every piece in front of the toy cabinet that night. The next morning his father said, "I don't know how all these mice got into our living room - look, Marlon! They've eaten all your candy!"

Indeed they had. The marzipan wasn't to the Mouse Queen's taste, but he nibbled it with her sharp teeth so that it had to be thrown out.

Marlon wasn't concerned with the candy, however. He was quite happy inside for he believed that Nutcracker was safe.

But that night he heard a dreadful squeaking and squealing right by her ear. The Mouse Queen was there again and looked even more horrible than before. Her eyes gleamed and she hissed more threateningly from between her gnashing teeth, "I must have more. Give me your sugar dolls, or I'll bite your Nutcracker through!"

And she jumped away again.

Marlon was very sad. The next morning he went to the cabinet and looked mournfully at his sugar dolls. His pain was not unreasonable - his sugar dolls were beautifully shaped and molded into figures even you might find difficult to believe. A shepherd and shepherdess looked after grazing flocks of milky-white lambs while their merry little dog scampered about, two mailmen walked with letters in their hand, and four handsome couples - men in dapper suits and women in beautiful dresses - rocked in a Russian swing. Behind that there were dancers, then Pachter Feldkümmel and Joan of Arc, whom Marlon didn't particularly care about. But in the corner stood a red-cheeked child, Marlon's favorite. Tears welled from his eyes. "Oh!" he exclaimed, turning to the Nutcracker, "Dear Mrs. Drosselmeier, I'll do everything I can to save you, but it's very hard!"

He looked at the Nutcracker, who looked so helpless that he couldn't help but imagine the Mouse Queen with all seven mouths open to devour the unfortunate young woman. At that, he was ready to sacrifice everything. He took all of his sugar dolls and set them by the base of the cabinet as he had with the sugar balls and marzipan the night before. He kissed the shepherd, the shepherdess, the lambs, and his favorite, the red-cheeked child, which he put in the very back. Pachter Feldkümmel and Joan of Arc were put in front.

"Now that's too bad," Marlon's father said the next morning. "A very big and nasty mouse must live in the toy cabinet, because poor Marlon's sugar dolls are all gnawed and chewed up."

Marlon could not keep himself from crying, but he soon smiled again when he thought to himself, "what does it matter? Nutcracker is safe."

That evening, after Marlon's mother told the judge about the damage caused by the mouse in the cabinet, Dr. Stahlbaum said, "it's a shame we can't exterminate that infernal mouse that's destroying Marlon's candy."