Snuggle in close, little one, and pull that blanket right up to your chin. Because tonight's story begins with a scritch… and a scratch… and a squeak-squeak-squeak coming from inside the walls.
Ooh. Shivery, isn't it? Don't worry. I'm right here.
Long, long ago, far across the seas, there was a pretty little town called Hamelin. It sat beside a wide blue river, with red rooftops, round chimneys, and streets made of smooth grey cobblestones. The bakers of Hamelin baked the softest bread in the land. The cheesemakers made the roundest, yellowest cheeses. And every evening, the whole town smelled like warm butter and honey cakes.
Which was lovely.
Unless, of course, you happen to be a rat.
Because if you are a rat, a town full of bread and cheese and honey cakes is not just lovely. It is paradise.
It started small, the way big troubles often do. One grey morning, the baker's wife opened her flour bin and — SQUEAK! — out jumped a fat brown rat, right over her shoulder!
"EEEEK!" she screamed, and threw her rolling pin at it. She missed. She hit the pot of jam instead. Splat.
The next day, the cheesemaker found three rats sitting inside his biggest cheese, munching away, bold as anything. They didn't even run. One of them — I promise you this is true — waved its little paw at him.
By the end of the week, there were rats in the flour. Rats in the sugar. Rats in the soup pots and the boots and the church bells and the mayor's second-best hat.
And then, my little dreamer, came more.
Rats poured out of the drains. Rats marched along the rooftops. Rats danced in the moonlight on the market square — hundreds of them, thousands of them! Big rats, small rats, thin rats, round rats. Brown ones, black ones, grey ones, and one enormous white one that the children secretly named "The General."
They chewed holes in the sacks of grain. They nibbled the candles down to stubs. They gnawed the legs of chairs until — CRACK! — grandpa sat down for dinner and ended up on the floor with his soup on his head.
They squeaked and scampered through the school, so the teacher stood on her desk and refused to come down. They chased the cats — yes, my dear, you heard me — the rats of Hamelin were so many and so bold that the cats ran away and hid!
The dogs howled. The babies cried. Nobody could sleep, because all night long the walls went scritch-scratch-scritch and the floors went pitter-patter-pitter and the pantries went munch-munch-munch.
The people of Hamelin marched to the Town Hall, banging pots and pans. "MAYOR!" they shouted. "DO SOMETHING ABOUT THE RATS!"
Now, the Mayor of Hamelin was a big, round man with golden buttons on his coat and a golden chain around his neck. He loved three things: big dinners, long naps, and telling everyone how important he was. What he did not love was work.
He stood on the Town Hall steps and puffed out his chest. "People of Hamelin! I have a plan!"
"WHAT PLAN?" shouted the crowd.
"We shall… get more cats!"
"THE CATS RAN AWAY!"
"Then… we shall get traps! A hundred traps! A thousand traps!"
So they set a thousand traps, baited with the finest cheese. And in the morning, do you know what they found? Every trap empty. Every cheese gone. And on the Mayor's own doorstep, the rats had left one tiny thank-you nibble of cheese rind, as if to say, Delicious. More, please.
The Mayor turned red. Then purple. He offered gold to any rat-catcher in the land who could clear the town. Rat-catchers came from villages far and near, with nets and sacks and clever cages. The rats stole their sandwiches, chewed through their nets, and sent them running down the road with rats hanging onto their boot-laces.
Oh, Hamelin was in trouble. Deep, deep trouble.
The people gathered in the square, tired and cross and afraid. "Winter is coming," they whispered. "The rats have eaten half our grain already. What will our children eat?"
And the Mayor — for once in his life — had absolutely nothing to say. He sat slumped on his golden chair, his chin in his hands, while outside the window ten thousand little pink noses twitched in the moonlight.
And then…
Knock. Knock. Knock.
Three slow knocks on the great Town Hall door.
Everyone froze. Even the rats went quiet.
The door creaked open, all by itself. And in from the twilight stepped the strangest man anyone in Hamelin had ever seen. He was tall and thin as a ladder. His coat was patched in every colour of the rainbow — red, yellow, sky-blue, and green — so the light seemed to dance about him when he moved. His eyes were sharp and twinkly at the same time, like two stars that knew a secret. And in his long fingers, he carried a slim wooden pipe, a little flute that glowed faintly golden, as if it had swallowed a candle flame.
He looked slowly around the room. He smiled a small, curious smile.
And he said, in a voice soft as music:
"I hear… you have rats."
Sweet dreams, little dreamer. Tomorrow night, we find out who this rainbow stranger is — and what happens when he lifts that glowing pipe to his lips. Trust me: all of Hamelin will never, ever forget it.