Part 7
Ralph’s mission begins over his mother’s protests: somewhere in the sleeping hotel there must be one aspirin, and he will find it. Room by room he searches the second floor — and in the very last room, disaster: a light snaps on and a schoolteacher captures him under a water glass. She and her colleague seriously discuss carrying him home to Wichita as a classroom pet, before choosing mercy of a sort: they set him free — outside the hotel, in the night. Ralph refuses to quit. He climbs a vine to an open first-floor window, and there, at last, gleams a tablet of aspirin. But a pill is boulder-sized to a mouse: after pushing it as far as the lobby, he must leave it hidden, climb all the way to Room 215, and wake Keith to borrow a vehicle. With the toy ambulance, an elevator ride shared with a sleepy guest (whose dog sees exactly what its owner cannot), Ralph transports his cargo to the second floor and delivers the medicine to his burning friend. The errand of mercy is complete.
| Section | What you will practice |
|---|---|
| Vocabulary | Words of the quest: mission, capture, mercy, vine, transport, errand… |
| Literary Elements | The quest, complications, and climax |
| Cross-Curricular | Where aspirin came from, and why elevators changed buildings |
| Ch. | What happens |
|---|---|
| 11a | Room by Room — against his mother’s pleas, Ralph searches the second floor for an aspirin. |
| 11b | Captured — a teacher traps him under a glass; two teachers debate a classroom-pet future, then free him outside the hotel. |
| 12a | The Vine and the Tablet — up a vine, through an open window: one aspirin found, pushed as far as the lobby. |
| 12b | The Ambulance Run — Keith lends the toy ambulance; an elevator ride past a dog that sees him; the medicine delivered. |
ⓘ The vocabulary words in this list are selected to help you understand and complete this workbook. Some may not appear verbatim in the original novel.
- A teacher captures Ralph under a water glass.
- Keith lends the toy ambulance for the carrying.
- Ralph searches the second-floor rooms for aspirin.
- Freed outside, Ralph climbs a vine to an open window and finds the tablet.
- An elevator ride brings the medicine to Room 215.
Think back over the longest night. A mother’s plea ignored; a dark hall of doors, each one a gamble. A glass falls like a sky; two voices discuss Kansas. Freedom lands him outside his own world. Then: a vine, a window, a boulder of medicine, a boy woken to lend wheels, and the hotel’s great machine rising floor to floor with the smallest paramedic in California at the controls.
The pill Ralph battles across the lobby has a four-thousand-year history. Ancient healers in Egypt and Greece eased pain and fever with a bitter tea of willow bark, never knowing why it worked. In the 1800s, chemists learned to extract the bark's active ingredient — to draw it out pure — and then to gentle it, for the raw chemical upset stomachs. In 1899 a German firm pressed the improved compound into neat tablets and gave it a trade name: aspirin. By the 1960s, aspirin sat in nearly every American medicine cabinet, the first thing reached for to relieve aches and cool fevers. Small size was part of its genius: a measured dose in a disc you could transport anywhere — though 'small' is a matter of scale. To a feverish boy it is a swallow; to the mouse pushing it across a midnight lobby, it is a full-grown boulder, and the greatest weight any friendship in the hotel has ever moved.
This writing task is optional and is not part of your auto-graded score. The feedback below checks only the basics — length, spelling, and grammar — not whether your ideas are right or wrong. It is meant for classroom discussion and creative practice, so feel free to use your imagination!
Writing Task — Part 7 “My Errand of Mercy”
Ralph crosses a dark hotel to bring one pill to a sick friend. Write about an errand of mercy of your own — real or imagined: someone needed something, and you set out to bring it. What stood in your way, and how did the delivery feel? Write at least 40 words.
No right or wrong — tell someone nearby what happened in this part. Can’t find anyone? Tell yourself out loud. The moment you teach it, you truly understand it.
Part 7 Complete!
You finished Chapters 11–12 of The Mouse and the Motorcycle.
Here are your auto-graded results:
The best last step is to teach it. In your own words, explain what happened — retell a favorite scene, teach a character’s big choice, or sum up the main idea for a parent, friend, or classmate. When you can teach it clearly, you truly own it.
Independent study guide by Garden Heights. Not affiliated with or endorsed by Beverly Cleary. Contains original analysis only; no text from the novel is reproduced. Reference text: This workbook follows Beverly Cleary’s classic text (the standard Puffin edition sold worldwide). Revised 2023 UK editions change some wording and may not match the vocabulary studied here.