The Exploits of Moominpappa Page 5

  Torn stays swayed sadly in the wind, and the railings were smashed in several places. But between them our three clouds rested, white and round, exactly as before.

  ‘Dear crew,’ said Hodgkins solemnly. ‘We have ridden out the hurricane. Let my nephew out, please!’

  We took off the lid and the Muddler appeared, pitifully green in the face.

  ‘Button of all buttons,’ he said wearily. ‘What have I done to be so sick? Oh, what life, what troubles, what worries! Look at my collection!’

  The Nibling came out also, sniffed against the wind and snorted. Then he said: ‘I’m hungry!’

  ‘Excuse me!’ exclaimed the Muddler. ‘Just to think of food makes me…’

  ‘Quite, quite,’ said Hodgkins kindly. ‘Perhaps Moomin will go and warm the pea-soup. I’ll have to think.… The Oshun Oxtra nearly flew tonight. I’ve an idea. You know. The flying houseboat…’

  And Hodgkins became absorbed in calculations. I made my way carefully over the deck.

  It was covered with sea-weed, Nibling smear, oysters, and a few faint sea spooks. And in that moment the sun rose.

  Oh, delight! I stopped outside the galley door and gave the warmth time to surge through me. I remembered the sunshine on my first day of freedom after the night of my escape. I loved the sun!

  I forgot all about the pea-soup and closed my eyes where I stood. The lovely feeling penetrated out to the tip of my tail, and I thought it was worth a hurricane to have the sunshine afterwards.

  But when I opened my eyes again I discovered some thing on starboard. Land!

  Land ahead also! Soft contours of strange mountains!

  I stood on my head for joy and shouted:

  ‘We’rethere! Land! Hodgkins!’

  Suddenly we all became busy.

  The Muddler’s sickness ceased at once, and he began putting his tin in order. The Joxter repaired the auxiliary engine. The Nibling chewed at his own tail out of pure nervousness, and Hodgkins put me to polishing all the brass-work.

  The foreign shore came nearer. There seemed to be a high mountain on it with a tower on top.

  ‘What on earth’s that?’ asked the Joxter.

  ‘Look, it’s moving,’ I said.

  But we were too busy to worry about it.

  Only when The Oshun Oxtra glided into harbour we gathered at the railing, after having combed our hair and brushed our teeth and tails.

  And then we heard a thundering voice high above our heads:

  ‘Ha!’ it roared. ‘The Groke take me if this isn’t Hodg kins and his dash-dashed crew! Now I’ve got you!’

  It was Edward the Booble. You can’t imagine how angry he was.

  *

  ‘That’s how life was when I was young!’ said Moomin-pappa and closed his book.

  ‘Read more, please!’ Moomintroll cried. ‘What happened then? What did the Booble do to you?’

  ‘Next time, my boy,’ Moominpappa said with an air of mystery. ‘That was thrilling, eh? But you see, it’s a trick all good authors use, to close a chapter at the ghastliest moment.’

  This time Moominpappa had seated himself on the sandy beach with his son, Snufkin, and Sniff at his feet.

  While he read to them about the terrible gale they gazed out over the sea and imagined The Oshun Oxtra careering along like a ghost ship, manned by their brave fathers, through the pale purple foam of the hurricane.

  ‘How sick he must have been in his tin,’ mumbled Sniff.

  ‘It’s cold here,’ said Moominpappa. ‘Shall we take a walk?’

  They wandered off over the dry sea-weed to the point.

  ‘Can you imitate a Nibling?’ asked Snufkin.

  Moominpappa tried. ‘No-o,’ he said. ‘It didn’t come right. It should sound as if from a tin tube.’

  ‘It wasn’t so far off,’ said Moomintroll. ‘Father, didn’t you go away with the Hattifatteners later on?’

  ‘Well,’ answered Moominpappa embarrassedly, ‘perhaps I did. But that was very much later. I suppose it won’t come into the book at all.’

  ‘Why not?’ cried Sniff. ‘Did you lead a wicked life with them?’

  ‘Shut up,’ said Moomintroll.

  ‘Dash, dash, dash,’ said Moominpappa. ‘But it wasn’t too wicked. Look, there’s something floating in the water. Run along and see what it is!’

  They ran.

  ‘What can it be?’ asked Snufkin.

  It was a heavy and onion-shaped thing. It seemed to have floated around for a very long time, because it was covered with weeds and clams. The wood was cracked, and in a few places there were remains of gold paint. Moominpappa lifted the wooden onion in both paws and examined it carefully. His eyes grew larger and larger, and finally he covered them with one paw and sighed.

  ‘Children,’ he said solemnly and a little shakily, ‘what you behold here is the knob from the roof of the boat-house of The Oshun Oxtra!’

  ‘Oh,’ said Moomintroll with great veneration.

  ‘And now,’ continued Moominpappa, overcome by his memories, ‘now I’m going to start on a new chapter and contemplate this unique discovery in solitude. Run along and play in the cave!’

  Moominpappa walked on with a springy step. He carried the knob under one arm and his Memoirs under the other.

  ‘I’ve really been a strapping Moomin in my day!’ he said to himself.

  ‘And still going strong,’ he added, and stamped his feet with a happy smile.

  CHAPTER 5

  In which (besides giving a little specimen of my intellectual powers), I describe the Mymble family and the Surprise Party which brought me some bewitching tokens of honour from the hand of the Autocrat.

  PERHAPS you’ve noticed the peculiar way my mind works? There’s simply a sudden click! – and the situation is saved. Like this one, for instance.

  Here’s the Booble, grumbling, bumbling and shouting at us, and here are we, looking rather foolish, and then I say (quite calmly): ‘Hullo, uncle! Glad to see you again!’ And of course this doesn’t stop him shouting, but I don’t mind at all. I just ask him whether his feet are sore still.

  ‘You have the nerve to ask me that!’ roars Edward the Booble. ‘You water-flea! You nightmare! Yes, my feet are sore! Yes, my behind is sore tool’

  ‘Well, in that case,’ I answer in a perfectly controlled voice, ‘in that case the present we’ve brought you will suit you all the better. Three genuine eider-down Booble sleeping-bags!’

  (Rather smart, wasn’t it?)

  ‘Sleeping-bags? Eider-down?’ Edward the Booble said suspiciously and carefully felt our clouds with one foot. ‘You’re deceiving me again, aren’t you, you dish-rags? I suppose they’re stuffed with rocks…’

  He hauled the clouds up on the wharf and sniffed at them.

  ‘Sit down, Edward, please!’ cried Hodgkins. ‘Nice and soft!’

  ‘I’ve heard that before,’ grumbled the Booble. ‘Nice, smooth sand bottom, you said. And what was it? The hardest, knobbliest, stoniest, pestilentiallest…’

  And Edward the Booble carefully sank down on the clouds.

  ‘Well?’ we cried expectantly.

  ‘Hrrumph,’ said the Booble sourly. ‘There seem indeed to be a few soft spots. I’ll sit here and think for a while until I’ve decided what to do with you.’

  But we didn’t care to wait. With great speed we made fast the hawser and stole past behind the Booble. And then we ran.

  ‘You did rather well,’ said the Joxter.

  ‘Just an idea,’ I said modestly.

  ‘I know,’ said Hodgkins. ‘Empty place, this.’

  Round green hills rose everywhere around us, with single big trees laden with bunches of green and yellow berries. We could see a few small straw huts huddling in the valleys between low stone walls stretching over the hillsides.

  But all was silent. Not a trace of the excited crowd we had imagined would come running to look at The Oshun Oxtra and ourselves, and to ask us all about the hurricane.

 
‘Perhaps Edward the Booble has frightened them away,’ I said a little disappointedly.

  We went up the nearest hill.

  ‘There’s a house,’ said the Joxter. ‘I’d like to see if the door’s locked.’

  It was a small hut, not very well built of board ends and large stiff leaves.

  We knocked four times, but nobody opened.

  ‘Ahoy!’ Hodgkins shouted. ‘Anybody home?’

  Then we heard a small voice that answered: ‘No, no! Nobody at all!’

  ‘That’s funny,’ I said. ‘Then who’s talking?’

  ‘I’m the Mymble’s little daughter,’ said the voice. ‘But you’ll have to go away quickly, because I’m not allowed to open the door to anybody until mother comes back.’

  ‘Where’s mother, then?’ Hodgkins asked.

  ‘She’s gone to the garden party,’ the little voice answered sadly.

  ‘Well, why didn’t she take you along?’ the Muddler asked in a shocked voice. ‘Are you too small?’

  Then the Mymble’s daughter started to cry and said: ‘I’ve a sore throat today! Mother thought it might be diphtheria!’

  ‘Open the door, won’t you?’ Hodgkins said kindly. ‘We’ll have a look at your throat. Don’t be afraid.’

  The Mymble’s daughter opened the door. She had a thick woollen scarf around her neck, and her eyes were quite red.

  ‘Let’s see now,’ Hodgkins said. ‘Open your mouth, please. Wider, please. Say a-a-a-ah!!’

  ‘Or typhoid fever, or cholera mother thought,’ said the Mymble’s daughter sadly. ‘A-a-a-ah!’

  ‘Not a spot,’ Hodgkins said. ‘Not even swollen. Does it hurt?’

  ‘Terribly,’ mumbled the Mymble’s daughter. ‘I think my throat’s growing together, so I’ll not be able to breathe at all, and not to eat or talk either.’

  ‘You’ll have to go to bed at once,’ Hodgkins said. ‘We’ll find your mother for you. Immediately!’

  ‘No, no, please don’t,’ the daughter cried. ‘It was just a fib. I’m not ill at all. Mother left me at home because I’ve been a bad girl.’

  ‘A fib? Whatever for?’ Hodgkins asked in astonishment.

  ‘To have a little fun!’ said the Mymble’s daughter and started to cry once more. ‘I’ve nothing on earth to do!’

  ‘Can’t we take her with us to that garden party?’ the Joxter proposed.

  ‘Perhaps the Mymble wouldn’t like it,’ I said.

  ‘Of course she would,’ said her daughter happily. ‘She’ll be terribly glad, because I’m sure she’s forgotten it all by now.’

  ‘Can you show us the way? To the party?’ asked Hodgkins.

  ‘’Course I can!’ said the Mymble’s daughter and took off her woolly scarf. ‘But we’ll have to hurry, or else the King will be disappointed. The surprises must have started long ago.’

  ‘Is he a real King?’ I asked respectfully as we went at a jog trot over the hills.

  ‘A real King?’ exclaimed the Mymble’s daughter. ‘He’s a true Autocrat and the greatest King alive. But we’re allowed to call him Daddy Jones to feel more at home with him.’

  ‘I’m going to call him Your Autocratical Majesty,’ I said very earnestly. ‘Imagine, to shake hands with a real King! It’s the reward for my old and sincere royalist views!’

  ‘Why do you have all these stone walls?’ asked the Joxter. ‘Do you want to shut people in or out?’

  ‘No,’ answered the Mymble’s daughter. ‘We don’t use them for anything special. It’s just that we like building them. My mother’s brother has built nineteen miles of them. And d’you know what else he does? He’s studying all letters and words from all sides. He likes to walk around them until he’s quite sure of them. It takes him hours and hours to do the longest words!’

  ‘Like otolaryngologist,’ said the Joxter.

  ‘Or kalospinterochcromatokrene,’ I said.

  ‘Oh,’ said the Mymble’s daughter. ‘If they’re that long he has to camp beside them for the night. He used to sleep on the ground in nothing but his long red beard. Half the beard’s his cover and the other half’s his mattress. In the daytime he keeps two small white mice in it, and they’re so sweet that they don’t have to pay any rent.’

  ‘Most curious,’ said Hodgkins. ‘Have you any brothers or sisters?’

  ‘Lots and lots,’ said the Mymble’s daughter. ‘Nobody’s been able to count them, they run so fast. Look, here we are. Promise me to tell mother that you made me come here to show you the way!’

  ‘Certainly,’ Hodgkins promised. ‘What does she look like?’

  ‘She’s round,’ said her daughter. ‘Everything’s round about her.’

  We were standing before a gate, garlanded with flowers, in an exceptionally high stone wall. The gate bore a large placard reading:

  DADDY JONES’S GARDEN PARTY

  FREE FOR ALL!

  Come in, come in, please!

  THE SURPRISE PARTY OF THE YEAR – VERY SPECIAL!

  (because of the 100th Anniversary of Our Birth)

  DON’T BE AFRAID

  If Anything Happens!!!

  ‘What happens?’ asked the Nibling.

  ‘Anything,’ said the Mymble’s daughter. ‘That’s the fun of it. You’ll see!’

  We went into the garden and looked around us.

  It was wild and overgrown.

  ‘Excuse me, are there any wild beasts?’ the Muddler asked nervously.

  ‘Much worse,’ grinned the Mymble’s daughter. ‘I’ll run along now. See you later.’

  We followed carefully. A long tunnel filled with green and mysterious light led us through the thickets and bushes.

  ‘Stop, everybody! Stay where you are!’ cried Hodgkins suddenly and halted in his tracks.

  An abyss yawned before us. And down there crouched a hairy and goggling Thing – on long, quivering legs – a giant spider!

  ‘Hush! Let’s see if he’s angry,’ whispered the and began throwing pebbles at the monster.

  The spider wobbled his legs, swayed horribly and threw his eyes about (they were on stalks).

  ‘Unnatural,’ Hodgkins remarked. ‘His legs. Wire springs.’

  He was right. The whole spider was made of wire springs.

  ‘Excuse me, that was almost impudent,’ said the Muddler. ‘As if one weren’t afraid enough of really dangerous things!’

  ‘One of the party surprises, I expect,’ said Hodgkins and led us on with redoubled care.

  At the next turn of the path hung a placard readings:

  SCARED – WEREN’T YOU?

  ‘I’d never thought a King would descend to such jokes,’ I said. ‘Even if he’s a hundred years old. Don’t let yourself be scared next time we see anything remarkable.’

  ‘Here’s a lake,’ Hodgkins said. ‘Artificial too.’

  We looked at it with suspicion. Small brightly painted dinghies bearing the Autocratical colours lay on the beach. Friendly-looking trees were leaning out over the clear water.

  ‘I don’t quite believe it,’ muttered the Joxter and chose himself an orange-coloured boat with an azure railing.

  We were out in the middle of the lake when the next surprise overtook us.

  A strong jet of water shot up between our boats and drenched us to the skin. The Nibling howled frightfully.

  Before we reached the other beach we had four more showers, and on the shore we found another placard asking us:

  WET – AREN’T YOU?

  ‘Funny kind of garden party,’ muttered Hodgkins.

  ‘I like it,’ said the Joxter. ‘Daddy Jones must be a singular person.’

  Now we came to a whole network of canals with a maze of bridges. In the difficult places you had to cross on rotten

  old tree-trunks or on suspended lianas. But nothing special happened, except that the Nibling dived head first into a mud bank.

  Suddenly the Joxter exclaimed: ‘At last! Here’s a new joke! But this time he won’t pull my leg!’ And the Joxter wa
lked straight up to a big stuffed bull and gave it a smack on the muzzle.

  Only the big bull wasn’t stuffed. It was very much alive and gave a terrific bellow. We fled head over heels behind a dense hedge where another placard was awaiting us:

  DIDN’T THINK SO – DID YOU?

  By and by we became accustomed to the surprises. We wandered further and further, deeper and deeper into Daddy Jones’s garden, through leafy caverns and secret hiding-places, under waterfalls and over new abysses with Bengal lights. But the Autocrat had provided his guests with other things than trap-doors, explosions, and wire spring monsters. If you looked carefully at the roots of bushes, in hollow trees and cracks in the rocks you some times found small nests containing one or more brightly painted or golden eggs. Each egg had a number on it.

  I found numbers 67, 14, 890, 223, and 27.

  It was Daddy Jones’s Royal Lottery.

  We all became quite crazy with egg-hunting. The Nibling found most of the eggs, but it was hard to make him understand that it would be better to save them for the draw than to eat them on the spot.

  Hodgkins came a good second, then I, and then the Joxter who was too lazy to search in earnest, and lastly the Muddler whose only method consisted in hopping around.

  Finally we found one end of a long red and yellow rope that was slung between the trees and tied in beautiful bows. As we followed it we began to hear a medley of happy whoops, shots, and music. The party seemed to be in full swing.

  ‘I think I’ll stay here and wait for you,’ said the Nibling a little nervously. ‘There’s such a lot of people.’

  ‘As you like,’ said Hodgkins. ‘Only keep still so we can find you again.’

  We were standing at the outskirts of a great open meadow. We looked, simply enraptured. In the middle of the meadow stood a large circular house that seemed to whirl round and round. It was full of fluttering pennants and white horses in shining silver harness, and an orchestra played all the time.

  ‘What on earth’s that?’ I asked excitedly.