Books: Half Past Seven Stories
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Robert Gordon Anderson >> Half Past Seven Stories
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Choo Choo Choo (for that was their leader's name) stretched himself.
With his drooping sleeves and foot-long fingernails, he looked like
the bats that sail under the trees in the twilight and nest, so they
say, in people's hair. He gazed out over the tea-fields and saw not a
soul, for every mother's son and mother's daughter, too, was hiding
tight under the bushes, but a million little pigtails trembled in the
air.
"Whee!" shouted the great Choo Choo Choo;
And again,--
"Whee!"
And once more,--
"Whee!"
The million pigtails shook more wildly each time until, at the last,
the million little Chinamen rose up from their hiding-places under the
bushes, and came running from all over the fields like the inhabitants
of a great city running to a fire.
When they reached the road and the green palanquin, they fell on their
knees, jabbering and praying the chief Choo Choo Choo not to hurt them
with his long curved sword or the curved fingernails, which were worse
than the sword.
"Pss-ss-iss-ssst!" exclaimed Choo Choo Choo, who for all his faults
liked to see people brave and not cowardly like that.
"Psss-sss-iss-sst!" he said again, then a third time, for in China,
especially if you are a robber, you must say things three times if you
really mean it, or else people won't believe you at all.
So, again "Pss-ss-iss-sst!" said this bold Choo Choo Choo.
At this third dread cry, each of the million Chinamen took out of his
pocket a penny, a Chinese penny. And a Chinese penny is rather big,
with a hole in the centre, and funny chicken-track letters stamped on
it.
Before Marmaduke could have said "Jack Robinson," there were a million
of them lying in the road.
Choo Choo Choo scratched his head with his long fingernail. He didn't
know what in the world to do with so many pennies.
After some time he seemed to land on an idea, for he beckoned to one
of his soldiers with that nail. And when that nail beckoned, it looked
like the long claw of a lobster, waving awkwardly back and forth. It
would have been funny indeed, if it hadn't been quite so dangerous.
Nearby a kite flew high in the air, its string tied to a tea-bush.
Choo Choo Choo's servant hauled in the kite and the twine, and one by
one the soldiers strung all those pennies, those pennies with holes in
them, on the twine, like beads on a string.
When they had finished, the string of pennies looked like a great
shiny bronze snake coiling back in the road for almost a mile.
By this time the great robber chief Choo Choo Choo had begun to notice
Marmaduke.
"Come here!" he commanded, crooking a fingernail. It was funny how
Ping Pong, Sing Song, and Ah See, who were quite honest, spoke broken
or Pigeon English, while Choo Choo Choo talked correctly and very
politely. Robbers, and burglars too, frequently do that. So you can't
always tell a man by his fine language.
Marmaduke obeyed. He drew near the palanquin and waited, his heart
banging against his ribs.
"What are you doing here?" asked Choo Choo Choo.
"I want to see China."
"Oh you do, do you!" said the robber chief, "and why, pray, do you
want to see China?"
"I wanted to see if the people stood upside down on the other side of
the world," explained Marmaduke, hoping that this explanation would
please Choo Choo Choo.
"So," said he very sarcastically, "that's silly--immeasurably silly, I
call it. Look out or you'll go back without a head yourself. But first
tell me,--have you any ancestors, _honorable_ ancestors?"
"What _are_ ancestors, honorable ancestors, sir?" Marmaduke
inquired. He thought that if he said "sir"--very politely--it might
help matters a bit.
"Oh, people in your family who lived long before you, and who have
long beards and are very honest," returned the robber chief.
Marmaduke thought it was odd, his mentioning that honorable ancestors
must be honest, when he was a robber himself, but anyway he was
relieved as he thought of "Greatgrandpa Boggs."
"Yes," he told Choo Choo Choo, "if that's what it is, I have an
honorable ancestor--Greatgrandpa Boggs. He was very old before he
died. He was so old his voice sounded like a tiny baby's, and he had a
beard--a long and white one--that nearly reached to the bottom button
of his vest, and he must have been honest, 'cause Mother said he might
have been rich if he hadn't been so honest."
"But wait a minute," roared Choo Choo Choo, "did he have fingernails
as long as mine?"
"No," replied Marmaduke, "they were short like these," and he showed
him his own hands.
"Pss-ss-iss-sst!" said Choo Choo Choo in disgust, "he couldn't have
been so very honorable then. I guess we'd better behead you without
any more argument."
He looked around at the sky and so did Marmaduke. It was very pretty
and blue, and the road looked very white and inviting, the tea-bushes
very lovely and green.
"It's just the right weather for beheading," remarked Choo Choo Choo,
"soldiers, are your swords very sharp?" and he patted the snake made
of pennies that curved up the white road.
Marmaduke was certainly in danger now, but he kept his head so as not
to lose it. And he found an idea in it.
The idea was this:--
Before he had left the Coal-Giant in the Pit in the centre of the
earth, the Giant had told him, if he ever needed an earthquake to help
him out, to call on him. All Marmaduke was to do was to tap on the
earth three times with his right foot, three times with his left, and
three times more, standing on his head. Then he was to run away. The
Giant had promised to allow five minutes so that Marmaduke and his
friends could get to safety.
So this Marmaduke did, just as he had been told. He tapped on the
ground three times with his right foot, three times with his left, and
three times more, standing on his head, and all under Choo Choo Choo's
very nose, for, of course, that was the very place where Marmaduke
wanted the earthquake to come.
Choo Choo Choo must have been fooled, for he stopped patting the snake
made of pennies, and sharpening his fingernails, and the soldiers
ceased whetting their swords. They thought Marmaduke was performing
circus tricks for their entertainment.
As soon as he was through standing on his head, he had run away, of
course, to get out of the way of the earthquake which he knew would
come. But the robbers thought he was just running back to his
dressing-room, as all acrobats do, and would come back again for his
bow. But he didn't. And after five minutes, just as the Coal Giant had
promised, there came a great roar and a mighty tremble, and Choo Choo
Choo and all his soldiers were blown up in the air, and when they came
down they fell on their heads and knocked their brains out. Then
Marmaduke came back--to find them all dead--stone dead.
And he thought it was very kind of the Coal Giant in the Pit in the
center of the Earth to help him out with that little favor.
But now all the million tea-Chinamen, who had seen the great
happening, fell down on their knees. They thought Marmaduke must have
come from Heaven, to work such wonders.
So they dressed him all up in a blue mandarin's coat, which they found
in the palanquin. It was covered with pretty snakes, all embroidered
in scarlet and gold. And they gave him a cap like a saucer turned
upside down and made of gold, and he looked all dressed up for a
party.
I guess the million Chinamen thought he did, too, and that they must
get up a party for him, for they led him to the great Pagoda which
stood on the top of the hill, and which, they told him, was the
highest anywhere in the world.
When they reached it, Marmaduke saw that it had many stories, which
grew smaller as they mounted nearer the sky. And each had roofs
curving like skis at the end. It was all pink-colored, too, with
stripes, and he saw that it was built of peppermint!
He was minded to eat it as Hansel and Gretel had eaten their sugar
house, but he didn't, because Ping Pong said it was sacred.
On a throne of stone, inside the Pagoda, sat an old jolly Billiken,
also of stone, and shaped just like an egg, with his hands across his
tummy and his legs crossed under him.
Now all the million Chinamen had followed Marmaduke, their slippers
going "clippity clop," on the pavement of the courtyard. They thought
he must be very wonderful to make the earthquake that killed Choo Choo
Choo, and they wanted him to sit on the great stone throne of the
Billiken. But Marmaduke wouldn't let them. He didn't want to take the
seat of the old Billiken when the old fellow had sat there for three
thousand years and more.
Billiken, however, had an idea about that. Probably he thought he had
been sitting there long enough, for he uncrossed his stone arms from
his stone tummy, unwriggled his stone feet, and stood up, stretching
and yawning.
"My! but that was a long sleep," he said, and Marmaduke nodded his
head. Three thousand years _was_ considerable of a sleep.
Then the Billiken stretched out his hand to shake Marmaduke's. The
little boy thought it felt very cold, but his new friend's face looked
jolly enough.
"Hello!" said the Billiken, "have a game?"
"A game of what Mr. Billiken?" Marmaduke replied.
"Oh, any old thing. What's the latest?"
Marmaduke thought for a moment.
"Well, there's Duck on the Rock," he suggested, "or Roly Poly."
"Duck on the Rock sounds interesting, let's try that."
Then he waved to the other little stone images all around him.
"Come on, fellows, let's play Duck on the Rock. But how do you play
it?" he added to Marmaduke, as they reached the courtyard.
"Oh!" replied that little boy, "it's easy. You just place a little
rock on a big one, and you each stand on the line with rocks in your
hand, an' take turns trying to knock the little one off the big one."
"Suits me," said Billiken, "here, _you_, stand on my head." And
he picked up one of the little stone images and set him upon his own
head, that was shaped so like an egg.
"Now shoot," he commanded Marmaduke, "let's see how it goes."
And Marmaduke did as he was bid, and he knocked off the little stone
image from the old Billiken's head.
They kept up the game for quite a while, but at last Marmaduke made a
wild shot. The rock which he threw went high up in the air and knocked
a pink gable off the Peppermint Pagoda.
At this, all the million Chinamen, who had been watching the game
respectfully from a distance, set up a howl. They thought it was a sin
to smash their pagoda, and that Marmaduke ought to be punished.
So, one and all, they made a rush for him, but again he remembered the
Coal Giant's advice. He tapped the ground three times with his right
foot, three times with his left, and three times, standing on his
head.
Then, after he had run to safety, there came as pretty an earthquake
as ever you saw. It didn't kill all the million little Chinamen, but
it threw them down on the ground, knocking the wind out of their
million tummies completely. And, of course, after that they were very
good, being afraid of Marmaduke, as well they might be.
Now, just at this time, the Queen happened by in a magnificent
palanquin of cloth of gold. When she saw the trick that Marmaduke had
performed, she, too, thought he must have come down from the sky, and
she sent her chief officer, the mandarin, to fetch the strange little
boy to the Palace.
He was glad to accept the invitation, for he was getting pretty hungry
by now. But they had to go through many beautiful grounds with strange
summer-houses, and high walls, and ponds with rainbow goldfish
swimming in them, before they reached the main part of the palace
itself. Then the Queen sat down on her throne, with her mandarins
around her, all dressed in those funny coats like pajama-tops and
embroidered with red dragons, and gold birds with great wings, and all
sorts of queer things.
The Queen seemed a little out of sorts, for, when he came to the
throne, she said to him sharply,--
"Show me a trick, or I'll cut your head off."
Marmaduke was puzzled. He didn't know just what to do. He didn't want
to start another earthquake. That was only to be used in times of
great danger. He'd better try something else first. So he felt in his
pockets once more, to see what he could find, and brought out the
little pack of cards with which he had played with the Coal Giant.
"I'll teach you how to play"--"Old Maid," he was going to say, but he
stopped in time. He thought that maybe the Queen had never been
married and she'd be insulted if he asked her to play Old Maid. Then,
too, she might insult him back by cutting his head off. And nobody
could stand an insult like that. So he just said,--
"_Casino_ is a fine game."
But "No," the Queen replied angrily, "I played that long before you
were born. And my honorable ancestors played it before me."
Again Marmaduke felt in his pockets, hoping to find something that
would help him out. He drew forth a penny, a fishhook, a dried worm,
two marbles, and--there--just the thing--the game of Authors, which
Aunt Phrony had given him for his birthday.
"I'll tell you what," he told the Queen, "let's play Authors. There's
nothing better than that."
"Authors, authors--" the Queen replied, tapping her foot impatiently,
"what are they?"
"Oh, people who write books and stories an' things. It's very nice."
So he explained to the Queen all about them, about Longfellow and
Whittier and all the rest. He really didn't know so very much about
them, you see, but he had played the game so often that he knew the
cards and names "'most by heart."
"Gracious!" exclaimed the Queen--in Chinese, of course. "Whittier and
Longfellow--what _pretty_ names! But haven't you got Confucius
there, somewhere?" Confucius, you see, was a man who wrote in Chinese
long years ago, and he was one of her pet authors.
Marmaduke shuffled the cards all over, but couldn't seem to find that
name.
"I guess he's been lost," he said politely, so as not to hurt her
feelings and lose his head, "but I'll tell you what"--he added,
pointing to a picture of Dickens--"we can call this man Confoundit
just as well."
"_Confucius, not Confoundit_," the Queen corrected him crossly,
then she looked at the card. "That'll do, I suppose. That author has a
kind face and a real long beard. It's not half bad."
She chose Marmaduke for her partner, and they played against the two
tallest mandarins in the red dragon coats.
The Queen and Marmaduke beat the old mandarins badly, due to
Marmaduke's fine playing. And the Queen was so pleased that she
exclaimed,--
"After all, I won't cut off your head. You see, it might stain that
pretty rug. I guess we'd better have tea and a party instead." Then
she added,--"By the way, do you drink tea?"
"Yes, thank you," he replied, "but make it '_cambric_.'"
"All right if you prefer it," she remarked, "but I call it silly to
spoil a good drink that way."
Then she clapped her hands, and her servants came running in, with
huge trays of wonderful foods in their arms. And the Queen and the
mandarins, Marmaduke and Wienerwurst, and Ping Pong, Sing Song, and Ah
See, all sat around the throne, drinking out of the little blue cups
and eating the strange food. It made Marmaduke's eyes almost pop out
of his head to see the way the Queen and her mandarins, and his three
little yellow friends, devoured those dishes,--the stewed rats, the
fricasseed shark's fins, and the old birds' nests. Now Wienerwurst
didn't seem to object to that sort of food at all, but "licked it
right up" like the Chinamen. Marmaduke chose other things
instead,--some pickled goldfish, candied humming-birds' tongues, some
frozen rose-petals, whipped cloud pudding, and a deep dish of spiced
air from the sky, with dried stars for raisins. And, to wash it all
down, he had a little blue cup of tea, "cambric" of course, quite as
his mother would have wished.
Seeing that he was growing drowsy from such a big meal, the Queen took
pity on him and said he could lean back against the golden throne and
take a nap.
But first she called the mandarin who was in charge of the
Fire-cracker Treasury, where they kept all the finest fire-crackers in
the world, and ordered him to bring Marmaduke some. Soon the mandarin
came back, and, with him, six servants, with trays heaped high with
the prettiest and the fanciest fire-crackers ever boy or man saw. They
were wrapped in rose-colored silk paper, with gold letters on the paper,
and dragons, too, with great eyes and fiery forked tongues.
[Illustration: "Then the Queen clapped her hands and the servants came
running in with trays piled high with wonderful foods."]
The six servants and the mandarin filled all Marmaduke's seven pockets
with the packs of fire-crackers, and tied one on Wienerwurst's tail.
Then they handed him some bundles of extra-fine punk sticks. It wasn't
at all like ordinary punk, but very sweet-smelling.
He lighted one stick, and it smelled so like incense, and he felt so
drowsy and nice, that he started to fall asleep. The lighted punk fell
lower and lower until it touched one of the fire-cracker-packs. The
silk paper began to curl and grow black, then it burst into flames.
There was a sputter, then a crackle like the firing of many rifles,
and then a great roar. My! but those were powerful fire-crackers. One
pack exploded--and he was blown through the palace. Another--and over
the Peppermint Pagoda he flew. Still another went off, and he was
tossed clean over the Great Wall to the mouth of the hole down which
he had come that very same day.
Then the last pack went--_bang_! and he was blown through the
hole, Wienerwurst after him, up, up, up, past the Coal Giant and the
Furnace Pit, and up, up, up, until he saw, just above him, the little
circle of light again.
Out of it he flew--and--all of a sudden his head cleared, and he saw
he was sitting back at home once more, sitting against the cedar post,
and the Toyman was rubbing his head.
"Never mind," the Toyman was saying, "It'll feel better soon. And how
did you like China?"
The head did feel better "pretty soon." Anyway, he didn't mind it a
bit. It was worth a headache, as the Toyman said, to have seen the
wonderful land of China.
XVI
HE THAT TOOK THE CITY
Marmaduke trudged up the road. And the road went up, up, up the hill.
First he thought that road was like a great worm, always squirming
ahead of him, but then he decided that, although it twisted, it didn't
_squirm_, it was too still for that. After all, it was more like
a ribbon, a wide brown ribbon, tied around the green shoulder of the
hill.
He wondered where that ribbon road went--over the hill and far
away--perhaps clear round the World! But, no, it couldn't do that, for
there was the Sea between, and it must stop at the Sea. Anyway, he
would have liked to have travelled over it, to the very end, to see
all the people and animals that walked over it, and the cities and
churches that stood by its side.
But first he must find the Toyman. That is what he had come for. And
the Toyman had just gone over that very road. Marmaduke had seen him
from the valley below, his long legs climbing up that hill and the
little boy had hurried after him, calling and calling.
"'Llo, Toyman, 'llo, Toyman!" he shouted.
He heard an answer and put his hand to his ear to hear more clearly.
"'Llo, Toyman, 'llo, Toyman!" came the mocking answer, faint and
far-away.
But it wasn't the Toyman. It was Echo, calling back from the hills.
Marmaduke had always wanted to meet Echo, but so far he never had. He
thought she must be something like the Star-Lady, whom he _had_
met, only not quite so bright. Her voice sounded a little sadder, too,
like the Bluebird's in the Fall when he says "Goodbye" to the fields
and flies to the South. Often he had run after Echo, but he never
could catch up with her, nor even see a glimpse of her silver and
green dress. She always played Hide-and-Seek with him, and he was
always "it."
However, he didn't worry long about friend Echo this morning. He was
thinking of the Toyman. For the Toyman's face had looked worried--far
away and sad. It had _looked_ somehow as Echo's voice always
_sounded_. What was it Mother had said? "Poor Frank!"--that's
what she called him; "he's in trouble," she had whispered to Father.
Marmaduke didn't know what he could do, but he wanted to catch up with
him, and put his hand in his, and tell him not to worry at all, and
say, if he needed money he could have all there was in Marmaduke's
bank--every last penny, even the bright ones.
Across the road a big jack-rabbit jumped--jumped
_sping--sping--sping_--like a toy animal made of steel springs.
Wienerwurst ran after the rabbit, but his master didn't stop to chase
Jack. He was afraid if he wasted any time he would never catch up with
the Toyman.
At last the ribbon road reached the top of the hill and wound along it
a little way before it started twisting down the other side. For a
moment Marmaduke's eyes followed it down hill, and he wanted to follow
it with his legs too, there were so many wonderful and mysterious
places where it went, but just then he caught sight of the Toyman.
He was sitting right on the top of the hill, sitting with his chin in
his hands, and his eyes on the West far away. And he said never a
word.
So Marmaduke just stole up softly, and put his face against the
Toyman's, and sat down beside him.
And then the Toyman's eyes came back from far away and looked down on
the little boy and smiled again.
"Don't you worry, Toyman," the little boy said to him, "don't you
worry about _anything_. It'll all come out in the wash."
The Toyman didn't ask what he meant by that, for he knew it was a
proverb, a boy's proverb that was as good as any King Soloman ever
made.
"Sure, sonny," he repeated, "it'll all come out in the wash." And he
patted the hand beside him.
You see, Marmaduke never asked the Toyman what his trouble really was,
or anything at all. And that is always the very best way--when a
friend's in trouble, don't bother him with a lot of questions--and
pester the life out of him--but just take his mind off his troubles by
suggesting some nice game to play--like marbles or "Duck-on-the-Rock,"
or going fishing, or something; and if you can't do that, just sit
beside him, "quiet-like," and be his friend.
For a while they sat so, drinking in the cool air, and looking down at
the valley, and the white houses, and red barns, and the yellow
haystacks, and the horses and people like ants crawling here and
there. There were two ribbons in the valley now, one brown and one
silver, the Road and the River. And from the Church with the Long
White Finger Pointing at the Sky, came the sound of bells--pealing
--pealing--up the hill to the Sky.
All else was still. But after they had listened for a while they
discovered that it wasn't so still as it had seemed. Every bird and
insect, each leaf and blossom, was busy, preparing its dinner, or else
just growing. A twig rustled as a little garter snake squirmed into
the thicket. A little gray nuthatch looked for its lunch on a locust
tree, crawling over the trunk head-downwards, while, on a branch
overhead, a crested flycatcher perched watching, watching, then
all-of-a-sudden swooped down and pounced on a fly, swallowed him, flew
back to its perch, and watched again.
In the tall grasses which rose like a miniature forest around his
head, green katydids jumped, as spry as monkeys. And, as he lay on his
back, he could see, way up in the middle of the sky, and right on a
line with his eye, Ole Robber Hawk himself, or else one of his
relatives or friends. He was brown, of course, but against the blue of
the sky he looked like a little black speck with a couple of thin wavy
lines for wings.
There was music, too, for a woodthrush sang, oh ever so sweet, and the
oriole whistled as clear as a flute, while a locust rattled away like
the man who plays the drum and all the noisy things in the
theatre-orchestra. But, busiest of all, at his feet an army of black
ants hurried around a little hole in the ground, seeming quite as big
as the people and horses in the valley below.
"It's just like a little city here, isn't it, Toyman?" Marmaduke said,
"all the katydids, and bugs, and snakes, and things, workin' an'
workin' away."
"Yes," said the Toyman, as they watched Robber Hawk swing round and
round in the sky, "how any one can feel lonely in the country I can't
see. I can understand it in the city, where you can't speak to a soul
without his putting his hand on his watch, but here there's always a
lot of folks with beaks and claws and tails, and all kinds o' tongues
an' dialecks, that you don't need any introduction to, to say
'howdy!'"
But Marmaduke remembered that morning and how the Toyman had seemed in
trouble. He had certainly looked lonely when Marmaduke and Wienerwurst
had found him sitting up there on the hill, and the little boy
couldn't help asking,--"Don't you ever feel lonely? You haven't any
wife, and Mother says she pities a man without chicken or
child--'tleast she said something like that--and how it wasn't good
for a man to live alone--an' _you_ do--out in your bunkhouse."
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