Читать книгу: «The Pond», страница 5

"Why, it's quite a fairy-tale!" said the reed-warbler.

"We flew a good distance," the mussel continued, "high above the fields and woods. I could just peep out, for my shells were ajar because of the bird's toe. We lost the fish on the way, but I held on, however much the gull might struggle and kick. Of course, I did not mean to hang on for ever, you know, but I wanted to have my say as to where we should alight. Suppose I had been dropped into a tall tree and had to hang there and wait until a student came and got engaged…"

"He would have come all right," said the reed-warbler. "I've travelled a great deal, but I have never been anywhere that there wasn't a student who got engaged."

"Well, in my case, it would have been rather uncertain," said the mussel. "And so, when I looked down and saw that there was blue underneath me, I let go and fell here, into the pond."

"And are you satisfied?"

"Yes, for the present. I have seen no other mussels, so it is a good deal pleasanter than in the other place."

"That's a curious story," said the reed-warbler.

Then he sat and fell a-thinking and night came.

But Mrs. Reed-Warbler ran down the reed and peered into the dark water:

"Are you there, my little grub?" she asked.

"Yes, thank you," said the May-fly grub.

"Have you had a good time to-day?"

"Yes, thank you. I was only nearly eaten up by the perch; and then there was a duckling after me and a horrid dragon-fly grub and a water-beetle. Otherwise everything was very nice indeed."

CHAPTER IX
The Water-Lily

"Don't you think we shall be able to let the children out soon?" asked the reed-warbler.

"Certainly not!" said his wife. "There can be no question of the little dears standing on their legs for quite a month yet."

"They can stand on their legs as it is," said he, "for they nearly trample one another to death when I come along with a silly fly. I tell you, it's getting a bit difficult to provide food for everybody. There are such an awful lot of us after it now. There are children all over the neighbourhood and they are all crying out for food."

"Are you beginning to see the truth of what I said, madam?" asked the eel, sticking his head out of the mud.

"Hold your tongue and mind your own business, you ugly fish," said Mrs. Reed-Warbler.

"Your husband has come round to my views long ago," said the eel. "I can see that plainly. He would give anything to be able to roam about as a free bird, instead of wearing himself out with a big family."

"You're quite mistaken, my good fellow," said the reed-warbler. "I certainly admit …"

"You'd better mind what you're admitting!" screamed his wife and pecked at him.

"Wriggle and twist!" said the eel; and off he went.

That afternoon, Mr. and Mrs. Reed-Warbler sat discussing the question again:

"If only we can hold out," said he. "Just now, I was fighting like mad with my old friend, the flycatcher, for a ridiculous little grub. I got it, but he will never forgive me. When poverty comes in at the door, love flies out at the window, as the human beings say. It will end in screaming and quarrelling all over the pond."

"It cannot be worse than it is," said she. "Do as I do and think of all the beautiful things the poets have sung about us. It always helps to keep one's spirits up."

"I wish I had a couple of nice little poets here to feed the children with," said he, grumpily.

They sat again for a while, plunged in gloomy thoughts. The young ones were having their mid-day nap. Then he said:

"Things are queerly divided in this world. The number of sorrows and cares that we have, we free birds, to whom the whole world is open! Look at the water-lily. She's bound to her place. She has to struggle up through the dark water for ever so many days before she reaches the surface. Then she's there and unfolds her white flower and is happy. She hasn't a care … look at her, lying and rocking and dreaming. I wish we were water-lilies!"

"Yes," said Mrs. Reed-Warbler. "And her seeds ripen in her lap and then glide down in the water and take root and grow up and, next year, they blossom around her. Oh, how delightful it must be!"

"Yes, but think of the bladder-wort and how he took us in!" said he.

"Pooh!" she replied. "Of course, it was that horrid spider who lived with him that led him into evil courses. No one will make me believe that there is anything but peace and contentment in the water-lily's beautiful calyx."

"Hush!" he said. "She's talking to that pretty little spear-wort beside her."

The two anxious birds bent their heads and listened.

"You spiteful minx!" said the water-lily. "You enticed two bumble-bees away from me to-day, though you haven't a farthing's-worth of honey in your withered calices."

"Scold away!" said the spear-wort. "All your fine clothes won't help you in the least. Things go by merit, you see. No respectable bumble-bee will look at a frivolous person like you. And you may be sure that I have more honey in one of my flowers than you in your whole body."

"Here I stand with all my pollen ripe," said the water-lily, "and can't get rid of it. How can any one care to look at a beggar like you? But I shall find a way of revenging myself. You annoyed me long ago, when we were growing up through the water. Your nasty thin stalks swarmed over me and would have choked me, if they could. You, with your pretence! In the autumn, there won't be a particle of you left. It's too funny, that you should be allowed to stand in the way of respectable people."

"In the autumn, my seeds will be ripe and sown, Water-Lily dear," replied the spear-wort. "And, next spring, I shall grow up and tease you, just as I'm doing now. Trust me for that."

"Unless they come and clean out the pond first," said the water-lily. "For then they'll take you and leave me here because of my beauty."

The spear-wort could say nothing to this, for it was true.

"Did you hear?" whispered Mrs. Reed-Warbler.

"Hush," answered the reed-warbler. "Here comes a bumble-bee."

And a big, buzzing bumble-bee came and whirred upon her wings and hung for a while in the air, above the two flowers.

"This way, please, dear Bumble-Bee!" cried the water-lily and displayed her white petals to the best advantage. "I keep the freshest honey in the whole district. Pray come nearer. I have combs and combs full. And here is pollen in fancy wrappers. And I have laid out my broad green leaves on the water for you to rest on, if you are tired. See for yourself … it is quite dry here … pray …"

"Don't mind that humbug," said the spear-wort. "This is the real old shop for honey. I scorn to advertise in that silly way, with big white petals and all that pretence. I put all I know into my honey and my pollen. I only have a little white flower for you to know me by."

"You must on no account be seen going into that common shop," screamed the water-lily. "Your honoured children will simply be poisoned by the stuff she keeps. If indeed she has any, for there were two big bumble-bees with her this morning and they looked very dissatisfied when they flew away."

"Don't you believe her," cried the spear-wort. "It's sheer jealousy makes her talk like that. The bumble-bees were exceedingly pleased and they have produced a quantity of honey. Mother Water-Lily's is yesterday's. No one will have anything to say to it; I swear it's all spoilt."

"Buzz … buzz …!" said the bee and flew away.

"You humbug!" said the water-lily.

"You idiot!" said the spear-wort.

"That's the worst of keeping bad company," said the water-lily.

"It comes of your mountebank ways, of course," said the spear-wort. "They're enough to drive respectable people from the pond."

They could think of nothing more to say and lay on the water and looked angrily at each other.

"Oh dear!" said little Mrs. Reed-Warbler. "Where on earth is one to go to find poetry?"

"Where can one find a fly?" said her husband.

"We must take life as it is," said the mussel, "and meddle with it as little as possible. That's what I do; and there's nothing to prevent my remaining here and growing to be a hundred."

A boy stood on the edge of the pond. He had a big stone in his hand. Suddenly, he flung it into the water with all his might. Then he went on and thought no more about it.

But the stone had hit the mussel and smashed him to pieces.

"There!" he said. "That's the end of me. Both shells smashed … there's nothing to be done. Good-bye and thank you for your pleasant company."

One by one all the eyes on his mantle grew dim; and then he was dead.

"Goodness knows who will be the next!" said the reed-warbler.

But Goody Cray-Fish came slowly crawling and took the dead mussel in her claws:

"Now I shall get my leg back with interest," said she.

CHAPTER X
The Cray-Fish's Journey

"How is my dear grub?" asked little Mrs. Reed-Warbler.

"Pretty well, thanks," replied the May-fly grub. "There was a roach, who wanted to eat me; and two caddis-grubs, who tugged at me; and a whirligig, who bit me in one of my legs. Otherwise, I've had a capital time."

Aren't you almost ready?"

"To-day or to-morrow, I think."

"Take care you don't meet with an accident first," said Mrs. Reed-Warbler, kindly.

Goody Cray-Fish crept round restlessly:

"Food's scarce," she said. "Oh, if I were only a smart bird and could fly away! But, it's true, you're angry with me, ma'am, and I hardly dare speak to you."

"I was very angry with you," said Mrs. Reed-Warbler. "But, since then, I have experienced such horrors that I've almost forgotten it. I have made the acquaintance of a spider who ate her own mother."

"Oh dear, oh dear!" said the cray-fish. "That's enough to upset any mother."

"So it is. She also ate her husband."

"I don't say that's right," said the cray-fish. "But at any rate it's more excusable, for men are neither more nor less than monsters. Oh, of course, I make an exception of your own husband, ma'am."

"Is it true, Goody Cray-Fish?" said Mrs. Reed-Warbler – "tell me, did you really eat your children?"

"I had the misfortune to eat seven of them," replied the cray-fish, with a woebegone face. "But it was out of sheer love. They were so nice. And, as I was patting them with my claws, I happened to touch them too hard. So I had to eat them myself, rather than let them go to strangers."

"It's terrible to listen to," said Mrs. Reed-Warbler.

"Yes, it's sad," said the cray-fish. "But their troubles are over now, poor little dears, while their hundred and ninety-three brothers and sisters have to go on struggling through this wicked world! Goodness alone knows how many of them are still alive and how they are doing!"

"Yes, it's a wicked world," said Mrs. Reed-Warbler.

"Would you mind telling me, ma'am?" asked the cray-fish, "don't you think a body might get away from the pond?"

"We shall leave in the autumn," said Mrs. Reed-Warbler, "for Italy. But you have no wings, Goody Cray-Fish, so I don't see how you can go."

"That's just it. If one had wings, one would soon be off. But they might be in one's way in the water. However, there are other people who travel, though they have no wings. What about the eel, ma'am, for instance?"

"Yes … the eel," said Mrs. Reed-Warbler. "He can wriggle and twist. You can't, you see."

"No," replied the cray-fish looking very sadly out of her stalked eyes. "I can't do that at all. Because of my stiff shirt, you know. Though I may be thankful for it, too, or I should have been done for long ago."

"What do you propose, then?"

The cray-fish crawled right under the reeds, where the nest hung, and asked, in a low whisper:

"What do you think of the mussel, ma'am?"

"The mussel?"

"Yes, the mussel. You see, I sit here in the mud and hear such a lot of things and turn them over in my mind. And I heard the story with which the mussel was diverting you and Mr. Reed-Warbler the other day. Do you think it's to be depended on?"

"Of course I do."

"Well, I don't take much account of the mussel," said the cray-fish. "A mollusc like that! And then he insulted me, besides. But I've eaten him now and I don't like to speak harm of what I've eaten myself. And, if the story is genuine, another person might possibly save herself in the same manner."

"Why, you have no shells to pinch with, Goody Cray-Fish!"

"No, but I have my claws," replied the cray-fish. "And, believe me, ma'am, they can pinch too."

The reed-warbler came home from hunting and his wife told him about the cray-fish's plan. They both laughed at it, but Goody Cray-Fish stuck to her guns.

She did not go to her hole all the morning, but crawled around and swam on the surface of the water, to see if no opportunity offered.

About the middle of the day, a little roach came skimming along.

"Look out, grub!" cried Mrs. Reed-Warbler.

"I've hidden under a leaf and I'm all right," replied the May-fly grub.

"Here's the roach," said the cray-fish. "Now we only want the gull."

She kept just under the roach and looked out eagerly, in every direction, with her long eyes.

"What do you want, you ugly cray-fish?" said the roach, and struck out with his tail.

"I sha'n't hurt you, Mr. Fish," said she. "The pond is meant for everybody, I should think. Surely a person's entitled to go and take the air outside her own door."

The eel put his head out of the mud:

"That's right, Goody Cray-Fish, stick to it!" he said. "Wriggle and twist!"

And the reed-warblers laughed and peeped down to see what on earth was going to come of it; and the youngsters were told as much of it as their little brains could take in, and they peeped too. The spider ran up and looked on, the May-fly grub was nearly jumping out of her cocoon with curiosity. The bladder-wort forgot to catch insects, the water-lily and the spear-wort stopped quarrelling; they all stared at the cray-fish and the roach. For they had all heard something of what was at hand, one from the other. But none of them said a word, lest they should frighten away the roach; he was the only one who had not the least suspicion. Only the reeds whispered softly to one another. But this they always do, so nobody minds them.

Just then a gull swooped down upon the roach.

It made such a splash in the water that no one could quite see what happened. But the roach was gone, and presently the reed-warblers exclaimed:

"Look!.. Look!.. There's the gull flying with the roach … and the cray-fish is hanging on to his hind-toe!"

The water-lily and the spear-wort shouted the news and the rushes whispered it on and soon there was not a midge-grub in the pond but knew all about the extraordinary thing that had happened.

"So she had her way," said the reed-warblers.

And they discussed for quite an hour where she would be likely to arrive, but no one could work that out and none of those in the pond ever got to know.

Only the woman who lived by the pond knew. For, when the gull came above the chimney of her little cottage, he gave such a kick with his leg that the cray-fish dropped off. She went right down the woman's chimney; and there stood a pot of boiling water, which she fell into.

"Oh dear!" said the cray-fish. "That was a silly business."

It was so silly that she turned as red as fire all over her body and died then and there. But, when the woman took her pot and was going to make herself a drop of coffee, she stared in amazement at that fine big cray-fish:

"Well, I never!" she said. "Best thanks to whoever sent you."

Then she ate her.

That same evening, the May-fly broke through her cocoon.

She flew up, on tiny little thin, transparent wings and with three long threads hanging from her abdomen to help her keep her balance.

"I say, isn't this lovely?" she cried. "How delicious life is! It's worth while living for ever so many days as a poor grub, if only one is permitted to gaze upon this splendour for an hour."

"Oh, so you're there, are you?" said Mrs. Reed-Warbler. "You look very nice."

"Thank you," said the May-fly. "Now I must just go round the pond and lay my eggs. Then I'll come back and sit down in the reeds and die; and then you can eat me. And a thousand thanks to you for sparing my life that time and for warning me when I was in danger. If you hadn't done that, I should never have beheld this glorious sight."

"If only you don't over-eat yourself on the way and forget your promise!" said Mrs. Reed-Warbler.

"There's no danger of that," replied the May-fly. "I have eaten all I need. I haven't even a mouth! I shall just enjoy an hour or two of this delightful life and then lay my eggs. That's my lot; and I don't complain."

"Life is not so delightful as you think," said Mrs. Reed-Warbler. "If I were a true friend to you, I would save you from seeing all your illusions shattered."

"How can you say that life is not delightful?" said the May-fly. "Look … and look … and look…"

"I will be a true friend to you," said Mrs. Reed-Warbler. "You shall be spared disappointment. I will eat you straight away."

Then she caught her and ate her.

"Good-evening, madam," said the eel. "Are you sitting and contemplating the poetry of Nature? I just saw you destroying a bit of it … for the May-fly… That's poetry, if you like! Well, did she taste nice?"

"You're a horrid, vulgar fellow," said Mrs. Reed-Warbler.

"You talk like one who is chock-full of poetry," retorted the eel. "I rejoice to see you making such smart progress as a murderess. You were shockingly squeamish at first!"