A few steps brought them to the shed, which was merely a roof of boughs
built over a square space, with some branches of trees fastened to the
sides to keep off the wind. The front was quite open and faced the sea,
and as our friends came nearer they observed a little man, with a long
pointed beard, sitting motionless on a stool and staring thoughtfully
out over the water.
"Get out of the way, please," he called in a fretful voice. "Can't you
see you are obstructing my view?"
"Good morning," said Cap'n Bill, politely.
"It isn't a good morning!" snapped the little man. "I've seen plenty of
mornings better than this. Do you call it a good morning when I'm
pestered with such a crowd as you?"
Trot was astonished to hear such words from a stranger whom they had
greeted quite properly, and Cap'n Bill grew red at the little man's
rudeness. But the sailor said, in a quiet tone of voice:
"Are you the only one as lives on this 'ere island?"
"Your grammar's bad," was the reply. "But this is my own exclusive
island, and I'll thank you to get off it as soon as possible."
"We'd like to do that," said Trot, and then she and Cap'n Bill turned
away and walked down to the shore, to see if any other land was in
sight.
The little man rose and followed them, although both were now too
provoked to pay any attention to him.
"Nothin' in sight, partner," reported Cap'n Bill, shading his eyes with
his hand; "so we'll have to stay here for a time, anyhow. It isn't a
bad place, Trot, by any means."
"That's all you know about it!" broke in the little man. "The trees are
altogether too green and the rocks are harder than they ought to be. I
find the sand very grainy and the water dreadfully wet. Every breeze
makes a draught and the sun shines in the daytime, when there's no need
of it, and disappears just as soon as it begins to get dark. If you
remain here you'll find the island very unsatisfactory."
Trot turned to look at him, and her sweet face was grave and curious.
"I wonder who you are," she said.
"My name is Pessim," said he, with an air of pride. "I'm called the
Observer."
"Oh. What do you observe?" asked the little girl.
"Everything I see," was the reply, in a more surly tone. Then Pessim
drew back with a startled exclamation and looked at some footprints in
the sand. "Why, good gracious me!" he cried in distress.
"What's the matter now?" asked Cap'n Bill.
"Someone has pushed the earth in! Don't you see it?
"It isn't pushed in far enough to hurt anything," said Trot, examining
the footprints.
"Everything hurts that isn't right," insisted the man. "If the earth
were pushed in a mile, it would be a great calamity, wouldn't it?"
"I s'pose so," admitted the little girl.
"Well, here it is pushed in a full inch! That's a twelfth of a foot,
or a little more than a millionth part of a mile. Therefore it is
one-millionth part of a calamity--Oh, dear! How dreadful!" said Pessim
in a wailing voice.
"Try to forget it, sir," advised Cap'n Bill, soothingly. "It's
beginning to rain. Let's get under your shed and keep dry."
"Raining! Is it really raining?" asked Pessim, beginning to weep.
"It is," answered Cap'n Bill, as the drops began to descend, "and I
don't see any way to stop it--although I'm some observer myself."
"No; we can't stop it, I fear," said the man. "Are you very busy just
now?"
"I won't be after I get to the shed," replied the sailor-man.
"Then do me a favor, please," begged Pessim, walking briskly along
behind them, for they were hastening to the shed.
"Depends on what it is," said Cap'n Bill.
"I wish you would take my umbrella down to the shore and hold it over
the poor fishes till it stops raining. I'm afraid they'll get wet,"
said Pessim.
Trot laughed, but Cap'n Bill thought the little man was poking fun at
him and so he scowled upon Pessim in a way that showed he was angry.
They reached the shed before getting very wet, although the rain was
now coming down in big drops. The roof of the shed protected them and
while they stood watching the rainstorm something buzzed in and circled
around Pessim's head. At once the Observer began beating it away with
his hands, crying out:
"A bumblebee! A bumblebee! The queerest bumblebee I ever saw!"
Cap'n Bill and Trot both looked at it and the little girl said in
surprise:
"Dear me! It's a wee little Ork!"
"That's what it is, sure enough," exclaimed Cap'n Bill.
Really, it wasn't much bigger than a big bumblebee, and when it came
toward Trot she allowed it to alight on her shoulder.
"It's me, all right," said a very small voice in her ear; "but I'm in
an awful pickle, just the same!"
"What, are you our Ork, then?" demanded the girl, much amazed.
"No, I'm my own Ork. But I'm the only Ork you know," replied the tiny
creature.
"What's happened to you?" asked the sailor, putting his head close to
Trot's shoulder in order to hear the reply better. Pessim also put his
head close, and the Ork said:
"You will remember that when I left you I started to fly over the
trees, and just as I got to this side of the forest I saw a bush that
was loaded down with the most luscious fruit you can imagine. The
fruit was about the size of a gooseberry and of a lovely lavender
color. So I swooped down and picked off one in my bill and ate it. At
once I began to grow small. I could feel myself shrinking, shrinking
away, and it frightened me terribly, so that I lighted on the ground to
think over what was happening. In a few seconds I had shrunk to the
size you now see me; but there I remained, getting no smaller, indeed,
but no larger. It is certainly a dreadful affliction! After I had
recovered somewhat from the shock I began to search for you. It is not
so easy to find one's way when a creature is so small, but fortunately
I spied you here in this shed and came to you at once."
Cap'n Bill and Trot were much astonished at this story and felt grieved
for the poor Ork, but the little man Pessim seemed to think it a good
joke. He began laughing when he heard the story and laughed until he
choked, after which he lay down on the ground and rolled and laughed
again, while the tears of merriment coursed down his wrinkled cheeks.
"Oh, dear! Oh, dear!" he finally gasped, sitting up and wiping his
eyes. "This is too rich! It's almost too joyful to be true."
"I don't see anything funny about it," remarked Trot indignantly.
"You would if you'd had my experience," said Pessim, getting upon his
feet and gradually resuming his solemn and dissatisfied expression of
countenance. "The same thing happened to me."
"Oh, did it? And how did you happen to come to this island?" asked the
girl.
"I didn't come; the neighbors brought me," replied the little man, with
a frown at the recollection. "They said I was quarrelsome and
fault-finding and blamed me because I told them all the things that
went wrong, or never were right, and because I told them how things
ought to be. So they brought me here and left me all alone, saying that
if I quarreled with myself, no one else would be made unhappy. Absurd,
wasn't it?"
"Seems to me," said Cap'n Bill, "those neighbors did the proper thing."
"Well," resumed Pessim, "when I found myself King of this island I was
obliged to live upon fruits, and I found many fruits growing here that
I had never seen before. I tasted several and found them good and
wholesome. But one day I ate a lavender berry--as the Ork did--and
immediately I grew so small that I was scarcely two inches high. It was
a very unpleasant condition and like the Ork I became frightened. I
could not walk very well nor very far, for every lump of earth in my
way seemed a mountain, every blade of grass a tree and every grain of
sand a rocky boulder. For several days I stumbled around in an agony of
fear. Once a tree toad nearly gobbled me up, and if I ran out from the
shelter of the bushes the gulls and cormorants swooped down upon me.
Finally I decided to eat another berry and become nothing at all, since
life, to one as small as I was, had become a dreary nightmare.
"At last I found a small tree that I thought bore the same fruit as
that I had eaten. The berry was dark purple instead of light lavender,
but otherwise it was quite similar. Being unable to climb the tree, I
was obliged to wait underneath it until a sharp breeze arose and shook
the limbs so that a berry fell. Instantly I seized it and taking a last
view of the world--as I then thought--I ate the berry in a twinkling.
Then, to my surprise, I began to grow big again, until I became of my
former stature, and so I have since remained. Needless to say, I have
never eaten again of the lavender fruit, nor do any of the beasts or
birds that live upon this island eat it."
They had all three listened eagerly to this amazing tale, and when it
was finished the Ork exclaimed:
"Do you think, then, that the deep purple berry is the antidote for the
lavender one?"
"I'm sure of it," answered Pessim.
"Then lead me to the tree at once!" begged the Ork, "for this tiny form
I now have terrifies me greatly."