“Starving,” whispered everybody else, frightened.
“Starving,” said Taffy again. “That’s why it takes so much meat now,
King Cole. They eat all the time, sir. You can see how they’re eating
now. I don’t suppose they ever will get really filled up. They’ve been
at it for days, yes, and for nights too.”
“They eat all night too?” asked King Cole.
“All night long and all day long and never stop except for the briefest
of naps,” Taffy told him. “You see, there’s no joke about this, King
Cole. These are really hungry animals.”
It was easy to see that Taffy was right, for as the people of Pudding
Lane looked at the animals, not one cat raised an eye at them, or not
one dog, but lickety-lick, crunchety-crunch, they kept on eating,
eating, eating.
It was an odd sight, all those gray and black and brown furry bodies,
all those tails in the air, all those clamping jaws, and not one sound
but lickety-lick, crunchety-crunch. It was a sad sight too, for the
people of Pudding Lane had never known that animals could be as hungry
as that.
And so they nearly turned themselves inside out in their generosity,
those kind-hearted citizens of Pudding Lane. Mr. Spratt declared rashly
that he didn’t care if he never saw a piece of lean meat again; Mr.
Claus magnificently offered to abstain from beef the rest of his life;
and Old King Cole ordered the Queen of Hearts to see that eggs appeared
thereafter on the royal breakfast table, instead of the usual chops.
Taffy, however, wouldn’t listen to these sacrifices. He was about to
move on anyway, he said.
“I’m going to Hamelin next and after that, who knows, I may even go to
France and steal some meat from the French awhile. The cats and dogs
have to be fed, but of course I can’t deprive you good people of your
proteins forever.”
The good people didn’t know what proteins were, but they vowed again
that these poor creatures could have Pudding Lane’s meat as long as
Pudding Lane had any meat, such a pitch had their ecstasy reached.
But no, Taffy insisted that they had suffered enough, and that he must
go. And before they knew it, he was gone, followed by his winding
procession of cats and dogs.
The funny part about it was that the people of Pudding Lane were
actually sorry to see him go. They had forgotten he was a thief, you
see; they had forgotten their recent anger and annoyance against him.
They had forgotten everything except that Taffy the Welshman was a man
who was kind to animals, a man who lived and plied his trade for cats
and dogs alone. And this fact was so important that they had forgotten
the picnic too; they had even forgotten the spider.
And so those very people who had called Taffy the worst names only that
same morning now watched his departing figure down the road and called
out, “Good-by, Taffy, good-by. Good luck, good luck.”
Fancy wishing a thief good luck! It doesn’t seem respectable, but
that’s what they did.
And as for Taffy, he did have good luck. He went on his way ever after
that, stealing meat, feeding the cats and dogs and having a lovely
time. For Taffy enjoyed the stealing part quite as much as the feeding
part, if the truth must be known. It’s deplorable. People oughtn’t to
enjoy stealing, but Taffy did enjoy it, and there’s nothing we can do
about it.
Perhaps some day he’ll reform and be an honest man. Yet if he did, the
cats and dogs might have a hard time of it, so we’d better let him
alone, I guess. If we must have thieves in the world, Taffy’s the very
sort to have.
X
THE CROOKED MAN GETS A BRAND-NEW REPUTATION
The Crooked Man had invited Santa Claus to visit him and the Clauses
were sitting at the kitchen table trying to decide about it.
“I can’t think why he should have asked Santa to his house,” said Mrs.
Claus. She looked down at the letter in her hand, which was, of course,
written in extremely crooked characters on a funny little crooked piece
of paper.
“Perhaps he’s heard about the toys and wants Santa Claus to make some
for the crooked children next Christmas,” suggested Mr. Claus.
“The crooked children!” exclaimed Mrs. Claus. “You ought to know by
this time, Mr. Claus, that the Crooked Man is a bachelor.”
“Is he?” asked Mr. Claus. “Dear me. Then who lives with him on the
Crooked Mile?”
“He bought a crooked cat which caught a crooked mouse, and they all
live together in a little crooked house,” explained his wife.
“Oh, I see,” said the baker. But he didn’t see. He simply couldn’t
imagine a crooked man and a crooked cat and a crooked mouse all living
together in a little crooked house. It sounded like a bad dream to Mr.
Claus, not like real life. In real life, men and cats and mice are
straight.
“I suppose it will be all right for Santa Claus to go,” Mrs. Claus was
saying.
“I suppose so,” assented her husband.
“Nobody ever did visit him, though.”
“No,” said Mr. Claus, “the Crooked Man doesn’t stand very well among
the best people, I must admit.”
“Well, do you suppose,” Mrs. Claus stopped, reddening. “Could it be,
baker, that the Crooked Man’s morals are crooked, too?”
The baker’s face fell. Morals. He hadn’t thought of them. But
naturally, the morals of a crooked man would be crooked, wouldn’t they?
So he said to Mrs. Claus, “Why, yes, certainly his morals would
be crooked. Santa Claus must not accept this invitation to visit
the Crooked Man. In fact, Mrs. Claus, I forbid it,” he finished up
pompously, just as if he, a sage man, had thought up the morals himself.
Santa Claus, who was sitting at the table too, didn’t quite understand.
“What are morals?” he asked his mother.
“Morals?” replied Mrs. Claus. “Why, washing your face every morning is
morals, and telling the truth, and going to bed at eight o’clock, and
minding your parents, and saving your pennies--all those are morals,
Santa.”
“Do you have to have them?” asked Santa. They sounded very
uninteresting. He could think of lots of people who were most
amusing and lovable, though they didn’t do all those things: the
candlestick-maker, for instance, who didn’t wash very often; and Piggy
Peddler who stayed up till all hours; and Simple Simon, who didn’t ever
save his pennies, but squandered them prodigally on horehound lozenges,
his favorite confection.
“Have to have them?” repeated Mrs. Claus, shocked. “Well, I guess you
do, Santa Claus. If you don’t have morals, you don’t get very far in
this world, sir. Morals make the world go ’round, don’t they, Mr.
Claus?”
Mr. Claus, thus appealed to, looked dubious.
“I thought it was love that made the world go ’round,” he ventured.
“Well, love is morals,” asserted Mrs. Claus. You can’t catch that woman
very often.
The subject was getting too deep, however, and she hastily changed it.
“I’ll tell you,” she said. “Instead of visiting the Crooked Man, Santa
Claus can go to the Gingerbread Fair.”
At which suggestion Santa Claus forgot morals and love and the Crooked
Man and everything else, so thrilled was he over the Gingerbread Fair.
The Gingerbread Fair was the great celebration which was held at Pye
Corner every year. It was a magnificent affair, of that Pudding Lane
was certain, although only Mr. Claus and King Cole had ever gone so far
as to attend it. Mr. Claus went on business, of course, and Old King
Cole went for pleasure.
And now Santa Claus was going. What an experience for a little boy
only nine years old! Why, most of the grown-ups of Pudding Lane lived
and died without going to it. Even Mr. Flinders, the wealthy, had not
permitted himself that luxury, though it was said that he was planning
to take Mrs. Flinders to the Gingerbread Fair on their twentieth
wedding anniversary.
Pye Corner was so very far off, you see. It was farther than Banbury
Cross, farther than Hamelin, almost as far as London. You went down
Raspberry Road, along the Crooked Mile, across Minnow Creek, up
Rocking-horse Row, and there, just before you got to London Bridge, was
Pye Corner. It took almost a day to get there by foot; it took half a
day to get there by coach. No wonder the citizens of Pudding Lane had
never traveled so far.
It was decided that Judy-Who-Lived-in-a-Shoe should accompany Santa
Claus on his trip to Pye Corner, for Santa Claus could hardly bear
to do anything without his favorite little friend, and to do such a
wonderful thing without her was unthinkable.
Mr. Claus was to take Santa and Judy to the Gingerbread Fair, but
Mr. Claus didn’t take them; he took the mumps instead. Where he took
them from was not known, for the Claus children had had the mumps
long before, but where he took them at was quite clear. His poor
jaws swelled up like balloons, his face ached worse than he had ever
supposed a mere face could ache, and on the very day of the Gingerbread
Fair, Mr. Claus lay in his bed, moaning, without a thought of
gingerbread.
Poor Mr. Claus, with those aching balloons where his face used to be.
Poor Santa, without any father to take him to the Gingerbread Fair.
Poor Judy, all dressed up and waiting in the Shoe for a Mr. Claus that
would never come.
Mrs. Claus, however, was not the woman to let plans slip simply
because her spouse had chosen this unlucky moment in which to take
on a distressing malady. She would never get to the Gingerbread Fair
herself, probably, but she was determined that Santa should go. So what
did she do but bustle down to the Town Crier’s and beg him to take the
children and the pies to the Gingerbread Fair? Not that it took much
begging. The Town Crier had his hat on his head before she had finished
her first sentence, and before she had started her second, he was
halfway down Pudding Lane toward the baker’s shop.
So it was the old Town Crier instead of Mr. Claus who climbed into the
stagecoach ten minutes later, with Santa and Judy in tow, and a great
basket of Mrs. Claus’s pies on his arm. Into the coach they got and
away they went, Santa Claus and Judy and the Town Crier and the pies.
They bowled along Raspberry Road, they bumped along the Crooked Mile,
they forded Minnow Creek, they rolled along Rocking-horse Row, and
they swung into Pye Corner, that great metropolis, at exactly twelve
o’clock.
“We have arrived,” announced the Town Crier sonorously. The Town Crier
never said things; he always announced them. Even when he uttered a
mere “Good morning”, he rolled it out like a piece of news, sang it,
cried it.
But Santa Claus and Judy knew they had arrived without his telling
them. They knew it by the sound of a fife and drums; they knew it by
the sight of a dozen merry-go-rounds, of Punch and Judy shows, of
brightly colored stalls, of children, children, everywhere; and most of
all, they knew it by the mountains of gingerbread pigs that were piled
up as high and as far as they could see.
“Oh, Judy!” whispered Santa Claus, pressing her hand fervently.
Judy nodded blissfully.
“I know,” she answered. “But come on. Let’s hurry. Oh, it’s a lovely
Gingerbread Fair, Santa Claus.”
And it was a lovely Gingerbread Fair, quite the loveliest one Pye
Corner had ever had. And such a time as Santa and Judy had that whole
long, sunny afternoon, while the Town Crier at his stall announced Mrs.
Claus’s pies and made change, incorrectly, for the buyers who ate Mrs.
Claus’s pies.
The first thing to do was to buy their gingerbread pigs, those brown
crusty beasts with curled tails and sprouting horns (the gingerbread
species have horns if other pigs do not), and each pig bearing the
name of its owner in sticky pink-and-white icing. There on her pig you
could read Judy’s name, plain as day, J-u-d-y, and there on Santa’s
pig blazed forth his name too, S-a-n-t-a. The man did it with a little
squeezer while you waited.
You picked the pig, you told your name, you paid your penny, and the
pig was yours miraculously.
Some of the pigs had freckles, candy ones, but the freckled pigs
cost two pennies, and a plain pig does very well if your pennies are
limited, as Santa’s and Judy’s were. There was the merry-go-round yet
to be reckoned with, and the circus, and the Punch and Judy--oh, lots
of things.
The merry-go-round came next. Judy rode a wild bull, a creature with
snorting nostrils, angry red eyes and a lolling tongue; Santa Claus
strode a Mexican pony whose long tail stuck out straight behind him.
They had just mounted when the music commenced, a tune that wheezed
from a bronchial music box in the middle somewhere; the platform began
to move slowly, the bull and the pony started to rock.
Faster went the music, faster went the platform, faster rocked the pony
and the bull. Judy’s fat little legs clung frantically; Santa Claus
gripped tight with his fists. The world spun around them, a flying haze
of faces and colors and shapes. On and on and on they went, whirling,
rocking, dipping, swaying, plunging.
When it was over and they stood dazed on the ground again, Judy gulped,
then turned to Santa.
“But what makes the merry go ’round, Santa?” she asked.
Santa Claus didn’t know exactly. In fact, he didn’t know at all. But
that only made it better. If you don’t know precisely how wonderful
things happen, it seems to make them more wonderful, somehow.
In the circus, they saw an elephant that waltzed and a clown who was
fearfully funny because his coat tails were forever getting afire. In
the Punch and Judy show there were six Punches and five Judys. Think of
it! At the candy stall, Judy and Santa bought taffy that was spun off a
wheel like wool. They shot guns and threw rings at bottles and bowled
at ninepins. And then, when they had spent every single penny they
had, they went back to get the Town Crier--and he wasn’t there. The
stall was deserted, the pies were gone, and so, evidently, was the Town
Crier.
They looked all over the whole Gingerbread Fair, but no Town Crier was
to be found. Where he had gone, nobody could say, until an old apple
woman in the next stall, who had known it all along, mumbled that he
had picked up his traps and gone home by the five-o’clock stage.
“Gone home!” ejaculated Judy.
She and Santa looked at each other.
“He does forget things, you know,” Santa reminded Judy.
“But he wouldn’t forget us,” Judy said.
“He did, though,” put in the old apple woman. Then she softened. “Look
here, you childer,” she said, “it’s yet light. Best hurry home afore
dark. Your mothers will be worried-like.”
“But it’s too far to walk before dark,” said Santa Claus. “We live ’way
off in Pudding Lane.”
[Illustration: _“But it’s too far to walk before dark,” said Santa
Claus. “We live ’way off in Pudding Lane.” Page 148._]
The apple woman considered them a moment. Then she spoke.
“I’ll give yer a lift. Nobody’s buying apples, anyway,” she said
savagely.
She did give them a lift, if you can call it a lift, that short ride
she gave them in her wheelbarrow on top of apples. Still, even if Judy
did keep tumbling off like a very apple herself, even if Santa Claus
did ache all over from sitting on the knobby things, it was better than
nothing, the apple woman’s lift. And when she dumped them in front of
her cottage on Rocking-horse Row with a hoarse “Good night to yer”,
Judy and Santa thanked her heartily.
Their thanks were hearty, though their hearts were rather faint. It did
seem forlorn to be there alone on Rocking-horse Row, so far from home
at such an hour. It was now nearly seven, and the sun was getting ready
for bed behind the hill.
But Santa and Judy were brave children. Judy didn’t cry and Santa
didn’t flinch. They simply picked up their tired feet and went on. They
weren’t really lost, you see, because they knew the way. Only it was
such a _long_ way; that was the trouble.
Well, they walked and walked, and finally they came to Minnow Creek,
several inches deep and at least four feet wide. Minnow Creek was
fun, though, because they took off their shoes and stockings and waded
across it. They wiped their feet on Judy’s petticoat, put on their
shoes and stockings and approached the Crooked Mile. That indeed looked
bad. It was such a crooked mile, twisting and curving like dozens of
horseshoes. People always got lost on it. And now, to make it worse, it
was almost dark. In another moment, it would be pitchy. Then what would
they do?
The darkness plumped down on them at last. Santa Claus could see
nothing but a few feeble stars overhead; Judy could not see a foot
ahead of her. Hands clasped, they walked on, frightened and quiet,
hardly daring to whisper.
Then, suddenly, a yellow light flashed up ahead of them.
“Firefly,” said Judy.
“Lantern,” said Santa.
But it wasn’t a firefly, it wasn’t a lantern; it was a lamp in a house.
As they got closer, they talked about the house, whose it was and
whether they should knock on the door or not. Judy was afraid it might
be a witch who lived there, but Santa Claus pooh-pooh’ed that.
“You know there aren’t any witches except in stories,” he said.
“But this may be a story,” was Judy’s answer.
“You only read stories.”
“You could be a story as well as read it,” asserted Judy.
Santa didn’t understand that, so he made no answer, but marched
straight up to the door and knocked. Witch or no witch, he was going to
ask for help.
The man that came to the door looked something like a witch, to be
sure, gnarled and twisted as he was, with a long irregular nose, and
knotted, hunched-up body. He spoke pleasantly enough, however.
“Good evening,” said he. “Why, bless my soul, it’s children.”
“Please, sir,” spoke Santa Claus courageously, “it’s Judy and Santa
Claus of Pudding Lane.”
“You don’t tell me,” exclaimed the gnarled man. “Why, come in, Judy and
Santa Claus of Pudding Lane.”
He held the door open so that the yellow light streamed out of the
little house. The children could see the house more plainly now. It
was an odd-looking house, leaning every which way, like a house in
a puzzle. Its door sagged at a dizzy angle; its windows were put in
aslant. Its very chimneys were askew on top of its zigzag roof.
Wondering, the children followed the hunched-up man into his crazy
house. How queer it was inside too. The fireplace seemed to stand on
its ear; the table supported itself on one leg; the lamp was upside
down. And there, beside the fire, lay a cat such as had never been seen
before, a cat all angles and points, between his paws a mouse whose
ears were crisscross, whose tail was curly like a corkscrew.... Oh, now
Santa Claus knew.
This was the Crooked Man, and here was the crooked cat who caught a
crooked mouse and they all lived together in this little crooked house.
Santa Claus had guessed the truth. When he asked the man timidly if he
really were the Crooked Man, his host gave a pleasant, crooked smile
and jerked his crooked head in assent.
“I am that,” he replied. “And I’ve wanted to see you, oh, so much,
Santa Claus, because you’re an understanding fellow, even if you are
only nine, and I thought--”
“You thought--” prompted Santa.
“Well, I thought--” the Crooked Man seemed rather embarrassed “--I
thought that maybe if you knew me and liked me, just a little, of
course--that maybe--”
“That maybe everybody else would like you too, and not be afraid of you
any more?” finished up Santa for him.
The Crooked Man nodded vigorously, with an eager look in his eyes.
“Why, of course they will,” said Santa Claus. “I do like you, Crooked
Man. You’re very kind and agreeable, and when I tell my friends in
Pudding Lane just how nice you are, I’m sure you’ll be very popular
there. I really am sure of that, sir.”
The Crooked Man blinked at this, trying to keep back some grateful
tears that wouldn’t be kept, however, but pursued a crooked course down
his cheeks.
“It’s rather lonely being crooked, I suppose,” said Judy, trying to be
tactful.
“It is,” replied the Crooked Man huskily. “It isn’t being crooked
that’s so bad; it’s just that nobody else is crooked, you see.”
“Yes, I see,” said Judy soberly. “It’s like spelling. If nobody else
knew how, you wouldn’t have to learn, but they do, so you do,” she
ended up rather incoherently.
“Only I can’t help being crooked, no matter how hard I try,” said the
man, “and you can learn spelling.”
“Can you?” thought Judy. Privately, she thought she would never learn
spelling any more than the Crooked Man would ever straighten out.
Well, that was the way Pudding Lane discovered what a nice chap the
Crooked Man was, after all. For, of course, he took the children home
in his cart as fast as he could, when they told him their story, took
them home to their mothers, and was the object of much praise and
admiration from all of Pudding Lane. Especially did the Town Crier
praise and admire him.
“I don’t see how you remembered to bring ’em,” he said, marveling.
“I forgot ’em clean as a whistle. Had a feeling I had left something
behind, but couldn’t remember what it was. You must have an excellent
memory,” he went on. “Perhaps crooked memories are better than straight
ones.”
“Perhaps,” agreed the Crooked Man, smiling crookedly.
XI
MOTHER GOOSE SETTLES A DIFFICULTY
The Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe was busy making broth one afternoon
when she looked out through the lowest buttonhole of her home and spied
Mrs. Dumpty coming up the walk.
“Why, Mrs. Dumpty, this _is_ a surprise!” cried the Old Woman. “I’m so
glad to see you. Do come right in.”
Mrs. Dumpty could not muster a smile in answer to the Old Woman’s
cordial greeting. She was a jolly little pudding of a lady with a round
face and no waistline whatever, but to-day her mouth drooped at the
corners and she looked very worried, as indeed she had looked all these
weeks of Humpty’s confinement. “I just thought I’d run over a while,”
she said to the Old Woman. “Humpty’s asleep.”
“Of course!” exclaimed the Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe delightedly.
“I’m so glad you did, Mrs. Dumpty. Now come right in.”
Mrs. Dumpty sighed heavily. She was very fond of the Old Woman, but it
was an ordeal to climb into that Shoe every time she wanted to call,
and she had always said she didn’t know why in the world the Old Woman
didn’t call Jack-of-all-Trades and let him build a few steps up to the
Shoe. However, the Old Woman was queer about her home, and so now Mrs.
Dumpty bravely lifted one fat little foot for the climb, and pretty
soon, panting and pink, she had scrambled into the Shoe.
“And how is Humpty?” inquired the Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe, as she
hastened to put the kettle on.
“He will never be any better,” answered Mrs. Dumpty sadly. “He will
never walk another step. Oh, Old Woman, if he had only not sat on the
wall that day--”
“I know,” murmured the Old Woman sympathetically. “But Humpty doesn’t
suffer any pain, does he?”
Mrs. Dumpty’s face cleared. “No, not a bit,” she answered. “But, Old
Woman, what do you suppose the doctor says he must have now?”
“I haven’t the faintest notion,” declared the Old Woman.
“A wheel chair!” Mrs. Dumpty’s little eyes bulged as she told her news.
“A wheel chair!” repeated the Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe. “Well,
whatever in the world is that?”
“It’s a chair with wheels on it,” explained Mrs. Dumpty. “You see, Old
Woman, if Humpty could be pushed around in a wheel chair, it would be
almost--not quite, but almost--as good as walking.”
“Why, of course!” agreed the Old Woman. “What won’t they be thinking up
next?” she concluded admiringly.
“But,” Mrs. Dumpty’s face became troubled again, “there isn’t a
wheel chair in all of Pudding Lane. I’ve been to the butcher’s and
the baker’s and the candlestick-maker’s, and they haven’t any. And
all the king’s horses and all the king’s men, which the king has so
generously put at my disposal”--here Mrs. Dumpty straightened up a bit
proudly--“even they have no wheel chair. And meanwhile my poor Humpty
sits by the window in his rocker.” She was ready to cry, poor thing.
The Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe brought her a cup of tea without a
word, and without a word sat down beside her guest and began to stir
her own tea vigorously. She was thinking, was the Old Woman, for this
was indeed a dilemma for the Dumpties, and the Old Woman wanted to help
them out of it if she could. So she stirred and stirred and stirred her
tea, making a great clatter, while Mrs. Dumpty sat looking sadly at her
cup.
And finally the Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe set her cup down noisily,
with a great light in her eye. “Well, Mrs. Dumpty, why don’t you ride a
cockhorse to Banbury Cross and get a wheel chair there?” she exclaimed
triumphantly.