The E. Nesbit Megapack: 26 Classic Novels and Stories (161 page)

It was H. O. who said—

‘Doing anything with animals is prime, if they only will. Let’s have a circus!’

At the word the last thought of the pudding faded from Oswald’s memory, and he stretched himself, sat up, and said—

‘Bully for H. O. Let’s!’

The others also threw off the heavy weight of memory, and sat up and said ‘Let’s!’ too.

Never, never in all our lives had we had such a gay galaxy of animals at our command. The rabbits and the guinea-pigs, and even all the bright, glass-eyed, stuffed denizens of our late-lamented jungle paled into insignificance before the number of live things on the farm.

(I hope you do not think that the words I use are getting too long. I know they are the right words. And Albert’s uncle says your style is always altered a bit by what you read. And I have been reading the Vicomte de Bragelonne. Nearly all my new words come out of those.)

‘The worst of a circus is,’ Dora said, ‘that you’ve got to teach the animals things. A circus where the performing creatures hadn’t learned performing would be a bit silly. Let’s give up a week to teaching them and then have the circus.’

Some people have no idea of the value of time. And Dora is one of those who do not understand that when you want to do a thing you do want to, and not to do something else, and perhaps your own thing, a week later.

Oswald said the first thing was to collect the performing animals.

‘Then perhaps,’ he said, ‘we may find that they have hidden talents hitherto unsuspected by their harsh masters.’

So Denny took a pencil and wrote a list of the animals required. This is it:

LIST OF ANIMALS REQUISITE FOR THE CIRCUS WE ARE GOING TO HAVE

1 Bull for bull-fight.

1 Horse for ditto (if possible).

1 Goat to do Alpine feats of daring.

1 Donkey to play see-saw.

2 White pigs—one to be Learned, and the other to play with the clown.

Turkeys, as many as possible, because they can make a noise that sounds like a crowd.

The dogs, for any odd parts.

1 Large black pig—to be the Elephant in the procession.

Calves (several) to be camels, and to stand on tubs.

Daisy ought to have been captain because it was partly her idea, but she let Oswald be, because she is of a retiring character. Oswald said—

‘The first thing is to get all the creatures together; the paddock at the side of the orchard is the very place, because the hedge is good all round. When we’ve got the performers all there we’ll make a programme, and then dress for our parts. It’s a pity there won’t be any audience but the turkeys.’

We took the animals in their right order, according to Denny’s list. The bull was the first. He is black. He does not live in the cowhouse with the other horned people; he has a house all to himself two fields away. Oswald and Alice went to fetch him. They took a halter to lead the bull by, and a whip, not to hurt the bull with, but just to make him mind.

The others were to try to get one of the horses while we were gone.

Oswald as usual was full of bright ideas.

‘I daresay,’ he said, ‘the bull will be shy at first, and he’ll have to be goaded into the arena.’

‘But goads hurt,’ Alice said.

‘They don’t hurt the bull,’ Oswald said; ‘his powerful hide is too thick.’

‘Then why does he attend to it,’ Alice asked, ‘if it doesn’t hurt?’

‘Properly-brought-up bulls attend because they know they ought,’ Oswald said. ‘I think I shall ride the bull,’ the brave boy went on. ‘A bull-fight, where an intrepid rider appears on the bull, sharing its joys and sorrows. It would be something quite new.’

‘You can’t ride bulls,’ Alice said; ‘at least, not if their backs are sharp like cows.’

But Oswald thought he could. The bull lives in a house made of wood and prickly furze bushes, and he has a yard to his house. You cannot climb on the roof of his house at all comfortably.

When we got there he was half in his house and half out in his yard, and he was swinging his tail because of the flies which bothered. It was a very hot day.

‘You’ll see,’ Alice said, ‘he won’t want a goad. He’ll be so glad to get out for a walk he’ll drop his head in my hand like a tame fawn, and follow me lovingly all the way.’

Oswald called to him. He said, ‘Bull! Bull! Bull! Bull!’ because we did not know the animal’s real name. The bull took no notice; then Oswald picked up a stone and threw it at the bull, not angrily, but just to make it pay attention. But the bull did not pay a farthing’s worth of it. So then Oswald leaned over the iron gate of the bull’s yard and just flicked the bull with the whiplash. And then the bull
did
pay attention. He started when the lash struck him, then suddenly he faced round, uttering a roar like that of the wounded King of Beasts, and putting his head down close to his feet he ran straight at the iron gate where we were standing.

Alice and Oswald mechanically turned away; they did not wish to annoy the bull any more, and they ran as fast as they could across the field so as not to keep the others waiting.

As they ran across the field Oswald had a dream-like fancy that perhaps the bull had rooted up the gate with one paralysing blow, and was now tearing across the field after him and Alice, with the broken gate balanced on its horns. We climbed the stile quickly and looked back; the bull was still on the right side of the gate.

Oswald said, ‘I think we’ll do without the bull. He did not seem to want to come. We must be kind to dumb animals.’

Alice said, between laughing and crying—

‘Oh, Oswald, how can you!’ But we did do without the bull, and we did not tell the others how we had hurried to get back. We just said, ‘The bull didn’t seem to care about coming.’

The others had not been idle. They had got old Clover, the cart-horse, but she would do nothing but graze, so we decided not to use her in the bull-fight, but to let her be the Elephant. The Elephant’s is a nice quiet part, and she was quite big enough for a young one. Then the black pig could be Learned, and the other two could be something else. They had also got the goat; he was tethered to a young tree.

The donkey was there. Denny was leading him in the halter. The dogs were there, of course—they always are.

So now we only had to get the turkeys for the applause and the calves and pigs.

The calves were easy to get, because they were in their own house. There were five. And the pigs were in their houses too. We got them out after long and patient toil, and persuaded them that they wanted to go into the paddock, where the circus was to be. This is done by pretending to drive them the other way. A pig only knows two ways—the way you want him to go, and the other. But the turkeys knew thousands of different ways, and tried them all. They made such an awful row, we had to drop all ideas of ever hearing applause from their lips, so we came away and left them.

‘Never mind,’ H. O. said, ‘they’ll be sorry enough afterwards, nasty, unobliging things, because now they won’t see the circus. I hope the other animals will tell them about it.’

While the turkeys were engaged in baffling the rest of us, Dicky had found three sheep who seemed to wish to join the glad throng, so we let them.

Then we shut the gate of the paddock, and left the dumb circus performers to make friends with each other while we dressed.

Oswald and H. O. were to be clowns. It is quite easy with Albert’s uncle’s pyjamas, and flour on your hair and face, and the red they do the brick-floors with.

Alice had very short pink and white skirts, and roses in her hair and round her dress. Her dress was the pink calico and white muslin stuff off the dressing-table in the girls’ room fastened with pins and tied round the waist with a small bath towel. She was to be the Dauntless Equestrienne, and to give her enhancing act a barebacked daring, riding either a pig or a sheep, whichever we found was freshest and most skittish. Dora was dressed for the Haute école, which means a riding-habit and a high hat. She took Dick’s topper that he wears with his Etons, and a skirt of Mrs Pettigrew’s. Daisy, dressed the same as Alice, taking the muslin from Mrs Pettigrew’s dressing-table with-out saying anything beforehand. None of us would have advised this, and indeed we were thinking of trying to put it back, when Denny and Noël, who were wishing to look like highwaymen, with brown-paper top-boots and slouch hats and Turkish towel cloaks, suddenly stopped dressing and gazed out of the window.

‘Crikey!’ said Dick, ‘come on, Oswald!’ and he bounded like an antelope from the room.

Oswald and the rest followed, casting a hasty glance through the window. Noël had got brown-paper boots too, and a Turkish towel cloak. H. O. had been waiting for Dora to dress him up for the other clown. He had only his shirt and knickerbockers and his braces on. He came down as he was—as indeed we all did. And no wonder, for in the paddock, where the circus was to be, a blood-thrilling thing had transpired. The dogs were chasing the sheep. And we had now lived long enough in the country to know the fell nature of our dogs’ improper conduct.

We all rushed into the paddock, calling to Pincher, and Martha, and Lady. Pincher came almost at once. He is a well-brought-up dog—Oswald trained him. Martha did not seem to hear. She is awfully deaf, but she did not matter so much, because the sheep could walk away from her easily. She has no pace and no wind. But Lady is a deer-hound. She is used to pursuing that fleet and antlered pride of the forest—the stag—and she can go like billyo. She was now far away in a distant region of the paddock, with a fat sheep just before her in full flight. I am sure if ever anybody’s eyes did start out of their heads with horror, like in narratives of adventure, ours did then.

There was a moment’s pause of speechless horror. We expected to see Lady pull down her quarry, and we know what a lot of money a sheep costs, to say nothing of its own personal feelings.

Then we started to run for all we were worth. It is hard to run swiftly as the arrow from the bow when you happen to be wearing pyjamas belonging to a grown-up person—as I was—but even so I beat Dicky. He said afterwards it was because his brown-paper boots came undone and tripped him up. Alice came in third. She held on the dressing-table muslin and ran jolly well. But ere we reached the fatal spot all was very nearly up with the sheep. We heard a plop; Lady stopped and looked round. She must have heard us bellowing to her as we ran. Then she came towards us, prancing with happiness, but we said ‘Down!’ and ‘Bad dog!’ and ran sternly on.

When we came to the brook which forms the northern boundary of the paddock we saw the sheep struggling in the water. It is not very deep, and I believe the sheep could have stood up, and been well in its depth, if it had liked, but it would not try.

It was a steepish bank. Alice and I got down and stuck our legs into the water, and then Dicky came down, and the three of us hauled that sheep up by its shoulders till it could rest on Alice and me as we sat on the bank. It kicked all the time we were hauling. It gave one extra kick at last, that raised it up, and I tell you that sopping wet, heavy, panting, silly donkey of a sheep sat there on our laps like a pet dog; and Dicky got his shoulder under it at the back and heaved constantly to keep it from flumping off into the water again, while the others fetched the shepherd.

When the shepherd came he called us every name you can think of, and then he said—

‘Good thing master didn’t come along. He would ha’ called you some tidy names.’

He got the sheep out, and took it and the others away. And the calves too. He did not seem to care about the other performing animals.

Alice, Oswald and Dick had had almost enough circus for just then, so we sat in the sun and dried ourselves and wrote the programme of the circus. This was it:

PROGRAMME

1. Startling leap from the lofty precipice by the performing sheep. Real water, and real precipice. The gallant rescue. O. A. and D. Bastable. (We thought we might as well put that in though it was over and had happened accidentally.)

2. Graceful bare-backed equestrienne act on the trained pig, Eliza. A. Bastable. 3. Amusing clown interlude, introducing trained dog, Pincher, and the other white pig. H. O. and O. Bastable.

4. The See-Saw. Trained donkeys. (H. O. said we had only one donkey, so Dicky said H. O. could be the other. When peace was restored we went on to 5.)

5. Elegant equestrian act by D. Bastable. Haute école, on Clover, the incomparative trained elephant from the plains of Venezuela.

6. Alpine feat of daring. The climbing of the Andes, by Billy, the well-known acrobatic goat. (We thought we could make the Andes out of hurdles and things, and so we could have but for what always happens. (This is the unexpected. (This is a saying Father told me—but I see I am three deep in brackets so I will close them before I get into any more).).).

7. The Black but Learned Pig. (‘I daresay he knows something,’ Alice said, ‘if we can only find out what.’ We
did
find out all too soon.)

We could not think of anything else, and our things were nearly dry—all except Dick’s brown-paper top-boots, which were mingled with the gurgling waters of the brook.

We went back to the seat of action—which was the iron trough where the sheep have their salt put—and began to dress up the creatures.

We had just tied the Union Jack we made out of Daisy’s flannel petticoat and cetera, when we gave the soldiers the baccy, round the waist of the Black and Learned Pig, when we heard screams from the back part of the house, and suddenly we saw that Billy, the acrobatic goat, had got loose from the tree we had tied him to. (He had eaten all the parts of its bark that he could get at, but we did not notice it until next day, when led to the spot by a grown-up.)

The gate of the paddock was open. The gate leading to the bridge that goes over the moat to the back door was open too. We hastily proceeded in the direction of the screams, and, guided by the sound, threaded our way into the kitchen. As we went, Noël, ever fertile in melancholy ideas, said he wondered whether Mrs Pettigrew was being robbed, or only murdered.

In the kitchen we saw that Noël was wrong as usual. It was neither. Mrs Pettigrew, screaming like a steam-siren and waving a broom, occupied the foreground. In the distance the maid was shrieking in a hoarse and monotonous way, and trying to shut herself up inside a clothes-horse on which washing was being aired.

On the dresser—which he had ascended by a chair—was Billy, the acrobatic goat, doing his Alpine daring act. He had found out his Andes for himself, and even as we gazed he turned and tossed his head in a way that showed us some mysterious purpose was hidden beneath his calm exterior. The next moment he put his off-horn neatly behind the end plate of the next to the bottom row, and ran it along against the wall. The plates fell crashing on to the soup tureen and vegetable dishes which adorned the lower range of the Andes.

Mrs Pettigrew’s screams were almost drowned in the discarding crash and crackle of the falling avalanche of crockery.

Oswald, though stricken with horror and polite regret, preserved the most dauntless coolness.

Disregarding the mop which Mrs Pettigrew kept on poking at the goat in a timid yet cross way, he sprang forward, crying out to his trusty followers, ‘Stand by to catch him!’

But Dick had thought of the same thing, and ere Oswald could carry out his long-cherished and general-like design, Dicky had caught the goat’s legs and tripped it up. The goat fell against another row of plates, righted itself hastily in the gloomy ruins of the soup tureen and the sauce-boats, and then fell again, this time towards Dicky. The two fell heavily on the ground together. The trusty followers had been so struck by the daring of Dicky and his lion-hearted brother, that they had not stood by to catch anything.