by Mary Norton
“We shouldn’t have come, Pod,” Homily said one evening as they sat alone upstairs.
“We had no choice,” said Pod.
“And we got to go,” she added and sat there watching him as he stitched the sole of a boot.
“To where?” asked Pod.
Things had become a little better for Pod lately: he had filed down the rusted needle and was back at his cobbling. Hendreary had brought him the skin of a weasel, one of those nailed up by the gamekeeper to dry on the outhouse door, and he was making them all new shoes. This pleased Lupy very much, and she had become a little less bossy.
“Where’s Arrietty?” asked Homily one evening.
“Downstairs, I shouldn’t wonder,” said Pod.
“What does she do downstairs?”
“Tells Timmus a story and puts him to bed.”
“I know that,” said Homily, “but why does she stay so long? I’d nearly dropped off last night when we heard her come up the laths. . . .”
“I suppose they get talking,” said Pod.
Homily was silent a moment and then she said, “I don’t feel easy. I’ve got my feeling. . . .” This was the feeling borrowers get when human beings are near; with Homily it started at the knees.
Pod glanced up toward the floorboards above them from whence came a haze of candlelight. “It’s the old man going to bed.”
“No,” said Homily, getting up. “I’m used to that. We hear that every night.” She began to walk about. “I think,” she said at last, “that I’ll just pop downstairs. . . .”
“What for?” asked Pod.
“To see if she’s there.”
“It’s late,” said Pod.
“All the more reason,” said Homily.
“Where else would she be?” asked Pod.
“I don’t know, Pod. I’ve got my feeling and I’ve had it once or twice lately,” she said.
Homily had grown more used to the laths: she had become more agile, even in the dark. But tonight it was very dark indeed. When she reached the landing below, she felt a sense of yawning space and a kind of draft from the depth, which eddied hollowly around her: feeling her way to the drawing-room door, she kept well back from the edge of the platform.
The drawing room, too, was strangely dark and so was the kitchen beyond: there was a faint glow from the keyhole fire and a rhythmic sound of breathing.
“Arrietty?” she called softly from the doorway, just above a whisper.
Hendreary gave a snort and mumbled in his sleep: she heard him turning over.
“Arrietty . . .” whispered Homily again.
“What’s that?” cried Lupy, suddenly and sharply.
“It’s me . . . Homily.”
“What do you want? We were all asleep. Hendreary’s had a hard day. . . .”
“Nothing,” faltered Homily, “it’s all right. I was looking for Arrietty . . .”
“Arrietty went upstairs hours ago,” said Lupy.
“Oh,” said Homily, and was silent a moment: the air was full of breathing. “All right,” she said at last, “thank you . . . I’m sorry . . .”
“And shut the drawing-room door onto the landing as you go out. There’s a howling draft,” said Lupy.
As she felt her way back across the cluttered room, Homily saw a faint light ahead, a dim reflection from the landing. Could it come from above, she wondered, where Pod, two rooms away, was stitching? Yet it had not been there before. . . .
Fearfully she stepped out on the platform. The glow, she realized, did not come from above but from somewhere far below. The matchstick ladder was still in place, and she saw the top rungs quiver. After a moment’s pause she summoned up the courage to peer over. Her startled eyes met those of Arrietty, who was climbing up the ladder and had nearly reached the top. Far below Homily could see the Gothic shape of the hole in the skirting: it seemed a blaze of light.
“Arrietty!” she gasped.
Arrietty did not speak. She climbed off the last rung of the ladder, put her finger to her lips, and whispered. “I’ve got to draw it up. Move back.” And Homily, as though in a trance, moved out of the way as Arrietty drew the ladder up rung over rung until it teetered above her into the darkness, and then, trembling a little with the effort, she eased it along and laid it against the laths.
“Well—” began Homily in a sort of gasp. In the half-light from below they could see each other’s faces: Homily’s aghast with her mouth hanging open; Arrietty’s grave, her finger to her lips. “One minute,” she whispered and went back to the edge. “All right,” she called out softly into the space beneath; Homily heard a muffled thud, a scraping sound, the clap of wood on wood, and light below went out.
“He’s pushed back the log box,” Arrietty whispered across the sudden darkness. “Here, give me your hand. . . . Don’t worry,” she beseeched in a whisper, “and don’t take on! I was going to tell you anyway.” And supporting her shaking mother by the elbow, she helped her up the laths.
Pod looked up startled. “What’s the matter?” he said as Homily sank down on the bed.
“Let me get her feet up first,” said Arrietty. She did so gently and covered her mother’s legs with a folded silk handkerchief, yellowed with washing and stained with marking ink, which Lupy had given them for a bedcover. Homily lay with her eyes closed and spoke through pale lips. “She’s been at it again,” she said.
“At what?” asked Pod. He had laid down his boot and had risen to his feet.
“Talking to humans,” said Homily.
Pod moved across and sat on the end of the bed. Homily opened her eyes. They both stared at Arrietty.
“Which ones?” asked Pod.
“Young Tom, of course,” said Homily. “I caught her in the act. That’s where she’s been most evenings, I shouldn’t wonder. Downstairs, they think she’s up, and upstairs, we think she’s down.”
“Well, you know where that gets us,” said Pod. He became very grave. “That, my girl, back at Firbank was the start of all our troubles.”
“Talking to humans . . .” moaned Homily, and a quiver passed over her face. Suddenly she sat up on one elbow and glared at Arrietty. “You wicked, thoughtless girl, how could you do it again!”
Arrietty stared back at them, not defiantly exactly, but as though she were unimpressed. “But with this one downstairs,” she protested, “I can’t see why it matters. He knows we’re here anyway, because he put us here himself! He could get at us any minute if he really wanted to. . . .”
“How could he get at us,” said Homily, “right up here?”
“By breaking down the wall; it’s only plaster.”
“Don’t say such things, Arrietty,” shuddered Homily.
“But they’re true,” said Arrietty. “Anyway,” she added, “he’s going.”
“Going?” said Pod sharply.
“They’re both going,” said Arrietty, “he and his grandfather; the grandfather’s going to a place called Hospital, and the boy is going to a place called Leighton Buzzard to stay with his uncle who is an ostler. What’s an ostler?” she asked.
But neither of her parents replied: they were staring blankly, struck dumb by a sudden thought.
“We’ve got to tell Hendreary,” said Pod at last, “and quickly.”
Homily nodded. She had swung her legs down from the bed.
“No good waking them now,” said Pod. “I’ll go down first thing in the morning.”
“Oh, my goodness,” breathed Homily, “all those poor children . . .”
“What’s the matter?” asked Arrietty. “What have I said?” She felt scared suddenly and gazed uncertainly from one parent to the other.
“Arrietty,” said Pod, turning toward her. His face had become very grave. “All we’ve told you about human beings is true; but what we haven’t told you, or haven’t stressed enough, is that we, the borrowers, cannot survive without them.” He drew a long deep breath. “When they close up a house and go away, it usually means we’re
done for. . . .”
“No food, no fire, no clothes, no heat, no water . . .” chanted Homily, almost as though she were quoting.
“Famine . . .” said Pod.
Chapter Five
Next morning, when Hendreary heard the news, a conference was called around the doorplate. They all filed in, nervous and grave, and places were allotted them by Lupy. Arrietty was questioned again.
“Are you sure of your dates, Arrietty?”
Yes, Arrietty was sure.
“And of your facts?” Quite sure. Young Tom and his grandfather would leave in three days’ time in a gig drawn by a gray pony called Duchess and driven by Tom’s uncle, the ostler, whose name was Fred Tarabody and who lived in Leighton Buzzard and worked at the Swan Hotel—what was an ostler she wondered again—and young Tom was worried because he had lost his ferret although it had a bell round its neck and a collar with his name on. He had lost it two days ago down a rabbit hole and was afraid he might have to leave without it, and even if he found it, he wasn’t sure they would let him take it with him.
“That’s neither there nor here,” said Hendreary, drumming his fingers on the table.
They all seemed very anxious and at the same time curiously calm.
Hendreary glanced round the table. “One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine,” he said gloomily and began to stroke his beard.
“Pod, here,” said Homily, “can help borrow.”
“And I could, too,” put in Arrietty.
“And I could,” echoed Timmus in a sudden squeaky voice. They all turned round to look at him, except Hendreary, and Lupy stroked his hair.
“Borrow what?” asked Hendreary. “No, it isn’t borrowers we want; on the contrary”—he glanced across the table, and Homily, meeting his eye, suddenly turned pink—“it’s something left to borrow. They won’t leave a crumb behind, those two, not if I know ’em. We’ll have to live, from now on, on just what we’ve saved . . .”
“For as long as it lasts,” said Lupy grimly.
“For as long as it lasts,” repeated Hendreary, “and such as it is.” All their eyes grew wider.
“Which it won’t do forever,” said Lupy. She glanced up at her store shelves and quickly away again. She too had become rather red.
“About borrowing . . .” ventured Homily. “I was meaning out-of-doors . . . the vegetable patch . . . beans and peas . . . and suchlike.”
“The birds will have them,” said Hendreary, “with this house closed and the human beings gone. The birds always know in a trice. . . . And what’s more,” he went on, “there’s more wild things and vermin in these woods than in all the rest of the county put together . . . weasels, stoats, foxes, badgers, shrikes, magpies, sparrow hawks, crows . . .”
“That’s enough, Hendreary,” Pod put in quickly. “Homily’s feeling faint. . . .”
“It’s all right . . .” murmured Homily. She took a sip of water out of the acorn cup, and staring down at the table, she rested her head on her hand.
Hendreary, carried away by the length of his list, seemed not to notice. “. . . owls and buzzards,” he concluded in a satisfied voice. “You’ve seen the skins for yourselves nailed up on the outhouse door, and the birds strung up on a thornbush, gamekeeper’s gibbet they call it. He keeps them down all right, when he’s well and about. And the boy, too, takes a hand. But with them two gone—!” Hendreary raised his gaunt arms and cast his eyes toward the ceiling.
No one spoke. Arrietty stoke a look at Timmus, whose face had become very pale.
“And when the house is closed and shuttered,” Hendreary went on again suddenly, “how do you propose to get out?” He looked round the table triumphantly as one who had made a point. Homily, her head on her hand, was silent. She had begun to regret having spoken.
“There’s always ways,” murmured Pod.
Hendreary pounced on him. “Such as?” When Pod did not reply at once, Hendreary thundered on, “The last time they went away we had a plague of field mice . . . the whole house awash with them, upstairs and down. Now when they lock up, they lock up proper. Not so much as a spider could get in!”
“Nor out,” said Lupy, nodding.
“Nor out,” agreed Hendreary, and as though exhausted by his own eloquence, he took a sip from the cup.
For a moment or two no one spoke. Then Pod cleared his throat. “They won’t be gone forever,” he said.
Hendreary shrugged his shoulders. “Who knows?”
“Looks to me,” said Pod, “that they’ll always need a gamekeeper. Say this one goes, another moves in like. Won’t be empty long—a good house like this on the edge of the coverts, with water laid on in the washhouse. . . .”
“Who knows?” said Hendreary again.
“Your problem, as I see it,” went on Pod, “is to hold out over a period.”
“That’s it,” agreed Hendreary.
“But you don’t know for how long; that’s your problem.”
“That’s it,” agreed Hendreary.
“The farther you can stretch your food,” Pod elaborated, “the longer you’ll be able to wait. . . .”
“Stands to reason,” said Lupy.
“And,” Pod went on, “the fewer mouths you have to feed, the farther the food will stretch.”
“That’s right,” agreed Hendreary.
“Now,” went on Pod, “say there are six of you . . .”
“Nine,” said Hendreary, looking round the table, “to be exact.”
“You don’t count us,” said Pod. “Homily, Arrietty, and me—we’re moving out.” There was a stunned silence round the table as Pod, very calm, turned to Homily. “That’s right, isn’t it?” he asked her.
Homily stared back at him as though he were crazy, and, in despair, he nudged her with his foot. At that she swallowed hastily and began to nod her head. “That’s right . . .” she managed to stammer, blinking her eyelids.
Then pandemonium broke out: questions, suggestions, protestations, and arguments. . . . “You don’t know what you’re saying, Pod,” Hendreary kept repeating, and Lupy kept on asking, “Moving out where to?”
“No good being hasty, Pod,” Hendreary said at last. “The choice of course is yours. But we’re all in this together, and for as long as it lasts”—he glanced around the table as though putting the words on record—“and such as it is, what is ours is yours.”
“That’s very kind of you, Hendreary,” said Pod.
“Not at all,” said Hendreary, speaking rather too smoothly, “it stands to reason.”
“It’s only human,” put in Lupy: she was very fond of this word.
“But,” went on Hendreary, as Pod remained silent, “I see you’ve made up your mind.”
“That’s right,” said Pod.
“In which case,” said Hendreary, “there’s nothing we can do but adjourn the meeting and wish you all good luck!”
“That’s right,” said Pod.
“Good luck, Pod,” said Hendreary.
“Thanks, Hendreary,” said Pod.
“And to all three valiant souls—Pod, Homily, and little Arrietty—good luck and good borrowing!”
Homily murmured something and then there was silence: an awkward silence while eyes avoided eyes. “Come on, me old girl,” said Pod at last, and turning to Homily, he helped her to her feet. “If you’ll excuse us,” he said to Lupy, who had become rather red in the face again, “we got one or two plans to discuss.”
They all rose, and Hendreary, looking worried, followed Pod to the door. “When do you think of leaving, Pod?”
“In a day or two’s time,” said Pod, “when the coast’s clear down below.”
“No hurry, you know,” said Hendreary. “And any tackle you want—”
“Thanks,” said Pod.
“. . . just say the word.”
“I will,” said Pod. He gave a half-smile, rather shy, and went on through the door.
Chapter Six
Homily went up th
e laths without speaking; she went straight to the inner room and sat down on the bed. She sat there shivering slightly and staring at her hands.
“I had to say it,” said Pod, “and we have to do it, what’s more.”
Homily nodded.
“You see how we’re placed?” said Pod.
Homily nodded again.
“Any suggestions?” said Pod. “Anything else we could do?”
“No,” said Homily, “we’ve got to go. And what’s more,” she added, “we’d have had to anyway.”
“How do you make that out?” said Pod.
“I wouldn’t stay here with Lupy,” declared Homily, “not if she bribed me with molten gold, which she isn’t likely to. I kept quiet, Pod, for the child’s sake. A bit of young company, I thought, and a family background. I even kept quiet about the furniture. . . .”
“Yes, you did,” said Pod.
“It’s only—” said Homily, and again she began to shiver, “that he went on so about the vermin. . . .”
“Yes, he did go on,” said Pod.
“Better a place of our own,” said Homily.
“Yes,” agreed Pod, “better a place of our own . . .” But he gazed round the room in a hunted kind of way, and his flat round face looked blank.
When Arrietty arrived upstairs with Timmus, she looked both scared and elated.
“Oh,” said Homily, “here you are.” And she stared rather blankly at Timmus.
“He would come,” Arrietty told her, holding him tight by the hand.
“Well, take him along to your room. And tell him a story or something. . . .”
“All right. I will in a minute. But, first, I just wanted to ask you—”
“Later,” said Pod, “there’ll be plenty of time: we’ll talk about everything later.”
“That’s right,” said Homily. “You tell Timmus a story.”
“Not about owls?” pleaded Timmus; he still looked rather wide-eyed.
“No,” agreed Homily, “not about owls. You ask her to tell you about the dollhouse”—she glanced at Arrietty—“or that other place—what’s it called now?—that place with the plaster borrowers?”
