The Curious Lobster

by Richard W. Hatch

  As soon as he started he realized once more that he must think about moving. First his breakfast and then the sculpin had driven that really important matter from his mind. And he knew very well by the feeling of his shell and joints that the water was getting colder and that soon it would be altogether too cold for him. There was no doubt now that he must move out into deeper water for the winter. It was the one thing he had failed to consider in the spring when he had moved into the home where he now lived.

  When he saw the two big rocks, which were such sure protection, and the lovely seaweed garden, which was such a delight to the eye, a feeling of real sorrow settled upon him. He was suddenly unhappier than he had been for a long time, a most unusual feeling for him to have just after a good breakfast. In fact, it was an unusual feeling for him to have at any time, for he was so curious that he was always trying to satisfy his curiosity. Of course that kept him busy and got him into adventures, and he usually had no time to be unhappy. As he had said to himself more than once, “In order to be really unhappy you have to sit down and think about it, and I haven’t time to do that, and I am too wise to do it, even if I did have time.” Which is just one of many things which show how wise Mr. Lobster was.

  But now he was unhappy, and there was no denying it. “I love my home,” he said to himself, “and now I’ve got to move out. I wonder if there is anything worse than moving out of home. If there were only some way to avoid it . . .”

  He went slowly past his seaweed garden and settled himself down inside his home to think. For a good many hours he thought and thought very patiently and very thoroughly. And then, when it seemed as though there were no more ideas left to think about, he had a wonderful thought.

  “Hibernating is the thing!” he exclaimed. “If I hibernate I’ll be asleep, and I won’t know whether the water is cold or not. And I won’t have to leave home, because I can hibernate right here.”

  And immediately he was happy.

  “Tomorrow,” he told himself, “I shall go out and look for several pleasant creatures. Then, when I have eaten well, I shall come home and hibernate until spring. I shall be the first lobster ever to do such a thing. I wonder what it will be like. Already I am curious about it.”

  The next day the water was even colder than before, but Mr. Lobster pretended that he did not notice it at all. He spent most of the day looking for pleasant creatures. Then, when the green daylight under the ocean began to fade, he hurried home. First he placed stones and sand in front of the entrance of his home to make a wall, so that it could be plainly seen that he did not wish to be disturbed. Then he climbed over into the most comfortable corner of his home, squddled down into the sand, and prepared to sleep.

  All was dark.

  “I shall hibernate until the water is warm and Mr. Badger and Mr. Bear come out again,” he said to himself confidently. And with that happy thought he went to sleep.

  In the morning, when the sunshine coming down through the green water revealed his house and his wall and his seaweed garden as plain as could be, just as it did every bright morning, Mr. Lobster thought that he must be awake. A lobster, you know, never closes his eyes, even when he sleeps; so he could not help seeing things. In fact, at first, when he saw all the things he knew so well, he was greatly worried.

  “No,” he said to himself, “I am not awake. I cannot be awake. I am hibernating, and so I must be asleep.”

  And he did not move at all.

  When the light grew brighter, and he could see each little leaf in his seaweed garden, and see how brown they were, now that cold weather had come, he said to himself: “I am asleep. I am asleep. I am hibernating for the winter.”

  And he did not move at all, because he knew that if he moved he would be awake.

  In the afternoon he had a feeling in a certain place under his shell, a kind of hollow feeling that he had known many times before.

  “I am not hungry,” he told himself very firmly. “I cannot be hungry because I am asleep. And oh, how pleasant it is to be asleep for the entire winter. How pleasant to be in my own home instead of having to move.”

  He had to say those words to himself a good many times, because the feeling under his shell was really not pleasant at all. Moreover, it seemed to be an unusually long day, so long that he began to wonder whether he could possibly sleep all winter long.

  But finally the light faded and darkness came, and gradually everything was gone but the night.

  The second day was even longer than the first, and much harder.

  In the first place, not very long after the light came, several small fish just the right size for breakfast went swimming past Mr. Lobster’s front door. When he saw them the hollow feeling under his shell immediately became much worse than it had been the day before.

  “If I did not know I was asleep,” he said to himself, “I should think I was good and hungry. But those fish must be just a dream. All that I see must be a dream, but I do wish it wouldn’t be so dreadfully real. I wonder what Mr. Badger does when he hibernates, and if he gets hungry while he is asleep, and if he has such dreams . . . Dear me, dreams can be so troublesome.”

  In truth, Mr. Lobster was not happy, and not to be happy in your own home is to be miserable. So Mr. Lobster was miserable.

  And then, to make things still worse, the water was much colder than it had been before, and the cold began to creep in between the joints of Mr. Lobster’s shell. His feelers were almost numb, and no matter how tightly he curled his tail, he grew colder and colder all over.

  By the time night came he felt that he had passed the longest and coldest day of his life.

  “I hope,” he said to himself, “that the beginning of hibernating is the worst, and that from now on it will be pleasant. How can it be so uncomfortable to be asleep?”

  He was still firmly resolved to hibernate, but as he lay still and shivered in the darkness he was just a little afraid. He wondered if he might not starve or freeze before spring. It was a dreadful thought. But still he did not move at all.

  A Serious Mistake Is Corrected

  SOMEHOW THE long cold night passed. When morning came, and Mr. Lobster saw that all was the same as the day before and the water colder than ever, he began to despair. He again thought of the dangers of starving and freezing if it should be true that he was not really asleep.

  “I suppose I must be patient,” he thought. “It always takes time to learn new things.”

  So he still lay without moving. And he wondered just how much colder the water would feel in his dreams, and how hungry he could dream he was, and how very real and unpleasant dreams could be.

  While he was going over these things in his mind he saw a familiar face looking over his wall and peering into his home. There was the sculpin.

  “Good morning,” said the sculpin. “So you are still here, although a codfish told me yesterday that all the lobsters had moved into deep water for the winter. Do you mind telling me just why you are hiding?”

  Somehow the tone of the sculpin’s voice and the superior look on his ugly face just at the moment when Mr. Lobster was suffering from cold and hunger made Mr. Lobster angry, and he answered before he remembered that he was asleep.

  “I am not hiding!” he exclaimed. “I am hibernating!”

  “What nonsense!” replied the sculpin scornfully. “Do you take me for a complete fool? If you are hibernating, you are asleep. You said so yourself. And if you are asleep, how can you talk? Pooh! I thought that this hibernating business was all a lie. Now I know it!” And with several bubbles of superiority and disgust the sculpin turned and swam away.

  Mr. Lobster was left feeling completely miserable.

  “I am not asleep at all,” he said to himself. “The sculpin is right. And I am not hibernating either. All I am doing is starving and freezing. I have made a terribly serious mistake, for I should have been in deep water days ago.”

  He slowly uncurled his tail and moved his legs and began to crawl out of
the sand.

  “This is a great disappointment,” he went on, “but the only thing to do when you have a disappointment is to think about something else. I shall think about having breakfast right away. I am two days late for it already.”

  So he left the home he loved and started to look for dabs and flounders. He did not go north toward the mouth of the river, nor west toward the shore. He did not go south toward Cape Cod, which was also shore. Very bravely, and without looking back, he started for deep water, which was east, toward the middle of the ocean. He knew that this time he was leaving his home for a long time.

  He was sad as he crawled along the bottom of the ocean, even though he tried to think only of his breakfast and of the next spring when he could return to his home and go ashore and see his friends. Even after he had met several pleasant creatures, and the hollow feeling under his shell was gone, he still kept thinking of his home and his serious mistake.

  “The water is now so cold I may not be able to get away,” he said to himself. “I am probably in danger. And I have certainly had a complete failure. . . . Well, I must not think of the past, and my failure is already in the past. A wise person does not think of the past except to remember pleasant things. Now what shall I remember?” Then he began to think of happy things like the picnic he had had with Mr. Badger and Mr. Bear, and how Mr. Badger had called him a hero. Soon he forgot to be unhappy, and was crawling along at a very good speed.

  It was difficult for Mr. Lobster to be unhappy very long, anyway, not only because of his wisdom, but because he was so curious as he traveled that he was careful to see everything he passed; and that kept him always interested. And when you’re interested, you are happy.

  He passed beautiful gardens of seaweed, big boulders and caves, and two old wrecks of boats that had sunk many years ago. There were starfish and crabs and huge sea snails moving about. There were many fish, too, some of them so big that when he saw them he kept very still until they had passed by, but most of them friendly cod and haddock who were glad to stop and pass the time of day with him and wish him a pleasant winter.

  Although he knew that the water was bitter cold and that he must keep moving as fast as possible, he did not allow himself to worry or to be afraid.

  “I am doing the best I can to correct my mistake,” he said to himself. “After all, this is really a very fine ocean that I live in.”

  At night, cold and tired, but satisfied that he had traveled a long distance, he rested under a large boulder covered with periwinkles and barnacles. In the morning he started out again very early, still going into deeper and deeper water. All the time he was getting further and further away from the daylight, and he knew that in another day or two he would be down deep where it would be dark and warm. There he would spend the winter.

  The second afternoon the going was harder than the day before, because the bottom of the ocean was hilly, and he found that he was getting tired from his steady crawling. So, although he knew that he ought not to rest very long, he stopped beside a large area of seaweed and just lay there looking around.

  He had been there only a short time when a huge round form came drifting down through the water, waving its flippers in lazy fashion until it rested on the bottom. At first Mr. Lobster was fearful because of the size of the creature, but when it came near him he saw that it was an enormous sea turtle, and he knew that turtles were usually friendly.

  “Good afternoon,” he said.

  “Yes, yes, indeed,” agreed the turtle. “You are Mr. Lobster, I believe. I’ve seen a good many of your relatives, but you are the biggest I’ve seen yet. Very fitting, indeed. Very fitting that we should meet.”

  “Thank you,” said Mr. Lobster. “And you are the biggest turtle I have ever seen.”

  “Only the simple truth, the simple truth,” murmured the turtle. “I love to have people speak to me frankly, and of course I am well aware of my size. You don’t see many like me, they all say. But I don’t let that go to my head, and I don’t boast about it. In fact, when people flatter me I just pull my head and flippers in and refuse to have anything to do with them. Nothing like being a turtle; you can always go away without moving. Yes, it’s a lovely afternoon. I’ve just been floating around for a while on top of the water. I’m going south, you see; always go south for the winter; and I’m just browsing about a bit before I go. Never do anything in a hurry, I say. What do you say?”

  “Oh, I agree,” said Mr. Lobster. “That is, unless there is danger.”

  “Danger, did you say?” asked the turtle. He waved one flipper in a negligent fashion, then scratched his neck for a moment, and went on. “I don’t know the meaning of the word. Are you out for a little crawl, Mr. Lobster, or are you exploring?”

  “I am going into deep water for the winter.”

  “I see. I see. Pity you lobsters don’t go south. Personally, I’m spending the winter at Bermuda this year. Nothing like an island, I say. An island or exploring—they’re practically the same thing, of course. That’s why I thought you might be out exploring this afternoon. Good afternoon for exploring.”

  Mr. Lobster was somewhat confused, not only by what the turtle was saying, but because the turtle talked so fast.

  “I am afraid I don’t understand,” he said. “Did you say an island and exploring were the same thing?”

  “Oh, yes, yes, indeed. Practically speaking. That is, they accomplish the same thing, you know.”

  The turtle was so good-natured and easy-going, and not in the least bit superior in manner, that it was impossible to be angry with him, even if he did speak as though he thought he knew everything.

  “Perhaps,” said Mr. Lobster, “I am exploring, as I am looking for a new home for the winter.”

  “Not what I meant at all, not at all!” exclaimed the turtle. “Exploring isn’t looking for things half so much as it is an excuse for getting away from things. Explorers are always looking for places where there aren’t any other people. Just like an island. When you find an island, no one can bother you. What kind of a place do you want for a home?”

  “Well, I think a kind of cave under a rock,” answered Mr. Lobster. “I have just had that kind of a home, and I was very happy there. I should be traveling now, but I stopped to rest because I was tired.”

  “Easy, very easy.” The turtle was lazily scratching himself again. “Don’t you worry a bit about it. I know some excellent places not very far from here. Wouldn’t take us more than a day or two at the most. Besides, I’m in no hurry. There’s no sense in hurrying, no sense at all. So you just go ahead and rest all you want; and we’ll start in the morning. Nothing like a good rest when you feel the need of it. I often rest for days at a time. Keeps me from feeling my age. I’m two hundred and twenty now, and you’d never know I was more than a hundred. Well, I’ll take a nap myself now. I’ll see you in the morning.”

  With those words the talkative turtle pulled in his head until it was out of sight, tucked in his flippers, and looked just like an old shell with nobody at home in it.

  Mr. Lobster was a bit out of breath just from listening; he had never before met a creature who talked so much. Also, he was tired from his long crawl. So he took the turtle’s advice and spent a quiet night right where he was, although he dreamed that the turtle was talking very fast and that he couldn’t understand a word that was being said.

  In the morning he ventured along the borders of the seaweed to look for breakfast. When he returned, the turtle had put his head out and was looking around.

  “Good morning, good morning,” he said by way of greeting. “Thought you must have gotten lost. Looked all around and didn’t see a sign of you.”

  “I’ve been getting breakfast,” explained Mr. Lobster.

  “Good idea. Very good idea. Personally, I don’t bother about breakfast. I often go for weeks at a time without eating. Personally, I’m tired of it. Been eating the same things for over two hundred years, you see. Are you ready to travel? Call it ex
ploring for you if you want to; won’t be for me, of course, because I’ve been there before. I’ll show you around this part of the ocean.”

  “I am all ready to go,” said Mr. Lobster, “but I am afraid I shan’t be able to go as fast as you can.”

  “Oh, I’ve thought of that. There never was a lobster who could travel as fast as I can—if you don’t mind my saying so. But what’s the use of hurrying, as I may have said before. Hurrying is all right if you do it just for fun, but it’s terrible if you have to. Hard on the nerves. You wouldn’t think I had any nerves, to look at me, but I’m positive I have; so I’ve always been careful not to arouse them.” The talkative turtle reached out one flipper, then another. “I feel fine,” he said. “Now you just climb up on my back, and hook your claws onto the edge of my shell. Hang on as hard as you want to—you can’t hurt my shell. Jump on!”

  Mr. Lobster obeyed at once. He had never ridden on a turtle’s back, and he was curious to see what it would be like.

  “Are you ready?” asked the turtle.

  “All ready,” answered Mr. Lobster.

  “Here we go, then. First I’m going up to the surface of the water, if you don’t mind. Take a look at the weather, you know, and get some fresh air.”

  And with that the turtle’s great flippers began to move, his neck stuck out straight, and he went up through the water so fast and so straight that he was nearly on end. If Mr. Lobster hadn’t been holding on tightly he would have fallen off backwards. At the surface of the ocean the weather was cold, but the sky was blue and the sun shining brightly. While Mr. Lobster just looked around, the turtle took several deep breaths.

  “Beautiful day, beautiful day,” he said. “I do delight in fine weather. Hang on now, and we’ll start for your cave.”

  He went down faster than he had come up, and when he was near the bottom he pointed his head toward the east and began swimming along so fast that Mr. Lobster’s feelers were blown out behind him, and the water rushed past him as though he were flying through it. It was all a strange experience for Mr. Lobster, who, for all his great age and wisdom, was what you would call a rather slow traveler.