‘Time will tell,’ she thought. And with that, she had to be content.
Chapter Three
PLOTS AND PLANS
IT IS THE day of the opening of The Shop in the Ford, and we had better pay it a visit before the animals get there, or it will be too crowded to see anything.
When Sam and his grandfather had first come to the wood, the Ford had been a very battered old car, abandoned years ago by some adventurous tourist, who had wandered off the beaten track and lost his way. Brambles thrust through the windows; there was no engine, there were no tyres, and nettles were growing out of the radiator. However, after Sam had cleared the ground, and mended the roof, and given it a coat of bright blue paint, it looked quite smart. And the animals, who had never seen a car before, thought it was very grand indeed.
‘Will it really go?’ demanded PC Monkey. (He was the policeman of the wood, and Sam had got on the right side of him by giving him a bag of nuts.)
‘Of course it will go,’ replied Sam.
‘Where is the engine?’
‘Underneath the bonnet.’
PC Monkey, to Sam’s great annoyance, had then proceeded to lift up the bonnet and peer inside.
‘But there isn’t anything here,’ he exclaimed.
Sam cursed; he would have liked to call PC Monkey a meddling young fool, but he did not dare to offend the law. So he thought for a moment and said, ‘It’s an invisible engine. They go much better than the ordinary ones.’
This had impressed PC Monkey so much that he had gone all through the wood, telling the animals about Sam’s wonderful invisible engine. They had all believed him except Mr Justice Owl, the Chief Magistrate of the wood. Mr Justice Owl had merely sniffed, and observed:
‘In the eyes of the law there is no such thing as an invisible engine.’
‘But the eyes of the law couldn’t see it,’ replied PC Monkey, ‘because it is invisible.’ He thought this was a very clever reply.
‘An invisible engine,’ summed up Mr Justice Owl, ‘is not evidence.’ And when he said something was ‘not evidence’ it was no use arguing with him any more. There was nothing worse than being ‘not evidence’ in the eyes of Mr Justice Owl; if you were ‘not evidence’ you just weren’t worth thinking about. PC Monkey was never quite sure what was evidence and what was not evidence, but if ever Mr Justice Owl told him that he was not he felt that it would be more than he could bear; he would go and hang himself by his tail on the highest tree in the wood.
*
On the morning of the opening, Sam was up early.
Instead of ‘up’ I should perhaps have written ‘down’ for Sam and his grandfather lived in a cave, and Sam slept in the top bunk. It was made of rough planks, and it was filled with hay; sometimes when Sam was getting out of it he stepped on his grandfather’s long beard, because it was warmer than the stone floor. Which shows the sort of person he was, because no polite little boy would deliberately step on his grandfather’s beard, however warm it might be.
Sam finished the work he was doing, and then he went back to the cave, pushed his head inside, and shouted ‘Get Up!’
With a great many mutterings and groanings, Old Sam shuffled out of bed, pulled on his shirt and stuck on his hat and wandered outside, blinking in the September sunlight. When he could see clearly he gazed with astonishment at the object which young Sam was holding up before him.
It was a huge notice-board, and it read like this:
THE SHOP IN THE FORD
Principal Emporium
of
The Animal Kingdom
UNDER ROYAL PATRONAGE
All the Latest Goods
Underneath, in smaller letters, was written:
Goods Delivered to your Door
Try our Speciality – Wakeo!
Visit Our Information Bureau
Special Terms for Large Families
‘What d’you think of it?’ demanded Sam proudly.
Old Sam scratched his head. ‘Looks pretty good to me. Only …’
‘Only what?’
‘What’s an emporium?’
‘It’s another name for a store.’
‘Well why not say so?’
‘Oh, don’t be dumb!’ snapped Sam. ‘We want to make a splash. We want to impress these darned animals, and that’s the way to do it. They’ll spend much more money if they think they’re spending it in an Emporium instead of just an ordinary store.’
Old Sam scratched his head again. ‘Maybe you’re right. But what’s that about royal patronage? I don’t remember seeing no Kings nor Queens round these parts lately.’
‘Gosh!’ cried Sam. ‘Why do they call animals “dumb” when things like you are walking about?’
‘That’s no way to speak to your grandfather,’ quavered the old man.
‘It’s the way I am speaking, so you can do what you like about it.’ Sam spat contemptuously on the grass. ‘Who’s going to prove we’re not under royal patronage? We’ve got a mail-order business, haven’t we?’
‘Have we?’
‘No, you old son of a lobster, we haven’t. But we can say we have. You’re old-fashioned. Now listen. The only way we’ll get the animals to come to us instead of going to that darned old Shop Under the Willow is by giving ’em something new. Or at any rate by making ’em think we’re giving them something new. That’s the reason for the telephone.’
‘We ain’t got a telephone,’ muttered Old Sam.
‘No. Nor has anyone else in the wood. So they can’t prove it, see? All we have to do is to say to an animal, “Call us up”, and we know quite well he can’t call us up ’cos he’s not got anything to call with.’
‘That seems fair enough,’ admitted Old Sam.
‘It’s the same with “Goods Delivered to your Door”.’
‘If you think I’m going round with a basket at my age, climbing trees and ferreting into burrows, you’re very much mistaken,’ proclaimed Old Sam.
‘You don’t have to. Read the notice. It says … “To your Door”. Well, none of the animals have got a door. They’ve got nests and holes and hideouts, but there’s not a darned door in the wood. So if we say we deliver to the door, we don’t because there ain’t no doors to deliver to. Got that?’
‘’Pon my word,’ admitted Old Sam, ‘that’s a bright idea.’
Together they carried the board over to the stump of a blasted oak. A few bangs with a hammer and it was firmly in position.
‘And now,’ said Sam. ‘we’d better have breakfast, so’s to be ready for the customers.’
*
News travelled fast in the wood. Long before the shop was open, processions of animals were to be seen coming from all quarters of the wood, and by nine o’clock there was a long queue outside the Ford. Sam had put up a lot of shelves, and on these shelves were a great number of boxes, tied up with attractive ribbons.
‘What was inside the boxes?’ you may ask.
We will tell you, because it will help to show you what a really horrible little boy Sam was.
There was nothing in the boxes.
Nothing at all.
‘But how could he get the animals to buy nothing?’ you may enquire. ‘Wouldn’t the animals call in PC Monkey and have the law on him?’
No, they couldn’t. Because, you see, Sam was very clever. He knew that ‘nothing’ has many names; in German it is nichts, in French it is rien. All over the world men make different sounds when they want to describe that which is without sound or shape or weight or life.
So Sam was going to sell the animals ‘Nichts’ and ‘Rien’ and if any of them made a fuss about it, he’d say that it wasn’t his fault that they were so ignorant. Anyway, he had a shrewd idea that they wouldn’t complain; he knew that an animal hates to be made to look a fool. If you had ever seen the look of pain in the eyes of a circus dog you would know what I mean. He was meant to run on all fours, free as the wind, through the long grass, through sunlight and shadow, but men force him to s
pend half his life staggering over the sawdust on two legs, blinking in the glare of arc-lights.
*
At nine o’clock precisely Sam’s grandfather came out of his cave, beating a big drum. That was the signal that the shop was open, and immediately all the animals began to swarm around, twittering, and purring, and squeaking, and sniffing.
Of course, there were lots of things besides the boxes full of Nothing … real things, I mean. Most of them – though the animals did not know it – were quite useless. There were heaps of brightly coloured glass, which Sam described as rubies and diamonds and emeralds, though they only came from Woolworth’s; there were all sorts of things like that. But it was the boxes full of Nothing which interested the animals most; they longed to know what was inside them; and soon there was quite a queue in front of the counter.
‘What is in these boxes?’ enquired Mrs Rabbit.
‘Nichts,’ replied Sam, with a grin.
‘Nichts?’ Mrs Rabbit looked puzzled. She had no idea what ‘nichts’ were, but she did not like to show her ignorance, because Mrs Hare was standing beside her. And Mrs Hare always put on superior airs, simply because she could run so fast.
‘Ah, nichts!’ repeated Mrs Rabbit, nodding and trying to look wise. ‘Nichts,’ she said again, wondering if they were anything like nuts. Probably that was what they were – a new sort of nut. But then again they might be nothing of the sort. They might be nightdresses or they might be nail-scissors. She tried to find out a little more.
‘What quality nichts?’ she asked.
‘Medium,’ observed Sam.
‘Medium,’ repeated Mrs Rabbit. That told her nothing at all, though it seemed to suggest that they were not nuts. You would not describe nuts as ‘medium’. Perhaps it was nightdresses after all, in which case she did not want to buy them; she had no use for medium nightdresses, being a very fat rabbit.
She turned to Mrs Hare. Maybe she would be able to learn something from her, without revealing that she did not know what ‘nichts’ were.
‘Ah, good afternoon, Mrs Hare!’
Mrs Hare gave one of her superior bows.
‘I was just thinking of buying some nichts,’ said Mrs Rabbit, fumbling with her shopping-basket.
‘Then why don’t you buy some and have done with it?’ snapped Mrs Hare. ‘You’re holding up the queue.’
Mrs Rabbit gave a nervous giggle. ‘It’s just a question of whether you think the medium variety is the best?’
She looked Mrs Hare straight in the eyes as she said this.
Now between you and me, Mrs Hare was just as ignorant as Mrs Rabbit about nichts, but being so superior she did not betray her ignorance. Without batting an eyelid, she returned Mrs Rabbit’s stare, and drawled:
‘Well, it depends on what you are going to use the nichts for.’
‘Yes, of course. It would depend on that.’
‘What were you going to use the nichts for?’ demanded Mrs Hare.
This was too much for Mrs Rabbit. She could not say, ‘I am going to eat them,’ because they might be nightdresses, and no lady would eat a nightdress – only shady girls like Miss Moth ever indulged in such a peculiar diet. On the other hand, she could not say ‘I am going to wear them,’ because they might be nuts, and you could not possibly wear a nut unless you balanced it on the top of your head, which would look ridiculous. Nor could she run the risk of saying, ‘I am going to cut my nails with them.’ They might be nail-scissors, it is true, but again they might not. And you could not possibly cut your nails with a nut or with a nightdress. Out of the question.
So she gave no direct reply; she merely lowered her eyes, fumbled in her bag, and asked:
‘How much?’
‘Five shillings,’ snapped Sam.
‘Five shillings!’ gasped Mrs Rabbit. It was far more than she could afford. It would mean that the whole Rabbit family would have to stay indoors, in the burrow, next weekend instead of going for a ramble in the wood. But she had gone too far to draw back … she could not admit to poverty in the presence of that dreadfully superior Mrs Hare.
‘I will have one box.’
Sam wrapped up a box for her in a cabbage leaf, tied it with a few strands of hay and sealed it with a drop of gum which he had stolen from the fir tree. It looked such a grand parcel that Mrs Rabbit felt it must be worth five shillings.
As Sam handed it to her, he said, ‘I suppose you understand how to undo this parcel?’
‘How to undo it?’ Mrs Rabbit blinked at him in bewilderment. She did not know what he meant.
‘You must not undo it in daylight,’ Sam said. ‘Otherwise, all the goodness goes out of the nichts. They must never be exposed to the sun.’
‘No,’ muttered Mrs Rabbit. ‘I quite understand.’
Poor thing. She did not understand at all. As she gathered up the parcel her brain was in a whirl. Nuts? Obviously not nuts … it didn’t make any difference if you exposed nuts to the sun. Nor, for that matter, nail-scissors or nightdresses. What could these nichts be? Perhaps they were some sort of photographic film? In which case, what would Mr Rabbit say when he learned that she had spent five whole shillings on a photographic film, considering that they were far too poor to afford a camera to fit it into?
She felt on the verge of tears. She wanted to go off, all by herself, and hide in the bracken till the darkness came and she could undo her box and see what it was that she had really bought. She was just about to hurry away when she caught Mrs Hare’s eye. For the first time in her life she thought that Mrs Hare looked embarrassed; she kept on biting her lower lip, and there was a nervous twitch to her tail. Was it possible, after all, that Mrs Hare had been bluffing, that she too did not know what nichts were? The thought made Mrs Rabbit feel much better. So instead of running off with her parcel, she hovered in the background pretending to examine some of the other goods on the shelves.
*
It was now Mrs Hare’s turn in the queue.
She strolled up to the counter, put down her bag, and sniffed haughtily.
‘Good afternoon, Mrs Hare,’ said Sam. ‘May I have the pleasure of selling you some nichts?’
‘Thank you, no.’ Mrs Hare had not the least idea what nichts were but she was not going to show it. Nor was she going to be such a fool as Mrs Rabbit, and buy something she might not want.
‘I have already a large supply of nichts,’ she said. ‘At “The Burrows”.’
That was the name of Mrs Hare’s house. When Mrs Rabbit heard these words, she felt a little better. If Mrs Hare kept plenty of nichts at ‘The Burrows’ it must be all right. ‘The Burrows’ was a very superior residence.
Mrs Hare leaned forward over the counter. She pointed to some boxes done up in pale pink paper.
‘What is in those?’ she drawled.
‘Rien,’ replied Sam.
‘Rien?’ she repeated. And then … in the same drawling tones … ‘Is it pure rien?’
Sam nodded. ‘You will not find purer rien anywhere.’
Mrs Hare sniffed. This sniff was another sign of nerves.
‘You say that this is pure rien?’ repeated Mrs Hare.
She asked the question because she wanted to gain time.
‘Yes, madam. Nothing but rien. Absolute … complete … rien.’
Sam spread out the palms of his hands to prove what he was saying. And suddenly some instinct warned Mrs Hare to beware of him and his boxes. She could not explain what she felt; it was like one of those tremors of warning which came to her on some still summer afternoon when a tiny sound or a faint scent told her that Man was in the wood.
So she plucked up her courage, and drew herself up to her full height, and looked Sam straight in the eye.
‘Thank you,’ she said, ‘I do not think I need any rien. It is one of those things which I can do without.’
*
So great was the success of The Shop in the Ford that dusk was falling before the animals reluctantly tore themselves away, and wander
ed back to their homes, bearing their parcels with them. After his experience with Mrs Hare, Sam had decided not to sell any more boxes of Nothing; it was too risky; some of the animals might talk, and then they would not come to the shop any more.
Meanwhile Mrs Rabbit, instead of going home, had scampered off to a quiet place to wait till darkness came, so that she might undo her parcel and see what was inside it. She did not dare to undo it in the presence of the family in case the ‘nichts’ was something which none of them wanted.
Never had night seemed so long in coming. There had been a beautiful sunset, but though it had faded, a few gleams of gold still lingered in the sky. Surely it was dark enough now? The outlines of the trees had merged into the night; even the white wings of Mr Justice Owl were invisible, as he soared overhead with a melancholy ‘too-wit too-woe’.
Now!
Mrs Rabbit stretched out her paw and with trembling fingers she untied the ribbon. She rolled it up carefully and placed it on the grass beside her. Next she removed the brightly-coloured paper, folded it up, and sat on it to make sure that it did not blow away. And at last, holding her breath, very slowly, very gently, she lifted the lid and peered inside.
She could see nothing, even though her eyes were made to see in what we would call ‘darkness’.
Perhaps it was very small – perhaps it was a jewel, a diamond or ruby? She put her paw inside the box and felt round the edges. She could feel nothing. Round and round moved her paw; it could find nothing. She lifted the box and sniffed it; there was no smell but the smell of paper; she turned it upside down and listened; there was no sound of anything dropping out, not even the faintest whisper. The box was empty.
Heavy at heart, and trembling with worry and disappointment, Mrs Rabbit put down the box and stared into the darkness. Big tears came to her eyes, but she did not notice them; they fell unheeded over the coloured paper on which she was sitting. Far, far away in the distance the faintest gleam of light still lingered; it was like a single golden thread in a coverlet of deep black velvet; and as Mrs Rabbit watched it she told herself that this was the cause of all her trouble, this little thread of light. Sam had said ‘wait till complete darkness’; she had not waited, she had been too eager.
The Tree that Sat Down Page 2
