The Tree that Sat Down

by Beverley Nichols

  ‘Do you like it?’

  ‘Oh, Sir!’ breathed Judy.

  ‘The name is John,’ he reminded her.

  ‘John,’ she whispered shyly. ‘It’s too wonderful.’

  ‘I’m glad you approve. As a matter of fact I designed it myself. I always think of you in that colour, somehow, with a background of leaves and trees, and green shadows.’

  ‘But how can I ever thank you?’

  ‘You don’t have to. After all, it’s only payment for an old debt. Don’t you remember?’

  She shook her head.

  ‘Don’t you remember mending my shell?’

  She laughed. ‘Oh, that!’

  ‘Well,’ he said, ‘that was the beginning of it all. I swore that when I came into my Kingdom …’

  ‘Kingdom?’ she interrupted. ‘Are you really a Prince?’

  ‘I’m afraid so. Does it matter?’

  ‘I don’t know. It seems so strange.’

  ‘It seemed much stranger to be a tortoise,’ he chuckled.

  ‘Why were you …’ she began, and then stopped. It seemed rude to ask him why he was a tortoise. However, he saw the question in her eyes.

  ‘I’ll tell you why I was changed into a tortoise in a minute,’ he said. ‘But first, what do you think of the Palace?’

  ‘Palace?’

  ‘If you turn round, you’ll see it. It’s been gradually becoming visible all the time we were talking.’

  Slowly Judy turned. And then all words failed her. For through the golden arch a palace of white glittered in the sunlight, with marble columns as slim as the stems of white narcissi, and staircases that were as graceful as a flight of sea-gulls. In the courtyard played a fountain whose many jets and sprays danced in the wind like silver feathers.

  But there was something even more wonderful. There, in the centre of a smooth-shaven lawn, stood the Tree – her Tree – the Tree that had sat down – the Tree that by some miracle had stood up again, green and strong, and rejoicing in its eternal youth.

  With a cry of happiness Judy ran through the golden arch, and a burst of music echoed as she passed.

  *

  An hour later, the Prince and Judy were sitting under the Tree, drinking sherbet out of cups of solid gold. Mrs Judy, who had suddenly appeared in the most wonderful costume, with a train three yards long, thickly embroidered with garnets, had retired to rest in one of the towers, which she had chosen as her apartment because she said it reminded her of her old bedroom in the Tree. So for the moment they had it all to themselves.

  ‘Do you really want to know why I was turned into a tortoise?’ asked the Prince.

  ‘Not if you don’t want to tell me,’ replied Judy. ‘Though I do think it would be interesting.’

  He smiled. ‘It’s quite simple. When I was very young …’

  ‘But you’re very young now.’

  ‘Well, when I was just a kid, I used to be pretty wild.’

  ‘I’m sure you were always very nice, whatever else you may have been.’

  ‘No, Judy my dear, I wasn’t. I … I … hurt people.’ He saw the look of reproach in her eyes, and he seized her hand. ‘Mind you, I didn’t really mean it. But I was just out for a good time. I thought I was being smart. I got hold of a pistol and pretended to hold people up. I laid traps for people, and laughed when they fell into them.’

  He held her hand a little closer.

  ‘Anyway,’ he continued, ‘what with one thing and another, my guardians decided that I had to be taught a lesson.’

  ‘But couldn’t your father have spoken to you, John?’

  ‘My father died when I was a baby, Judy. And my mother too. Perhaps that’s why I was so lonely.’

  He sighed – and held her hand still more closely. ‘So you see, I just had to put up with a lot of old guardians. And by the way – that reminds me. Do you remember the Clerk of the Weather?’

  ‘As if I could ever forget him!’

  ‘Well, he’s a sort of uncle of mine.’

  ‘So that explains it!’ Judy clapped her hands together … she had remembered the face in the clouds.

  ‘Explains what?’

  ‘Never mind for the moment,’ she said. ‘Go on about being a tortoise.’

  ‘Well, the guardians got together and they made a bargain with me. Either I had to give up being a Prince for ever or else I had to prove that I was worthy of my trust. And I could only do that by being turned into a tortoise.’

  ‘But why a tortoise?’

  ‘Because I had to learn three lessons. And two of those lessons were the sort only a tortoise can learn. First, I had to learn to go slow. Well … a tortoise isn’t exactly a speedbug. Second, to rely on my real self and not on my …’ He paused, and a blush mounted his cheeks.

  Judy smiled and put her hand over his. ‘Go on, my dear. You mean you were very nice to look at, and you had to forget about it.’

  He grinned and scratched his head, with a very unprincely gesture.

  ‘If you put it like that. Anyway, a tortoise isn’t exactly handsome.’

  ‘And third?’ asked Judy.

  ‘Third,’ he said, ‘was you.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘I had to meet a girl with a golden heart.’

  Judy blushed. ‘And do you think you’ve met her?’

  ‘I don’t think. I know.’

  He bent down and kissed her hand.

  Many other things he told her, in that enchanted interlude, when the last glow of autumn seemed to brighten again into the first flush of spring; but the most important thing he told her was that he had loved her all the time, and didn’t she think that the sooner they were married the better?

  To which Judy could think of only one reply. Which, of course, was ‘Yes’.

  *

  Now in a few minutes we shall be able to write the words with which all true fairy stories must end – the words … ‘And they lived happily ever after.’ For very soon they were married, and the wedding was quite wonderful, with Mr Bruno as best man, and Mr Peacock as chief page, and a whole bevy of bridesmaids led by Miss Squirrel and Miss Fox – and, of course, Mr Justice Owl to give the bride away.

  However, it would take a whole book to tell you about these things, and time is growing short. So we must content ourselves with a little tidying-up. There were quite a number of people whom we deserted in the middle of the storm, and it would be rude to leave them without saying goodbye.

  For instance, what happened to Sam, and Old Sam, and Miss Smith and the toads, and all the rest of them?

  Well, Sam was blown out to sea. For a whole day and night he tossed and twirled in the clouds; and it was not till dawn on the second day that the Clerk of the Weather decided that he had learned his lesson, and allowed the wind to drop. Then he fell swiftly through the air, and dropped with a bump straight on to the deck of an oil tanker bound for Venezuela.

  ‘Where the deuce did you come from?’ demanded the Captain, startled by this strange apparition.

  Sam explained as best he could.

  The Captain snorted. He was a huge man with red whiskers and red eyes and a red nose; in fact, everything was red about him, even his language.

  ‘Well,’ he growled, ‘if you want to come along with us, you’ll have to earn your keep – see?’

  Sam saw.

  ‘Get along to the kitchen, then, and start peeling potaters.’

  So Sam got along, and did the first honest day’s work of his whole life. And strangely enough he felt much happier for it.

  Old Sam? Well, to be frank, we don’t know what happened to him, nor do we very much mind. He was always a bit of a bore. He probably got blown over the Atlantic and landed on some island. For all we know he may be a respected citizen by now, giving lectures on fairies. Who cares?

  A word, however, must be said about Miss Smith. She got into dreadful hot water when she reported back to the Witch’s Employment Bureau. ‘A complete failure, Miss Smith, that’s what you are,’ hi
ssed the Chief Witch, in the crossest of tones. ‘I shall have to put you in the Warts Department.’ Now this was a terrible come-down for Miss Smith; it meant that all she would be allowed to do was to fly through the windows of poor old women at night, and put warts on their noses when they were asleep. Very monotonous work, and very badly paid. So Miss Smith tossed her head, remarked that she hadn’t come to that, thank you very much, and stalked out. For some time she was out of work and then, one evening she was strolling down the Street of the Wicked Newspapers when she heard the sound of music coming from a public house. She walked in, followed by the toads, and – to cut a long story short – they offered her a job in the cabaret. She was quite good at it, for her voice was exactly like the voice of a popular crooner – which, as we all know, is one of the favourite noises in hell (in fact, there is a special corner of hell reserved for very bad cases, where ten thousand crooners moan all day and all night without stopping). So if you should ever take the wrong turning in one of your dreams and find yourself drifting down the Street of the Wicked Newspapers, you will be sure to hear Miss Smith crooning, with the toads croaking in chorus by her side.

  So much for the bad characters in our story; now for the good. The only real trouble was caused by Mrs Judy, who found it very difficult to get used to living in a palace, doing nothing. It was very nice to begin with, when she was trying on her new dresses, and wandering through all the wonderful rooms, and exploring the kitchens which were full of exciting things which she had never seen before, such as refrigerators and electric irons and washing machines. But after a little while, time hung heavy on her hands and she decided that she would start another shop.

  She was out walking in the grounds when she came to this decision and she happened to meet Mrs Hare, who – needless to say – had been one of the first people to call.

  ‘I think I shall be opening The Shop again, Mrs Hare,’ she said, ‘as soon as the young couple are nicely settled.’

  Mrs Hare looked extremely shocked. ‘Oh, madam!’ she cried.

  Mrs Judy blinked. ‘Why d’you call me madam, all of a sudden?’

  ‘Well, madam, your new position …’

  ‘Haven’t got a new position.’ snapped Mrs Judy. ‘Same old position. Standing up in the daytime and lying down at night.’

  ‘But, madam,’ insisted Mrs Hare, ‘surely trade … when you might have to be a lady-in-waiting?’ She did not finish the sentence, but stood sniffing as though she were a duchess looking for a drain.

  Mrs Judy left her in a huff. When she returned home, Judy could not think what was the matter with her. At last it came out.

  ‘I ought to be back in The Shop,’ she muttered suddenly. Judy had no idea that she really wanted to go back; she thought she was just suggesting that she was not needed in the palace; so she said:

  ‘But Grannie darling, that’s absurd … we want you here.’

  ‘I’ve kept a shop all my life,’ insisted Mrs Judy. ‘And I shall go on keeping it, princesses or no princesses.’

  And she mumbled and muttered to herself, and her old eyes were very near to tears.

  ‘But Grannie, if you really want to, nobody suggested that you should stop …’

  ‘Oh yes, they did,’ she interrupted. ‘Everybody suggested. You suggested … Mr Tortoise … I beg his pardon … His Royal Highness suggested … Mrs Hare suggested …

  ‘So Mrs Hare has been talking to you, has she?’

  ‘Well, she said that of course I couldn’t go on with The Shop, not now. She said I’d have to be a lady-in-waiting, or something awful. I won’t be a lady-in-waiting. I’m not sure if I’m a lady, and I hate waiting, so why should I?’

  ‘Grannie, you shan’t. All we thought …’

  ‘I don’t care what you thought … I won’t give it up!’

  It took Judy quite a long time to calm down her old grannie, but at last she succeeded, and in the end Mrs Judy was as happy as she had been miserable. For now she saw all the wonderful possibilities of The Shop as it might be in the future, with the Prince helping her.

  ‘Just think of the things we shall be able to do,’ she said. ‘I’ve always hated having to ask for money, when I know how hard it is for the animals to pay … and now I shall just say … ‘Oh, that’s quite all right, we’ll put it down to your account.’ And then, of course, I shall lose all the accounts, and nobody will have to pay anything at all.’

  ‘It will be a lovely shop, Grannie.’

  ‘It will indeed.’

  And it was. The Prince had it specially built under the shadow of the Tree, and though it was much more comfortable than the old one had been, and had a great many more things in it, it was still a shop, and Mrs Judy felt quite at home in it. She even deserted her bedroom in the Tower, and went back to her hammock in the Tree, where she might be seen swinging happily every night, watching the lights of the palace go out one by one – the lights in the dining-room, the lights in the ballroom, the lights in the guard-room where the sentries slept, and at last, the little light in the farthest tower, where Judy and her prince lay dreaming.

  *

  And now, we must put the lights out, too. For darkness is drawing over our magic wood, and it is time to say goodbye.

  Let us take a last look at it. There it lies sleeping over the hills and far away, with the shadows creeping down its glades, and the night wind sighing down its valleys. Mr Bruno slumbers in his cave, Mrs Hare is yawning at the Burrows, Mrs Rabbit is counting her little ones to see that they are all safely home. There is a twinkle under a fern … it is Miss Glow-worm going for her evening walk … a frisk through the undergrowth … it is Miss Fox, giddy as ever … a flash of jewels in the moonlight … it is the last flutter of Mr Peacock’s tail, folding up for the night. Through the silence echoes the melancholy cry of Mr Justice Owl – too-wit, too-woe – proclaiming the follies of the world, and slowly, in the heavens, rises the evening star. A very golden star, a very special star, that shines for the wood alone.

  One day, maybe, if you search the skies, you may find that star. And if you follow it, it may lead you to the wood. Maybe yes, maybe no. For it is not easy to follow a star.

  But it is always worth trying.

  Footnote

  Chapter Thirteen – The Book of Magic

  fn1 This College has since been amalgamated with the Wizard’s Institute and the United School of Gnomes and Poltergeists.

  COLLINS MODERN CLASSICS

  Collins Modern Classics:

  Harriet the Spy

  The Indian In the Cupboard

  Mary Poppins

  The Tree That Sat Down

  Street Child

  A Stitch In Time

  The Rescuers

  Jennie

  The Kingdom By the Sea

  Journey To Jo’burg

  The Phantom Tollbooth

  The Sword In the Stone

  When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit

  Thomasina

  The Hobbit

  Bugsy Malone

  Tiger, Tiger

  The Silver Brumby

  Number The Stars

  Feather Boy

  Manxmouse

  Spellhorn

  The Giver

  White Boots

  Ballet Shoes For Anna

  Charmed Life

  The Owl Service

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