The Children of Green Knowe Collection

by Lucy M. Boston

  Oskar was frowning with concentration, his long fingers delicately manipulating fine dead grass, but in vain.

  ‘My hands are too big,’ he said. ‘Anyway, they do it from inside.’

  ‘Let’s have our sandwiches,’ said Ida, ‘then afterwards we can climb trees.’ She and Ping began to unpack the picnic basket, but Oskar was in one of his obstinate moods and would not stop.

  ‘I am going to do it properly,’ he said. ‘From inside.’

  Ping and Ida laughed. ‘It will be big enough for a bear.’

  Oskar took no notice. He began tearing up big swaths of grass which he wrapped round himself till he was hidden. He then turned round and round inside like a dog determined to lie down just right.

  The other two were setting out the meal and joyfully drinking home-made lemonade out of bottles with straws, closing their eyes to enjoy it more. When they looked round again at Oskar, the swaths of grass were tightening up round him into a passably firm ball, from inside which, through a hole that his hands were fashioning, they could see his face looking out.

  ‘Doesn’t he look small,’ said Ping. ‘It must be the hole working like the wrong end of a telescope.’

  Oskar’s eyes were immensely big and bright and his nose sharp as he continued to work inside his nest, tightening it ever closer round him.

  ‘Don’t you want any sandwiches, Oskar? They are lovely. And there is melon too.’

  ‘Not yet.’ Oskar’s voice from inside sounded faint. He grunted with effort as he turned round and round in the rustling grass ball where every moment the space grew less.

  Ping and Ida ate, putting aside Oskar’s share. The melon was most delicious, and as the pips that they had emptied out dried in the sun, they were thrilled to see the harvest mouse come and take some away. Afterwards they watched the two mice at the opening of their nest, holding melon pips with their hands and wiggling their whiskers as they ate.

  ‘Oskar! Do come and look. Oskar!’ There was no answer. ‘Hush!’ said Ping. ‘Don’t speak to him. He’s really doing it.’ The grass ball had tightened up till it seemed impossible Oskar could be inside. And it was growing smaller every minute.

  It was very hot. The midday siesta was on. The birds had vanished, the butterflies lay with wide-open wings fearing no attack. The harvest mice went in to sleep. Smaller things crept under leaves. Ida and Ping were drowsy too. Looking at tiny things closely for a long time makes one sleepy. They lay back in the grass and snoozed.

  Something made Ida wake with a start. A ginger cat was sitting in the grass staring with its purposeful eyes at a little ball of hay that was rocking slightly on the ground. For one second Ida’s heart stood still, then she made the most tigerish sound she could and threw the vacuum flask at the cat. It fled, pursued by Ida and Ping with every stick or stone they could lay their hands on.

  When they came back, Oskar was standing beside his nest. He was perfectly recognizable, two inches tall. His tiny voice came up to them. He did not seem to have noticed anything wrong.

  ‘I’ve made the nest all right. It is beautiful inside. I just didn’t know how to make it up on the stalks. But I see now. It’s quite easy really. I’ll have to begin again. I’ll make one next door to the mice. Get your big feet out of the way, Ping.’

  ‘Do be careful not to tread on him,’ said Ida. ‘Isn’t he sweet?’

  ‘Idiot!’ said Oskar. He was obviously shouting, but it was the littlest voice in the world.

  They watched him make his way along, tacking and working out how to get round obstacles exactly as all the other grass dwellers do. The ants to him were as big as dogs, the grasshoppers like kangaroos. Before long he picked up a pole as big as a match to use in self-defence. When he came face to face with a stag beetle he gave it a whack as if it were a bullock, and it veered off. He came at last after a lot of scrambling and sprawling, to the mouse road where the going was easier.

  Ping and Ida on all fours watched spellbound. Ping’s face had his happiest golden moon look, but Ida looked like a fox terrier whose dearly-loved owner is behaving incomprehensibly.

  Oskar stood at the foot of some grass stalks swaying them to see if they were stable enough. He chose three good ones and began his second nest. To save him many laborious journeys Ping and Ida from the immense range of their arms picked and handed him the fine dead grasses he needed. His pink hands, no bigger than mouse hands but still recognizably Oskar’s, came out through the hole and took what was offered them. Sometimes he rejected them and asked for softer ones, and finally for moss. And now a second nest was swaying on its three poles next door to the mice, whose anxious faces peeped out with twitching noses. Clearly they didn’t at all want a neighbour.

  Oskar looked out of his door, laughing with teeth like pinheads.

  ‘I’m hungry after all that. What is there for lunch?’

  Ida felt peculiar. She broke off a corner of egg-and-salad sandwich and offered it on a wild-rose leaf. ‘Oskar!’ she pleaded, ‘please don’t grow wiggly whiskers! He can’t drink lemonade out of the bottle, Ping – he might slip in down the neck and drown.’

  ‘I’ve got an acorn-cup in my pocket. Fill that.’

  Oskar took it between his mouse hands. It was like drinking out of the salad bowl, but he was very thirsty.

  ‘You can’t think how cool and nice it is in this moss,’ he said. ‘I must just curl up and have a sleep. It was awfully hard work.’ His head withdrew into the nest, and Ping and Ida were left out.

  ‘We’ll have to sit and keep watch,’ said Ida, ‘because of that cat. What do you think will happen next, Ping?’

  ‘I don’t know! But I wish I had thought it too.’

  ‘Could you have done, Ping?’

  ‘Well, I knew what he was doing. I could think it for him but not for myself.’

  ‘I can’t think it at all. I’m frightened because of that hateful cat. And maybe the beetle was a bloodsucking one. Oh Ping! There’s a woolly bear going up Oskar’s stalk. It’s as tall as he is. Just imagine those baggy suction legs walking over you.’

  Ping picked it off and immediately it curled up into a ring in his palm.

  ‘You see, he’d only have to give it a poke in its soft underneath and it would curl up like a hedgehog.’

  ‘I hope hedgehogs don’t eat mice.’

  ‘They eat beetles, I think. But it would be horrid if one rolled on you by accident.’

  They sat on, anxious and puzzled. And after a while bored.

  ‘I wish he’d wake up,’ said Ping. ‘I want to see him walking along the high road.’

  ‘No. He might get run over. Besides, think how slow he would be. Like going for a walk with a woolly bear.’

  Presently, however, Oskar put his head out and said: ‘I’m hungry again. What is there?’

  ‘Apple pie, Melon and Chocolate.’

  ‘I think I’ll go and call on my neighbours. Break off a piece of pastry, Ida, and give it me when I get to their door.’

  He shinned down his stalk and began to climb up to the harvest mice. As their stalk swayed under his weight, the mice looked out in wonder and alarm. When he was at nest-level, Ida with her huge fingers handed him a fraction of pastry which he clutched to his chest as he went in.

  There was agitation and squeaking inside the nest as it swung from side to side, but after a while all was still.

  ‘Do mice bite visitor mice, do you think, Ping? It is terribly quiet.’

  To Ida’s great relief Oskar’s face appeared.

  ‘They are nice. They eat out of my palm like ponies. Their eyes are as big as hand mirrors and their tickly whiskers reach across the nest. It’s like being in a room full of aerials. You have to be careful not to step backwards through them. But I’ve combed their coats with my pocket comb and they loved it. They lie on their backs to have their stomachs done.’

  In fact, Oskar was so delighted with his new view of the world that when it was tea-time he wouldn’t come in with the others. ‘You go
. Just say you don’t know where I’ve got to. It’s too nice here and too exciting. I’m going to stay. I want to explore the forest again to see woodlice like armadillos and earwigs like crocodiles. Besides, I’m going to sleep here in the moonlight.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Ping. ‘I do feel stupid being this size. Perhaps in the night a death’s-head moth might look in at your door.’

  ‘Oskar,’ said Ida, ‘I won’t budge unless you come with me, and that’s flat. I’m bigger than you and you’ve got to do what I say. If you go in the grass you could get lost, and we might tread on you while we were looking for you. Or a cat might get you and bring you in and play at killing you on the floor. Or an owl might eat you and spit your bones out in a pellet. You come with me or I’ll break your nest open and catch you.’

  ‘I wish you’d go away. You talk like an ogress.’

  ‘Come with me,’ said Ping. ‘I promise to bring you back again. You can sleep in your nest, only we must be there on guard.’

  ‘What a lot of fuss about nothing,’ said Oskar, stepping out on to Ping’s hand.

  ‘Besides,’ said Ping, looking lovingly at the little person on his palm, ‘think how exciting the house will look. No cathedral was ever anything like so big. The biggest cathedral imaginable would go under the table, spires and all.’

  Ida was miserable because Ping had got Oskar, and because she had nagged just like any grown-up woman. When they reached the house Ping put Oskar in his pocket and they went in to wash for tea. As they stood side by side at the basin, Ida could bear it no longer. ‘Let me have Oskar in my pocket, please, Ping.’

  Ping amiably fished him out. ‘He kicks like anything,’ he said, standing him on the glass shelf.

  ‘My legs have been nearly broken by your pocket-knife,’ said Oskar buzzing and squeaking with annoyance. ‘And why do you want to fill your pocket with fossils and shells. They nearly crushed me.’

  ‘There’s nothing in mine, and it’s a patch pocket. You can hold on to the edge and look out. I would like to see Aunt Sybilla persuading herself she wasn’t seeing you.’

  ‘I wish I was back in my nest. This is just tiresome. I’m not going to be in anybody’s pocket. Put me down, Ping. I’m going upstairs by the mouse route. I’ll meet you there after tea. Bring me something to eat.’

  Ping put him down on the floor, and they watched him make his way round the side of the bath to the hole where the pipes went through the floor.

  ‘Be sure you make plenty of noise, so that we can hear where you are,’ said Ida, as he lowered himself into the hole. ‘Promise!’ she called urgently to the tiny fingers clutching the edge of the floorboard, which was the last she could see of him. The only answer was the faint scraping of his buttons as he slid down the lead pipe.

  Tea was to be in the garden because of the heat. It was a blow to Ida, who would not be able to hear Oskar’s progress behind the wainscot. She hated lying, but it is no use saying what nobody will believe, so she made the best of it and carelessly announced, as she sat down to tea:

  ‘Oskar said please excuse him tonight. He met a thatcher and stopped to learn how it is done. And he was very good at it and he has stayed for tea with the thatcher.’

  ‘Oh dear! And I have made chocolate eclairs for a treat. Who is the thatcher? Not a gipsy I hope.’

  ‘I know him,’ said Dr Biggin. ‘A decent sort of man. I had a talk with him the other day. It’s a trade that goes back further than any other, probably, that and wattle-making for the walls. Paleolithic man must have thatched where there were no caves. Very interesting survival. Surprised you two were not more interested.’

  ‘We were,’ said Ida. ‘We were terribly interested, but we were no good at it.’

  ‘Too small, I suppose. Sybilla, have you made that gruel for Ida?’

  ‘I made a sort of girdle cake of it, Maud. It seemed more appetizing for the poor child.’

  ‘Aunt Maud!’ said Ida, suddenly brightening up. ‘May I keep it till bedtime? I read once that we only grow in our sleep so surely it will work better then?’

  ‘It’s never been tried before, so one experiment is as good as another. But promise me that you will eat it.’

  ‘Yes, Aunt Maud.’

  While they were having tea, sudden banks of cloud reared up high and toppling, one on each horizon as if threatening each other. The air had gone copper-green and electric. The wind blew first from one side and then from the other, urging the opposing storms towards each other. The leaves shuddered and showed their pale undersides, the birds hid – all except the swallows who continued cutting figures of eight at ground level till it was as dark as in an eclipse. Then the first lightning flicked like a whip and Miss Bun cried out: ‘Here it comes! Hurry, children, before the cake gets wet.’

  They ran indoors carrying plates and finished the meal in the dining-room. Nobody talked much because of the oppression of the hush that precedes the real downpour. From time to time above the ceiling unusual slitherings and scatterings occurred, not convincingly mouse-like to Ida and Ping. But Miss Sybilla cocked her head and said: ‘I wonder if mice come indoors away from the lightning. I never heard so many. I must set some traps.’

  ‘OH, NO!’

  Miss Bun and Dr Biggin looked at Ida in surprise.

  ‘I love mice,’ she said lamely. ‘Besides, you might catch the wrong thing. Such as … a robin.’

  ‘Or a butterfly,’ said Ping helpfully.

  ‘Please don’t put traps, Aunt Sybilla.’

  ‘Schoolgirl sentimentality,’ said Dr Biggin with her mouth full.

  It had grown quite dark. Miss Sybilla was turning on the lights, but Ida and Ping went up to the attic where they were right in the middle of the storm and could watch it out of three windows and see the lightning reflected in the river.

  ‘Oskar’s missing this,’ said Ida. But at that moment they heard a little fluttering noise behind the cupboard door. A clap of thunder made them jump, but when it had finished tearing and crashing, there was the impossibly small noise again, as if a fox-terrier as little as a harvest mouse was waiting to be let in. They opened the door, and Oskar ridiculously walked in. He was covered with cobwebs. ‘Beastly stuff,’ he said. ‘It’s sticky and elastic and I can’t get it off. I’d hate to be a fly.’

  ‘Could you see the lightning?’ asked Ping.

  ‘Of course I could, through every crack. There were long corridors under the floors between the joists. In the flashes they looked endless and awfully ghostly. Sometimes I had to climb over beams with sides as high as a cliff. It wasn’t too difficult, because fumbling about in the half-dark I could always find worm-holes big enough to put my fingers and toes into. Then the lightning would come and show me myself hanging on high up, and that was frightening. Mice must be very good alpinists. I gave up the stairs and came by the slanting waterpipes, but the hot ones were terribly hot and when they cooled down and clanked they bucked me like a horse. What have I missed? I heard you shouting that I was missing something.’

  ‘I wasn’t shouting. I was just talking. I meant the storm. Come and stand on the window-frame.’ She lifted him up. They were still three special and equal friends, but the friendship had a most uncomfortable, lopsided feeling. They counted the seconds between the flashes and the thunder, the interval getting less and less until both happened together and the house rattled its window-frames. Then the rain hurled down and they could see nothing more.

  Ping believed that a promise is a promise however small the person to whom it was made.

  ‘Do you still want to go back to your nest, Oskar? Because I promised I would take you. It would certainly be exciting in the orchard with apples flying like cannon balls and trees being struck, and the nest rocking under the gale. But the two outside the nest would get very wet.’

  Oskar magnanimously agreed to wait till early morning. ‘I’m hungry again,’ he said.

  ‘I read that field mice have to eat every twenty minutes or they die.’ Ida gave him some
of her medicinal girdle cake. It had a pleasant ship’s biscuit taste.

  The rain continued to sluice down the windows and gurgle like brooks in the gutters. The thunder circled round the outside of the sky and the lightning lit up the room every few seconds but seemed to have no further connection with any detonations.

  The children were tired. Things had become more complicated than they had expected. Other adventures had not left them with a problem like Oskar’s aberration. The storm had sucked up and dashed away all their energy.

  Ida punched a dent in Oskar’s pillow and laid him in it, with enough girdle cake by him to last for the night.

  ‘Don’t play dolls with Oskar,’ said Ping. ‘It’s horrid.’

  ‘I’m not playing dolls.’

  ‘You are. You’re nearly as silly as Aunt Sybilla,’ said Oskar. ‘I’m fed up with your big hands.’

  This was the nearest to a quarrel that they had ever had.

  They lay lonely and angry in their beds. And the rain teemed down and battered on the roof.

  Ida had bad dreams. Out of Oskar’s nest a huge hornet was crawling, its triangular face evil and satisfied. Then the lightning was the glint of cats’ claws striking and striking. She fought her way out of the sheets to a sitting position. She could hear Ping tossing in his bed, but not a sound from Oskar’s. She felt for the switch and turned on the shaded lamp. Oskar was lying in bed, his hands under the back of his head, his long legs making a ridge down the middle and his feet lifting up the blankets at the end. He turned his big grey eyes to Ida and smiled.

  ‘I’ve just woken up too,’ he said. ‘Such a funny dream. Parts of it were lovely. But I got bored with it in the end, so I unthought it. Don’t let’s get up yet. I could do with hours more.’

  Ida stared at his blissful ordinariness.

  ‘Wiggle your toes, Oskar.’

  ‘Idiot! Whatever for?’ he answered, wiggling them.

  ‘I just wanted to be sure.’ She put out the light with a deep sigh and turned back into dreamless sleep.

  *

  BY MORNING THE sky had emptied itself and the river had filled to the brim and over. The children ran out after breakfast, determined to be first on the river and to get far away before the crowds came. Miss Bun had given them a picnic again, because the proposed visit of the Committee had so filled her with hospitable ideas that her head was in a whirl. The day’s outing therefore could be a long one and the children could go far afield.