by E. Nesbit
II
MAKING AN AEROPLANE
THE Five Bells was asleep; asleep, at least, was the face with which itmet the world. In the brick-floored kitchen, out of sight and hearing ofthe road, the maid was singing as she sluiced the bricks with a whitemop; but if she and her mop had been state secrets, matters of life anddeath, they could not have been more safely hidden from any chancepasser. In the bar the landlord was asleep behind the _Lewes Gazette andSouth Coast Journal_. In the parlor the landlady was asleep behind ascreen of geraniums and campanulas. The ornamental clock on themantelpiece said, most untruly, ten minutes to eight. Really it was fouro'clock, the sleepiest hour in the day. The flies buzzed in the parlorwindow; in the bar the wasps buzzed in the bottle that had seemed sosweet a bourn to each as it drifted in from the out-of-door heat to thecool darkness of the sanded bar.
On the broad, white door-step the old cat slept, his person nicelyadjusted to the sun and shade, his flanks in the sunshine and his headin the shadow of the porch. The white blind of the window swelled out,now and then, like a sail, because in this sort of weather one leavesall doors and windows open. In the yard some one had drawn a bucket ofwater--the brown oak and the brown iron of the bucket were still wet,and still wet the trail it had made where it was carried to the old baththat the chickens drank from. But the trail was drying quickly, and thehens, having had their drink, had gone to sleep in the hollows they hadscooped for themselves in the dust of their inclosure. Some one had beenchopping wood, for a few chips lay round the block, in which the billwas stuck by its sharp edge. The man who attended to the wood and waterwas asleep, standing against the ladder that led from the stable to thehay-loft--a convenient position, and, if you were wanted in a hurry, notcompromising, as lying down would be.
To right and left the road stretched, very white and shining, betweendusty hedgerows and scattered cottages whose drawn blinds looked likethe eyelids of sleepers. The whole village was asleep, it seemed--only aboy and a dog were awake. The boy had not gone to school because he hadtorn his every-day trousers on a nail in the stable. To wear his Sundaytrousers was, of course, out of the question. And to mend the every-daytrousers would take time. So Tommy was put to bed, nominally as apunishment for not looking where he was going--a most unfairimplication, for the nail had attacked him in the rear. Children do notgo to sleep when they are put to bed as a punishment. They cry, if theirspirit has been broken by unkindness; if not, they lie and meditatemischief. Tommy waited till the afternoon silence settled on the house,and then very carefully and slowly crept down the stairs in hisnightshirt, dodged Gladys and the mop, and reached the larder. Here hesecured a flead-cake, a raisin-cake, and an apple, dodged Gladys again,and reached the back door, where he stood looking out at the yard. Itwould be silly to go back to bed. Mother would not be awake for a goodhalf-hour yet. There would be time to get to the stable, climb into theloft, and eat his booty there. It would be safer, in one way, and inanother more adventurous.
He stooped till his head was below the kitchen window and crept by,skirting the walls of the yard till he reached the stable door, and nextmoment was safe in the half-darkness where the sunlight through thecracks of the door made dusty shafts of radiance. The familiar smell ofhay and horses charmed him, as it always did. Ah, there was Robert,asleep as usual. Well, even if Robert woke, he could be trusted not totell. Tommy climbed into the manger of one of the empty stalls, and justas he got his knee on it some one behind pushed him with sudden andincredible violence. He fell heavily, dropped his plunder, and foundhimself involved in the enthusiastic embraces of a large, strange, whitedog, which in one breathless instant licked his face all over, trampledon his stomach, made two mouthfuls of the flead-cake and theraisin-cake, rolled the apple in the muck of the stable, snorted in asort of brutal ecstasy, and bolted heavily out into the sunshine.
It was too much. The sudden and brutal attack overcame allconsiderations of prudence. Tommy forgot where he was, and why; thedangers of his situation were nothing beside the outrage of thisunprovoked assault and theft. Robert was awakening slowly. If he hadbeen awake before he might have repulsed the enemy. Tommy opened hismouth to howl, but the howl changed to a scream, for there was the dogback again, snuffing loudly in the straw and fawning at Tommy as on anold and valued friend.
"Charles!" a stern voice called from the yard, "come here, sir."
The dog wagged a muscular tail and grinned at Tommy, as though invitinghim to share the joke. The stable door was darkened by a form. Even inthe difficulties of repulsing the dog's attention without irritating it,the child found time to be glad that the darkening form was that of astranger.
"Call him off, if he's your dog," Tommy urged, thickly, backing againstthe manger.
"Might as well call him off, sir," Robert--now almost awake--conceded.
The stranger stepped forward, a snap clicked, and Charles, still widelysmiling, was straining at the end of a leathern thong.
"I hope he didn't frighten you," said the stranger.
"He bunted at me with his great head," said Tommy, with half a sob, "andthen he eat up what I'd got, and hooked it off again afore you could sayknife."
"What had you got?"
"Nothing," said Tommy, remembering caution, "at least--"
"The jingling of the guinea heals," said the stranger, incomprehensibly."Would sixpence be any comfort to you?"
Tommy's eyes answered, and the stranger held it out.
"Thank you, sir," said Tommy, and added, in close imitation of hisfather's manner to thirsty travelers, "Going far to-day, sir?"
"I was thinking," said the stranger, "of putting up here."
"Then," said Tommy, with great presence of mind, "please don't sayanything to them about the dog eating--what he did eat--nor me beinghere in my shirt, nor about Robert being asleep. If you'll go round tothe front, sir, you'll find the bar, and that'll give me a chance toslip back to bed, sir, if you'd be so kind."
"I see," said the stranger, "you were sent to bed."
"In punishment like," said Tommy, "so you see I don't want to. . . ."
"Exactly. An unobserved retreat. I will draw the enemy's fire from thefront premises. Come, Charles."
Charles obeyed, only pausing to entangle the lead in the handle of ashovel and to bring this down upon the feet of Robert, to upset a sieveof chaff and run between his master's legs with a sudden violence which,but for the support of the door-post, would have thrown him to theground.
"Nice-spoken young man," said Robert. "Now, young Tommy, you cut alongback where you belong. I'll be asking Gladys the time to keep her offof the back door while you slips in, you young limb."
He strolled across to the window as Tommy's bare feet trod thesun-warmed bricks to the back door. As the child crept up the stairs heheard the stranger's voice in the bar.
"Sixpence," said Tommy, in ecstasy, "and him going to put up here." Hecuddled down into his bed well satisfied with the afternoon's adventure.Adventures are, indeed, to the adventurous.
"If I'd 'a' bin a good boy and stayed in bed nothing wouldn't havehappened," was how he put it to himself.
Meanwhile the stranger, encumbered by the striving Charles, was "beingshown the rooms"--the bare, much-scrubbed bedroom, the all-too-full andtoo-carpeted parlor.
"They are exactly what I want," he said, and so won the heart of hishostess.
When Tommy, his trousers restored, came down to tea he was warned not togo clamping about in his boots, because there was a gentleman in theparlor. Tommy fingered the sixpence in his pocket and said nothing; hismouth was, indeed, far too full for words.
That evening in the parched orchard behind the house Tommy came edgingshyly toward the stranger as he lounged under the trees smoking a fatpipe.
"Hullo, young man!" was the greeting. "Come here and talk to me."
Tommy dumbly drew near.
"Got your trousers back, I see," said the stranger, genially.
Tommy admitted it with a grunt. The stranger nodded and t
ook his pipeout of his mouth.
"Ever see a pig?" he asked.
Tommy grunted again.
"I see you have. You speak their language awfully well." The strangeruttered a sound which Tommy recognized and smiled to hear. "That's whatthe pigs say," said the stranger. "Agreeable little boys who haverecovered their trousers say 'Yes' or 'No' when their friends ask themquestions. Don't they?"
"I dun'no'," said Tommy.
"Oh yes, you do. Because I've told you. Now what would you like to do?"
"I dun'no'."
"I can't tell you that you know, because I don't know myself. But I'llput it to you like this: If you can make up your mind to talk thelanguage of agreeable little boys who have recovered their trousers, Iam disposed to endure your company and even to assist you in any playyou may have in hand. But I can't associate with a person who grunts atme. If you want to grunt, go and grunt at some one who likes it. Idon't."
"I didn't go for to," Tommy urged.
"Handsomely admitted. I accept your apology. You don't know what you'dlike to do, I say. Well, is there anything you'd like to _have_? I'mliving the idle life, Tommy, and my hands are beginning to ache for wantof something to do. I want to make something. Ever make anything?"
"I made a rabbit-hutch, onst," Tommy owned, "but the door warn'tstraight on her hinges. And I tried a kite--but it stuck to me and cometo bits afore ever it was dry."
"Look here," said the stranger, sitting up, "what about a kite? I couldmake you a kite as big as a house or a fire-balloon. Would you likethat?"
Tommy began a grunt, pretended that it had been a cough, and turned thatinto, "Yes, please, sir."
"We must restrain Charles," said the stranger, turning to the largewhite dog, who sat with feet firmly planted, smiling a wide, pink smile,"or this kite will certainly stick to _him_ and come to pieces afore_it's_ dry. Where's the shop?"
"Down street," said Tommy. "I could pop down street in a minute for thepaper and things."
"Sure you'd rather have a kite than anything else?"
Tommy hesitated, and then said of course he'd rather have a hairyplane,but he supposed the stranger couldn't.
To which the stranger startlingly replied, "Oh, couldn't I, my boy!Father got a horse and trap?" he went on. And from that moment the mostwonderful four days of Tommy's life moved forward majestically withoutpause or let.
To drive into Eastbourne with the gentleman--rather slow the old horsewas, but it was the best trap--to hold the reins outside important andunusual shops, including the Eastbourne Motor-Car Company and thetelegraph-office at the station; to be taken to dinner at a fine hotelwith flowers in all the windows, and real waiters dressed exactly likethe gentlemen who sang at the school concert, white ties and all--orjust like the butler at Mr. Ferney's who had the training-stables--andsuch things to eat as Tommy "never did."
The horse and trap were put up at Mr. Pettigrew's Livery and BaitStables, in itself an act of unheard-of daring and extravagance. Andafter dinner the stranger got a motor-car--a real private one--none ofyour red flags and mustn't ride on the front seat, where, in fact, heand the stranger did, with great dash and daring, actually ride. Andthey went to Pevensy and Hurstmonceau and Hastings, and the strangertold Tommy stories about the places, so that history was never quiteitself again to Tommy. Then back to Eastbourne, to call again at theunusual shops, as well as at one of the more usual character, where thestranger bought toffee and buns and cake and peppermint creams; to get aparcel from the station, and so home round the feet of the downs in thepleasant-colored evening, with the dust white on the hedges, and thefurze in flower, and the skylarks singing "fit to bu'st theirselves," asTommy pointed out when the stranger called his attention to the little,dark, singing specks against the clear sky, the old white horse going ata spanking pace. No one would have believed he had it in him, comparedto what he was in the morning; and drawing up very short and sharp infront of the porch--no driving into the yard and just calling forRobert--and father himself coming out to take the reins. Oh, that was aday!
To the stranger, also, whose name, it will surprise you little to learn,was Edward Basingstoke, the home-coming was not without charm. The daybefore he had been welcomed as a guest; now he was welcomed as a friend,one who had taken Tommy for an outing and spent money on him likewater. Any one could see that from the parcels the child had his armsfull of.
Robert in the stable, hearing the return, and heartened by theunmistakable attitude of the family, loosened Charles from the tautchain at whose end he had choked all day, and sent him flying like alarge white bullet into the bar, where his master was standing. Charlesknocked over a table and three glasses, trod on the edge of a spittoonand upset it, and the landlord said it didn't matter! Could anyreception have been more warmly welcoming?
It charmed Edward so much that he said, "When Tommy's face is washed,might he have tea with me to finish up the day?"
And this, too, happened. And after tea, when Charles had been partiallycalmed by five whole buns, eaten in five eager mouthfuls, they undid theparcels, and Tommy reveled in the tools and metals, the wood, thecanvas, the dozen other things he knew neither the names nor the usesof. And when it was time to say good night and they had said it, Tommywanted to say something else. He stood by the parlor door, shuffling hisboots and looking with blue, adoring eyes at the stranger.
"I say," he said.
"Well, what _do_ you say?"
"I say," was still all that Tommy said.
"Yes, I hear you do. But what?"
"I'm right-down glad you come here to stay, instead of going on toWilmington, like what you might have," was the most Tommy could do. Thenhe added, after a fierce, brief struggle between affection and shyness:"I do take it very kind, sir--and the peppermints, and all. Good night,sir."
It was the happiest day Edward had spent since he left Crewe.
And next day they began to make the aeroplane. I do not know how toyaeroplanes are made. There may be a hundred ways of making them. Ifthere are, Mr. Basingstoke knew at least one of these ways, and it wasquite a good way, too. The village carpenter and the village blacksmitheach was visited--I know that--and a good deal of the work was done atthe carpenter's bench. And at the end of the third day the toy wasready.
"We'll fly it in the morning," said Mr. Basingstoke. "Are you glad it'sdone? Sure you wouldn't have liked a kite better?"
"Not by long chalks," was Tommy's fervent answer.
The little aeroplane sat on the little stand the carpenter had made forit, shiny with varnish, white with canvas, glittering in all its metalmysteries.
"Jiminy!" said Tommy, awe-stricken at his own good fortune, "I didn'tknow anybody could be so clever as what you are."
Edward Basingstoke, as he went to bed, wondered whether, after all, hecould spend his money to any better purpose than going about the countrymaking aeroplanes to please little boys.
