Five Children and It by E. Nesbit (top 100 novels of all time .txt) đź“•
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- Author: E. Nesbit
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"First," said Robert grimly, "I'm going to reason with that baker's boy. I shall catch him at the end of the road."
"Don't hit a chap smaller than yourself, old man," said Cyril.
"Do I look like hitting him?" said Robert scornfully. "Why, I should kill him. But I'll give him something to remember. Wait till I pull up my stocking." He pulled up his stocking, which was as large as a small bolster-case, and strode off. His strides were six or seven feet long, so that it was quite easy for him to be at the bottom of the hill, ready to meet the baker's boy when he came down swinging the empty basket to meet his master's cart, which had been leaving bread at the cottages along the road.
Robert crouched behind a haystack in the farmyard, that is at the corner, and when he heard the boy come whistling along he jumped out at him and caught him by the collar.[Pg 216]
"Now," he said, and his voice was about four times its usual size, just as his body was four times its, "I'm going to teach you to kick boys smaller than you."
He lifted up the baker's boy and set him on the top of the haystack, which was about sixteen feet from the ground, and then he sat down on the roof of the barn and told the baker's boy exactly what he thought of him. I don't think the boy heard it all—he was in a sort of trance of terror. When Robert had said everything he could think of, and some things twice over, he shook the boy and said—
"And now get down the best way you can," and left him.
I don't know how the baker's boy got down, but I do know that he missed the cart and got into the very hottest of hot water when he turned up at last at the bakehouse. I am sorry for him, but after all, it was quite right that he should be taught that boys mustn't use their feet when they fight, but their fists. Of course the water he got into only became hot[Pg 217]ter when he tried to tell his master about the boy he had licked and the giant as high as a church, because no one could possibly believe such a tale as that. Next day the tale was believed—but that was too late to be of any use to the baker's boy.
When Robert rejoined the others he found them in the garden. Anthea had thoughtfully asked Martha to let them have dinner out there—because the dining-room was rather small, and it would have been so awkward to have a brother the size of Robert in there. The Lamb, who had slept peacefully during the whole stormy morning, was now found to be sneezing, and Martha said he had a cold and would be better indoors.
"And really it's just as well," said Cyril, "for I don't believe he'd ever have stopped screaming if he'd once seen you, the awful size you are!"
Robert was indeed what a draper would call an "out-size" in boys. He found himself able to step right over the iron gate in the front garden.[Pg 218]
Martha brought out the dinner—it was cold veal and baked potatoes, with sago pudding and stewed plums to follow.
She of course did not notice that Robert was anything but the usual size, and she gave him as much meat and potatoes as usual and no more. You have no idea how small your usual helping of dinner looks when you are many times your proper size. Robert groaned, and asked for more bread. But Martha would not go on giving more bread for ever. She was in a hurry, because the keeper intended to call on his way to Benenhurst Fair, and she wished to be smartly dressed before he came.
"I wish we were going to the Fair," said Robert.
"You can't go anywhere that size," said Cyril.
"Why not?" said Robert. "They have giants at fairs, much bigger ones than me."
"Not much, they don't," Cyril was beginning, when Jane screamed "Oh!" with such loud suddenness that they all thumped her on [Pg 219]the back and asked whether she had swallowed a plum-stone.
"No," she said, breathless from being thumped, "it's—it's not a plum-stone. It's an idea. Let's take Robert to the Fair, and get them to give us money for showing him! Then we really shall get something out of the old Sammyadd at last!"
"Take me, indeed!" said Robert indignantly. "Much more likely me take you!"
And so it turned out. The idea appealed irresistibly to everyone but Robert, and even he was brought round by Anthea's suggestion that he should have a double share of any money they might make. There was a little old pony-cart in the coach-house—the kind that is called a governess-cart. It seemed desirable to get to the Fair as quickly as possible, so Robert—who could now take enormous steps and so go very fast indeed—consented to wheel the others in this. It was as easy to him now as wheeling the Lamb in the mail-cart had been in the morning. The Lamb's cold prevented his being of the party.[Pg 220]
It was a strange sensation being wheeled in a pony-carriage by a giant. Everyone enjoyed the journey except Robert and the few people they passed on the way. These mostly went into what looked like some kind of standing-up fits by the roadside, as Anthea said. Just outside Benenhurst, Robert hid in a barn, and the others went on to the Fair.
There were some swings, and a hooting-tooting blaring merry-go-round, and a shooting-gallery and Aunt Sallies. Resisting an impulse to win a cocoanut,—or at least to attempt the enterprise,—Cyril went up to the woman who was loading little guns before the array of glass bottles on strings against a sheet of canvas.
"Here you are, little gentleman!" she said. "Penny a shot!"
"No, thank you," said Cyril, "we are here on business, not on pleasure. Who's the master?"
"The what?"
"The master—the head—the boss of the show."[Pg 221]
"Over there," she said, pointing to a stout man in a dirty linen jacket who was sleeping in the sun; "but I don't advise you to wake him sudden. His temper's contrairy, especially these hot days. Better have a shot while you're waiting."
"It's rather important," said Cyril. "It'll be very profitable to him. I think he'll be sorry if we take it away."
"Oh, if it's money in his pocket," said the woman. "No kid now? What is it?"
"It's a giant."
"You are kidding?"
"Come along and see," said Anthea.
The woman looked doubtfully at them, then she called to a ragged little girl in striped stockings and a dingy white petticoat that came below her brown frock, and leaving her in charge of the "shooting-gallery" she turned to Anthea and said, "Well, hurry up! But if you are kidding, you'd best say so. I'm as mild as milk myself, but my Bill he's a fair terror and"—
Anthea led the way to the barn. "It really[Pg 222] is a giant," she said. "He's a giant little boy—in a suit like my brother's there. And we didn't bring him up to the Fair because people do stare so, and they seem to go into kind of standing-up fits when they see him. And we thought perhaps you'd like to show him and get pennies; and if you like to pay us something, you can—only, it'll have to be rather a lot, because we promised him he should have a double share of whatever we made."
The woman murmured something indistinct, of which the children could only hear the words, "Swelp me!" "balmy," and "crumpet," which conveyed no definite idea to their minds.
She had taken Anthea's hand, and was holding it very firmly; and Anthea could not help wondering what would happen if Robert should have wandered off or turned his proper size during the interval. But she knew that the Psammead's gifts really did last till sunset, however inconvenient their lasting might be; and she did not think, somehow, that Robert [Pg 223]would care to go out alone while he was that size.
When they reached the barn and Cyril called "Robert!" there was a stir among the loose hay, and Robert began to come out. His hand and arm came first—then a foot and leg. When the woman saw the hand she said "My!" but when she saw the foot she said "Upon my word!" and when, by slow and heavy degrees, the whole of Robert's enormous bulk was at last disclosed, she drew a long breath and began to say many things, compared with which "balmy" and "crumpet" seemed quite ordinary. She dropped into understandable English at last.
"What'll you take for him?" she said excitedly. "Anything in reason. We'd have a special van built—leastways, I know where there's a second-hand one would do up handsome—what a baby elephant had, as died. What'll you take? He's soft, ain't he? Them giants mostly is—but I never see—no, never! What'll you take? Down on the nail. We'll treat him like a king, and give him first-rate [Pg 224]grub and a doss fit for a bloomin' dook. He must be dotty or he wouldn't need you kids to cart him about. What'll you take for him?"
"They won't take anything," said Robert sternly. "I'm no more soft than you are—not so much, I shouldn't wonder. I'll come and be a show for to-day if you'll give me,"—he hesitated at the enormous price he was about to ask,—"if you'll give me fifteen shillings."
"Done," said the woman, so quickly that Robert felt he had been unfair to himself, and wished he had asked thirty. "Come on now—and see my Bill—and we'll fix a price for the season. I dessay you might get as much as two pounds a week reg'lar. Come on—and make yourself as small as you can for gracious' sake!"
This was not very small, and a crowd gathered quickly, so that it was at the head of an enthusiastic procession that Robert entered the trampled meadow where the Fair was held, and passed over the stubby yellow dusty [Pg 225]grass to the door of the biggest tent. He crept in, and the woman went to call her Bill. He was the big sleeping man, and he did not seem at all pleased at being awakened. Cyril, watching through a slit in the tent, saw him scowl and shake a heavy fist and a sleepy head. Then the woman went on speaking very fast. Cyril heard "Strewth," and "biggest draw you ever, so help me!" and he began to share Robert's feeling that fifteen shillings was indeed far too little. Bill slouched up to the tent and entered. When he beheld the magnificent proportions of Robert he said but little,—"Strike me pink!" were the only words the children could afterwards remember,—but he produced fifteen shillings, mainly in sixpences and coppers, and handed it to Robert.
"We'll fix up about what you're to draw when the show's over to-night," he said with hoarse heartiness. "Lor' love a duck! you'll be that happy with us you'll never want to leave us. Can you do a song now—or a bit of a breakdown?"[Pg 226]
"Not to-day," said Robert, rejecting the idea of trying to sing "As once in May," a favourite of his mother's, and the only song he could think of at the moment.
"Get Levi and clear them bloomin' photos out. Clear the tent. Stick out a curtain or suthink," the man went on. "Lor', what a pity we ain't got no tights his size! But we'll have 'em before the week's out. Young man, your fortune's made. It's a good thing you came to me, and not to some chaps as I could tell you on. I've known blokes as beat their giants, and starved 'em too; so I'll tell you straight, you're in luck this day if you never was afore. 'Cos I'm a lamb, I am—and I don't deceive you."
"I'm not afraid of
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