In Camp With A Tin Soldier.
by John Kendrick Bangs.
CHAPTER I.
THE START.
"Br-r-r-rub-a-dub-dub! Br-r-r-rub-a-dub-a-dub-dub!
Br-r-r-rub-adub-dub-a-dub-dub-a-dub-dub!"
"What"s that?" cried Jimmieboy, rising from his pillow on the nursery couch, and looking about him, his eyes wide open with astonishment.
"What"s what?" asked mamma, who was sitting near at hand, knitting a pair of socks for a small boy she knew who would shortly want them to keep his feet warm when he went off coasting with his papa.
"I thought I heard soldiers going by," returned Jimmieboy, climbing up on the window-sill and gazing anxiously up and down the street. "There were drums playing."
"I didn"t hear them," said mamma. "I guess you imagined it. Better lie down again, Jimmieboy, and rest. You will be very tired when papa gets home, and you know if you are tired you"ll have to go to bed instead of taking supper with him, and that would be too bad on his birthday."
"Is papa really going to have a birthday to-day?" queried the little fellow. "And a cake with candles in it?"
"Yes," answered mamma. "Two cakes with candles on them, I think," she added.
"What"s he to have two cakes for? I had only one," said Jimmieboy.
"One cake wouldn"t be big enough to hold all the candles," mamma answered. "You see, papa is a few years older than you are--almost six times as old to-day, and if he has a candle for every year, he"ll have to have two cakes to hold them all."
"Is papa six years old to-day?" asked Jimmieboy, resuming his rec.u.mbent position on the pillow.
"Oh, indeed, yes, he"s thirty," said mamma.
"How many is thirty?" asked Jimmieboy.
"Never mind, dearest," returned mamma, giving Jimmieboy a kiss. "Don"t you bother about that. Just close those little peepers and go to sleep."
So Jimmieboy closed his eyes and lay very still for a few minutes. He was not sorry to do it, either, because he really was quite sleepy. He ought to have had his nap before luncheon, but his mamma had been so busy all the morning, making ready for his papa"s birthday dinner, that she had forgotten to call him in from the playground, where he was so absorbed in the glorious sport of seesawing with his little friend from across the way that he never even thought of his nap. As many as five minutes must have slipped by before Jimmieboy opened his eyes again, and I doubt if he would have done so even then had he not heard repeated the unmistakable sounds of drums.
"I did hear "em that time, mamma," he cried, starting up again and winking very hard, for the sand-man had left nearly a pint of sand in Jimmieboy"s eyes. "I heard "em plain as could be."
To this second statement of Jimmieboy"s that he heard soldiers going by somewhere, there was no answer, for there was no one in the room to give him one. His mamma, supposing that he had finally fallen asleep, had tiptoed out of the room and was now down stairs, so that the little fellow found himself alone. As a rule he did not like to be alone, although he knew of no greater delight than that of conversing with himself, and he was on the point of running to the door to call to his mother to return, when his attention was arrested by some very curious goings-on in a favorite picture of his that hung directly over the fire-place.
This picture was not, under ordinary circ.u.mstances, what any one would call a lively picture--in fact, it was usually a very quiet one, representing a country lane shaded on either side by great oak-trees that towered up into the sky, their branches overhanging the road so as to form a leafy arch, through which only an occasional ray of the sun ever found its way. From one end to the other of this beautiful avenue there were no signs of life, save those which were presented by the green leaves of the trees themselves, and the purling brook, bordered by gra.s.ses and mosses, that was visible a short distance in; no houses or cows or men or children were there in sight. Indeed, had it not been for a faint glimmering of sunlight at the far end of the road, some persons might have thought it a rather gloomy scene, and I am not sure but that even Jimmieboy, had he not wondered what there could be beyond the forest, and around the turn which the road took at that other end, would have found the picture a little depressing. It was his interest in what might possibly lie beyond the point at which the picture seemed to stop that had made it so great a favorite with him, and he had frequently expressed a desire to take a stroll along that road, to fish in the little stream, and to explore the hidden country around the turn.
So great was his interest in it at one time, that Jimmieboy"s papa, who was a great person for finding out things, promised to write to the man who had painted the picture and ask him all about the unseen land, so that his little son"s curiosity might be satisfied, a promise which he must have kept, for some days later, on his return from business, he took a piece of paper from his pocket and gave it to Jimmieboy, saying that there was the artist"s answer. Jimmieboy couldn"t read it, of course, because at that time he had not even learned his letters, so he got his papa to do it for him, and they made the pleasing discovery that the artist was a poet as well as a painter, for the answer was all in rhyme. If I remember rightly, this is the way it read:
AROUND THE TURN.
Around the turn are kings and queens; Around the turn are dogs and cats; Around the turn are pease and beans, And handsome light blue derby hats.
Around the turn are grizzly bears; Around the turn are hills and dales; Around the turn are mice and hares, And cream and milk in wooden pails.
Indeed, you"ll find there horses, pigs, Great seas and cities you"ll discern; All things, in fact, including figs, For all the world lies round the turn.
This explanation was quite satisfactory to Jimmieboy, although he was a little fearful as to what might happen if the grizzly bears should take it into their heads to come down into the nursery and hug him, which was certainly not an unlikely thing for them to do, for the mice had come--he had seen them himself--and his mamma had often said that he was a most huggable little fellow.
Now there was undoubtedly some sign of life down the road, for Jimmieboy could see it with his own eyes. There was something moving there, and that something was dressed in gay colors, and in front of it was something else that shone brightly as an occasional ray of the sun shimmered through the trees and glistened upon it. In an instant all thought of his mamma had flown from his mind, so absorbed was he by the startling discovery he had made up there in the picture. To turn back from the door and walk over to the fire-place was the work of a moment, and to climb up on the fender and gaze into the picture occupied hardly more than another moment, and then Jimmieboy saw what it was that was moving down the road, and with delighted ears heard also what that other thing was that preceded the moving thing.
The first thing was a company of tin soldiers marching in perfect time, their colors flying and the captain on horseback; and the other thing in front was a full bra.s.s band, discoursing a most inspiring military march in a fashion that set Jimmieboy strutting about the nursery like a general.
As the little fellow strode around the room his step was suddenly arrested by a voice immediately at his feet.
"Hi, there, Jimmieboy!" it said. "Please be careful where you are walking. You nearly stepped on me that time."
Jimmieboy stopped short and looked down upon the floor.
"h.e.l.lo!" he said. "What are you doing there, colonel?"--for it was none other than the colonel of the tin soldiers himself who had thus requested him to look out where he stepped.
"There"s trouble on hand," said the colonel, climbing up on to a footstool so as to be nearer Jimmieboy"s ear, for he did not wish to alarm everybody by shouting out the dreadful news he had to impart.
Jimmieboy"s mamma, for instance, was a timid little woman, and she would have been very much frightened if she had known what had happened.
"There"s a great deal of trouble on hand," the colonel repeated. "The Noah in your ark fell asleep last night before the animals had gone to bed, and while he was napping, the Parallelopipedon got loose, ate up the gingerbread monkey and four peppermint elephants, and escaped out of the back window to the woods. Noah didn"t find it out until an hour ago, when he went to feed the elephants, and immediately he made the discovery word came from the Pannikins, who live around the turn there in the woods, that the Parallelopipedon had eaten the roof off their house, and was at the time the letter was written engaged in whittling down the fences with a jackknife, and rolling all the pumpkins down the mountainside into Tiddledywinkland, and ruining the whole country. We have got to capture that animal before breakfast. If we don"t, there"s no telling what may happen. He might even go so far as to come back, and that would be horrible."
"I don"t think I remember the Parawelopipedon," said Jimmieboy, p.r.o.nouncing the animal"s name with some difficulty. "What kind of an animal was that?"
"Oh, he"s an awful animal," returned the colonel. "I don"t blame you for not remembering him, though, because he is a hard animal to remember. He is the only animal they had like him in the ark. They couldn"t find two of his sort, and I rather guess they are glad they couldn"t, because his appet.i.te is simply dreadful, and the things he eats are most embarra.s.sing. He"s the one your papa was telling you about last night before you went to bed. Don"t you remember the rhyme he told you--beginning this way:
"The Parallelopipedon I do not like, because He has so many, many sides, And ninety-seven claws"?"
"Oh, yes," replied Jimmieboy. "He is the same animal that----
"Hasn"t got a bit of sense, Or feather to his name; No eye, no ear with which to hear, But gets there just the same.""
"That"s it! that"s it!" cried the colonel. "And don"t you remember,
"There"s not a thing he will not eat, From pie to sealing-wax, Although he shows a preference for Red bricks and carpet tacks"?"
"Yes, I remember that very well now," said Jimmieboy. "Wasn"t there a verse about his color, too? Didn"t it say:
"His color is a fearful one-- A combination hue Of yellow, green, and purple, mixed With solferino blue"?"
"No; that was the Parallelogram," replied the colonel. "A Parallelopipedon is six times as bad as a Parallelogram. His color has a verse about it, though, that says:
"His hue is the most terrible That ever man has seen; "Tis pink and saffron, blue and red, Mixed up with apple green"."
"Dear me!" cried Jimmieboy. "And do you mean to say he"s really got away?"
"I do, indeed," returned the colonel. "Got away, and Noah is glad of it, because he doesn"t have to feed him any more. But it"ll never do to let him stay loose; he will do too much damage. Why, Jimmieboy, suppose he should overeat himself and die? He"s the only one in the world, and we can"t afford to lose an animal like that; besides, after he has ruined all the country around the turn, it"s just as like as not he"ll begin on the rest of the picture, and eat it all up, frame and all."