The City Curious

All the Wigs began to laugh, their large, amiable frogs' mouths expanded, and they crossed their fingers under their chins, which is in this country a great sign of mirth. They laughed because they all knew quite well that the Despoiler himself was only made of cardboard. He was certainly very well covered with jams and sweetmeats; but he was cardboard underneath for all that.

There was a story that one day the Despoiler had found himself beside a pool which lay between his house and the great kitchen of the Chief Contractor. The Despoiler had wanted to capture a flying-fish made of red marzipan, which was feeding upon a laurel-tree beside the pool. He leaned forward too far towards the tree and fell into the water, which was none the less wet for being scented with orange flowers. The birds which lived at the bottom of the pool brought him up to the surface once more. He was saved; but a terrible thing had happened to him. Not one spot of jam remained upon his cardboard.

He fled hastily.

He had left one of his feet behind him in the water, and the Crow, taking off his spectacles, fished it up. Two kindly Wigs ran after the Despoiler with his cardboard foot.

The Despoiler, although he was very clever, was also very vain, and pretended that it was not his foot at all; but only the sole of one of his shoes; but all the Wigs knew perfectly well that it was really his foot.

While the Wigs were still laughing at the expense of the Despoiler, Smaly saw Mistigris, a Wig who moved with an extremely cat-like tread, strike the Despoiler from behind with a long fish-bone, and transfix his insensible cardboard back.

The Chief Contractor, who saw what had happened, rattled the castanets which he wore on his left knee, and a young Stork dressed in the uniform of a fireman ran up behind the Despoiler, and by the aid of long pincers withdrew the fish-bone. This was evidently quite a usual occurrence.

The Chief Contractor picked up one of the masks that hung round his neck, a mask which was called "Dignity," and placed it over his face. When he had worn this for a minute he let it swing like a monocle, and put in its place a mask called "Severity."

"Let every one take his place," he cried in a stern voice.

The Wigs gathered round in a circle, all looking towards the door.

"You're making a mistake, old man," whispered the Despoiler familiarly. "The arrangement was that we were going to see a review of your soldiers."

"We are going to hold a council instead," shouted the Chief Contractor, and drops of perspiration, big and pink as strawberries, rolled down his mask.

Suddenly he snatched it off and replaced it with a mask which signified "Anger."

The assembly trembled. There was a sound as of shuddering macaroni or of dominoes rattling with fear.

"Reckybecky, you are out of line!" cried the Chief Contractor from beneath his mask of saffron and flame colour. "Papylick and Mistigris, pay attention! Is it possible that already the intrusion here of two rascals made of suet is going to corrupt you all and reduce you to anarchy?"

Mistigris and Papylick came running up with a cord, and, each taking an end, they held it in front of the row of Wigs to keep them straight. Those Wigs whose feet stuck out too far drew them back, and those whose feet did not come out far enough advanced them until every one's toes touched the cord and made a straight line.

"You can roll the cord up," commanded the master; then he turned to Smaly. "Tell the truth," he demanded, "are you made of suet?"

At this moment Papylick and the Young Stork gave a cry of horror. They had discovered that Smaly and Redy had licked the painted landscapes off the insides of the nuts in which they had been transported.

Every one uttered cries of indignation, and pressed forward so that their feet had to be brought to order again with the help of the cord.

"The law is clear. These people made of cardboard and suet must be banished at once," said the Despoiler, who did not wear a mask, but could roll his eyes and open his mouth as much as he liked.

"The sun is at its height. It's hot enough to bake tarts," said the Confectioner. "If these two people go out now the sun will melt them, and our beautiful lawns will be covered with fat."

"Horror!" cried several of the Wigs.

"Then they must stay here until the sun has set," decided the Chief Contractor, and putting on a mask called "The Listener" he continued:

"Now tell me what they want, these disturbing people whom you have brought here. Tell me everything that you know, O Short-Legged Man."

But Smaly and Redy spoke together, and they said:

Here Redy stopped and said:

The Chief Contractor replied, "Won't do."

The Crow added, "Because there aren't any."

"There are the three daughters of the Prisoner," said the Chief Contractor; "but they can't go out of the country."

"Look here," said the Mother of the Crow, who had just been brought in seated in her oyster-shell, "why shouldn't this man and his wife live just behind the wall of the country, then they will be able to look at the Prisoner's daughters."

"That won't do," said the Chief Contractor, "the girls mustn't speak to each other. They don't know, none of them knows, that their father was beheaded, and if they spoke to each other about it they would all know."

"Well, well," said the Mother of the Crow, preparing to be very wise, "they can surround each garden by a wall and keep the girls separate."

So it was decided that the little man and his wife were to be banished after sunset; but they could live beyond the wall, and the girls should each have a green garden surrounded by a wall of its own.

These walls were to be quite low to suit the stature of the young girls, and each year the walls were to be raised as the girls grew taller. Thus the girls would not be able to see each other or be able to confide to each other indiscretions on a thousand and one subjects of which they knew nothing.

Here the Chief Contractor again made a very strong objection.

"It's important," he said, "that every year on their birthdays we should insert a slice of cake in these little girls so that they should grow tall enough to suit their age."

In the somewhat embarrassed silence which followed, Smaly discovered why the Wigs had such short legs and such long bodies.

"Of course, that is it," he said to himself; "each year on their birthdays somebody adds another tart or slice of cake to them, and they grow taller."

He glanced out of the window and saw that this was indeed so, that the children were built of much fewer slices of cake than the grown-ups.

The Chief Contractor now made a second objection.

"But what shall we do," he said, "when the garden wall of the eldest girl grows to be five feet high, for you mustn't forget that that is the height at which the fishes and lizards fly, so the wall will never be able to be higher than five feet, for every night these creatures will eat the top off the walls."

It was again the Mother of the Crow who saved the situation. The dark hole in which she wore her eye when her son was not carrying it round his neck seemed full of intelligence. She placed her finger upon her brow without moving her arm (for the simple reason that she did not possess one), and said:

"When we can no longer make the walls higher, then we will sink the gardens as much as is needful."

All the same the Wigs could not accept this as a solution, for it seemed to them that men grew upwards and not towards the ground, that is to say, from the head and not from the feet.

The Chief Contractor gave the matter due thought.

"We will place the annual slice of cake exactly in the middle of the girls," he announced, "and thus we will only have to sink the level of the gardens a little, and raise the top of the walls a little."

But since nobody seemed quite ready to accept this as a solution, the Chief Contractor again placed upon his face the mask called "Anger," and every one held their tongues from perplexity.

Happily at this moment the most charming music was heard upon the air. One could detect the scent of this music with one's nose, and taste it with one's tongue. One could see it floating out from various little boxes that some very elegant mice were opening and shutting with much delicacy and care.

"It's the review of the troops beginning," exclaimed the Young Stork in a loud voice as he tweaked the hundredth fish-bone out of the insensible back of the Despoiler.

CHAPTER V

The Wigs now began to form themselves into a semicircle, the smallest nearest the door, and the others standing behind them so that they could see over their heads.

It was a half-holiday for Laptitza, the second daughter of the Prisoner, and Papylick brought her in so that she could see the review of the troops.

Laptitza was shown to a low chair in the midst of the semicircle formed by the Wigs.

Laptitza was so beautiful that it would not have been possible to have painted her portrait.

The soldiers arrived in Indian file, one behind the other.

"There are a hundred and two of them," announced the Chief Contractor, looking furtively at Smaly. He shot this look through the eyeholes of the mask which he had just slipped on and which appeared to be made in two halves, for while one half expressed severe authority, the other was all gentleness.

"One hundred and two," repeated Smaly in a perfectly expressionless voice.

"My brother used to have only one hundred," said the Despoiler, "but I made him understand that they could not possibly march until they had one at the head and one at the tail, and that makes one hundred and two." It was now the Despoiler's turn to look slyly at the two little human beings and see how they took his remark.

The soldiers came on in a straight line towards the great door of the kitchen. They had an extraordinarily complicated method of marching, taking two steps in advance and then one backwards, and this was made all the more difficult for them because discipline enjoined that each man should place his feet accurately in the footsteps of the leader. This man's feet, by an ingenious arrangement, left white marks in the ground.

When the leading soldier arrived at the door, since it was not permitted him to turn his back upon such an august assembly, he had to take his departure marching backwards, and so had all those who followed after him. From that moment there were two long lines of soldiers, one going forwards, the other going backwards; but all the soldiers had their noses, their chests, their knees, and their big toes pointing in the same direction—the door of the kitchen.

When the review was over, the Chief Contractor was so pleased that he decided that they must have a similar review every week. He had a fence erected round the traces left by the soldiers' feet, so that they would not be effaced, but could be used again each week.

Just as this was finished Smaly noticed that the eye of the Mother of the Crow was regarding him steadfastly. Suddenly the eye winked as though to signal him to approach. Smaly began to walk towards the eye; but it occurred to him on reflection that it was towards the Mother of the Crow herself that he ought to turn his steps, and not towards her eye, which, after all, was merely hung in a locket round the neck of her son. Therefore he turned and approached the oyster-shell, where the Mother of the Crow was seated.

The Wigs were no longer taking any notice of him; they were eating ices, and chatting together in their mellifluous voices. They had all put on thick gloves, for the warmth of the fresh pastry of which their hands were composed would have melted the ices.

"None of them really knows what a soldier is," said the Mother of the Crow in a low voice to Smaly.

"Oh," said Smaly; "but you know, don't you?"

"Certainly I know. Soldiers are beings who cut up the meat that men like you eat, who hack down big trees, who kill the beautiful horned animals for food. You see I know perfectly well what a soldier is, and one can always tell a real soldier because he carries big knives, axes, saws, razors, and scythes."

"H'm! Not at all," contradicted Smaly with the air of one beginning a lecture. "A soldier is a man who fights other soldiers."

"What?" asked the Mother of the Crow. "How is that possible when they are both the same thing?"

"I assure you that it is so," replied Smaly.

The Mother of the Crow reflected; but catching sight of the Wigs, who were putting the soldiers back in their boxes at the end of the courtyard, she began again.

"He," she said, nodding her head towards the Chief Contractor, "has no idea of what a soldier is. He has never seen one excepting in a painting that a cousin sent him. It is a painting that represents a court in full dress. There are several soldiers with knives standing round the cousin, who is the President of the Republic of Pasenipus. They wear breastplates of gold to prevent the blood of the animals they kill soiling their fine coats. The Chief Contractor thought that these breastplates must be eggs, and, as you see, these soldiers are just eggs with legs. The Chief Contractor has had oxeye daisies fastened to their heels, because in the picture there were golden daisies fastened to the boots of the soldiers."

"Those must have been spurs!" explained Smaly absently, his attention being distracted by a curious rattling noise from afar off.

"I don't know what spurs are," admitted the Mother of the Crow; "but the Chief Contractor doesn't even know what the shield is that each soldier carries to protect his face from the horns of the animals. He doesn't even know that soldiers carry knives," she added, "but has put in his soldiers' hands flowers with long stalks. He doesn't know what a helmet is, for he thought that soldiers must be a sort of bird with a plume on their heads."

Smaly didn't mind. He had very much admired the feathered heads, and, above all, he admired the shields, which were made of pearly shell-fish, but before the review the Wigs had eaten the contents of these beautiful shields lest the shell-fish should all have hidden their faces from fright.

When the Wigs had placed the soldiers in the boxes the Young Stork and Papylick came towards Smaly. The Stork took charge of the Mother of the Crow to conduct her back to her house, which was in a cosy nook in a great tree of coral.

Smaly and Redy now wished to go, but Papylick informed them that neither the sun nor moon having yet set, it was not possible, and so the little husband and wife sat down on their heels in the doorway of the kitchen.

The rattling sound had now come nearer, and the Chief Contractor appeared in the public square surrounded by Wigs pushing wheelbarrows and turning rattles.

These Wigs laid the rattles in the wheelbarrows, and everything became quiet once more.

Then the Chief Contractor advanced boldly into the full sunshine, and the Wigs, who watched him put one foot in front of the other, prepared also to advance.

The Chief Contractor had made a few changes in his costume. He still wore his big ring and his box marked "Soy"; but a huge hat now covered his head. Little shelves were hung all about his person, and on these and on his hat were placed pots and jars, cakes and flagons. He had many more than the Confectioner, who, after all, was only his lieutenant. He carried a quiverful of ebony knives, and an urn from which stuck out long bamboo spoons. His masks were slung from the end of a stick. He touched his lips with his magic ring, then he agitated the castanets which hung at his knee, and cried:

"Food, food! Come in by the door, come in by the door," and he shut his mouth up again quickly with his left thumb.

"I don't see a door, or even a place for a door. There isn't anything," said Smaly to Papylick.

"There it is," said Redy, pointing towards a little door which stood in the middle of the square. "There's no wall, but that is a door. See, it's open," she added.

"But what's the good of that door," cried Smaly to the Chocolate Grub, which had come up beside him and was waiting with the others to go and get his provisions.

"I know nothing about doors," said the Grub sharply. "You must ask some specialist in such matters; some one who knows about draughts and opening and shutting. Some one, in fact, who looks like a doorkeeper," and the Grub withdrew proudly.

Smaly realized that he had been lacking in tact to mention the word "door" to the Grub, who always pretended that he was not a doorkeeper. Papylick explained to the two little people:

"If there weren't a door the people would simply tear the Chief Contractor to bits to get at the food."

"But——" began Smaly.

"And anyway the door was open," said Redy.

"That's true," replied Papylick, "but nevertheless it's so narrow that only one person can go through at a time."

And, indeed, each Wig was passing singly through the little door to receive in his pot or pan a drop of gooseberry jam or a morsel of cake or apple, or one or two cherry-stones.

The Chief Contractor served out his goods with his bamboo spoons. When the Wigs were served they made their way in single file towards two posts which stood in the square, and passed very carefully between them so as not to spill any of their precious provisions.

And every one had received from the Contractor a little powder in a box like a small snuff-box labelled "Soy."

Back in their kitchen the Wigs sprinkled a pinch of the Soy powder on their crumbs of cake and spots of jam, and then taking hands danced slowly round the table, singing, while the little crumbs of food began to grow bigger and bigger. The fragments of cake became whole cakes, the spots of jam swelled to marvellous jellies, and the cherry-stones became baskets full of the most succulent fruits. When they had finished their song they did not shut their mouths up again, thereby attaining two excellent results—the song went on and on while they could eat their dessert at their ease.

CHAPTER VI

While the Wigs were in the kitchen, and Smaly and Redy were seated in the doorway sharing Papylick's provisions, distant cries rose upon the air. Smaly and Redy turned to gaze out at the public square, which was hot and empty; but in a moment several Wigs arrived at the far end, running hard with their little short legs, and crying out:

"The prison has turned round, it's coming in this direction."

The Chief Contractor, who was eating in the kitchen in company with the Despoiler, the Confectioner, the Crow, Mistigris, the Stork, and various other people, precipitated himself towards the door, followed by the rest. Listening to their scraps of conversation Smaly gathered that the Wigs held some stranger captive, and that this prisoner lived in a perambulating prison which travelled about the country. This astonished Smaly very much, as, indeed, it would have astonished you had you been in his place. Even I, who have seen many strange things, was very astonished when I first heard about it.

The shouting grew nearer, and there appeared at the far end of the square a forest of sugar-canes moving steadily onwards. The canes reared up into the air like rockets which never rose any higher, or like a field of gigantic corn, and they formed a solid wall which came ever nearer and nearer.

The wall came onward and hit against a house which stood in its way, and mowed it down. The sugar-canes were far more powerful than the pastry of which the house was composed.

The sugar-cane forest came closer, so close that Smaly and Redy perceived how amongst the base of the canes there was a multitude of Water-Rats who were busy watering the roots.

These Rats were all provided with large mackintoshes, which, however, they took off for greater freedom of movement while they were watering. They wore boots like those you see upon the men who clean out drains, and each Rat had upon its head a fireman's helmet similar to that worn by the Stork.

Some watered with a watering-can, some with firemen's hose, connected with reservoirs shaped like enormous bottles of champagne, and mounted upon wheels.

One of the Rats, who wore a long red feather trailing from its helmet, was mounted upon a Hare whose pads were wrapped in linen. The Rat galloped backwards and forwards upon the Hare from the forest to a big windmill marked "Soy," where the reservoirs were.

Still the forest kept on advancing until the quiet square was transformed into a den of noise and activity. The sugar-canes grew higher and more numerous every moment under the influence of the water of Soy, which was as productive as the Soy powder.

The kitchen was by now emptied of everything movable; the Wigs ran hither and thither carrying away every object that they could lift, as people move furniture when a neighbouring house is burning; only Smaly and Redy remained, stupefied before this moving forest which marched down upon them.

When it was almost on them they ran to one side, and there, where the sugar-canes were less thick, they could see into the heart of the forest, and they saw crouching within it a strange-looking man dressed in rags. Little of his face showed between his long hair and his tangled beard. He wore no shoes; but carried at the end of a string several boxes of matches. Perpetually he made the same rhythmic gesture with his arms, and with every gesture the sugar-canes around him broke as if they were made of brittle glass. His eyes stared straight in front of him, and he seemed to be laughing to himself.

"He is a madman," said Redy.

"They have driven him mad," replied Smaly in a low voice.

Smaly and Redy joined hands. "We ought to save him," they said together.

The Prisoner never ceased to break the sugar-canes, and fresh canes sprang up around him also without a pause.

Fish that had wings and paws flew above the forest, brushing the heads of the canes with their ringed noses. Whenever they did this the sugar-canes seemed to shrivel up and vanish.

And thus the forest advanced, new canes springing up ahead, and the old canes withering behind; but always surrounding the Prisoner, no matter how he shattered them.

Now these rings which the Flying-Fish wore in their noses had been fixed there by the Despoiler, and the rings worn by all the Wigs came from the same source and served the same purpose, that of stopping all growth. This was how the Despoiler came by his name, for mere creature of insensate pasteboard as he was, he had the power from his magic ring to arrest all life—a blade of grass in the ground, or the passage of a bird in the air.

Suddenly the Prisoner paused in his frantic toil and fell asleep like a child. The rats also left off their work and wrapped themselves in their mackintoshes.

Smaly and Redy wished to attract the attention of the Prisoner; but the strange man slept on, and they did not dare speak to him too loudly, for they were afraid that he might be quite mad, and also they did not know how the Wigs would take interference with their prisoner. Indeed, Papylick and the Young Stork had already noticed what they were trying to do, and since the kitchen had been destroyed by the passing of the forest they now drew Smaly and Redy gently but firmly into one of the houses in the square.

"This is the house of the Historian," said Papylick, "and here you must stay until the setting of the sun."

CHAPTER VII

Smaly and Redy found themselves in a room that was rather dark in spite of the fact that the sun was still high in the heavens. There were only four windows, one placed so low down that the Wigs, even when seated, could observe what passed. Another, very little higher, was for the Wigs to look out of when they were standing on their short legs. These two windows had already been in existence when the Government of the country offered the house to the Historian to enable him to write the chronicles of the inhabitants.

The Historian put in an indent asking for two more windows, and succeeded in obtaining them. The first of the new windows was put alongside the old one, which had been for the use of the Wigs standing; but this new window was for the Historian when he was sitting down, as he was twice the height of an ordinary Wig. The fourth window was set very high to allow of the Historian looking out on the market square as he walked about.

It will be seen what bright ideas this Historian had; but the result of one of his brightest was to be seen in the ceiling, where there were two circular holes, one much bigger than the other.

The big hole had been there for a long time and had been made to allow of free exit and entry to the pet Flying-Fish, which every Wig family possesses and cherishes, much as you or I cherish a dog or a cat; but when some one made the Historian a present of another and much younger Flying-Fish, he at once caused a smaller hole to be made so that his new pet also could come in and out as it pleased.

Redy and Smaly found the Historian sitting in a corner of his room studying a piece of paper through a telescope, and taking notes as to what he saw. The little husband and wife shut the door gently behind them and remained very quiet. They were quite alone with this curious and enormous being, who took no more notice of them than if they had been a couple of mice.

It was the first time that Redy and Smaly had seen the interior of a Wig house, and they found it resembled nothing so much as the laboratory of an alchemist or astronomer. The thing Smaly and Redy admired most was a large globe upon which all the Wig possessions were painted in red.

At first they were very astonished to see how big the Wigs' country appeared to be; but after a little study Smaly suggested that the areas covered in red must represent the importance morally and mentally of the country rather than its geographical area, and this Redy agreed with, for she had found ranged in a row beside the globe a lot of little painted cardboard figures of different sizes representing the amount of cake and pudding eaten annually in the countries represented by these little figures; which were the Wigs' country, Parseny's Land, England, France, Italy, and Belgium, and the Wigs' country was the biggest of the lot.

While the little husband and wife were discussing this in low voices so as not to disturb the Historian, the elder of the Fishes flew in. With great difficulty it scraped through the small hole instead of its own. It flew to its perch, and announced in a clear voice:

"Three o'clock has struck."

It said these words to a Hen who was sitting upon a coal-scuttle, busily making little white and yellow pasties.

Having made this announcement the Fish pulled down its eyelids with its left paw, buried its nose in a nightcap, wrapped its wings round its head, and went to sleep. The Hen seemed very agitated by the Fish's words, and began to work harder than ever.

She wore a peruke like all the Wigs, and an infinite number of skirts made of butter muslin. She looked at the clock, for the big hand had stopped at two, whereas the little hand was at the hour of three. While she gazed at it the left foot of the Historian shot out and brought the little hand round to six o'clock.

At once the Hen started rolling out six yellow balls upon her pasteboard. These she wrapped up in a white crust and then hid them in the pockets of her skirts and sat upon them, while she made fourteen more eggs out of the white and yellow paste.

"The little hand must be to ask for six hard-boiled eggs," whispered Redy to Smaly.

At that moment Smaly, who was staring out of the window, nudged Redy, and looking out together they saw that the Wigs, who had been busily rebuilding the kitchen, had all fallen asleep in the market square because three o'clock was the hour of the afternoon's rest. The Confectioner, his hair streaming in the wind, was running hard towards his own house. He held by the hand Fritilla, the youngest of the Prisoner's daughters, whose big eyes were looking all about her as she ran. The Confectioner pushed her rapidly into his house and shut the door upon her, then he, too, fell asleep in the square like the other Wigs. This care which the Confectioner took of Fritilla was by no means unnecessary, as for several days she had been pursued by an enormous red Flying-Fish which declared that she had stolen from it its seven hundred and eighty-secondth feather. It declared that it had seen the plume actually in her hands, and that when it had gone home and counted its feathers over before going to sleep that night it only possessed seven hundred and eighty-one.

The smaller Flying-Fish now flew into the Historian's room, using its own little hole. It hated using this; but it seemed an even greater humiliation to use the big one, for that made the poor little Fish feel smaller than ever. Thus it came about that neither the big nor the little Flying-Fish ever used the larger hole, which had become all overgrown with delicate mosses and stonecrop, and even by a fine yellow wallflower. The windows in this country, if people did not look through them often enough, became almost opaque.