THE TALE OF THE FRETFUL CHILD
There lived once upon a time, in the Land of Grown-ups, a very little boy. As soon as he was old enough to cry, which was when he was very young indeed, he began to cry for an adventure. But he always cried for it in baby talk, which Grown-ups cannot understand because they have forgotten it; and so nobody knew what he wanted. They gave him milk, and they spanked him. They sang to him and they rocked him, and they even showed him how the wheels in Daddy’s watch go round. But they did not give him an adventure, and so he kept right on crying, until bye and bye he came to be known as That Fretful Child, and everyone hated his parents.
Now there is only one person in all Grown-up Land who understands baby talk, and that is the Oldest Woman in the World. People say that she understands it only because she is so old that she has learned everything there is to know and is going back to begin all over again. And, since she is as wise as she is old, and equally as gossipy, she soon heard everyone talking about That Fretful Child.
She suspected that the baby wanted something very badly, and that that something was neither warm milk, nor a spanking, nor the wheels in Daddy’s watch. And she decided to find out what it was that he did want.
So she put on her grey cobweb scarf, which makes her invisible, and climbed up the handle of her carpet-sweeper, for she is a very modern Old Woman indeed. She grasped the handle of her carpet-sweeper, right where the shiny part ends, said a magic word, which I have forgotten, and Higgelley, piggelley, before you might say “I spy” three times without winking, she was driving up to the home of the Fretful Child with a fearful clatter.
Now the Fretful Child’s Mother was a regular sort of a Mother, excepting that on Sunday’s she always used silk handkerchiefs, embroidered with storks, and folded in thirds, instead of the linen ones folded in quarters that she used every day. When she heard the noise, and saw the carpet-sweeper drive up to the door she became very much excited.
“Look, Timothy,” she called to her husband, who is also the Baby’s Father, “Look at the carpet-sweeper I have found outside of the door.” In Grown-up Land, you see, carpet sweepers do not always wander about by themselves.
Timothy, however was not impressed. He only said “Un-huh”, and went on reading his newspaper.
So the Fretful Child’s Mother took in the carpet-sweeper, and put it next to the Baby’s crib, for safe-keeping. Then, because the baby was crying very hard indeed, she hurried away to get him some warm milk, and left him alone to drink it, for she had learned by experience that he could not cry while he was doing this.
When she had gone, the Oldest Woman hopped down from the carpet-sweeper, and took off her cobweb scarf, which made her visible. Then she looked at the Fretful Child over her dark green spectacles, and said:
“Google de Goo.”
Now the Baby was so surprised to hear anyone besides himself speaking his language, that he stopped swallowing warm milk, right in the middle of a gulp, and simply stared. But, although this is generally considered very rude, the Oldest Woman paid no attention to it whatsoever, and instead went right on to say something which translated means:
“What are you crying for, anyway?”
By that time the Fretful Child had stopped staring, and had finished his warm milk, and was able to tell her that he wanted an adventure, and that he wanted it badly.
Upon hearing this, the Oldest Woman became very serious indeed. She shook her head, and wiped away a tear which had settled on the rim of her green spectacles and was about to roll down her nose. Then she said:
“Doodle de doo,” which, as all babies know, means “You are very young indeed, but I will do the best I can for you.”
She told him that there are very few places where adventures still grow wild, for they have all been collected many years ago by a group of people called “Famous Persons”. However, she did know of one adventure tree that was just beginning to bear fruit. It was quite far away, but all that one needed to get there was a silk handkerchief embroidered with a stork. Now this was very fortunate indeed. For you see, the baby knew that once a week his Mother used to wipe his tears off with a silk handkerchief, and he remembered that something on it sometimes used to bite him.
“It must have been a stork,” exclaimed the Oldest Woman, and at this she became so excited that her eyes twinkled behind her green spectacles.
In less time than it takes to tell about it, the baby was flying through the air on his Mother’s silk handkerchief, with his eyes tightly closed, and the Oldest Woman was astride a carpet-sweeper. He could feel the wind blowing through his hair, and the stars snapping at him as he went whizzing past. All the time the Oldest Woman kept saying magic words, and telling him not to open his eyes whatever he did, so that it all sounded something like this:
Hoity toity, keep them shut,
Ali pali poo,
Flutter, gutter, down he’ll clut
Sniggle, snaggle yo-u-u-u-u
O-o-o-o-w
You-u-u-u-u
And all the voices of the night owls and snapping stars echoed
You-u-u-u-u-u-u-U*U*U*U!
Until the Fretful Child felt very pale indeed.
When at last the Oldest Woman told him that he might look, he found that they had flown all the way to Nowhereland. He knew it was Nowhereland, by all the Nothings standing about. There were tall Nothings, and short Nothings, and fat Nothings, and thin Nothings, and they were all kept in order by Nobodies with grey dresses on. These Nobodies are very much like the people in Grown-up Land. Excepting that, as you will notice when you look at them very closely, their faces are made up entirely of cheeks.
The Fretful Child stared about very hard indeed. Then, because he couldn’t see any adventure tree, he was just beginning to take a long breath in order to cry. But he stopped short, just as his face was beginning to turn from pink to purple. For, right in the midst of the Nobodies stood the most beautiful adventure tree you ever saw. Its pale blue branches were weighed down to the place where the ground would have been, if there had been a ground in Nowhereland. And from even the lowest branches there hung luscious adventures that were dark red, and just right for picking. All about lay others that the wind had blown down, or that the Nobodies had picked, tasted, and thrown away. But they had missed the very best of all. And this was perfectly natural, when you stop to think that the Nobodies have no eyes, and their faces are made up entirely of cheeks.
But the Fretful Child was not a Nobody. He had eyes. He saw the red adventures dangling there, and he squealed and crowed, and did all the things that fretful children never do. And then he picked one.
Now it is strange to tell about, but as soon as the Fretful Child bit into that adventure, he stopped being a Fretful Child, and became a Regular Boy. Even his skin, at that very moment forgot how to change from pink to purple, as it used to when he wanted to cry.
When the Nobodies felt what he was doing, they became very angry indeed, and shouted Nonsense at him, and threw Nothings at him. But these did not hurt him much, and so he went right on eating his adventure.
The adventure did not taste at all the way he thought it would, and it puckered his mouth all up. So he tried to hold his breath to make his face change from pink to purple, but it wouldn’t do what he told it to. And then he knew that the adventure must have done something to him. He was not sure, but he strongly suspected that it must have changed him into a Regular Boy. So he stopped crying, even before he had let out the tiniest bit of a sound, and he smiled all over instead. And thereupon the Nobodies, feeling that some thing just hadn’t happened, dropped their nothings on the spot. And a brand new adventure bloomed on the tree, where the one the Fretful Child had eaten hung.
He squealed in glee, and looked around for the Oldest Woman, but as she was as wise as she was old, and equally as gossipy, she must have ridden away on her carpet-sweeper to tell her friends about it, for she was not to be found.
Just as he was wondering where she could have gone to, he felt a tugging at his right arm. It was the embroidered stork. Without a minute’s delay he climbed upon the handkerchief, stuck out his tongue at the Nobodies, which shows that he was a Regular Boy, and, higgelley, piggelley, before you might say “I spy” three times without winking, he was back in his own little crib.
His Mother was just coming to get the carpet-sweeper, which she had left beside the crib, for, you see, in Grown-up Land time passes much more slowly than in Nowhere land. There was a great to-do when she found that it was gone, but just as she was growing very excited about this, she noticed that the Fretful Child had stopped crying, and this made her even more excited (but in a different way) so that she forgot all about the carpet-sweeper. She rushed in to tell Timothy, her husband about it; but he was reading the newspaper, and only said “Un-huh.”
Soon all the neighbors came in to find out why That Fretful Child had stopped crying, and his Mother proudly told them that she had given him warm milk.
Whereupon all the neighbors shook their heads and opened their mouths very wide, and went home to feed warm milk to their Fretful Children, as they have been doing ever since.