Half-Past Bedtime

by Sir H. H. Bashford

"It's a hard life," he said, "being a saint."

But he looked so comfortable, sitting on the rock, with his fat thighs spread out beneath him, that Doris was almost sure that he wouldn't mind, and so she asked him if he would take them. He stroked his chin for a moment and looked at her thoughtfully.

"Well, of course I could," he said, "though it would be rather irregular. But Albert Hezekiah here would have to look after my landing-net, because I've only got two hands."

So they all three of them looked at the moon-boy, and he promised to take care of the landing-net; and then Fat Bill held out his hands, and Cuthbert and Doris each took one of them. The moment they did so they were, of course, in In-between Land, because that was where Fat Bill and his brother lived; and the rocks looked ghostly, just like dream-rocks, and they could see the moon-boy's soul, like a tiny flame. But the next moment they were alone on a shore of the whitest sand that they had ever seen, and the dawn was coming up over an enormous sea, stiller than stillness and breathlessly blue. At their feet lay a shallow lagoon—or at least it looked shallow—trembling with colour; and strange-petalled weeds swung to and fro in it, and the silver-scaled fishes slid between them.

It was so hot that they wanted to throw their clothes away, and the jungle behind them was full of odours—sleepy odours, like the odours of a medicine-chest—and nodding, red-lipped flowers. Leading from the shore, between the walls of the jungle, was a narrow path of grass and sand; and standing in the middle of it, still as an idol, was a little dark-brown naked girl. Fat Bill had gone, but they knew that it was Blossom-blossom, and then she gave a yell and fled from sight; and Cuthbert and Doris couldn't help laughing as they began to explore the rim of the lagoon.

But a minute or two later, as they were kneeling on the shore and peering down into that wonderful water, something happened that made them think of Blossom-blossom in rather a different sort of way. For just as Doris had made up her mind to take off her shoes and stockings, they heard a little sound, and the next moment a spear was quivering in the sand between them. They sprang to their feet just in time to avoid another one and to see a man crouching at the edge of the jungle; and then they were snatched up, and there they were on the rock again, with Gannet Head towering above them. The moon-boy was laughing, but Fat Bill looked serious.

"Narrow squeak," he said. "That was Blossom-blossom's father. I thought he was asleep in his hut."

Then he shook hands with them and said good-bye, and they climbed up the path again and went home to bed; and when Uncle Joe came up to look at them, they confessed to him what they had been doing. He was rather angry, of course, but he didn't laugh at them, and as for Fat Bill, he said that he had heard of him; and as for the old clown, he promised to see what he could do for him before they left the town next morning.

"But don't you think it was rough," said Cuthbert, "after I had helped to save Blossom-blossom, to have her father throwing spears at me?"

But that was just the sort of thing, said Uncle Joe, that saviours had to be prepared for.