Rolie Polie jumped quickly to his feet, and didn’t say no to that proposition, I can tell you, for he thought it would be great sport to tend the mill. Presently the Miller of Dee was telling him to turn this lever this way, and that lever another way, and to be sure not to touch the third lever, and then the mill would grind, or stop grinding, and all would be well. “Be sure, Rolie Polie, not to touch the third lever,” finally cautioned the Miller, as he went hurrying out of the door.
After Rolie Polie had tended the mill for a while, he too began to wonder what was happening out on the lake. “I will shut off the mill,” said he, “and get up on the roof and see.” {115}
“Now, was it this lever the Miller said to turn, or that one, or the third one?” wondered Rolie Polie. Then he pushed down a lever, and no sooner had it turned than Rolie Polie heard a great rushing and roaring which nearly shook the mill from off its foundations.
“Oh, Rolie Polie!” cried the Miller’s wife, scaring her cat from its nap in the sun, as she ran hurriedly into the mill, “What have you done? What have you done? The gates to the dam are open and the water is tearing wildly through the mill brook. We must turn the lever again and shut the gates!”
But, work as hard as they could, the gates would not budge one inch, and presently the Miller was heard calling loudly: “Shut the gates! Shut the gates!”
Rolie Polie began to shake and tremble. “I think it is time for me to go and hide,” he said. “There is no telling what the Miller might do.” Then off he hurried and soon had tucked himself in a corner behind some meal bags.
“Shut the gates! Shut the gates!” yelled the Miller, as he bounded through the open door and ran across the mill to the levers. But for all his hard tugging, the Miller of Dee never closed the gates even one particle. Then he went outside and called for help, and presently there was no less than a dozen stout Toy people tugging at the lever, which little by little, as the pressure of the water grew less, began to turn and finally shut the gates.
“It is a fine mess this little clown has made for us now,” said the Miller. “He deserves to have a good birch twig laid upon his back, only, of course, that is against the laws of Toyville, and besides he is such a jolly little fellow, it would be a shame to give him a whipping.” {116}
While the little Miller of Dee was talking this way, Rolie Polie, now much frightened, kept creeping further into his nook behind the barley bags.
