The Pigeon Tale
Page 5
CHAPTER V.
The owl looked very sleepy, and blinked his eyes very hard. "He musthave been asleep," said Laurie to himself, "owls always do sleep in theday-time I suppose."
"Who-oo!" screeched the owl, flapping his wings and ruffling up hisfeathers, and looking very hard at Laurie. "Oh, dear! I beg yourpardon," said Laurie, feeling very much frightened indeed, "I didn'tmean to be rude, but all the birds and animals on the farm here havesuch a curious way of knowing what I'm thinking." The owl paid noattention to him, however, but opened the door wider for them to enter,and Laurie, keeping close behind the pigeon, stepped in. The owl wasevidently a bachelor, for his room was very untidy; books and papers laypiled about in the greatest confusion, and while he tried in a clumsyway to make room for them, every now and then he would upset something,as he was extremely near-sighted. He finally pushed a revolving globe ona stand toward Laurie, evidently thinking it a stool; it was veryuncomfortable to sit on, and it had a way of turning round at the leastlittle motion, and Laurie hoped that whatever the message was thepigeon would not remain long.
The owl reads over the paper]
The pigeon now brought out a folded paper from a pocket underneath hiswing, and handed it to the owl, who opened it, and said he would give itdue consideration on reading it over. After listening to theirconversation awhile Laurie learned that the owl, because of his wisdom,was the judge who decided the serious affairs and quarrels among theother birds and animals. The room was built in the hollow of a deadtree--it was quite snug, but not half so nice as the squirrel house, forthere was no pretty wall paper, and a great spider-web instead hungacross one corner of the room; on one side was an oval window, out ofwhich could be seen wood and meadow, and on a peg against the wall hunga warm winter cloak of soft moleskin. The owl now gravely folded andsealed several legal-looking documents, and gave them to the pigeon,who, tucking them away in the same pocket, flapped his wings, and,nodding to Laurie to jump on his back, flew out into the sunshine.Laurie had hardly time to wonder where the pigeon was taking him to thistime, when he saw the farm below them, and they alighted on the roof ofthe barn.
Laurie was standing on the top of the barn roof]
"Cock-a-doodle-doo," crowed the rooster on the weather-vane, but hereally thought he was saying "How-de-do-de-do?" He was a splendidfellow, for he was pure gold and shone in the sunlight; he turned thisway and that for everybody to see him, until the common fowls in thebarn-yard envied him and wished themselves in his place, though if theyhad only known it they were far better off than he, for they could pickup corn and worms, while he was obliged to stand there always, which wasnot so pleasant on rainy days. He was terribly hoarse, too, from thedamp weather, and it made his voice sound like a rusty hinge that neededoiling. "Cock-a-doodle-doo!" he said to Laurie, and Laurie bowed thebest way he could, which was not very easy considering that he wasstanding on the top of the barn roof. "So you are the little boy who hascome to visit at the farm-house; I saw you drive in. I see everythingand everybody, people come and people go; it is a mistake to think thatone must travel to see the world: I prefer to remain at home, but thenevery one is not as bright as I"--he certainly was conceited--"still Iam never idle," he continued, "for I have my work to do; the farmercannot do without me. I warn him of a change of weather, but noteveryone who is changeable can be depended upon."
Here the pigeon interrupted him to tell him what the wind had said of astorm coming, and he promised to look toward the east for it. The windhad certainly got up, there was no doubting it; the weathercock andpigeon were right, it was going to rain, big drops were pattering downon the roof.
Beside him stood the turkey-gobbler]
Laurie looked round to find the pigeon, but he had disappeared, no doubtfor fear he would get his feathers wet. "Serves you right, serves youright!" sounded close to Laurie's ear, and beside him stood theturkey-gobbler. "So you thought the pigeons just flew round in a sillysort of way, picking up crumbs did you," he said--or gobbled I shouldsay, his voice was so cross--"and you didn't suppose we had our work todo as well as the people on the farm, did you?" he really looked veryalarming as he ruffled up his feathers and spread out his tail like agreat fan. "Serves you right, to be left out in the rain this way," hewent on, "next time you'll have better manners, I hope, than to call anyone a rude bird." Laurie was very much frightened indeed--it was rainingharder and harder; he started to run: patter, patter, patter, soundedthe feet of the turkey behind him, "gobble, gobble,"--patter,patter,--no, it was only the rain drops this time, he was quite out ofbreath, where was he?
The turkey-gobbler]
He looked about him, he was no longer in the barnyard--of course he knewwhere he was now, but--how frightened he had been; he rubbed his eyes,it was morning, the sun shone and there was Aunt Laura clapping herhands in the doorway to waken him. "Wake up, wake up, Laurie," shesaid--"why dear me," she added in a puzzled way, looking up at themantelpiece, "how did I happen to forget to shut the cupboard door lastnight?"
"How did I happen to forget to shut the cupboard doorlast night?"]
Perhaps she forgot to shut it, or the pigeon forgot, I do not know;anyway that is the end of the Pigeon Story, children;--and maybeto-morrow, when the stockings are all darned, and the toys put neatlyaway, I shall tell you the Field Mouse Tale, or the Duck Tale or theWindmill Tale, for there are four altogether--would you like to hearthem?
Flower ornament]
_Printed in Bavaria._
[Transcriber's Note: The original varied spelling has been retained inthis ebook. The following typo has been corrected:
p. 34: "How could a pigeon be in his room," -> this room
The Illustration descriptions have been added by the transcriber exceptthose marked in _italics_.]