Blinky Bill

by Dorothy Wall

  “We’re here,” Mrs Field Mouse called encouragingly. “Don’t give in! Keep up, ’cause I’ve got the medicine and friends.” Another hacking cough came from the ground.

  “It must be a terribly big mouse!” Nutsy whispered to Blinky, then — straight in front of them lay the whooping animal.

  “Why it’s a porcupine!” Blinky shouted. “That’s not a mouse.”

  “Is that the name of her?” Mrs Field Mouse asked looking surprised. “I always call her ‘friend’ as I’d no idea who she was, except I knew she wasn’t a cat.”

  “We’re nearly there!” Mrs Field Mouse announced as they hurried through the wheat field.

  “You’ve come at last; but I think you’re too late,” Mrs Porcupine gasped. “I can’t even raise my quills now.”

  “You’re not going to die,” Mrs Field Mouse replied with a tear, the tiniest tear in the world, trickling down her nose.

  “See! Dr Owl has sent this eucalyptus oil along and we’re to rub your chest and back with it. That’ll cure you in no time, and these friends are going to do it for you.”

  “How can we rub a porcupine’s chest and back? Look at the spikes!” Nutsy whispered in dismay.

  “Gosh!” Blinky half whistled, “we’d better pour it all over her and tell her to wriggle about on the ground.” Then suddenly he thought of something. “Does it say rub her with it? All that writing on the bottle! Those are the directions. Let me see what it says.”

  Nutsy handed the bottle to Blinky while the others waited expectantly for his verdict.

  “I’m sure Dr Owl said rub it on,” Mrs Field Mouse remarked.

  Blinky gazed at the label on the bottle. He didn’t understand a word of it; but his little brain was working quickly.

  “Hu-u-m!” he declared with an important air. “I thought so! It doesn’t say anything at all about rubbing it on; it says, POUR THE OIL DOWN THE COUGHER’S THROAT!”

  “Ah!” the others sighed with relief — that is, Nutsy and Mrs Field Mouse. The porcupine had other thoughts.

  “You can’t do that!” she whined. “I never drink.”

  “Well, you’ll have to!” Blinky announced. “Unless, of course, you want to be a corpse.”

  “What’s that?” Mrs Field Mouse asked anxiously. “All stiff and cold, and no breath coming,” Blinky explained.

  The porcupine sighed, then commenced coughing again, rolling from side to side.

  “Grab her spikes!” Blinky commanded, “while I pour it down her throat.”

  Instantly the porcupine raised her quills until they stood up like a pin-cushion.

  “I thought you said they wouldn’t work!” Blinky cried angrily. “She’s only pretending.”

  “I’m sure she’s not. I’m quite sure she’s not,” Mrs Field Mouse said crossly. “She nearly shook me out of bed the other day when she was whooping, and being upstairs you can imagine how the house shook and quivered.”

  The house of Mrs Field Mouse was a few wheat-stalks cleverly bent together, while her bed was nestled amongst the ears. That of the porcupine was directly on the ground underneath.

  “Something must be done!” Nutsy said, looking with sorrow at the patient. “I know!” she cried excitedly, as she broke off a wheat-stalk, “we’ll paint her throat.”

  “Hu-u-m! I thought so!”

  “What colour?” Blinky asked immediately.

  “No colours,” Nutsy remarked. “We’ll paint it with the oil.”

  “That’s a blessing,” the porcupine gasped, withdrawing her spikes.

  Nutsy pushed the wheat-ear into the bottle, then stooped over the porcupine.

  “Open your mouth wide,” she said gently, “and don’t gurgle when I poke it down.”

  Blinky and Mrs Field Mouse watched in silence, while the porcupine opened her mouth the tiniest bit.

  “Open it wider!” Nutsy ordered.

  The porcupine did as she was told and, losing not a second, Nutsy poked the wheat-ear right down her throat.

  A dreadful spluttering and coughing was the outcome of the operation; in her fright the porcupine almost sprang in the air.

  “She’s taking convulsions!” Blinky shouted, scrambling for safety as the porcupine rolled and wobbled about in a most distressing manner, all her quills on end.

  “How awful!” Mrs Field Mouse cried. “What will we do?”

  But the porcupine gradually quietened. When the last quill lay flat on her back, she crawled under a tuft of dry grass; then, looking at Nutsy, she smiled weakly and whispered:

  “I’m better — much better, and after a snooze I’ll be quite better.”

  “How wonderful!” Mrs Field Mouse exclaimed running up a wheat-stalk with joy; then, taking a nibble of the ripe grain, ran down again.

  “Open it wider!” Nutsy ordered.

  “We’ll go now!” Blinky said immediately. “Come on, Nutsy. We’ve to find the pelicans, and it’s getting late.”

  “I’m sure she’s better,” Nutsy said as she was bidding good-bye to Mrs Field Mouse. “If she coughs again poke the stalk down her throat.”

  So with the little mouse’s thanks and tiny laughs ringing in their ears, the two bears proceeded on their way. Daylight found them on the outskirts of the lake, where hundreds and hundreds of pelicans were in residence. Unnoticed, they climbed a great gum-tree overlooking the birds’ domain and, tired out with their journeying, fell asleep after a good meal of the finest leaves. Here, all through the warm day and late into the afternoon they slept. Just as the sun was sinking they woke and, presently, started to scramble down the tree again.

  “I believe they’re going to bed,” Blinky remarked disgustedly. “What silly things! Why don’t they play in the moonlight as we do?”

  “Let’s wake them up!” Nutsy said. “When they see who we are probably they’ll have games with us.”

  “They might gobble us up in their big beaks,” Blinky said doubtfully. “Golly! What big beaks they have. Look at them!”

  “I’m sure they won’t be angry if we speak to them politely,” Nutsy remarked, “anyway I’m going to try. I’m not afraid.”

  “Neither am I!” Blinky exclaimed boldly. “You’re only a girl and I’m ten times braver than you.”

  “Well — you go first then,” Nutsy said slyly.

  “No. Ladies always go first. Splodge told me that,” Blinky replied, pushing Nutsy ahead as he spoke.

  “Poof! You’re afraid!” Nutsy said, with a note of contempt in her voice, as she bravely padded down to the water’s edge.

  “Well — you go first then.” “No! ladies always go first.”

  CHAPTER 15

  The Council Meeting

  OU shout at them,” Nutsy ordered. “You’ve got the biggest voice.”

  “Gee up!” Blinky yelled. “Hip, hip, hooray!”

  “That’s done it!” Nutsy said, as dozens of pelicans ceased paddling about in the water and all, as if by command, faced the intruders with looks of great surprise.

  “Caught anything?” Blinky shouted, waving a paw.

  The pelicans just looked all the harder. They seemed rooted in the water.

  “How’s the fishing going?” Blinky asked at the top of his voice.

  “You’re too cheeky,” Nutsy said, poking him in the side, “Ask them politely. No! Keep quiet and I’ll ask.”

  “May we come and see you Mr and Mrs Pelicans?” Nutsy called as loudly as she could.

  “Who are you?” came a guttural reply, as the largest pelican of all advanced to meet the bears.

  “Only Nutsy and Blinky,” the two koalas responded.

  “I’m none the wiser,” the big bird said shaking his head from side to side as he met the strangers.

  “We’re friends,” Nutsy said meekly, holding her breath as she looked up at the huge bird with that very large bill.

  “Do you mind telling me what’s in your scooper?” Blinky asked as he eyed the great pouch attached to the pelican’s bill.

 
; “Nothing!” the pelican replied, and to show them how true it was he opened his mouth to its widest.

  “Oh!” Nutsy gasped. “Gosh!” Blinky exclaimed.

  With a snap the pelican closed his mouth, so quickly and decidedly that the two little bears jumped with fright.

  “Don’t open your gate again,” Blinky said when he had at last recovered his self composure.

  “Be quiet!” Nutsy hissed giving Blinky’s foot a kick. “He could swallow us in one gulp.”

  “Now you see what the day’s fishing has been like,” the pelican remarked, “and we’re holding a meeting tonight to discuss the whys and what-nots of it all.”

  “May we come?” Nutsy asked excitedly. “We’ll be very quiet.”

  “Oh!” Nutsy gasped. “Gosh!” Blinky exclaimed.

  The pelican looked at her for a minute, tilting his head on one side, then on the other, eyeing her with curiosity.

  “They’re strictly private — our meetings,” he said at last, “Only the aldermen are admitted. I’m the mayor, as no doubt you can see by my large paunch, and it all rests with me whether I say yes or no.”

  “How important,” Nutsy said admiringly. “Couldn’t you take us to the meeting as guests?”

  “S’pose I could if it came to a scratch,” the pelican replied, still looking very thoughtfully at the two little bears. “You’ll have to be prepared for a rumpus,” he said warningly. “And if there is one it’s a case of every man for himself,”

  “What happens to all the womans?” Nutsy interjected.

  “They’re crushed to death,” Blinky replied immediately.

  “No such thing!” the pelican said with annoyance. “Women are not admitted to our council meetings, they’re held in camera.”

  “Do-you-mean-to-tell-me-you-all-sit-in-a-camera?” Blinky asked in amazement.

  “Yes! that’s so,” the pelican replied, puffing out the pouch in his bill.

  “For goodness’ sake don’t open the gate again,” Blinky said excitedly.

  “Sh-h-h!” Nutsy scowled at him.

  “And who takes the photos?” Blinky asked, returning to the former discussion.

  “What photos?” the pelican asked.

  “When you’re all sitting in the camera,” he replied.

  “Well — upon my soul! You’re goofy,” the pelican retorted. “Don’t you know what sitting in camera means? Well — really, I didn’t think it possible.” Here the pelican opened his mouth and gave a terrific yawn.

  “Look out! You’ll break the hinges,” Blinky shouted as he quickly edged away.

  The pelican ignored his remark completely. But coming right over to where Blinky was standing, half in and half out of a prickly bush, he snapped his bill at him and asked very crossly: “Didn’t your mother send you to school?”

  “Look out or you’ll break the hinges.”

  “No! I wouldn’t go!” Blinky shouted, trying to cover up his nervousness by making as much noise as possible.

  “That explains it!” the pelican said coldly. “That’s why you don’t know what ’sitting in camera’ means.”

  “For goodness’ sake tell me, and don’t talk so much,” Blinky retorted. He was clearly annoyed.

  “It means sitting behind closed doors,” the pelican replied.

  “And what a smack you’d get if someone suddenly opened it,” Blinky said with a sneer. “No closed doors for me.”

  “You’re worse than I thought you were,” the pelican said with disgust. “I’ve no more time to waste on such silly simpering people.” Taking a huge watch from under his wing he shook it violently, then looked at its face.

  “By Jove!” he exclaimed, “the meeting will have started if I don’t get a hurry on.”

  “Do let us come!” Nutsy pleaded. “I’ll see that Blinky behaves himself, Mr Pelican.”

  “Mr Mayor — if — you — please!” the pelican said looking sternly at the two bears.

  “I beg your pardon. You see, you’re the first mayor I’ve ever met in my life.”

  “That’s quite understandable,” the pelican replied. “Mayors are very rare.”

  So taking it for granted that they were to be admitted to the meeting, the koalas followed the pelican, round the edge of the lake to a secluded swamp fringed with tall reeds. Here thousands of pelicans had forgathered, and the snapping and scraping of beaks made a noise like a gale in the trees.

  As the mayor appeared, all those hundreds and hundreds of pelicans opened their mouths to their full extent and snapped three times.

  “If there’s that thing the mayor called a rumpus, for goodness’ sake keep away from their snappers,” Blinky whispered to Nutsy. “We’d be cracked in halves like walnuts.”

  Twenty superior looking pelicans stood in a semicircle, to the centre of which the mayor advanced.

  “Are the aldermen’s wives at home?” the mayor solemnly asked before commencing business.

  “Yes! Your Worship,” came the chorus.

  “Then we’ll open the meeting,” the mayor announced with great dignity.

  Blinky heard a reed rustle close to where he and Nutsy were sitting on a water-worn stump of mangrove-tree. Quickly looking in that direction he saw many eyes peering through the reeds.

  “They’re the wives,” he whispered to Nutsy. “Will I tell the mayor?”

  “’Course not!” Nutsy replied indignantly. “Mind your own business.” Just at that moment the mayor rapped his large webbed foot on the stone that served as a table.

  “Off we go!” he shouted. “Any complaints barring the usual one of pilfering fish?”

  Such a clamour arose, so many bills snapped and opened, that it was impossible to hear an intelligible remark.

  “Order! Order!” the mayor shouted, while the twenty aldermen began to mark time rapidly with their large webbed feet.

  Squish, squash, squish, squash, they pancaked the mud.

  “Stop that squelching!” the mayor shouted.

  “They’re the cause of all the trouble!” several angry pelicans screamed.

  “Why? What? How?” the mayor asked above the noise.

  “They’re the cause of the famine,” the others shouted. “Playing the organ all day long in the swamp; kneading the bread just where the mud’s the thickest, until the fish all swim away, and no respectable pelican can wade in up to his knees without becoming covered in mud.”

  “What about our bills?” someone shouted above the uproar.

  “Yes!” came a chorus of shouts. “What about our bills?”

  “What about them?” the mayor shouted.

  “Do you think we’re all mud larks?” someone else asked. “Our pouches were made to catch fish in — not scoops for mud. Anyone would think we were two-legged dredges.”

  “Sit down!” the mayor ordered, “or I’ll close the meeting.”

  “And a jolly good job if you did,” a pelican in the back row shouted.

  “What about the frog banquet you and the aldermen had last night?” a tiny skinny moulting pelican piped.

  “Your nose is too long!” the mayor shouted amid the uproar. “Aldermen, see that his nose is decapitated.”

  The aldermen hastily scribbled in large books that hung around their necks: “One nose — decapitate.”

  “Shame! Shame!” came a chorus of cries.

  “Next complaint!” the mayor demanded, snapping his beak so that Nutsy and Blinky jumped with nervousness.

  “He’ll break his snapper, for sure,” Blinky whispered.

  “What about relief for the widows?” someone asked.

  “Bother the widows!” the mayor mumbled under his breath. Aloud he asked: “Can anyone suggest something?”

  “I can!” came a squeaky voice from behind the reeds. “All you fat aldermen, the mayor included, go out and catch some fish for us poor widows.”

  The mayor puffed his pouch out with indignation. “The very idea!” he exclaimed. “I thought all the wives were at home,” he shout
ed. “How did women get into this meeting?”

  “They’re the widows!” someone called, “and we’re not responsible for them.”

  “Make them go themselves,” the aldermen shouted. “They’re always stirring up trouble.”

  “That’s a jolly good idea!” the mayor declared. Pointing to the reeds he called out in a loud voice. “Widows — stand before me!”

  With a rush the reeds parted in all directions, and out marched a hundred widows.

  “Eavesdroppers!” the mayor hissed at them as they stood two deep in front of him.

  “Traitors!” the aldermen whispered to one another. The widows ignored the remarks, and an old lady pelican stepped out from the rest. Advancing towards the mayor she astounded everyone by rapping him sharply on the bill.

  “Look here, my lad!” she exclaimed. “There’s been enough of this nonsense, Frog banquets, eel snacks, and all the rest of it. Cut it out, or out you’ll go!”

  “What do you want?” the mayor asked looking very subdued.

  “Equal rights!” the old lady shouted. “No puddling in squashy mud holes. No sitting in the background while you and the aldermen fish in the best and cleanest water. Give us permission to hold a fishing party — Now!”

  “Hear, hear!” the other ninety-nine widows screeched.

  “And we want a permanent fishing-ground,” the old lady pelican demanded. “None of your fished-out pools and corners with half a dozen tadpoles in them,” she cried.

  “Give them the weedy end of the lake,” an alderman whispered to the mayor, who seemed to be speechless with anger and surprise. He nodded his head upon hearing this advice.

  “Madam!” he said in an icy tone, “you and the rest of the widows can have the south end of the lake.”

  “It’s full of weeds!” the old lady shouted.

  “Take it or leave it!” the mayor thundered, now regaining his self-composure. “And in future,” he added to the whole of the meeting, “you others keep away from that part of the lake. Those are the widows’ weeds. I’ll have no arguments. The matter’s closed.” And to emphasize his words — snap! went his beak.