Mr. Pudgins (Nancy Pearl's Book Crush Rediscoveries)

by Ruth Christoffer Carlsen

The three of us pressed our noses against the window pane. “There it comes,” said Janey. And sure enough, it was a big hook-and-ladder truck swinging right down our street.

  “Lookit all the people out there,” said Pete.

  There were a lot of people all gathered on our front sidewalk.

  “Hey,” I said in surprise, “it’s us. They think we’re on fire.”

  “Bouncing butterballs,” said Mr. Pudgins sinking down in the armchair. “Well, let’s keep calm.” He took out his pipe again and was just drawing hard on it when a fireman burst in the door. It was open, of course, to let the smoke out.

  “Where’s the fire? Where’s the fire, bub?” said the fireman. Another and another and still another came in the door. They had their axes ready, and out on the truck they were starting to unwind the hose. One of the firemen carried a chemical fire extinguisher. It was pretty impressive.

  Mr. Pudgins looked up from lighting his pipe with a surprised expression. “Fire?” he said. “There’s no fire here.”

  “Listen,” said the first fireman, “we got four calls from neighbors, and they said the smoke was pouring out of the door and windows. Where there’s smoke, there’s fire.”

  “Well, not in this case,” said Mr. Pudgins.

  I snickered.

  “Oh yeah!” said the fireman. “If it wasn’t a fire, what was it then?”

  Mr. Pudgins rose from the chair and smiled at the fireman. “Nothing to be alarmed at, gentlemen. Just a little invention of mine.”

  “Some invention,” growled the fireman. “We ought to haul you in for a false alarm. We’ll just take a look around anyway.”

  “I’m in quarantine,” Janey spoke up proudly, “for SCARLET FEVER.”

  “Good gosh! What next?” said the firemen in disgust. I noticed they were careful to stay away from us. They tramped all through the house, but they couldn’t find a thing. We could hear them muttering as they left.

  We had had a wonderful afternoon. Petey stood at Mr. Pudgins’s chair.

  “What’ll we do now?” he asked plaintively.

  “Why, pick up the track, of course,” said Mr. Pudgins. “Then supper and to bed.” And that’s exactly what we did.

  This was the last Saturday we were to be in quarantine for scarlet fever, and the circus was in town. Of course we were going to miss it, so we felt pretty sad.

  “Why is everyone so glum, Johnny?” asked Mr. Pudgins.

  “It’s the circus,” I grumped from a corner.

  “I wanta go,” wailed Petey, and he started to cry.

  “I want to go, too,” moaned Janey, and she started to cry.

  “Oh, hush up, Janey,” I growled. “It’s all your fault. You didn’t have to go and get scarlet fever.”

  It looked as if we were going to get into a good fight. And I felt just like having one. Then Mr. Pudgins said, “Let’s have our own circus.”

  “Goody! Goody!” yelled Jane and Pete. They stopped crying immediately.

  “Nuts!” I said crossly. “That’s baby stuff.”

  “All right, Johnny. You stay in here and feel sorry for yourself,” said Mr. Pudgins. “Come, Pete and Jane, let’s go outside.”

  I was afraid I might really miss some fun, so I followed after them. Mr. Pudgins put some boxes on the grass.

  “Those are seats,” he said.

  “Who’s going to sit there?” I growled.

  “Why, we are, of course,” said Mr. Pudgins.

  “Then who is going to perform?” I asked just as nastily as I could. I certainly felt horrible.

  “My friends,” said Mr. Pudgins. He didn’t pay any attention to my nastiness, and I began to feel better.

  “All right,” I said. “I’ll help.”

  “Then go and get some bags. Now Pete, you and Jane can blow up the balloons. Take them out to the car and let Podo do the blowing. They will float then.”

  We all ran to do our jobs. It took me quite a while to find paper bags, and when I looked out the window I could see that Peter was holding a big bunch of balloons while Jane kept leaning into the trunk of the car. Suddenly Pete started to float right up into the air. Janey turned around, saw him, and grabbed his feet. I rushed out to help her.

  “Go away,” she said. “This is fun pushing Pete through the air.”

  “My, my,” said Mr. Pudgins as we rounded the corner of the house. “What is our balloon man doing?”

  “I’m floating,” said Petey happily. “I’m floating.”

  “Tie him to the clothespole, Janey, so he won’t get away. If he wants to see the circus from up there, I’ve no objection.”

  Petey hung on the clothes pole for almost five minutes and then he said, “I want to get down, Mr. Pudgins.”

  So Janey untied him, and together they fastened the balloons to the lilac bush.

  “Here are the paper bags, Mr. Pudgins,” I said.

  “Oh yes,” he said vaguely. “Just fill them with peanuts and popcorn. It wouldn’t be a circus without peanuts and popcorn.”

  “Oh yes, peanuts and popcorn. But where are they?”

  “Over there,” he said waving toward the garden. “Hunt for them.”

  Janey and Pete came along to help me. They love to eat. We crawled everywhere, looking, and it was slightly hard on mother’s flowers. Suddenly Pete yelled, “I found it! I found it!”

  Janey and I rushed over. He was digging in the ground at a few pieces of popcorn, and suddenly up burst a geyser of popcorn. It gushed high into the air and fell down on us like snow. Janey held out her skirt, I pulled off my shirt, and Pete ran around holding paper sacks in the air. We filled everything in a hurry, and it started to pile up.

  “How do you shut it off?” I called to Mr. Pudgins who was relaxing in a lawn chair.

  “Try saying ‘Stop,’” he suggested.

  All three of us yelled “STOP!” And sure enough, the next bursts were lower and lower and lower, until it stopped.

  “Now where are the peanuts?” I muttered.

  “We haven’t tried the rock garden,” said Janey.

  We hurried over there and on the rocks, in between rocks, under rocks were peanuts in the shell. Hundreds and thousands and millions of peanuts. It took Pete’s big wagon and Dad’s wheelbarrow to get them all back to Mr. Pudgins.

  “Whew! That was some job,” I said, wiping my forehead.

  “Let’s have the circus,” said Pete, grabbing a handful of peanuts and munching.

  “Sit down,” said Mr. Pudgins. “The show is about to begin.”

  We were sitting facing our swings and trapeze bar. There was a toot of a horn, and then from the garage came a lot of little field mice carrying pint jars. They placed them in a circle. When they had finished that, the mice took zinnia stalks in their teeth and out from the garage drove ten little kittens—some tiger-striped, some yellow, and a few all black. The kittens jumped up on the fruit jars and snarled. Now from the garage ran a big field mouse with a tiny whip in his mouth. He put those cats through all sorts of tricks. They sat up on their haunches; they jumped through a dandelion hoop; they danced on their hind legs; they leaped across six jars set side by side. It was a wonderful act. You should have heard us applaud when it finished.

  “Hey, give me some popcorn,” whispered Janey. I was most willing to oblige. I handed her a whole shovelful.

  The next act was bunnies on the flying trapeze. They swung by their ears, and you should have seen those bunnies twirl, whirl, and catch each other. Just as they started back for the garage at the end of their performance, we saw Podo, the dodo bird, coming toward them. And you know what he was? A clown, of course. He was wearing Janey’s doll’s bonnet and lots and lots of clothes. He was waving so hard at us that he bumped right into the littlest rabbit, and was that rabbit mad! He wanted to fight right away. Podo was very willing to fight, but first he started to take off his jackets. Podo threw the rabbit a green jacket. Then he took off a patched red one. The rabbit was struggling to put up his paws
to fight, but he was getting slowly buried. Next he caught a blue and yellow plaid jacket. Now a pink organdy blouse.

  The rabbit was gasping. And still the clothes came. A white shirt, a pair of baggy pants, a pair of yellow patched overalls, a white T-shirt. The rabbit was staggering. Podo threw a long flannel nightie at the rabbit, and he fell over backward with all the clothes on top of him. Podo paraded around proudly in a suit of long underwear and clasped his hands together, shouting, “The winnah!” Suddenly he looked down and saw his underwear for the first time. He let out a little embarrassed shriek and fled from the ring. We all sat back and laughed. Podo was a wonderful clown.

  “Gosh, this is fun!” I said.

  “More peanuts,” said Pete.

  Jip, the McCrackens’ dog, walked in on his hind legs, and he looked mean—just as mean as he had the night we landed in his backyard in a bathtub. He carried a whip in his paw and cracked it loudly. It made us all jump. Behind him ran four skunks, and they formed a circle. Jip soon had them performing like a machine. When he barked once, they would run ’round and ’round the circle, single file like Arabian horses. Two quick barks, and they would reverse and double up. It was remarkable.

  But then Jip did it. He cracked the last skunk with the whip, and it made a dull thud when the thong landed. We jumped. The skunk just turned his back on him and very slowly raised his tail. We knew what was coming now.

  “Run, run!” I shrieked. And you should have seen us scoot. Even Mr. Pudgins bounced right along with us. We heard an awful yelp from Jip and knew the skunk had hit. All of us giggled. And then Jip, in his frantic effort to escape, ran headlong into the lilac bush. Of course he got caught in the balloon strings. How he tugged and struggled to get loose, and finally the whole bunch of balloons broke away from the bush and started to float off. Jip floated right with them. We just howled.

  Mrs. McCracken told Mother the next Saturday that Jip disappeared for a whole week and came limping home smelling of skunk. She just couldn’t understand it. But we could. Those Podo-blown balloons must really have floated. And Jip evidently had time to do some doggy thinking, for he’s a pleasanter dog now.

  Annabelle was Mr. Pudgins’s car. And what a car it was—an old Model T coupe. You know what those look like. It was a cracker box on wheels. Whenever Mr. Pudgins drove up in her, we would beg for a ride. And he always said, “No!”—until this particular September day. Mother was going downtown for lunch and some shopping, so Mr. Pudgins suggested he take us on a picnic. Mother said “No” at first because Annabelle was so very old. But at last she relented.

  Golly! Were we relieved and excited! Janey made peanut-butter sandwiches, I put chocolate milk in the thermos, and Pete found some cookies and bananas. Then we raced for the car. We looked for Podo when we opened the trunk to put the lunch in, but he wasn’t there.

  “I have to leave him home sometimes,” said Mr. Pudgins, guessing our thoughts. “He can be a nuisance. Now hop in the car.”

  We had to squeeze a little to get the three of us and Mr. Pudgins on that small seat. But we made it.

  “This is fun, up so high,” said Janey. “I can see everything.”

  “Annabelle is a lady, and real ladies keep their skirts off the ground,” said Mr. Pudgins. He struggled with the starter. Nothing happened. Out he climbed with a crank in his hand. “Kick the throttle in when she grabs, Johnny.” He spun the crank and he spun the crank and he spun the crank some more. At last whirrah, whirrah, jickety jounce. The motor started. We bounced sideways. We jiggled and jaggled.

  “She’ssss got lotsssof act . . . ttion,” I sputtered. It was pretty hard to talk because the words kept getting jumbled up on the way out of you.

  “Of course, Annabelllle has zzzzipp,” said Mr. Pudgins, jouncing too. “It willlllbe betterrr on the highway.”

  As we were putting along a country road, Mr. Pudgins turned to me and said, “Would you like to steer for a while, Johnny?”

  “Oh jeepers, can I? Can I? Let me at it.”

  “Now take it easy, my boy.” Mr. Pudgins leaned forward and screwed a little switch. Then he simply handed me the steering wheel.

  “Look! Look!” screamed Janey excitedly. “It comes off.”

  “Just remote control. One of my own inventions,” said Mr. Pudgins modestly. He put his head down under the dashboard to listen to the motor. “Sounds pretty good for such an old lady, eh?” He acted very pleased.

  I tried turning the wheel left, and the thing really worked. I thought he might have been fooling me. We were driving very slowly now. Mr. Pudgins seemed to be looking for something. About this time we sighted a farmer hoeing his corn. Whirrah, whirrah, jickety jounce. Slowly we approached. “I say,” said Mr. Pudgins, leaning out the window and using both hands as a megaphone. “Where is Donnavan’s stream?”

  “You durn fool,” shouted the farmer, “put your hands on the wheel!” He couldn’t see that I was steering, so we were past him before we found out about the stream. Pete had a turn at steering and so did Janey. It was wonderful to have a wheel that could be passed back and forth. Mr. Pudgins just leaned back in his corner and smoked.

  Finally Mr. Pudgins took the wheel back and turned into a little meadow with a stream. We followed along until we came to the lake, and with a snort and puff Annabelle stopped. We piled out of the car, spread a blanket, and sat down to eat. Boy! That lunch tasted wonderful.

  “Wish we had a boat,” murmured Pete as he finished his cookie.

  “Oh, me too,” said Jane, chewing on her banana.

  “Looks like a good lake for fish,” I commented.

  “By all means, let us go fishing,” said Mr. Pudgins. We looked at him a little surprised. “Johnny, you climb on the trunk, and Jane and Pete can sit on the hood.”

  “You mean of Annabelle?” I gasped.

  “And why not?” He walked over to the car, opened the hood, and we heard an awful clinking clanking noise. “All right, children. Come.”

  We did. He tied a rope around Pete and Jane and ran the rope through the window, where he tied it to the wheel. I hopped on the trunk, which jutted out pretty straight, and he handed me a fishing line. “All set?” We nodded. Whirrah, whirrah, jickety jounce went Anna-belle. Mr. Pudgins hopped in the car and started driving right toward the water.

  “Oh, oh! We’ll get drownded,” whimpered Pete.

  Then salop, salop we were in the lake. No, we were on the lake. Annabelle was floating. She really made a wonderful boat. Pete and Jane dipped their feet in the water and giggled when the minnows tickled them. And I caught fish. Yes, sir! I caught three good-sized bass. I was proud as punch. Suddenly we all realized it was getting pretty late, and Mr. Pudgins gave Annabelle the gun as he headed for shore. He swerved to miss a log, and then it happened. The rope jammed the steering wheel, and we started whirling around and around like a saucer in the fun house. I stuck my hand through the back window to hold on, but the rest of me flew straight out in the air. I could see Jane and Pete flying around, too.

  “I’m an airplane,” yelled Pete.

  “I’m a stork,” shrieked Jane. That was a funny bird to pick.

  “I’m Superman!” I shouted. “Let her rip.” I could see Mr. Pudgins tinkering with the steering wheel, and finally he jerked the rope loose. He tossed the steering wheel to me. “Take her in, please, Johnny. I’m exhausted.”

  And, boy, I did! We were all a little dizzy, so Annabelle just weaved up to the shore. That flying had dried us off, so we started right out for home. When we turned back on the highway, Mr. Pudgins opened Annabelle up, and then we really jiggled. “I . . . I . . . thinknnkkkk, I’I’I’mmmmmlossssing a toootthh,” said Janey.

  And she was. The jiggling was shaking it loose. Pete and I were so interested in watching Jane’s tooth that we didn’t see the big coal truck ahead of us that was slowly moving up a long hill. “Hold on!” shouted Mr. Pudgins. “We’re going to jump it.”

  We looked up in surprise, and ooooof, my stomach se
emed to fall! Annabelle gave a big push with her rear wheels, and there we were in the air. Only she didn’t push quite hard enough. Plop! We came down on top of the coal, and the motor stopped. Mr. Pudgins couldn’t get it to turn over again.

  “Now what?” I asked. People were staring at us as they whizzed by the truck. And we must have looked a little peculiar. Annabelle, though, was still the prim lady, and I knew she must be disgusted at getting her wheels so dirty. “Shall I climb over and signal the man to stop?”

  “Capital idea, Johnny. All that whirling in the water must have knocked something loose. Here, tie this rope on just to be safe.”

  It was pretty exciting to step out of the door way up in the air like that, and the truck was really whipping along now. I had to just inch my way past Annabelle’s hood, and then I crawled on my hands and knees over the coal to the truck’s cab. With the wind biting my face, I lay down on my stomach and leaned over the windshield. The man inside was watching the road with a bored expression. I tapped gently on the window. I didn’t want to frighten him. He looked up, and then how we swerved! I was scared Annabelle might be thrown right off. The truck pulled to the side of the road and stopped with a jerk.

  “You darn fool kid. Whatcha doin’ up there?” shouted the driver as he jumped from the cab.

  I just grinned.

  “Get down in a hurry, ya hear me?” I started moving back over the coal, and then . . .

  “Excuse me, sir,” came Mr. Pudgins’s quiet voice.

  The driver looked up and saw Mr. Pudgins leaning out of Annabelle, who was perched a little screwily on the coal. His mouth dropped so low I could see his tonsils vibrating.

  “We are in a predicament, as you can see,” said Mr. Pudgins. “Johnny just wanted you to stop so that we can get off of here.”

  “Thunderation,” gasped the driver. He was pretty upset: “I’ve picked up lots of things in a load, but never a car.”