Leaping Beauty: And Other Animal Fairy Tales

by Gregory Maguire

  “I’ll think about it, dear,” said Mama Hen, which Baby Chick knew full well really meant, Not very likely in this lifetime, honey chile.

  Mama Hen made some oatmeal and brought it to the table.

  “Yikes, it’s piping hot!” yelled Papa Rooster.

  “So is mine,” wailed Baby Chick.

  “What a pair of complainers,” said Mama Hen. “So blow on it to cool it down already.”

  “I prefer to save my breath for complaining,” said Papa Rooster.

  Baby Chick blew on his breakfast a little too hard, and then Papa Rooster had something to complain about. He didn’t enjoy oatmeal in his coxcomb.

  After they had all cleaned up, Mama Hen said, “Why don’t we go for a walk in the forest and give the oatmeal a chance to cool down? Ourselves, too.”

  “I’ll lead the way, as I’m the largest and most important,” crowed Papa Rooster. “Also I have a wonderful sense of direction.”

  “I’ll follow along behind, as I’m the last, the smallest, worth nothing at all,” whimpered Baby Chick. “I wish I had a baby brother or sister chick that I could be bigger than. Let’s hunt for one in the ferns.”

  “I’ll go to the park and feed the ducks by myself if you two don’t quit your bellyaching,” said Mama Hen. And off they went into the woods, single file.

  They were gone a long time because Papa Rooster’s sense of direction wasn’t quite as wonderful as he thought.

  Now, who should come slinking through the woods from the other direction but a golden fox. He was beautiful to behold, shiny as the foil around fancy chocolates. But he was miserable, for he had just been fired from his job as a carpenter at the local furniture store. It seemed that a lot of the customers were scared to order rocking chairs for their grannies or cradles for their new babies from a fox who was walking around with a sharp-toothed saw. Besides, he had sharp teeth of his own, which were big and in very good condition. Customers didn’t like to come inside the shop.

  The out-of-work carpenter—whose name was Goldiefox—was in a bad mood when he came upon the house of the three chickens. He smelled the smell of something delicious. He knocked on the door to ask if he could have a bite, for he was very hungry. When no one answered, he pushed the door open and looked inside.

  He saw the table with three bowls of oatmeal. “My word!” he said. “A delicious breakfast, and no one here to eat it.”

  Goldiefox took a spoonful of oatmeal from the largest bowl. “It is too hot,” he said, and moved on to the medium-sized bowl. “It is too cold,” he said. The smallest bowl had only a little oatmeal at the bottom, as most of it seemed to have been blown out all over the tablecloth. “This is just right,” said Goldiefox, and ate what little there was. But he was still hungry, and he was still cross.

  He went into the next room looking for a pie or a sandwich or something. There he saw three chairs. “Perhaps I’ll take a rest and wait for the owners of this house to come home,” he said to himself. He sat down on the largest chair. It was too hard. By now Goldiefox was thoroughly annoyed, and though he ought to have counted to ten and had a time-out, he lost his temper. He jumped up and down on the large, hard chair, and he broke it.

  He then sat in the medium-sized chair. It was too soft. He jumped up and down on it and he broke it, too.

  There was a small chair. Goldiefox tried to sit in it, but it was too small. Then he tried to jump up and down on it and break it, but it got stuck on his foot. It was a very small chair.

  “This is not a good day,” said Goldiefox to himself. “First I get fired from my job, then I get my foot stuck in a tiny chair. What next?”

  Since the family still wasn’t showing up, Goldiefox clumped upstairs to try to find a saw with which to remove the small chair from his foot. He found no work tools, but he did see a very high bed.

  Since he was tired from all his jumping up and down and breaking furniture, he decided to have a nap. He tried to leap up on the high bed, and he smashed his face on the headboard and broke off a front tooth. We all have days like this sometimes.

  Goldiefox became irate. He jumped up and down on the high bed and he broke it.

  Next he found a very low bed. It was so low that it was hard to jump up and down on and break, so he threw it out the window.

  Finally he found an exceedingly small bed. It was clearly too small for a fox to sleep in, but by now he was out of control. Goldiefox tried to jump up and down on it and break it, but the very small bed got stuck on his other foot.

  Just at this moment the chicken family came home from their walk.

  They were in bad moods. Papa Rooster pretended he hadn’t gotten lost. Mama Hen pretended she couldn’t hear any whining and walked straight into the kitchen. Baby Chick pretended he belonged to another family and had nine brothers and sisters.

  Goldiefox heard them coming. Quite suddenly he found himself ashamed of his bad behavior. He hid in a convenient cupboard on the stair landing.

  Papa Rooster looked in his bowl and said, “I’m ready for my breakfast, but it looks as if someone has been eating my oatmeal.”

  Mama Hen came out of the kitchen and looked in her bowl. “Someone has been eating my oatmeal,” she said.

  Baby Chick said, “Someone has been eating my oatmeal, whatever I didn’t blow all over the room by mistake! And there’s nothing left for me!”

  “What kind of a loony would break into our house and eat our oatmeal?” said Papa Rooster. “Let us investigate. I’ll go first as I’m the strongest and the bravest.”

  “I’ll go last as I’m the weakest and least important,” said Baby Chick, for once glad to be the smallest.

  “I’ll call the cops,” said Mama Hen. “Let the professionals do their jobs.”

  Papa Rooster strutted into the parlor. “Someone has been sitting in my chair! And he’s jumped up and down on it and broken it!”

  “Why do you assume it’s a he?” said Mama Hen. “Maybe it’s a she. I sometimes feel like jumping up and down on things and breaking them. But I choose to control my temper when I feel like that. It’s my best quality, patience.”

  Then she saw her own chair and lost her patience. “Someone’s been jumping up and down on my chair, and she’s broken it!” she clucked, flabbergasted. “Though, thinking it over some more, it’s probably a he.”

  “Someone’s been jumping up and down on my chair,” screamed Baby Chick, “and I can’t even tell if it’s broken because it isn’t even here anymore!”

  “This is serious,” said Papa Rooster. “Everybody stay back. I’m going to look upstairs. I have a feeling whoever has done these foul deeds is still here.”

  “Oooh, I’m scared,” said Baby Chick. “This is better than a horror movie.”

  Papa Rooster climbed the stairs to the bedrooms. Mama Hen and Baby Chick huddled close behind him.

  “Somebody has been sleeping in my bed, and he jumped up and down on it and broke it!” cried Papa Rooster. “Not that I care very much. That bed is so high, it makes me dizzy trying to get down every morning.”

  “That’s why you’re always in such a bad mood,” clucked Mama Hen. “If you had a better night’s sleep, dear, you wouldn’t be such a grouch all the time.” She then looked for her bed. “My word! Someone’s been sleeping on my bed, and it isn’t even here!”

  “There it is,” said Baby Chick, looking out the window. “It’s in the garden, squashing the squashes.”

  “If I catch that vandal, I’ll give him a piece of my mind!” squawked Mama Hen. “Clearly he doesn’t have any of his own.”

  “Why do you assume it’s a he?” asked Papa Rooster, but Mama Hen was giving him such a look that he didn’t wait for an answer.

  “Someone’s been jumping up and down on my bed, and it’s probably broken or thrown out the window, but I can’t even find it!” cried Baby Chick.

  “We have problems with our furniture,” said Papa Rooster.

  “Do you think it could be ghosts?” said Mama Hen
.

  “What if it’s hiding in the convenient cupboard on the stair landing?” screeched Baby Chick.

  His parents looked at him.

  “Well, that’s where I hide when I do something wrong,” he said.

  The three chickens approached the door to the convenient cupboard on the stair landing. “Stand back,” said Papa Rooster. “I’ll fling the door open with a bold and decisive gesture.”

  “I’ll henpeck to within an inch of his life anyone who’s in there,” scolded Mama Hen.

  “Maybe it’s a new baby brother or sister for me!” cried Baby Chick.

  “Son, we have to have a little chat,” said Papa Rooster. “However convenient a cupboard is, it’s not where new baby brothers or sisters come from.” He flung open the door.

  Goldiefox, who had been trembling in terror at the sound of the furious chickens, stumbled out onto the landing. He tried to run away, but with a tiny bed on one foot and a tiny chair on the other, he merely tumbled to the bottom of the stairs.

  In an instant the three chickens had launched themselves through the air and tackled him. Papa Rooster sat on his head. Mama Hen sat on his tail. Baby Chick ran around in the front and looked him in the eye.

  “I can smell oatmeal on his breath!” he shouted. “This is our villain!”

  “How dare you jump up and down on our furniture and break it!” cried Papa Rooster. “Would you like me to jump up and down on your head and break that?”

  “How dare you throw my bed out the window!” cried Mama Hen. “Would you like me to throw you out the window?”

  “How dare you eat my oatmeal, after I had blown on it to cool it down!” cried Baby Chick. “Would you like me to blow on you to cool you down?” Without waiting for an answer, he made good on his threat.

  “Please,” said Goldiefox, “please. Dear chickens of the woods. I have been a bad fox. I have done everything wrong. I am out of work, I am hungry, and I have miniature furniture stuck to my feet. Furthermore I have broken a tooth as well as most of your furniture. This is not one of my good days. Do not jump up and down on me. Do not throw me out the window. And stop blowing in my face; it’s very annoying.”

  Baby Chick stopped.

  “I will tell you something,” said Goldiefox. “If you let me live with you, I will build you all new furniture. The chairs will not be too hard or too soft or too little. The beds will not be too high or too low or too little. Perhaps I can set up shop in the backyard and make furniture there, away from the prying eyes of animals too frightened to buy furniture from me. You can sell it in your front room.”

  “Well, perhaps,” said Papa Rooster. “I wouldn’t be in such a bad mood if I could get a better night’s sleep.”

  “If you got a better night’s sleep, we’d all get a better night’s sleep,” said Mama Hen. “I think it’s a great idea. Perhaps I’ll make up batches of oatmeal and we can have an oatmeal restaurant, too. For all the customers who come to buy furniture.”

  “But where will you sleep?” asked Baby Chick.

  “I can sleep in the convenient cupboard on the stair landing,” said Goldiefox.

  And that’s just what they did. They opened a new store in the woods, called The Three Chickens Furniture Store and Oatmeal Restaurant. Every once in a while the oatmeal was too hot to eat, so the chickens went for a walk in the woods. But they left Goldiefox behind to guard their house. With his broken front tooth, he was quite a scary-looking animal. So they never had trouble with hungry, destructive trespassers again.

  Baby Chick never did get a baby brother or sister. But at the end of the day, when the carpenter tools were all stored away, Goldiefox would wash his face of sawdust and play with Baby Chick.

  They especially enjoyed jumping on the furniture, now that it was strong enough to stand up to such punishment.

  HAMSTER AND GERBIL

  Once there was a happy family who lived in a beaver dam. Not surprisingly, they were beavers. That is, the father and the mother were beavers. The children were adopted. There was a boy named Hamster and a girl named Gerbil. Not surprisingly, they were a hamster and a gerbil. Hamster was the hamster, and Gerbil was the gerbil.

  Life was sweet for them. The beaver dam was warm and dry. The river was full of fish and fun. Hamster and Gerbil got along about 50 percent of the time, which is average for brothers and sisters, adopted or otherwise.

  One day when Mama Beaver was on her way home with the week’s shopping, a sudden storm came up. A bolt of lightning fell from the sky and struck the trunk of an old pine tree.

  Down came the tree. Down came Mama Beaver.

  All the forest animals attended the funeral, weeping into the oak leaves that they brought as handkerchiefs. It was awfully sad. It rained during the service and during the sad, wet reception that followed. It was still raining when the grieving family headed home.

  But their home was gone, too. The storm had caused the river to overflow its banks. Their beaver dam had been swept away, and the family now had no place to live.

  After some looking around, Papa Beaver found a small, damp hole in the side of the riverbank. It was full of worms and spiders, and Hamster and Gerbil didn’t like it at all.

  “It feels creepy,” said Hamster. “It feels haunted.”

  “It is smelly,” said Gerbil. “Frankly, it stinks.”

  “You’re just sad because you miss your mother,” said Papa Beaver. “I feel sad too.”

  They huddled against one another to keep warm. There was nothing to eat because all the fish had been swept down the river out to sea. The sun went down. Against the damp walls, the last weak rays of light slanted. Things could hardly get worse.

  Suddenly they did.

  “Who’s this trespassing in my cave?” said a raw, fierce voice.

  The beaver family looked up and trembled. The shape of a forest animal was silhouetted in the door of the cave. They were trapped.

  “Papa, I’m scared,” murmured Hamster.

  “Papa, I can’t breathe,” mumbled Gerbil. “The walls are closing in on me!”

  “Courage, children,” said their father. In a louder voice he said, “I’m so sorry, we didn’t know this cave was occupied. If you’ll move aside, we’ll go quietly.”

  “Papa, I can’t breathe either,” whispered Hamster. “The air in here smells like the dirty socks of human men.”

  “Papa, I can’t grab my breath,” warbled Gerbil, who tended to be dramatic. “The lights are going out! The cruel world is fading away! It reeks of rotten diapers in here!”

  “Please,” said their father to the imposing shape in the doorway. “Please let us go!”

  “Not so fast,” said the voice. The shape shifted in the dusk, and a wind came in past the animal. Papa Beaver and Hamster and Gerbil all passed out. The aroma was more or less disgusting.

  When Hamster and Gerbil came to their senses, their father said, “Children, I’d like you to meet your new mother. I hope you like her. She’s a real skunk. Her name is Skunk.”

  She was a real skunk, and she smelled like one too.

  “She said if I didn’t marry her she would squirt us with her extra-strength industrial-action high-tech preemptive-strike joy juice,” said Papa Beaver in a defeated voice. “I couldn’t do that to you.”

  “Just what I wanted, a hubby!” said Skunk. “And two annoying little children to boss around. Whoopie. My lucky day.”

  Warning them not to run away, Skunk went outside and found some skunk cabbage. She brought it back and gave it to them for dinner. “Eat up, for that’s all there is,” she said. “Don’t let anyone say I don’t provide for my family.”

  “I’m not eating this tripe,” said Hamster bravely.

  “Are you talking to me?” said Skunk. “Are you talking to me?”

  “I’m not eating it either,” remarked Gerbil. “Not to be rude or anything, but quite frankly, this meal stinks.”

  “Can I believe my ears?” screamed Skunk. “Ungrateful children! Af
ter all I’ve done for you! For that, you can go to bed without any supper!” And Skunk fell on the skunk cabbage and ate it, chewing with her mouth open, which made the children even more grossed out than ever.

  They crawled off to bed. Papa Beaver lowered himself next to them, letting his children sleep behind his back. Trying to breathe through their mouths so as to avoid inhaling stench, Hamster and Gerbil cried themselves to sleep.

  Hamster woke up in the middle of the night because his stomach was rumbling with hunger pains. He heard his father and his new stepmother talking.

  “Please don’t be cruel to them,” said Papa Beaver. “They’ve already had a hard life.”

  “If you can’t provide for them, then neither can I,” said Skunk. “I think I’ll wake them up and take them out for a walk in the woods and lose them.”

  “Oh, don’t do that,” cried Papa Beaver.

  “Try and stop me,” said the Skunk. “If I lift my tail, you won’t know what hit you.”

  “I forbid it!” cried Papa Beaver. “Over my dead body!”

  “Your funeral,” said Skunk. She gave him a little zap, and Papa Beaver keeled over with his four legs straight up in the air like a table turned upside down. “Now I’m cooking with gas,” said Skunk proudly, and she kicked Gerbil to wake her up. “Yo. Gerbil. Hamster. We’re going for a little nature walk. Papa’s sound asleep so come quietly.”

  “Do as she says,” whispered Hamster to his sister, “because you have asthma, and if she squirts you, you’ll be a goner.” Even though his father seemed to be in a coma, Hamster could see that he was still breathing. So it seemed safest just to do as they were told.

  Skunk wandered into the forest. Hamster and Gerbil followed her. When they were far away from anyplace Hamster and Gerbil had ever seen, Skunk said, “Oh, I think I smell a rat over there. Let me go kill it and bring it to you for a little midnight snack. Wait here.” And off she went.