He ran. He usually won the egg-and-spoon race at the school sports, which was just as well – it’s hard enough to carry an egg in a spoon running along a flat field; it’s a great deal harder to carry a tablespoonful of boiling hot stew steady while you rush up a flight of stairs. If most of it was still there when he got to the top it was more by good luck than skill because he was hardly noticing the spoon at all – all he could think of was what might be – no, must be happening in his room, and how much more of it would happen if he didn’t hurry.
He burst in through the door and saw exactly what he’d dreaded – Patrick, bent over the cupboard, just turning the key to open it.
“What—” Omri gasped out between panting breaths, but he had no need to go on. Patrick, without turning round, opened the cupboard and reached in. Then he did turn. He was gazing into his cupped hands with eyes like huge marbles. He slowly extended his hands towards Omri, and whispered, “Look!”
Omri, stepping forward, had just time to feel intensely glad that at least Patrick had not put a whole handful of figures in but had only changed one. But which? He leant over, then drew back with a gasp.
It was the cowboy. And his horse.
The horse was in an absolute panic. It was scrambling about wildly in the cup of Patrick’s hand, snorting and pawing, up one minute and down on its side the next, stirrups and reins flying. It was a beautiful horse, snow-white with a long mane and tail, and the sight of it acting so frightened gave Omri heart-pains.
As for the cowboy, he was too busy dodging the horse’s flying feet and jumping out of the way when he fell to notice much about his surroundings. He probably thought he was caught in an earthquake. Omri and Patrick watched, spellbound, as the little man in his plaid shirt, buckskin trousers, high-heeled leather boots and big hat, scrambled frantically up the side of Patrick’s right hand and, dodging through the space between his index finger and thumb, swung himself clear of the horse – only to look down and find he was dangling over empty space.
His hat came off and fell, slowly like a leaf, down, down, down to the floor so infinitely far below. The cowboy gave a yell, and scrabbled with his feet against the back of Patrick’s hand, hanging on for dear life to the ridge beside his thumb-nail.
“Hold your hands still!” Omri commanded Patrick, who in his excitement was jerking them nervously about. There was a moment of stillness. The horse stood up, trembling all over, prancing about with terror. Beside his hooves was some tiny black thing. Omri peered closer. It was the pistol.
The cowboy had now recovered a little. He scrambled back through the finger-gap and said something to the horse which sounded like “Whoaback, steady, fella.” Then he slid down and grabbed the reins, holding them just below the horse’s nose. He patted its face. That seemed to calm it. Then, looking round swiftly but not apparently noticing the enormous faces hanging over him, he reached cautiously down and picked the pistol up from between the horse’s hooves.
“Whoa there! Stand—”
Omri watched like a person hypnotized. He wanted to cry out to Patrick that it was a real gun, but somehow he couldn’t. He could only think that the sound of his voice would throw the horse once more into a panic and the horse or man would get hurt. Instead he watched while the cowboy pointed the gun in various directions warily. Then he lowered it.
Still holding the reins he moved until he could press his hand against Patrick’s skin. Then he let his eyes move upward towards the curved fingers just level with the top of his head.
“What the dawggone heck—” he said. “It sure looks like a great big – Aw, what’m Ah talkin’ about? It cain’t be. Hell, it just ain’t possible!” But the more he looked, the more certain he must have become that he was, indeed, in a pair of cupped hands. And finally, after scratching his gingery head for a moment, he ventured to look right up past the fingers, and then of course he saw Patrick’s face looking at him.
There was a petrified moment when he couldn’t move. Then he raised his pistol in a flash.
“Patrick! Shut your eyes!”
Bang!
It was only a little bang, but it was a real bang, and a puff of real, gun-smelling smoke appeared. Patrick shouted with pain and surprise and would have dropped the pair if Omri hadn’t thrust his hand underneath to catch them. Patrick’s own hand had clapped itself to his cheek.
“Ow! Ow! He’s shot me!” Patrick screamed.
Omri was not much bothered about Patrick at that moment. He was furious with him, and very anxious about the little man and his horse. Quickly he put them down on the bed, saying, like the cowboy himself, “Steady! Whoa! I won’t hurt you! It’s okay!”
“Ow!” Patrick kept yelling. “It hurts! Ow!”
“Serve you right, I warned you,” said Omri. Then he felt sorry and said, “Let’s have a look.”
Gingerly Patrick took his hand down. A drop of blood had been smeared on his cheek, and by peering very close Omri could see something very like a bee’s sting embedded in his skin.
“Hang on! I see it – I’ll squeeze it out—”
“OW!”
A quick squeeze between his thumbnails and the almost invisible speck of black metal, which had only just penetrated the skin, popped out.
“He – shot me!” Patrick got out again in a shocked voice.
“I told you. My Indian stuck a knife in me,” said Omri, not to be outdone. “I think we ought to put him back – your cowboy I mean, of course, not my Indian.”
“Put him back where?”
Omri explained how the cupboard could change him back to plastic again, but Patrick wasn’t having any of that.
“Oh no! I want him! He’s terrific. Look at him now—”
Patrick feasted his eyes admiringly on the little cowboy. Ignoring the ‘giants’, whom he clearly thought he must have imagined, he was doggedly dragging his horse across Omri’s quilt as if he were wading through the dunes of some infinite pale-blue desert.
Omri reached for him determinedly, but Patrick stepped into his path.
“Don’t you touch him! I bought him, I changed him – he’s mine!”
“You bought him for me!”
“You said you didn’t want him.”
“Well, but the cupboard’s mine, and I told you not to use it.”
“And so what if I did? Anyway, it’s done, he’s alive now and I’m keeping him. I’ll bash you right in if you try to take him. Wouldn’t you bash me if I took your Indian?”
Omri was silent. That reminded him! Where was Little Bull? He looked round. He soon spotted him at the other side of the room, busy with his paints. Some beautiful minute designs, showing turtles and herons and beavers, mainly in red and yellow, had appeared on the side of the tepee Omri had made. As Omri crouched beside him to admire them, Little Bull, without looking at him, said “You bring food? I very soon die if not eat.”
Omri looked around. What had he done with the spoonful of stew? But he soon saw that he’d put it down on the table without thinking. There it sat, tilting slightly and spilling a few drops of gravy, but still steaming. He hurried to get Little Bull’s – or rather the Action Man’s – mess-tin (the paper plate had got all soggy) and carefully filled it with the hot savoury stuff.
“Here you are.”
Little Bull stopped work, laid down his paintbrush, and sniffed eagerly.
“Ah! Good!” He sat down cross-legged among the paint lids to eat, dipping some of yesterday’s stale bread in as a spoon. “Your wife cook? Ah. No. Little Bull forgot. Omri not got wife.” He ate ravenously for a few moments and then said, “Not want?”
“I’m having mine downstairs in a minute,” Omri said.
“Mean, Omri not want wife,” said Little Bull, who was now in a much better mood.
“I’m not old enough.”
Little Bull looked at him for a moment. “No. I see. Boy.” He grinned. “Big boy, but boy.” He went on eating. “Little Bull want,” he said finally, not looking up.
&n
bsp; “Another wife?”
“Chief needs wife. Beautiful. Good cook. Act as told.” He put his face into the mess-tin and licked it clean. Then he looked up.
“With Iroquois, mother find wife for son. But Little Bull’s mother not here. Omri be mother and find.”
Omri couldn’t quite see himself as Little Bull’s mother, but he said, “I might try. I think there were some Indian women in Yapp’s. But what if I get one and make her real and then you don’t fancy her?”
“Fancy?”
“Like her.”
“I like. Young. Beautiful. Act as told. I like. So you get.”
“Tomorrow.”
Little Bull grinned at him happily, his face smeared with gravy.
Patrick had come up behind him.
“Let’s put them together and see what they do!”
Omri jumped up quickly.
“No!”
“Why not?”
“You idiot, because yours has got a gun and mine’s got a bow and arrow and one of them’s sure to kill the other!”
Patrick considered this. “Well, we could take their weapons away from them. Come on, I’m going to!”And he reached towards the bed.
Just at that moment there was the sound of steps on the stairs. They froze. Then Omri swiftly moved the dressing-up crate enough to hide Little Bull, and Patrick sat down on the end of the bed, masking the poor cowboy who was still toiling along over the lumps in the quilt.
Just in time! Omri’s mother opened the door next second and said, “Patrick, that was your mum on the phone. She wants you to come home right away. And Omri – it’s supper.” And she went.
Omri opened his mouth to protest, but Patrick at once said, “Oh, okay.” With one quick movement he had scooped up cowboy and horse in his left hand and thrust them into his blazer pocket. Omri winced – he could easily imagine the horse’s legs being injured by such rough treatment, not to mention the matter of fright. But Patrick was already halfway out of the door.
Omri jumped up and grabbed his arm.
“Patrick!” he whispered. “You must be careful! Treat them carefully! They’re people – I mean they’re alive – what will you do with them? How will you hide them from your family?”
“I won’t, I’ll show them to my brother anyway, he’ll go out of his mind.”
Omri began to think he might go out of his. He shook Patrick’s arm. “Will you think? How are you going to explain? What will happen? If you say you got him from me I’ll do worse than bash you – you’ll ruin everything – they’ll take the cupboard away—”
That got through to Patrick at last. He put his hand slowly back into his pocket.
“Listen then. You can look after them. But remember – they’re mine. If you put them back in the cupboard, I’ll tell everyone. I’m warning you. I will. Bring them to school tomorrow.”
“To school!” cried Omri aghast. “I’m not bringing Little Bull to school!”
“You can do what you like about Little Bull, he’s yours. The cowboy’s mine, and I want him at school tomorrow, otherwise I’ll tell.”
Omri let go of his arm and for a moment they looked at each other as if they’d been strangers. But they weren’t strangers; they were friends. That counts for a lot in this life. Omri gave in.
“All right,” he said, “I’ll bring them. Now give them to me. Gently.” And Patrick brought man and horse out of his pocket and tipped them very carefully into Omri’s waiting hand.
Chapter Nine
SHOOTING MATCH
OMRI PUT THE cowboy and horse in his shirt drawer while he had the quickest supper on record. Then he raced upstairs again, stopping only to pinch a few grains of Gillon’s rat feed for the two horses.
Shut up in his room, he took stock. A room this size was like a sort of indoor national park to the cowboy and the Indian. It should be easy enough to keep them apart for one night. Omri thought first of putting the new pair straight back in the cupboard, and then bringing them back to life next morning in time for school, but he had promised Patrick not to. So he decided to empty out the dressing-up crate and put the cowboy and his horse in there for the night.
The crate was a metre square, made of planks. There was certainly no visible way out of it for the cowboy. Omri put him carefully down into it. Looking at him, he felt curious – about his name, where he came from and so on; but he decided it was better not to talk to him. The cowboy had clearly decided that Omri was not really there at all. When his big hands reached down, carrying some cold stew, grain for the pony, some fragments of apple for them both and, later, some cottonwool and scraps of material for bedding, the cowboy deliberately covered his eyes by pulling down his big hat brim. It was only when Omri reached in one final time to give him a drink of water in a minute green glass bottle that he had found in the bathroom cupboard, that the cowboy spoke a word.
“Take that filthy stuff outa here!” he suddenly shouted, in his strong Texas accent. “Ah ain’t aimin’ to drink no more o’ that as lawng as Ah live!”And he heaved the bottle (which was almost as big as himself) up by its base and tipped its contents out onto the boards at the bottom of the crate.
“It’s only water,” Omri ventured to say.
“You shet yer mouth!” shouted the little man. “Ah won’t take no lip from no gol-darned hallucy-nation, no sir! Mebbe Ah do drink too much, mebbe Ah cain’t hold m’likker like some o’ them real tough guys do. But if’n Ah’m gittin’ the dee-lirium tremens, and startin’ in to see things, why couldn’t Ah see pink elly-fants and dancin’ rats and all them purty things other fellas see when they gits far gone? It ain’t fair fer me to see giants and blue deserts and git put in boxes the size of the Grand Canyon with no one but m’little hoss for comp’ny!” He sat down on the pile of hay, took the horse’s nose in his arms, put his face against it and began to sob.
Omri was shattered. A cowboy – crying! He didn’t know what to do. When his mother cried, as she did sometimes when things got too much, she only asked to be left alone till she felt better. Maybe all grown-ups were like that. Omri turned away and got slowly into his pyjamas, and then went to see how Little Bull was getting along on the far side of the crate.
He’d finished the painting. The tepee looked really good. Little Bull was now in the longhouse, arranging his blanket for the night. The pony was tethered to his post on a long rope. Omri took out the rat food and gave it to him. Then he called Little Bull out.
“Are you okay? Anything you need?”
He should have known better than to ask.
“Plenty! Want fire in longhouse, keep warm, keep wild animals away. Want tomahawk—”
“So you can chop bits out of my leg?”
“Little Bull angry when say that. Sorry now. Use tomahawk cut down trees, chop firewood, kill bird—”
“What bird?”
Little Bull replied with a very good imitation of a cock crowing. Then he did a mime of catching it, putting its neck on to a block, and, with a whirl of his arm, chopping off its head with gleeful relish.
“I don’t know about that!”
“You get. Tomorrow. Birds from plass-tick. Good tools. But fire – now. Chief Little Bull say!”
Omri sighed. He went to the waste paper basket and picked out the remains of the other fire that he’d thrown away in there. There was quite a lot of the firelighter left. He gathered up some of the bits of willow-bark and twigs from where Little Bull had been working.
“You’re not having it inside, though – far too dangerous!”
He arranged the fire on the packed earth of the seed-tray, about fifteen centimetres from the entrance to the longhouse, first moving the tepee to safety. Then he struck a match and soon there was a cosy blaze.
Little Bull crouched beside it, his red skin glowing and his eyes bright with pleasure.
“Little Bull, can you dance?”
“Yes. War dance, wedding dance, many kind.”
“Would you do one now so I can see?”
He hesitated, then he shook his head once.
“Why not, though?”
“No make war, no make wedding. No reason dance.”
“Maybe if I got you a wife—”
The Indian looked up eagerly. “You get? Give word?”
“I only said I’d try.”
“Then Little Bull dance. Then do best dance – love dance.”
Omri turned off his light and drew back from the scene. It looked amazingly real, with the fire making shadows, the little horse munching his grain and the Indian sitting on his heels warming himself, wearing his colourful headdress and the Chief’s cloak. Omri wished he himself were small enough to join Little Bull by the fire.
“Om-ri! Are you in bed? I’m coming up in five minutes to kiss you goodnight!”
Omri felt panicky. But it was all right. The fire was going out. Already Little Bull was standing up, yawning and stretching. He peered up through the darkness.
“Hey, Omri! Paintings good?”
“Great!”
“You sleep now?”
“Yes.”
“Peace of great spirits be on you.”
“Thanks, same to you.”
Omri peered quickly into the crate. The poor cowboy had crawled away into his makeshift bed and was snoring loudly. He hadn’t eaten a thing. Omri sighed. He hoped Patrick was making plans and arrangements. After all, if Omri could keep his Indian secret, Patrick might be able to do the same. All might yet be well. But Omri certainly wasn’t going to try the experiment again. It was all just too much worry.
He climbed into bed, feeling unusually tired. His mother came in and kissed him, and the door was shut. He felt himself drifting off almost right away.
When suddenly, a piercing whinny sounded. And was answered by another.
The horses had smelt each other!
They were not so far apart – and the cowboy’s wasn’t tied up. Omri could hear his little hooves clattering on the bare boards of the crate, and then the whinnies began again, high, shrill – almost questioning. Omri thought of putting on his light, but he was awfully tired – besides, what could he do? They couldn’t possibly reach each other through the planks of the crate wall. Let them whinny their heads off, they’d soon get fed up.
The Indian in the Cupboard (Essential Modern Classics, Book 1) Page 7