Freddy the Pilot Page 10

  Nothing had been heard from Freddy, and they had no way of getting word to him. They kept watch by the big elm, but Mr. Pomeroy didn’t appear. What had happened, they learned later, was that J. J. had set out from the farm the day after Freddy dropped them over the field. But in a thunderstorm his spectacles, which he now had to wear all the time, blew off. He flew on, since any attempt to find them would be useless, but as the weather did not clear he couldn’t see his landmarks, and he flew west instead of north. He got nearly to Buffalo before he found out where he was.

  “We’ve got to do something,” Sniffy said. “You don’t think Robin Hood would have just sat around like this, do you?”

  “My Horribles are restless too,” said 18. “But we can’t attack. I tell you what. There’s a loose board in the kitchen floor.” And he outlined a plan.

  That evening Felix and Jackson sat down to their nightly game of slap jack. Halfway through dealing the cards Jackson stopped and raised his head. “What’s that?” They pushed back their chairs and went to the door.

  A rabbit can give a shrill high-pitched scream that sounds pretty scary at night. When six rabbits all start screaming together, the effect is just plain terrifying. And six of the Horribles were down by the barn, screaming their heads off. The men ran back and pulled guns out of the rack, and sneaked cautiously down towards the terrible sounds.

  Sniffy and Aroma and Sniffy, Jr., and the other nine rabbits were under the kitchen floor. The rest of the Wilsons were posted in the bushes near the house door with bows strung and arrows nocked to the strings, ready to create a diversion if the men came back too soon.

  But the six Horribles moved slowly off down the old road, screaming at intervals, and drawing the men after them; so that the raiders were able to accomplish what they had set out to do. They lifted the loose board and scrambled up into the house. Ten minutes later when word that the men were returning was relayed to them from outside, they had succeeded in getting two shotguns down from the rack, and in dragging them out through the hole under the floor. Sniffy had also brought out three boxes of shotgun shells. And the men were so interested in wondering what the screaming could have been that they never noticed that the guns were gone.

  A shotgun isn’t much use to a rabbit or a skunk. “Even if we could get the muzzle up to aim,” No. 4 said, “the thing would kick us right into the middle of next Sunday at supper time. I vote we bury ’em.”

  “We’ll put ’em in the tree with the umbrellas,” said No. 18. “They may come in handy. Bring those cartridges along. We’ve got work to do at the barn.”

  There were plenty of holes in the barn; they had gone in it the first day and inspected the plane, and tried vainly to figure out some way of putting it out of commission. Now they went in, and when they had gnawed off the ends of the cartridges and got the powder out, Sniffy laid a train of it from under the plane out through a hole and along the ground for five or six yards. Then he went in and turned the spigot on a big iron barrel of gasoline. He watched until the gasoline had formed a pool under the plane and had touched the powder train, then he went out, leaving the spigot open.

  And found that nobody had a match.

  “You know that Mr. Bean won’t allow us to have matches,” No. 7 said. “He’s afraid we’ll burn the barn down.”

  “Well, here’s one barn he’ll be glad to have us burn,” said Sniffy. “Oh, darn it, how can we get a match?”

  “I saw some in the kitchen,” said Sniffy, Jr.

  His father looked at him for a minute. Then he said: “Wait right here.” He ran back to the house. He crawled under the kitchen, lifted the board, and crept cautiously over to the stove. The matches were in a holder hung on a nail a good foot out of Sniffy’s reach. He saw a yard stick in a corner of the room, so he got it and, holding it between his paws, pushed one end up under the match holder and jiggled it. Nothing happened. He jiggled it harder, and the matches jumped around, but none came out. He jiggled it harder, and the whole holder came off the nail and dropped.

  It rattled on the floor, but luckily for Sniffy, at that moment in the next room Felix dealt a jack, and the bang as both men slapped at it covered the sound. Sniffy grabbed half a dozen matches in his mouth and ducked down under the floor.

  “Everybody here?” he said, when he had rejoined the others.

  “All present and accounted for,” said 18.

  “Then scatter,” he said. “You know what to do. Get as far away as possible.” And when they had gone he touched a match to the powder train and ran.

  He touched a match to the powder train.

  He stopped on the far side of the clearing and watched. A bright light and a plume of white smoke traveled along the powder train. It looked like a little steam engine as it went up to the barn, through the hole, and then … whoosh!—there was a gush of flame, and boom!—the sides of the barn blew apart and the roof opened up like a book. In two minutes the barn wasn’t a barn any longer, and the plane itself was burning fiercely.

  Mr. Condiment had chosen the site of his secret airfield well. Lying in a fold of the hills, it was so well hidden from observation that nobody saw the flames. Nobody notified the West Nineveh fire department—who in any case couldn’t have done anything. And Felix and Jackson could only stand and watch until the barn had burned to the ground and the plane was a scorched skeleton.

  The Horribles and the Wilsons watched from the other side of the field. They laughed and danced and whacked one another on the back as the flames roared up, and when at last they died down, 18 said: “Well, Brother Horribles, there’s a good night’s work done. And all thanks to Sniffy. Let’s give him the Horrible salute.”

  So the rabbits began circling around Sniffy in a war dance, and sang:

  O Sniffy, we salute you,

  And hereby constitute you

  A Horrible (first class) and we

  Do therefore solemnly agree

  To back you up in any fight.

  Provided you’re not in the right.

  But in the wrong, we’ll stand by you.

  (Good deeds of course, we never do.)

  If you have enemies, we’ll help

  To make them holler, squirm and yelp;

  We’ll pinch them black, we’ll punch them blue!

  Oh, we’ll do anything for you!”

  Sniffy was pleased, and he thanked them; but later he said to Aroma: “Robin Hood was a fighter; he didn’t go in for sabotage. Oh, sure; we had to do it for Mr. Boom. But I didn’t like doing it much.”

  “Oh, Sniff, don’t be silly,” said his wife. “Robin Hood didn’t have gunpowder; if he had, he’d have blown that Sheriff of Nottingham right through the roof of his old castle.”

  Sniffy dreamt of noble deeds and rescues all night, and when he woke in the morning the contrast between the heroic exploits he had dreamed of and just setting fire to an old barn made him feel unhappy. But he cheered up when he saw the new respect with which the Horribles greeted him. Even his own children were respectful. This is very unusual among young skunks.

  Late in the morning a car came bumping up the old road. It stopped by the barn and the animals, watching from their posts, saw Mr. Condiment and Mr. Newsome get out. The men just stared silently at the ruins of the barn. After a minute Felix and Jackson came out from the house, and then Mr. Condiment let loose. He yelled and roared and stamped his feet; he called them every name he could think of, and accused and threatened until his voice gave out, and then he kept right on in a whisper. He didn’t give them a chance to explain, which was just as well for them, since they didn’t have any explanation. And finally even the whisper gave out, and Mr. Newsome said: “Let’s go back to the car and talk it over.”

  The animals couldn’t get near enough to hear anything, but the argument seemed less angry now that Mr. Condiment was silent. The others talked, and he chewed throat lozenges and wrote notes in a little book which he then passed around. Finally they all got out and went over to the house to have s
ome lunch. And it was while they were there that Freddy came sliding down from the sky in his plane and made an elegant three-point landing on the field.

  CHAPTER

  14

  In landing on the secret field, Freddy had expected to be received with suspicion, perhaps to be warned off with threats, and he had a story ready. He was amazed to have Mr. Condiment rush up to him as he climbed out and practically throw his arms around him. “My dear sir! This is delightful, charming—I mean to say, very pleasing. You are more than welcome, sir. Perhaps you can help us out of a dilemma.”

  “I must apologize,” Freddy said. “The oil pressure dropped suddenly and I saw this field and decided I’d better set her down and see what is wrong. Was on my way to pick up a passenger in Oswego and fly him to Washington.”

  “You’re in luck,” said Mr. Condiment. “Felix here is an excellent mechanic. He can find the trouble. While he’s looking it over, come down to the house. I have a proposition for you.—Good heavens, what’s that—a cat?” For Jinx was sitting in the passenger’s seat of the plane.

  “My mascot,” said Freddy. “Devoted to me—always goes along. Very affectionate little fellow—aren’t you, kitty-witty?” he said in a sugary voice.

  Jinx gave him a dirty look and turned his back and began to wash his face.

  On the way to the house Freddy glanced at the ruins of the barn. “That must have been a bad fire,” he said. “Was it recent?”

  “Yes. That’s what I want to talk to you about. You see, it is important, vital—that is, necessary, that I fly to a certain place tonight. Well, I have my pilot, but no plane. It burned last night. —Yes?” he said to Felix, who had come running after them. “What is it?”

  “That cat,” Felix said. “He won’t let me touch your plane, mister.”

  So Freddy went back. Jackson was saying: “Come, kitty, nice kitty!” and trying to coax Jinx out. Jinx just arched his back and spit.

  “Here, here,” said Freddy. “Get out. This man is going to look at my oil line.” He saw that for some reason Jinx didn’t want to get out, but neither of them could say anything in front of the men. And as Freddy persisted, Jinx finally jumped out and sat down under the wing and went on washing his face.

  Freddy went back to the house. “Come inside,” said Mr. Condiment. “And do take off that helmet and those goggles.”

  But Freddy said no, he was so accustomed to wearing them that he didn’t feel properly dressed without them on. So then Mr. Condiment made his proposition. He would pay two hundred dollars for the use of Freddy’s plane that night.

  Freddy said, “I agree. Only I must fly the plane myself.”

  This of course didn’t suit Mr. Condiment at all, and they were arguing about it when Jackson came into the room. He tossed what looked like a bundle of clothes on the table. “Take a look at that,” he said. And Freddy jumped up. For the bundle was wrapped in a black skirt, and it unrolled as it struck the table, and out fell a shawl, a flat black hat, high-heeled shoes, some castanets, and an artificial rose.

  Mr. Condiment jumped up too. “Where did you find that?” he demanded.

  “In this guy’s plane.”

  Freddy was horrified. So that was why Jinx hadn’t wanted to get out! He had remembered the costume was there and was afraid Felix would find it. “And I forgot it!” Freddy thought. “Oh, gosh, I’d better get out of here!” But he was too late. They grabbed him as he edged around the table. In the scuffle the helmet and goggles came off.

  “Hey, it’s a pig!” shouted Felix.

  “Hey—it’s a pig!”

  “What?” Mr. Condiment exclaimed. “Newsome! Where’s Newsome? He told me about this creature, this animal—I mean, this pig. Yes, yes; he’s a friend of old Boomschmidt’s. He’s smart, he’s got brains—that is, he’s dangerous. And that costume—ha, I see now! Lorna, eh?” He pushed his face close to Freddy’s and did something that Freddy had read about in books but had never seen done—he gnashed his teeth. “So you were Lorna!” he snarled. “Well, Lorna, take that!” And he slapped Freddy’s face hard twice.

  Pigs don’t have as sensitive skins as people do, but their feelings are just as easily hurt. “He slapped me because I am a pig,” he thought. “If I were a boy or a man he wouldn’t have done it.” It made Freddy feel bad, but he was mad too. He was mad at himself for his carelessness. But he told himself that he wasn’t mad at Mr. Condiment. He would defeat Mr. Condiment; he would return those slaps, and add a couple of kicks for good measure, when he got the chance, but he thought, “I am not going to lose my temper! Mr. Bean had told him once, “If you lose your temper in a fight you’re licked before you start.” And Freddy believed that it was true.

  They tied him up and gagged him and shoved him into a dark closet off the kitchen and locked the door. He wasn’t really very uncomfortable. If he had been a thin pig the cords and the hard boards and the gag would have hurt more; but as he said later, he always carried his own cushions around with him. Of course his thoughts weren’t very pleasant. And after a long time he began to get pretty stiff and to ache a lot.

  Hours later he heard the engine of his plane. It started with a roar, then sank to a hum as someone ran it to warm it up, then roared again and gradually died away. Then for a long time nothing happened. Freddy couldn’t do anything but worry. So he worried.

  But quite a lot was happening outside. As soon as Freddy’s plane, with Jackson at the controls and Felix in the seat behind, had dwindled and disappeared in the darkening southern sky, the Wilsons and the Horribles closed in on the house. Mr. Condiment and Mr. Newsome, sitting on a bench by the front door in the twilight, discussing the situation in low voices, were unaware that every little bush, every clump of grass, concealed an armed enemy.

  The animals knew that Freddy was a prisoner in the house, but they didn’t know where, and they certainly couldn’t rescue him while the two men were around. So some of the Horribles crawled into the house and closed the front door with a bang and turned the key. And at this signal the skunks rose up behind their grass clumps and commenced shooting. Whit, whit, whit went the arrows. They didn’t make any noise when they hit Mr. Condiment but Mr. Condiment made plenty. So did Mr. Newsome. “Ouch! Oh-ouch! Oh ow-yow-yow!” It was hard to tell which yelled the loudest as they dashed at the door. They shoved and they tugged at the doorknob and pushed each other aside and howled, and all the time the arrows, some tipped with wire and some with porcupine quills, were going whit, whit, whit into their backs and legs. At last Mr. Newsome woke up to the fact that the door was locked. He turned and dashed off down the old road towards his car, and the archers let him go. And then Sniffy unlocked the door and pulled it quickly open, and Mr. Condiment plunged in and fell flat on his face in the hall, looking in the dimness, with the dozens of little arrows sticking in him, like an enormous porcupine.

  The animals swarmed in after him and Sniffy locked the door again. Mr. Condiment made no effort to get up; he just lay and groaned.

  “Where have you hidden Freddy?” Sniffy demanded.

  “Oh-oh-oh!” Mr. Condiment moaned.

  So Sniffy motioned to the others and they began pulling the arrows out of him. Of course they hadn’t gone into him more than quarter of an inch, but porcupine quills have little barbs on them and they hurt a lot more coming out than they do going in. Mr. Condiment yelped every time one was pulled out. And at last he said: “Oh cease, desist—I mean, stop! You’re killing me.”

  “Foul caitiff loon!” said Sniffy. “We slay thee not yet. But an thou tellest not where thou hast hidden Freddy, that great and noble pig, we give thee fair warning—these arrows which we have withdrawn from thy measly hide we will shoot back into thee, and so will continue, to withdraw, and then shoot them—”

  “Oh, here—here!” Mr. Condiment groaned. “In the closet off the kitchen.” And he pulled the key out of his pocket.

  When they had released Freddy he hobbled out into the hall—for he was pretty stiff—and lit
a lamp. Then he looked on Mr. Condiment. “Good work, Sniffy,” he said. “Not much fight left in him.” He grinned. “I heard your little speech. Thanks for the ‘great and noble.’”

  “Oh, well,” said the skunk. “That was Robin Hood talk. You don’t have to take it literally.”

  “Nay, lad,” Freddy said, “’tis thou that deservest the praise. Thou hast captured this great beast, and tonight in thy honor shall the feast be spread. Let great fires be lit, and we will e’en roast him and devour him to the last whisker.”

  People who read comics will believe almost anything, and Mr. Condiment had of course read, and no doubt enjoyed, a great many. With some difficulty he sat up and stared wildly around at the armed skunks, and the strange looking Horribles, with their ears pinned down and little tin knives flashing in their paws. He had no doubt that their threat to cook and eat him would be carried out. He got to his knees and began to beg for his life.

  Freddy was disgusted with him. “Oh, keep still,” he said. “You, Junior, pull the rest of those arrows out of his back.” And when this had been done to an accompaniment of squeals: “We’ve got to lock him up so those other two won’t find him when they come back. Where’s Mr. Newsome?”

  “I followed him to his car,” said No. 7. “He jumped in and drove off. Guess he’s had enough.”

  They decided that the only place to hide Mr. Condiment was under the floor in the kitchen. The hole the skunks had dug from the outside was too small for him to escape through. They made him walk into the kitchen and lie down in the space where the board was pulled up.

  “Hadn’t we ought to tie him up and gag him?” 18 asked.

  “I kind of hate to do that,” Freddy said. “Though after they come back, if he starts yelling or banging on the floor …”