Freddy Plays Football (14 page)

“
Not a coat, not a vest, not a pair of pants,”

said Uncle Solomon.

“OK, you're so smart; finish it,” said Freddy.

“I merely suggest,” said the owl; “I do not complete. I know quite well that there is only one correct rhyme to ‘cousins'. It is ‘dozens.'”

Freddy expressed surprise. “I didn't know you knew so much about poetry.”

“I know a great deal about words. It is not the same thing. However, proceed.”

Freddy went on.

“
Though happier pigs, as they sing and dance
,

Have relatives by dozens.”

“Personally,” said the owl, “I have not found that a multiplicity of relatives is conducive to gaiety. But continue.”

“
For others, the lights in the windows gleam
,

For others, the fried eggs sputter;

For—”

“
For the pig, all puffed up with self-esteem
,

A roll in the muddy gutter.”

And Uncle Solomon gave his dry little titter. “Rather neat, I think. Your mention of food suggested the roll though in general I consider puns rather vulgar.”

“What was your verse, Freddy?” the frog asked.

“
For others, the coffee with lots of cream
,

And the toast, with lots of butter.”

“It has always struck me as significant,” remarked Uncle Solomon, “that in all poetry written by lower animals—I distinguish them thus from humans and from birds—there is an intense preoccupation with food. For your benefit, Theodore,” he said, looking down at the frog who had his mouth open, and was scratching his head with his little green fingers, “I will elucidate.”

“You needn't bub-bother,” said Theodore.

“It is no trouble,” said the owl graciously. “I suggest merely that the chief interest of the lower animal is food. His mind seldom rises to higher things. His eyes, if I may so express it, are on the dinner table, rather than lifted to the stars. The poem to which we have just been privileged to listen illustrates this very clearly. This pig, this friendless outcast—why do his tears drip like rain? (And I may remark parenthetically that tears dripping like rain is a very ordinary and hackneyed expression.)”

“Maybe you could improve on it,” said Freddy crossly. He sometimes rather enjoyed these arguments with Uncle Solomon, but nobody likes to have a poem he has just made pulled to pieces.

“I could,” said the owl. “If you say: ‘By hill and valley and mountain, His tears they flow like a fountain.' Or: ‘By hill and valley and highland, His tears turn him into an island.' But to return to my theme. The pig weeps. Does he weep for his friends, for his vanished home? Mildly—yes he does—mildly. And with—I may remark—a quite sickening sentimentality. But it is the food that really gets him going. He weeps for food—rich food. And that, I submit, quite proves my case. I will say nothing of the dreadful false modesty of our poet, who—”

He stopped short. They had all been so occupied with his remarks that they had not heard the rustlings and snapping of twigs in the woods behind them. But at that moment, Mr. Garble stepped out from behind a tree. “I've got you this time, pig,” he said, and pointed a large pistol at Freddy's head.

Chapter 13

When Mr. Garble had learned from Mr. Doty that Freddy suspected them of plotting to get Mr. Bean's money, he was pretty nervous. And when Freddy called, pretending to be the real Aaron Doty, he had got good and scared. He had a lot of respect for Freddy's detective ability, and he saw trouble ahead. When Freddy took the five thousand dollars and disappeared he saw his chance. He joined the sheriff's posse.

The sheriff knew pretty well what Freddy was up to, but it was his duty to catch him if he could. He and his men had combed the country around the Bean farm pretty thoroughly, but they had not yet gone into the Big Woods. Mr. Garble wanted to search them on Sunday, but the sheriff had said No, Sunday was a day of rest. “I don't ever chase criminals on Sunday,” he said. “As a matter of fact, I don't see why a criminal shouldn't get Sunday off as much as anybody else.”

So Mr. Garble went out alone. He came down from the north through the Big Woods, and searched the Grimby house, and having found no clues, kept on and cut across the back road just about where Freddy had. It was then, as he was working down through the Bean woods, that he heard voices. He crept forward, and there at the pool he saw Freddy.

Of course Freddy didn't know, when Mr. Garble's pistol was pointed at his head, that it wasn't loaded. So he just stood very still. There was a plop as Theodore dove into the pool. But the owl didn't stir.

“OK.” Mr. Garble motioned up the hill with his pistol. “After you, my fat friend.”

“But-but why are we going this way?” Freddy asked. For he supposed that Mr. Garble would take him down to the farmhouse, then call the sheriff.

Mr. Garble showed his teeth in a sneering smile. “Why it's such a fine day, that I thought we'd go for a little ride. And then, instead of being locked up in a stuffy jail, I've planned a trip for you. A nice long trip. You're going to see the Great West—won't that be nice?—Now get going!” he snapped.

So Freddy turned and went. He felt pretty sick. He wasn't going to be any wanderer on the face of the earth. He was going to be nailed up in a crate and shipped off to Montana. This time Mr. Garble was going to succeed. For he didn't see any escape. His verses seemed pretty silly now; instead of weeping, a wanderer pig ought to be kicking up his heels and singing for joy. But it shows how low he was that he didn't give a thought to changing the poem.

In the meantime, Uncle Solomon after waiting to see in which direction Freddy went, had dived into the air and was winging it straight as an arrow for the cow barn. He was there in a matter of seconds. “Freddy is captured!” he called as he shot in the door. “Garble's taking him up through the Big Woods toward Schermerhorns'. Up and after 'em! Come on—everybody out!”

There was no time to raise the flag and call the animals together. As the cows trotted out of the barn and started up the lane, the owl flew off to warn the dogs and Hank and Bill and whoever else was in the barnyard. But he didn't think the rescue party could do much. Garble probably had his car somewhere near the Big Woods; he would have Freddy in it before they could catch him; and anyway, he had a pistol. There was one thing that might help, though. As soon as he had given the alarm, he started for Centerboro.

On the way he reproached himself bitterly, for he was really very fond of Freddy. “Solomon,” he said to himself, “you have been inexcusably lax and remiss and negligent. It was your duty to keep watch for the enemy; instead, you abandoned that duty for an argument about an inferior poem. You are a fool, Solomon; a corrupt and perfidious traitor, a rogue, a scalawag, and a black-hearted, pie-eyed dope.” It shows how upset he was that he used several slang words in his denunciation of himself.

When the owl flew in the office window, the sheriff was leaning back in his big chair with a toothpick in his mouth and his eyes closed.

“Sheriff!” Uncle Solomon called in his quick gabble. “Garble's got Freddy! Come on—hurry up or we'll be too late!”

The sheriff slowly took the toothpick from his mouth and said sleepily, and without opening his eyes: “Too late? You mean for church? Well now, that's too bad. Guess we can't go. Don't want to disturb everybody, comin' in late.” And he went to sleep again.

Uncle Solomon flew over and perched on his shoulder and gave a loud screech in his ear.

The sheriff started up. “Hey now, look,” he said, “that ain't any way to act. I told you at breakfast, Looey, I didn't think I'd ought to go today. On account of my Adam's apple durin' the singin'. I—” Then at last he caught sight of the owl. “Hunh!” he said in a puzzled tone. “You ain't Looey.”

“No, and I'm not urging you to go to church,” said Uncle Solomon. “I am requesting in words of one syllable to
hop to it!
Garble's captured Freddy.”

At that the sheriff finally woke up all over. And two minutes later, with the owl beside him on the front seat, he drove out of the jail gate.

The sheriff shouted above the noise of the engine. “If Garble's kidnapin' Freddy, I know where he'll head for—his shack at the east end of the lake. His road crosses this one a couple miles up. If we're in time we'll cut him off at the corners.”

When they reached the corners there was no sign of Mr. Garble. Uncle Solomon circled up in a spiral, hovered for a moment then shot down again. “Something going on up this left-hand road. Can't make out just what, but—” The rest of the sentence was lost in the roar of the engine as the sheriff swung the wheel to the left and shoved down the accelerator.

While all this was going on Theodore had not been idle. As soon as Freddy and Mr. Garble left the pool, he came out from under the bank, gathered his legs under him, and gave a leap that carried him up into the edge of the woods, a little to the left of where the others had entered them. Then he kept right on leaping. He looked like a little green ball bounding along through the trees. And as he bounded, he thought: “I hope P-Peter is in his den, and not off berrying. If he's home, maybe we can head off gug, gug—I mean Garble and rescue Freddy.”

It may seem odd that Theodore stuttered even when he was thinking. But he said that he did it on purpose. “You see,” he said, “if I don't stutter, then it doesn't sound to me like
me
, and I think maybe it's somebody else thinking, and then I get mixed up. But if I stutter, then I know right away it's my own thought.”

A frog can really travel when he gets into the swing of jump—gather your legs—jump—gather your legs—jump. Long before Freddy and his captor had got through the Big Woods, Theodore had reached the bear's den. Luckily Peter was home. Since it was October, it was getting along towards his bedtime, and he was busy airing his blankets and pillows, but he left them hanging on the line and set out at a dead run. Even Theodore was left behind, for although bears look clumsy, they can gallop through the tangle of thick woods faster than you can run on the open road.

Luckily Peter was home.

And now there were three rescue parties, all headed towards Freddy from different directions. Peter reached him first. He came out of the Big Woods on the north, and there by the side of the old wood road was a station wagon, with the initials H.G. on the door. There was no one in it.

Peter looked at it. “I wonder what these things weigh?” he said. Then he went up to it, and bending down, put his big forepaws under the runningboard. And he was just about to heave the car over on its side when a voice shouted: “Stand away from that car!” and he looked around to see Mr. Garble pointing a pistol at him, while Freddy, with bright steel handcuffs on his fore-trotters, stood dejectedly beside him.

“A pistol!” said Peter. “H'm, that alters things, rather.” He got up and walked slowly towards Mr. Garble. “Good morning,” he said. “I was just looking—I thought you had a puncture in that rear tire.”

“Stand where you are, or your rear tires will get plugged full of punctures,” said Mr. Garble menacingly. “Get into the car, pig.”

As Freddy obeyed there was a crashing and trampling in the woods, and the Bean animals burst into the open a little way up the road and came galloping down on them.

Of course none of them knew that the pistol wasn't loaded, and as Mr. Garble swung it to cover them while reaching for the doorhandle with his free hand, they skidded to a stop. They stood around him in a semicircle, the cows and goat with horns lowered, the dogs snarling, the cat with back arched and tail three times its natural size—even the placid Hank showed his long wicked teeth.