Moominland Midwinter (6 page)

The Lady of the Cold was standing by the reeds. Her back was turned, and she was bending down over the snow.

'It's the squirrel,' said Too-ticky. 'He's forgotten to keep at home.'

The Lady of the Cold turned her beautiful face towards the squirrel and distractedly scratched him behind one ear. Bewitched, he stared back at her, straight into her cold blue eyes. The Lady of the Cold smiled and continued on her way.

But she left the foolish little squirrel lying stiff and numb with all his paws in the air.

'Too bad,' said Too-ticky grimly and pulled her cap over her ears. She opened the door, and a cloud of white snow-fog came whirling in. She darted out, and in a moment she slipped back in again and laid the squirrel on the table.

The invisible shrews came running with hot water and rolled the squirrel in a warmed towel. But his little legs sprouted just as sadly and stiffly in the air, and he did not move a whisker.

'He's quite dead,' said Little My matter-of-factly.

'At least he saw something beautiful before he died,' said Moomintroll in a trembling voice.

'Oh, well,' said Little My. 'In any case he's forgotten it by now. And I'm going to make myself a sweet little muff out of his tail.'

'But you can't!' Moomintroll cried, very upset. 'He must have his tail with him in the grave. Because he has to be buried, hasn't he, Too-ticky?'

'Mphm,' replied Too-ticky. 'It's very hard to tell if people take any pleasure in their tails when they're dead.'

'Please,' said Moomintroll. 'Don't talk about him being dead all the time. It's so sad.'
^*

'When one's dead, then one's dead,' said Too-ticky kindly. 'This squirrel will become earth all in his time. And still later on there'll grow trees from him, with new squirrels skipping about in them. Do you think that's so very sad?'*

'Perhaps not,' said Moomintroll, and blew his snout. 'But in any case he's going to be buried tomorrow, and his tail too, and we'll have a nice and very proper funeral,'

*

The following day it was very cold in the bathing-house. The fire was lighted in the stove, but evidently the invisible shrews were tired. The coffee pot that Moomintroll had brought from home had a thin layer of ice under the lid.

Moomintroll wouldn't take any coffee, out of consideration for the dead squirrel. 'You'll have to give me my bath-gown,' he said solemnly. 'Mother's told me that funerals are always cold.'

'Turn your back and count ten,' said Too-ticky.

Moomintroll turned towards the window and counted. At eight Too-ticky shut the cupboard door and gave him his blue gown.

'Oh, you remembered that mine was the blue one,' Moomintroll said happily. He stuck his paws in the pockets at once but found no sun-glasses there, only a little sand and a perfectly round and smooth, white pebble.

He closed his paw around the pebble. Its roundness held all the security of summer. He could even imagine that it was still a little warm from lying in the sun.

'You look as if you were at the wrong party,' said Little My.

Moomintroll didn't look at her.

'Are you coming to the funeral or not?' he asked in a dignified manner.

'Of course we're coming,' said Too-ticky. 'He was a nice squirrel in his way.'

'Especially the tail,' Little My said.

They wrapped the squirrel in an old bathing-cap and stepped out into the bitter cold.

The snow crunched under their paws, and their breaths became clouds of white smoke. Moomintroll soon felt his snout stiffen so that it was impossible to wrinkle it.

'Tough going, this,' Little My said happily and skipped along over the frozen shore.

'Can't you slow up a bit,' asked Moomintroll. 'This
is
a funeral.'

He was able to draw only very short breaths of the icy air.

'I never knew you had any eyebrows at all,' said Little My interestedly. 'Now they're all white and you look more confused than ever.'

'That's rime,' said Too-ticky sternly. 'And keep quiet now, because neither you nor I know anything about funerals.'

Moomintroll cheered up. He carried the squirrel up to the house and laid it down before the snow-horse.

Then he went up the rope-ladder and down into the warm, peaceful drawing-room where everybody lay asleep.

He searched all the drawers. He ransacked every place, but he didn't find what he needed.

He went to his Mother's bed and whispered a question in her ear. She sighed and turned around. Moomintroll repeated his whisper.

Then Moominmamma answered, from the depths of her womanly understanding of all that preserves tradition: 'Black bands... they're in my cupboard... top shelf... to the right...' And she sank back into her winter sleep again.

But Moomintroll took out the ladder from under the staircase and climbed up to the top shelf of the cupboard.

There he found the box with all those superfluous things that can sometimes be absolutely necessary: black bands for mourning, golden bands for great celebrations, and the key to the house, and the champagne whisk, and the tube of porcelain glue, and spare brass knobs for the bedposts among other things.

When Moomintroll came out again he had a black bow on his tail. He also made fast a little black bow on Too-ticky's cap.

But Little My refused blankly to be decorated. 'If I feel sorry I needn't show it with a bow,' she said.

'If you feel sorry, that is,' said Moomintroll. 'But you don't.'

'No,' said Little My. 'I can't. I'm always either glad or angry. Would it help the squirrel if I were sorry? No. But if I'm angry at the Lady of the Cold, I might bite her leg some time. And then perhaps she'll take care not to scratch other little squirrels behind their ears just because they're sweet and fluffy.'

'There's something in that,' said Too-ticky. 'But Moomintroll's also right, however that's possible. And what do we do now?'

'Now I'm going to dig a hole in the ground,' said Moomintroll. 'This is a nice spot, there are a lot of marguerites here in summer.'

'But dearest,' said Too-ticky sadly. 'The ground's frozen stone hard. You couldn't bury even a grasshopper in it.'

Moomintroll looked helplessly at her without replying. No one said a word. And at that moment the snow-horse lowered its head and cautiously sniffed at the squirrel. It looked questioningly at Moomintroll with its mirror eyes, and its broom-tail moved slightly.

At the same time the invisible shrew struck up a sad tune on his flute. Moomintroll nodded gratefully.

Then the snow-horse lifted the squirrel on his back, tail and bathing-cap and all, and everybody started to walk back to the shore.

And Too-ticky sang this about the squirrel:

There was a little squirrel,

A very small squirrel.

He wasn't very clever

But his fur was nice and warm.

Now he is cold, quite cold.

And all his legs are numb.

But still he is the squirrel

With the marvellous tail.

When the horse felt hard ice under his hooves, he tossed his head and his eyes lighted up; and suddenly he cut a caper and galloped off.

The invisible shrew changed to a fast and lively tune. Farther and farther away galloped the snow-horse with the squirrel on his back. Finally he was just a speck on the horizon.

'I wonder if this went off right?' said Moomintroll worriedly.

'It couldn't have been better,' said Too-ticky. 'Well, it could,' said Little My. 'If only I had got the nice tail for a muff.'

CHAPTER 4
The lonely and the rum

A
FEW
days after the squirrel's funeral Moomintroll noticed that somebody had stolen peat from the woodshed.

There were broad tracks in the snow outside, just as if heavy sacks had been lugged off.

'If can't be My,' thought Moomintroll. 'She's much too small. And Too-ticky only takes what she needs. It must be the Groke.'

He followed the trail with bristling neck fluff. There was no one else to keep watch over the family's fuel, and this was a matter of honour.

The trail ended on the top of the hill behind the cave.

There lay the peat sacks. They were piled up to make part of a bonfire, and on top of them rested the family's garden sofa that had lost one of its legs in August.

'That sofa's going to look fine,' said Too-ticky, stepping out from behind the bonfire. 'It's old and dry as dust.'

'Certainly,' said Moomintroll. 'It's been a long time in the family. We could have repaired it.'

'Or made anew one,' said Too-ticky. 'Would you like to hear the song about Too-ticky who made a great winter bonfire?'

'By all means,' replied Moomintroll, good-naturedly.

And Too-ticky started at once to stamp around slowly in the snow, while she sang as follows:

Here come the dumb,

The lonely and the rum.

The wild and the quiet.

Thud goes the drum.

Crackle goes the bonfire

Glowing in the white snow,

Swish go the tails,