Читать книгу More Adventures on Willow Farm - Enid blyton - Страница 4

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Mark arrived the next day. Rory went to meet him at the bus-stop, a mile or two away. The snow was now thick, but would soon melt, for the wind had changed. Then everywhere would be terribly muddy.

“Will you lend me Bray?” asked Rory of Benjy. “I thought I’d ride on Neddy to meet Mark, and if you’d lend me your donkey, I could take it along for Mark to ride back on.”

“Yes, you can have him,” said Benjy. So Rory went off on Neddy, his own donkey, and Bray trotted willingly beside him. They came to the bus-stop and waited patiently for Mark. The bus came in sight after a while, and Mark jumped down carrying a small bag. He was astonished to see Rory on a grey donkey.

“Hallo, Rory,” he said. “I didn’t know you had donkeys. You never told me.”

“Well, we didn’t have them till Christmas Day,” said Rory. “Did you have a good Christmas? We did! We each got a donkey for our own. This is Neddy, the one I’m riding on. And this is Bray. He belongs to Benjy. You can ride him home.”

“Well, I’ve never really ridden a donkey before, except once at the seaside,” said Mark, who was smaller and fatter than Rory. “I fell off then. Is Benjy’s donkey well behaved?”

Rory laughed. “Of course! Don’t be silly, Mark! Gracious, wait till you’ve been on the farm a few days. You’ll have ridden all the horses, and all our donkeys, too. And Buttercup the cow if you like. She doesn’t mind.”

Mark had no wish to ride horses or cows. He looked doubtfully at Bray, and then tried to mount him. Bray stood quite still. Soon Mark was on his back holding tightly to the reins.

“Give me your bag,” said Rory, trying not to laugh at Mark. “That’s right. Now off we go.”

But Bray did not seem to want to move. He stood there, his ears back, flicking his tail a little. Mark yelled after Rory, who was cantering off.

“Hie! This donkey’s stuck. He won’t move!”

Rory cantered back. He gave Bray a push in the back with Mark’s bag. “Get up!” he said. “You know the way home! Get up, then!”

Bray moved so suddenly that Mark nearly fell off. The donkey cantered quickly down the road, and Rory cantered after him. Soon Mark got used to the bumpity motion of the little donkey, and quite enjoyed the ride. Once he had got over his fear of falling off, he felt rather grand riding on the little donkey.

“We’ll soon see the farm,” said Rory. “It’s a jolly good one. It’s a mixed farm, you know.”

Mark didn’t know. He wondered what a mixed farm was. “Why is it mixed?” he said.

“Well—a mixed farm is one that keeps animals and hens and things, and grows things in the fields too,” explained Rory. “It’s the most paying sort of farm. You see, if you have a bad year with the sheep, well, you probably have a good year with the wheat. Or if you have a bad year with the potatoes, you may make it up by doing well with the poultry. We love a mixed farm, because there’s always such a lot of different things to do.”

“It does sound fun,” said Mark, wishing his donkey didn’t bump him quite so much. “I shall love to see everything. I say—is that Willow Farm?”

It was. They had rounded a corner, and the farmhouse now lay before them. It was built of warm red bricks. Its thatched roof was now covered with white snow. Tall chimneys stood up from the roof. Leaded windows with green shutters were set in the walls, and Rory pointed out which belonged to his bedroom.

“You’re to sleep with me,” he said. “I’ve a lovely view from my room. I can see five different streams from it. All the streams have willow trees growing beside them—they are what give the farm its name.”

Mark gazed at the farmhouse and at all the old farm-buildings around—the barns and sheds, the hen-houses and other outbuildings, now white with snow. It seemed a big place to him.

“Come on,” said Rory. “We’ll put our donkeys into their shed, and go and see the others.”

Soon the five children were gathered together in Rory’s bedroom, hearing Mark’s news and telling him theirs. Then they took him to see the farm and all its animals.

“Come and see the horses first,” said Rory. “Benjy and I look after them. We groom them just as well as the men could, Daddy says.”

Mark was taken to the stables and gazed rather nervously at three enormous shire-horses there.

“This is Darling, the best of the lot,” said Benjy, rubbing a big brown horse. “And that’s Captain. He’s immensely strong. Stronger than any horse Daddy’s ever known. And that’s Blossom.”

Then Mark had to see the cows. He liked these even less than the horses because they had horns!

“See this one?” said Benjy, pointing to a soft-eyed red and white cow. “We hope she’ll have a calf this spring. We want her to have a she-calf that we can keep and rear ourselves. If she has a bull-calf we’ll have to sell it. Jonquil, you’ll have a little she-calf, won’t you?”

“We may be going to have a big fierce bull of our own this year,” said Penny, twinkling at Mark. She guessed he wouldn’t like the sound of bulls at all! He didn’t. He looked round nervously as if he half expected to see a bull coming towards him, snorting fiercely!

“Well—I hope I shan’t be here when the bull arrives,” he said. “I say—what a horrid smell! What is it?”

“It’s only Jim cleaning out the pig-sties,” said Sheila. “Come and see our old sow. She had ever so many piglets in the summer—but they’ve all grown now. We hope she’ll have some more soon. You’ve no idea how sweet they are!”

“Sweet?” said Mark in amazement. “Surely pigs aren’t sweet? I should have thought that was the last thing they were.”

“Piglets are sweet,” said Penny. “They really are.”

“Well, your old sow is simply hideous,” said Mark. The five children stared at the enormous creature. The four farm children had thought she was very ugly indeed when they first saw her—but now that they were used to her and knew her so well, they thought she was nice. They felt quite cross with Mark for calling her hideous.

She grunted as she rooted round in the big sty. Mark wrinkled up his nose as he smelt the horrid smell again. “Let’s come and see something else,” he said. So they all moved off over the snowy ground to the hen-houses. Mark saw the hens sitting side by side on the perches. They did not like walking about in the snowy run.

“I manage the hens, with Fanny, our little maid,” said Sheila proudly. “I made a lot of money through selling the eggs last year. I put some hens on ducks’ eggs as well as on hens’ eggs, and Fanny and I brought off heaps and heaps of chicks and ducklings.”

“Cluck-luck-luck,” said a hen.

“Yes, you did bring us luck,” said Sheila, laughing. “Luck-luck-luck-luck!”

In the fields were big folds in which Davey the shepherd had put the sheep. He did not want them to roam too far in the snowy hills in case they got lost. Penny stood on the fence and called loudly.

“Skippetty, Skippetty, Skippetty!”

“She’s calling the pet lamb she had last year,” explained Rory. “Oh, Mark, do you remember when it followed her to school, like Mary’s lamb in the rhyme? Wasn’t that funny?”

Mark did remember. He looked to see if a little lamb was coming. But no lamb came. Instead, Davey the shepherd let a fat sheep out of the fold. It came trotting across the snowy grass to Penny.

“Penny! This isn’t your lamb, is it?” cried Mark, in surprise. “Gracious! It’s a big heavy sheep now.”

“I know,” said Penny regretfully. “When I remember that dear little frisky, long-leggitty creature that drank out of a baby’s milk-bottle, I can hardly believe this sheep was once that lamb. I think it’s very sad.”

“Yes, it is,” said Mark. Skippetty put his nose through the fence and nuzzled against Penny’s legs. To him Penny was still the dear little girl who had been his companion all through the spring and summer before. She hadn’t changed as he had.

“I wish I could show you my tame squirrel,” said Benjy. “He’s been missing the last few days. We think he may be sleeping the cold spell away.”

“Oh, I’ve seen Scamper, you know,” said Mark, remembering the times when Benjy had brought him to school on his shoulder. “Whistle to him as you used to do. Maybe he’ll come. Even if he’s asleep somewhere surely he will hear your whistle and wake!”

“Well, I’ve whistled lots of times,” said Benjy. “But I’ll whistle again if you like.”

So the boy stood in the farmyard and whistled. He had a very special whistle for Scamper the squirrel, low and piercing, and very musical. Tammylan the wild man had taught him the whistle. The five children stood still and waited.

Benjy whistled again—and then, over the snow, his tail spread out behind him, scampered the tame squirrel. He had been sleeping in a hole in a near-by willow tree—but not very soundly. Squirrels rarely sleep all the winter through. They wake up at intervals to find their hidden stores of food, and have a feed. Scamper had heard Benjy’s whistle in his dreams, and had awakened.

Then down the tree he had come with a flying leap, and made his way to the farmyard, bounding along as light as a feather.

“Oh, here he is!” yelled Benjy in delight. The squirrel sprang to his shoulder with a little chattering noise and nibbled the bottom of Benjy’s right ear. He adored the boy. Mark gazed at him in envy. How he wished he had a pet wild creature who would go to him like that. “Would he come to me?” he asked.

“Yes,” said Benjy, and patted Mark’s shoulder. The squirrel leapt to it, brushed against Mark’s hair, and sprang back to Benjy’s shoulder again.

“Lovely!” said Mark. “I wish he was mine.”

A bell rang down at the farmhouse. “That’s Harriet ringing to tell us dinner’s ready,” said Rory. “Come on. I’m jolly hungry.”

“So am I,” said Mark. “I could eat as much as that old sow there!”

“Well, I hope you won’t make such a noise when you’re eating, as she does!” said Benjy. “Listen to her! We’ve never been able to teach her table-manners—have we, Penny?”