Читать книгу Amelia Jane Again! - Enid blyton - Страница 3

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Now once the toys in the nursery had a party and they didn’t ask that big naughty doll, Amelia Jane. She didn’t even know they were going to have a party until she saw them setting the table, and smelt the cakes cooking on the little stove in the dolls’ house.

‘Oooh!’ said Amelia Jane, pleased. ‘A party! This is a surprise!’

The teddy bear looked at her. ‘It will be an even greater surprise to you when you find you’re not coming!’ he said. ‘We’re a bit tired of you and your tricks. A party will be very nice without you!’

‘Eeee-eee-eeee!’ laughed the clockwork mouse, and the other toys giggled too. Amelia Jane went red.

‘You nasty, horrid things!’ she said. ‘Well, have your party then! I’m sure I don’t want to come. I’ve better things to do than come to silly little parties like yours!’

She went off into the corner in a huff. The toys giggled again. Amelia Jane was funny when she was in a huff. She pouted her mouth and wrinkled her nose and tossed her thick black hair.

The party began. It was a lovely one, with tiny chocolate cakes to eat, small pink sweets out of the toy sweet-shop, and lemonade to drink. The toys played blindman’s buff, and musical chairs, and general post, so they really did have a fine time. Amelia Jane pretended to be reading a book, but all the time she was really peeping at the party, and making up her naughty little mind that she would think of some trick to punish the little toys.

Now after a bit the toys wanted to dance. It was quieter to dance with their shoes off, so they all sat down, took off their shoes, and piled them in a heap near the dolls’ house. Then they set the musical-box going, and began to dance with one another.

Amelia Jane saw the shoes in a big pile. She grinned to herself. What would the toys say if those suddenly disappeared? That would be funny!

So, when the toys were all busy dancing in and out and round about, Amelia Jane crept up to the shoes, stuffed them into the apron of her dress, and ran off again. Nobody noticed her.

Amelia Jane sat in a dark corner of the nursery with the shoes, wondering where to hide them. Near by was a mouse-hole.

‘Oooh!’ thought Amelia. ‘If I stuff these shoes down the mouse-hole, no one will find them. What fun!’

So she stuffed the little shoes down the mouse-hole. There were leather shoes and woollen socks, kid shoes and felt shoes, some with laces, some with buttons, some with nothing at all. They all went down that mouse-hole.

Well, when the dancing was over the toys ran to put their shoes on again. But they weren’t there! They stared all around, very puzzled.

‘I’m sure we put them here,’ said the clockwork clown.

‘Well, where are they?’ asked the curly-haired doll. ‘Shoes can’t walk!’

‘That’s just what they can do!’ said the clockwork mouse smartly.

‘Not unless there are feet in them,’ said the teddy bear, rather crossly. He wore woollen socks, and they kept his feet warm at night. He did hope they weren’t lost.

‘I’m sure Amelia Jane knows something about our shoes,’ said the clockwork clown suddenly. The toys went over to her.

‘Amelia Jane, what have you done with our shoes?’ asked the teddy bear.

Amelia Jane looked so surprised that her eyebrows shot up into her hair. ‘Shoes!’ she said. ‘Shoes! Whatever do you mean?’

‘Oh come, Amelia, you know quite well what shoes are!’ said the clown crossly. ‘What—have—you—done—with—our—SHOES?’

‘Well, really!’said Amelia Jane. ‘Why should you think I’ve done anything with them? Do you suppose I came and took them off your feet?’

‘No, we don’t suppose anything so silly,’ said the bear. ‘But we do feel perfectly sure you’ve taken the pile of shoes and hidden them somewhere.’

‘Well, you can go on supposing,’ said Amelia Jane rudely, and she began to read her book again. Not another word would she say.

The toys hated going without their shoes. Their feet were cold, and the teddy bear trod on a pin and yelled so loudly that the Jack-in-the-box sprang out to see what the matter was. Not until the next night did Amelia Jane say what she had done.

All the toys were round her, begging for their shoes, and Amelia Jane looked at them, her cheeky face red with delight. ‘Yes, I did take your shoes!’ she said. ‘I thought I would punish you for not asking me to your party.’

‘Well, where did you put them?’ asked the bear impatiently. ‘Hurry up and tell us.’

‘I pushed them down the mouse-hole,’ said Amelia Jane, grinning.

‘Pushed them down the mouse-hole!’ cried all the toys in astonishment. ‘Oh, you naughty doll! Get them at once.’

‘Get them yourself,’ said Amelia Jane. ‘I’m not going to bother!’

So the clockwork mouse was sent into the mouse-hole to fetch out everybody’s shoes. But, oh dear, oh dear, when he came back with them one by one, what an upset there was!

The little brown mice down the hole had bitten and chewed the shoes, meaning to make their new nest of them—and they were full of holes now.

‘How dreadful!’ groaned the clown. ‘They’re quite spoilt. Oh, you are a very naughty girl, Amelia Jane! Look at our shoes.’

Amelia was really sorry to see what had happened, but she wouldn’t say so.

The toys put on their shoes, and went back to the toy-cupboard, very upset.

The next day, when the children saw the nibbled shoes, they were most surprised. ‘Look!’ they said. ‘The mice have been eating our toys’ shoes. What a shame! We will take some money out of our money-box and buy them some more, and we’ll knit the bear some nice new socks.’

So it wasn’t very long before all the toys had fine new shoes and socks, better than their old ones, and they were very pleased indeed!

But Amelia Jane wasn’t pleased! She felt cross. She hadn’t got any new shoes. It was too bad.

So what do you think she did? She took off her nice blue shoes, which were made of warm felt, and went to push them down the mouse-hole! But they were too big to go down, so Amelia Jane took them to the window, and threw them out! Perhaps they wouldn’t be found—and then she too would have some new ones!

But, dear me, the two children were very cross with Amelia Jane when they found that her shoes were missing. ‘You have lost them!’ they said. ‘You are getting very careless with your clothes, Amelia Jane. What you want is a good smacking.’

And they turned her over and gave her such a smacking that she cried a puddle on to the floor. What a shock for naughty Amelia Jane!

But that wasn’t the end of it. No—the children found her shoes out in the garden, where she had thrown them, wet through with the rain. They dried them and put them on Amelia’s feet again. But they had shrunk smaller with the rain, and they were dreadfully tight. Really, poor Amelia could hardly walk!

‘I’m sorry I played about with your shoes,’ Amelia Jane wept to the toys. ‘I’ve been smacked—and you’ve all got nice new shoes—and my shoes are old and tight and hurt me! I’m very miserable.’

So the kind-hearted toys took off her shoes, and stretched them by pulling hard. Then they fitted Amelia Jane properly, and she dried her eyes and was very grateful.

‘I won’t play tricks again,’ she said. ‘I really won’t.’

But nobody believed her—and I’m afraid I don’t either.