The Further Adventures Of Gobbolino And The Little Wooden Horse

16 SOOTICA ON HER WAY

Two DAYS BEFORE THIS, when the old priest met a little black cat at the door of his house, he thought at first it was Gobbolino, and called to his housekeeper to get a saucer of milk and some other dainties for the little cat to eat.

He was very glad to see it again, and made Sootica very welcome, not least because he thought she had rid the church of the bats that had plagued the congregation for so long. Already the people were coming back to church, and the bells were rung joyously at the proper hours.

Sootica, for her part, had her eye on the tidy warm parsonage, and thought this was not at all a bad place for a cat to make her home. Already the big open world frightened her a little, but the old priest seemed very kind and harmless, while she felt positive her own mistress, the witch, would never dare to come near so holy a place as the church.

While he went to get the milk she sat in the sun washing her face and trying to make up her mind whether she would trouble to go any further when there was such a comfortable place close at hand to live in.

"But where is your friend, the little wooden horse?" the old priest asked her, coming back from the parsonage kitchen.

"Oh, he’s still up in the mountain!" said Sootica carelessly.

Hearing her voice, which was rather loud and shrill, the old priest stared at her, and at the same moment the housekeeper appeared, carrying a saucer of milk and a plate full of food that looked very good to eat.

The housekeeper stared too.

"That’s not the cat you had before," she exclaimed. "I only caught a glimpse of it, to be sure, but I’ll swear it had slightly tabby fur and one white paw, and its eyes were blue! Look at this one’s feet — black as ink, all of them — and its eyes are green as little apples!"

Sootica looked at her angrily and sure enough, the flashing of her eyes was a brilliant emerald green.

She opened her mouth to spit, but thought better of it and applied it instead to the good food that the housekeeper had brought for her to eat.

"This is very extraordinary!" said the priest, puzzled. "Really this cat is very like the other one! Can it be.. no! It is hardly possible.. but is it the little sister Sootica that Gobbolino talked about? The sister he was going up the Hurricane Mountains to rescue?"

With her mouth full of food and splashes of milk round her chops Sootica mewed agreement. The old priest was more puzzled than ever.

"But what are you doing here without your brother, my young friend?" he asked her.

Sootica merely dipped her nose in the plate and went on eating. She did not intend to begin explaining to these people until she had eaten her fill.

"He was so anxious to save you!" the old priest went on reproachfully. "I never saw a cat so concerned about his sister! And his wooden friend likewise! I do pray and trust that no harm has come to them in saving you from the witch?"

"Oh none! None!" said Sootica carelessly licking the last of the gravy from the dish. "He will be passing by later in the day I do assure you, though it is quite possible he will not have time to pay a call."

"I am glad to think he will be on his way home," said the priest, much relieved. "And tell me, are the bats settled in their new quarters? And are they likely to stop in their homes?"

"Oh positively! Positively!" said Sootica, washing away, though not very carefully. "They have beautiful new homes, and so has my brother Gobbolino, and so has the little wooden horse, and it is their own affair if they don’t want to stay there! They all have beautiful new homes to live in except poor little me!"

"That is a sad story!" said the old priest sympathetically. "Were you so very unhappy up there with the witch?"

"Miserable! Miserable!" said Sootica, although looking back on it the witch’s cavern already seemed more attractive than it once had done. The parsonage was almost too clean for comfort. "I don’t know what I shall do now!" she said plaintively with a final wipe to her chops.

"Why!. Perhaps we can find you a small corner in our house!" said the priest happily but his housekeeper broke in at once.

"That’s a witch’s cat, your reverence! It’s written all over it. You don’t want the likes of that in the parsonage, it would be worse than having those nasty bats about the place! Don’t you have anything to do with it, your reverence!"

"You rude hag!" said Sootica crossly.

Even the priest was shocked.

"Come! Come!" he protested, calming them both. "After all, the poor puss need not live in the parsonage. She could live in the church — in the vestry, of course — and catch the mice!"

"I don’t want to live in the church!" snapped Sootica, who was already trying to remember a spell that would turn the housekeeper into something particularly disagreeable, but there was an atmosphere about the old priest that made her powerless. She sat sulking on the floor and decided to leave as soon as possible.

"Please tell me, little cat, what has become of your brother?" the priest asked her. "And why are you travelling all alone? I thought he meant to take you back with him to his home in the forest, but that may have been a misunderstanding on my part. Is he still up there on the mountainside? And if so, why?"

"He has taken my place with the witch," said Sootica calmly. "As you can see, we are very much alike, and when I left home the witch was asleep! She is getting blind, I don't expect she will notice the difference!"

"Why, you selfish, good-for-nothing little baggage!" cried the housekeeper. "Do you mean to say you have run away and left your brother to his fate? What will the witch do to him when she finds you have deceived her?"

"If he is lucky she will never find out," returned Sootica, "but I think after all I would be wiser to get to the far side of the stream as we planned when I left the cavern, and my brother will follow me at noon.

The witch is pretty blind by daylight, and she can't cross water at earth level, as I can, so she is not likely to catch either of us, and as for the little wooden horse, he can look after himself I imagine!"

The priest realized that Sootica was a very different character from her brother Gobbolino.

"You say he will pass by here at midday?" he asked her again.

"Yes. The witch sleeps nearly all day long," Sootica replied. "But it was necessary for Gobbolino to stay so that if she did wake she would think it was me. But if I’m not to stay here I must get on and cross over the stream, so I shall be safe. When my brother turns up you will know he is safe too. Tell him I shall not wait for him at the stream after all. We shall no doubt see each other by and by. It will take me all my time to find myself a good home to live in. I am determined to be a proper cat in the future and not a witch's cat any more. At any rate, not often!"

"Much good may it do you!" muttered the housekeeper. She picked up the dishes and took them away to scrub them very thoroughly.

"I hope you find your hearts desire," said the old priest gravely opening the door for Sootica to pass out.

She had not been gone more than an hour when the housekeeper came running to the priest in a great state of alarm.

"I told you no good would come of opening the door to that witch’s creature!" she cried. "It has even brought the bats back with it!"

"The bats!" said the priest in dismay. "What? All of them?"

"Well, one of them at any rate!" said the housekeeper. "It keeps banging away at my kitchen window and trying to get in. I’m not going to open up to the nasty brute! I’m off to find my brother-in-law to come and shoot it with his gun!"

She was gone before the priest could prevent her, and he made his way to the kitchen in time to see the bat disappearing round the corner of the house.

Later on, as he went to say his midday prayer in the church, he found the bat flying round and round the bell-ropes, twittering.

To his great surprise, for he had never been very friendly to the bats, the little creature flew down immediately and perched on his shoulder. He could see that it was quite a young bat, and it was carrying something in its sharp little teeth, something wooden and carved, which it now let fall to the floor, as it continued to twitter into his ear.

For a long while the twittering made no sense, and he stooped to pick up the little wooden object and examine it.

It lay flat in the palm of his hand, looking strangely familiar, although he could not for the life of him say what it reminded him of.

And then, in a flash, sudden recognition came to him.

It was the ear of the little wooden horse!

The old priest was horrified. What dreadful adventure had befallen his little friends up there on the Hurricane Mountains? He had not felt happy about them since Gobbolino’s sister had appeared in his stead, having escaped so heartlessly without him.

Her story had made him most uneasy. It was all very well to say her brother and the little wooden horse were safe and would soon be on their way home, but what would happen if the witch did, in fact, wake up and find they had deceived her? Sootica would not be there to take the blame, and what dreadful vengeance would she take upon them? Or, what dreadful vengeance had she in fact taken, since here was the little wooden horse’s wooden ear lying in his hand, perhaps the only bit of him left? It was too terrible to contemplate.

It was the ear of the little wooden horse!

And then he became aware of the young bat still murmuring and hissing in his ear, and repeating the words: "Bless it! Bless it! Bless it!" over and over again.

The priest was none the wiser, nor was he at all comforted by the bat’s instructions. Yet after all, if his good little friend were dead it was only right and proper to bury his ear with a suitable blessing. He went into the churchyard, still carrying the wooden ear, to get a spade from the toolshed and to find a quiet corner where he might bury it and say a blessing over his humble grave.

The bat became extremely agitated and even aggressive. When the priest tried to brush it away it beat his cheeks with its small wings and even bit the lobe of his ear till blood appeared. All the while it kept up its excited twittering: "Bless it! Bless it! Bless it!" till it became clear enough to the old priest that it did not intend him to bury the ear first.

Wiping the blood from his own ear he half turned his head towards the little bat and inquired mildly:

"And why are you asking me to bless it?"

This time the bat had some difficulty in getting out the words he wanted to say. After several attempts it stammered:

"Gobbolino!"

Then, delighted at mastering the name, it left his shoulder and flew back into the church, twittering:

"Gobbolino! Gobbolino! Gobbolino!."

The priest followed it, carrying the wooden ear in his hand.

Standing in the nave, he sprinkled the ear with holy water and blessed it, first once, and then twice more, praying that its brave owner might be safe and sound, and find his way home from the witch’s territory without harm. The little bat perched on a choir stall, and seemed to take a deep interest in the proceedings.

The priest did not know what to do next. He walked to the door and looked out across the plain. It was past midday, and if Sootica’s word could be trusted the little wooden horse and Gobbolino ought to have passed through the village by now. No doubt she herself had already crossed the stream and was well on her way to the forest, or wherever she intended to look for a home. The priest did not think she would find it very easy to get one.

Perhaps the bat would take the ear back to its owner the way it had come? But the young bat seemed coy, and by its twitterings and mutterings he slowly made out its explanation that it was forbidden to go into the caves on the Hurricane Mountains where its elders had found new homes. It had to be content with living in a rabbit burrow at the foot of the mountain, and it did not want to return there at all. It had decided, it said, to go back to living in the bell tower, where at least it was warm and dry, and it did not get cold and wet at night.

Saying this, it flew swiftly round the church and disappeared above his head into the belfry, through the hole where the ropes hung down.

The priest did not feel inclined to climb the belfry stairs and chase it out. He guessed that, if he did, the bat would simply fly round and round the church and hide somewhere else.

Rather than waste his time on such a wild goose chase he thought it better to go himself to the Hurricane Mountains and find out what was happening, and why it was so important to bless the little wooden ear.

He waited all the afternoon for Gobbolino and the little wooden horse to appear, but when they did not, he carefully locked up the church for the night, and set out across the plain. The housekeeper's brother-in-law, who had seen no sign of the bat in the house, stayed on to keep her company while the priest was out.

The young bat was frightened and lonely, but it hung itself up in a corner of the church and went to sleep.