The City Curious Part 10

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE DESPOILER, WHO WAS ALWAYS AFRAID THAT SOME ONE WOULD FIND OUT THAT HE WAS ONLY MADE OF CARDBOARD, NEVER SLEPT IN PUBLIC]

"Thursday, half-past three.

"All buildings except the cherry-tart destroyed in the market square.

"The Prisoner crossed the river while it was dry.

"Rolled across the park of chocolate-moulds, crushing everything beneath him.

"He then rolled on over the great kitchen, which was happily empty.

"(The two little people made of suet have been shut in with me.)

"Up past the public square, and the two little people tried to talk to him.

"The Rats worked hard at keeping the prison together; but there are cries everywhere.

"Every one is calling out 'The Prisoner is coming.'"

"How annoying this is," said Redy, "we're reading it backwards."

"Annoying," said a deep voice which came from the closed beak of the Historian. He had forgotten that he was asleep, and lifting up his foot he kicked the two inquisitive little people to the other end of the room.

But the sight of the Flying-Fish and the Hen sleeping reminded him that he, too, was not really awake, so he closed his eyes and did not move again.

Smaly was able to go on unrolling the whole of the ma.n.u.script.

CHAPTER VIII

Redy and Smaly read of the childhood of the Prisoner.

They read as follows:

"THE STORY OF DJORAK

"This is what I, the Historian, have been able to discover about the life of Djorak, called The Prisoner, before he came to us. He told it to me himself before he was placed in his prison of sugar-canes.

"He is a sailor.

"He has been tattooed.

"Nearly everything that has been tattooed upon him is very terrible; for instance, one can read upon his shoulder-blade:

"'Eat meat raw if you can't get it cooked.'

"Indeed, he has himself avowed to me that he used to eat all sorts of animals, rabbits, sheep, and even birds.

"On his other shoulder was written:

"'Avoid water like poison.'

"He had also inscribed about his person:

"'Drink your gin and whisky neat.'

"'Always have a hot drink in the evening.'

"'Reverence the sun and each of the winds as it blows.'

"On his breast he bore a heart cruelly transfixed with arrows.

"I gathered that from his childhood he was rough and disobedient. That when as a little boy he used to go into the wood behind the house to smoke, his mother always followed him and carefully presented him with an ash-tray, yet he never made use of the tray; but kept it in his pocket and scattered the ash all over the wood.

"Instead of cutting his toe-nails as we do with the help of a long-handled pair of scissors and a telescope, he preferred to take each nail off separately, trim it, and put it back, although this invariably made his mother cry.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "INSTEAD OF CUTTING HIS TOE-NAILS AS WE DO WITH THE HELP OF A LONG-HANDLED PAIR OF SCISSORS AND A TELESCOPE"]

[Ill.u.s.tration: SOME OF THE DANCES WERE VERY COMPLICATED

_Page 122_]

"He was so perverse that when any one asked him what the time was he would always insist on telling it by the barometer, although he knew perfectly well that the exact time is only to be found on the clock.

"He always marked out the tennis-court with green chalk, because he maintained that the white looked too loud and left marks upon the gra.s.s.

"Evidently from his earliest youth he was of the stuff of which criminals are made.

"When he grew up he married and became the father of three adorable little girls."

At the mention of the three little girls Redy and Smaly stopped and looked at each other.

"Those are the three little daughters of the Prisoner," whispered Redy.

Smaly went on reading:

"When his wife died," Smaly read, "he decided to give to his daughters a good, if rather original education.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE KING]

"Every alternate week he dressed them as boys, and during that week they behaved as boys, and the next week they would become girls again. 'That will accustom them to anything,' he used to say. 'Nothing in life should be difficult to them after that.'

"Three young men fell in love with them, but unfortunately called on their father to demand them in marriage one Monday morning when the three girls were dressed as boys, and considered as such by their father.