The Story of Freginald (7 page)

CHAPTER 6

For the next hour the two prisoners were left alone. Leo paced back and forth, swishing his tail irritably and muttering angrily under his breath. Every time he came near the door the two guards lowered their horns menacingly.

Freginald was rather cross with Leo. It seemed to him that a good deal of planning was to be done if they were to escape. But the lion couldn't seem to think of anything but the remark the bull had made about him. “Dog!” he growled. “Calling me a dog. Me that's taunted elephants and bearded the rhinoceros in his den. Me whose roar was making the jungle tremble with fear when he was just a blatting calf.”

So Freginald tried to do some planning by himself. It seemed to him that the only possible thing to do was to try to let Mr. Boomschmidt know where they were. If he could persuade someone to carry a message—perhaps a bird. He could hear birds on the roof and in the trees outside.

In a dark corner of the barn was a ladder leading up into the hayloft. If he could get up there, perhaps there would be holes in the roof through which he could talk to the birds without being overheard. He started for the ladder when an exclamation from Leo made him turn his head. The guards at the door were standing at attention. And then between them a small important-looking figure marched into the barn.

It was a very slick and dapper rooster. “Morning, gentlemen,” he said, with a brisk nod. “Quite comfortable, I hope? Yes, yes.” He held up a claw as Leo started to say something. “I quite understand. Most unfortunate, the whole occurrence. No one, I assure you, regrets it more than I do. However, the captain has asked me to come lay our proposition before you. Will you sit down, please?”

“Now, gentlemen,” he said, “here is the situation. To make it quite clear, I must go back a few years. Seventy-odd, to be exact. At that time this was a prosperous plantation owned by Colonel Jefferson Bird Yancey. Then war broke out between the North and South. Colonel Yancey marched off at the head of his regiment. He was gone a year, two years. Nothing was heard from him. His slaves drifted away. Finally only the farm animals were left.

“Well, they had all been fond of Colonel Yancey. They carried on as best they could. After a while they heard rumors that Colonel Yancey had been killed in battle. Later there were other rumors—that peace had been made; that the South had been defeated. Meanwhile most of the neighbors had moved away. Trees and brush grew up about the neglected plantation, whose very existence was forgotten.

“But the animals were pleased to be cut off from the world. They hated the Yankees who had brought ruin to their master and his friends. And at last, at a historic meeting which took place in this very barn, they formally swore undying allegiance to the Confederacy and agreed to defend this plantation, the last unconquered territory of the C. S. A., even from the armed forces of the Federal Government.

“Well, gentlemen, the animals who made that compact are all dead. But their children's children still hold to the very letter of it. I am proud to say that it was my great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather who raised his venerated bill and led his comrades in the long Rebel yell which ratified the agreement. Ah, sirs, that was a truly great day for our beloved Southland.”

He covered his eyes for a moment with one claw. Then he said: “Forgive me, gentlemen, if I am deeply moved. Though I have heard that tale a thousand times, my fiery Southern blood thrills anew at each rendition. Ah, of what chivalries, of what tendernesses, are we of the South not capable! But there; our knightliness is too well known to the world to need further advertisement from me. But let me say this: from that day to this no blue-coated Yankee soldier has ever set foot on this land.”

“They don't wear blue any more,” said Freginald.

“I was speaking metaphorically, suh,” said the rooster with dignity.

“He means he's just sounding off,” said Leo, who was getting tired of their visitor's oratory. “Look, rooster, when are we going to be let out of here?”

“I am commissioned by the captain, whom you have already seen—” began the rooster.

“That old bull?” asked Leo.

“The bull, yes. He offers you this choice: to join our band, or to remain our prisoners.”

“You mean we can't go back to Mr. Boomschmidt?” Freginald asked.

“Precisely,” said the rooster. “If you join us, you will swear allegiance to the Confederacy. You will agree to become members of our band, and to obey our captain's orders. If you refuse, you will remain under guard until you change your minds.”

“I don't call that much of a choice,” said Leo. “See here, I'm not a Northerner, I came from Africa. You've no reason to pick on me.”

“Indeed?” said the rooster. “Our slaves were from Africa, you know. H'm, I shall have to speak to the captain about that.”

“Slaves!” the lion exclaimed, with a sudden roar. “You think I'm going to be a slave to a moth-eaten bull and a silly, strutting little bug-eater like you? You think—”

“Wait a minute, Leo,” Freginald put a restraining paw on his friend's shoulder. The rooster, with an excited squawk had fluttered backward through the doorway, where the guards' lowered horns closed in front of him. “You can't blame Leo for roaring at you,” he said. “That slave talk is all nonsense. But I want to ask a question or two. Can we have a little time to think over your proposition?”

“A year if you want to,” said the rooster. “Or ten. You'll just be kept here till you agree.”

“And if we join your band, what will we have to do? I mean, how do you live? You can't raise corn and oats and so on, yourselves.”

“Naturally, we don't. We raid the enemy, suh. We cross into Federal territory and take whatever we need—by force, if necessary.”

“I see,” said Freginald. “Well, thank you. We'll think it over and let you know.”

“Raid into Federal territory indeed!” said Leo when the rooster had gone. “That's somewhere off the plantation. They're just a gang of robbers.”

“Sure they are,” said Freginald. “But look here, Leo. You keep the guards amused for a while. I'm going up into the loft and see if I can't make a deal with some bird to take a message to Mr. Boomschmidt.”

He went up the ladder as quietly as he could, and sure enough, there were a dozen big holes in the roof. He poked his head through one, and there at the edge of the roof stood a wren with a piece of straw in his beak.

“Hi, wren,” said Freginald.

“Well, well, bear,” said the wren. “I saw 'em bringing you in. Too bad. I bet you wish you were back with your circus.”

“Oh, so you know about the circus?” said Freginald.

“Oh, I get around.”

“Are you a Confederate, too?” the bear asked.

“Well, yes and no,” said the wren. “You see, I spend the winters in South America, and if I were to say down there that I was a citizen of the C. S. A. they wouldn't know what I was talking about. While if I say I am a citizen of the United States, I get more respect and consideration.”

“Oh, that's fine,” said Freginald. “Now look, I want—”

“Stop right there,” said the wren. “I know what you're going to say. You're going to ask me to take a message to Mr. Boomschmidt. Well, it can't be done. I'm too busy. I've got a nest to build, bear. I can't take time off to go tearing around the country playing postman every few minutes.”

“Why, that's just silly,” said Freginald. “You'd be back in a couple of hours. The circus hasn't got far away.”

“Yes, and what will my wife say if I go gallivanting off and the floor not even done yet?”

“Mr. Boomschmidt will give you anything you want. Pounds and pounds of corn meal, enough to last all summer. Or ribbons for your nest—”

The wren shook his head. “The old house is full of stuff to build with. And we get all we want to eat from the captain. He sees to it that the birds get their share of everything.”

“Ah, you're afraid of your old captain. That's it,” said Freginald. “Hool Afraid of an old bull. Well, what a scairt cat you turned out to be!”

“Oh, you can't get me that way,” said the wren. “Sure, I'm afraid. Nope, you'd better apply elsewhere.”

“Oh dear,” said Freginald. “Well, I guess that's that. But you don't mind just talking to me a little, do you? Leo's in such a bad temper, and I do enjoy a little conversation.”

“Not at all,” said the wren. “I suppose you're going to try some other way now, to fool me into taking a message. Well, go ahead. If you can kid me into doing anything, why, you're welcome.” He laughed his sly little rippling laugh. “As if anybody could fool a wren! But,” he said, “I would like to know about your circus.”

So Freginald told the wren about life on the road, and what all the different animals did. The wren was interested and asked very intelligent questions. But finally Freginald brought the talk around to nestbuilding. So the wren told him what materials were used and how they were woven together. And finally Freginald said: “This is all extremely interesting to me. By the way, did you ever hear of the African dip-dip?”

“I can't say that I have,” said the wren.

“He's a bird,” said Freginald, “that's about your size. Only his coloring is very bright—red and blue and yellow—Forgive me,” he said as the wren glanced down at his own dull and dowdy plumage rather sourly, “I wasn't making comparisons. We can't all be beautiful, like the dip-dip. I myself have often wished I could wear a tiger skin instead of this ragged, rusty old coat. However, I was thinking of the dip-dip because he builds a nest much like yours. Only he builds it—will you believe me?-of nothing but those long coarse hairs from the lion's mane.”

“Really,” said the wren.

“Yes indeed,” said Freginald. “Wear like iron, you know. I've seen dip-dip nests that were twenty years old and as good as the day they were made.”

“That animal with you is a lion, isn't he?” asked the wren.

“Yes, but, boy, how he cherishes that mane! None of our dip-dips get any building material from him. Uh, uh; not Leo. He says it's nothing in his life what color their children grow up to be.”

“Color?” asked the wren. “What's that got to do with it?”

“Oh, I forgot,” said Freginald. “Why, I don't think there's any truth in it, but the dip-dips claim that children reared in a nest made of lion's hair are much brighter colored. Doesn't sound reasonable, though, does it?”

“Well, I don't know,” said the wren. “Look, do you suppose that lion—”

“No, no. Not a chance,” said Freginald quickly. “Pshaw, I'm sorry I spoke of it. Why, Leo'd go to the rack before he'd let you touch a hair of that mane.”

“I don't care for myself,” said the wren. “But I do like the children to have all the advantages I can give them. And while up here it doesn't matter so much, down in South America in the winter there are so many bright birds—toucans and parrots and humming-birds—well, you just can't get anywhere socially unless you are noticed. The children we raised last year, now—they were bright enough, goodness knows, but it's no good being bright inside if you aren't bright outside.”

“Fine feathers make fine birds,” said Freginald solemnly. “True enough, I'm afraid. I've seen the same thing so often in the circus. We have an ostrich—”

“Excuse me,” said the wren, “but to go back to your lion. Don't you suppose you could persuade him to spare a few hairs? It wouldn't take many.”

“You put me in a very embarrassing position,” said Freginald. “It's true, it's just barely possible that later on, when we have joined the band and he's less upset about things—”

“You intend to join, then?” interrupted the wren.

“What else can we do? Well, as I say, later you might approach him about it. But right now, when he's so angry—why, I wouldn't dare even mention it to him.”