CHAPTER XIV.INSIDE A CROCODILE
COPPERTOP had travelled many miles, and was growing very tired, when she remembered that she was on an island, and therefore must be going round and round in her search for the crocodile.
And now the question arose as to which was chasing which.
“I can’t be running after him and away from him at the same time, can I?” she exclaimed.
“Was that question addressed to me?” chirped a small blue bird, from the branch of a baobab tree.
“Oh, yes, if you like,” said Coppertop, not at all surprised to be conversing with a strange bird; nothing surprised her now. “If only I had brought Pudgy with me, instead of Miss Smiler,” she mused, “he would have been able to tell me!”
“Who is Pudgy?” asked the Bird, who was very curious.
“Why, my little bronze Golliwog, of course.”
“Golliwog! Golliwog!” exclaimed the Bird, putting his little blue head first on one side and then on the other. “Never tasted Golliwog! Don’t suppose it grows in these parts.”
“It isn’t to eat!” cried Coppertop, glancing nervously behind her as she hurried along.
“Not to EAT! Then what’s the use of it? Everything is to eat here, and everything eats everything else,” explained the Bird, “until there’s nothing else left to eat anything else!”
“What happens then?”
“Then! Oh, then we turn back and start the other way,” chirped the Bird, with an air of great wisdom.
But Coppertop found this more puzzling than the question as to which was being chased, she or the crocodile.
“Which is what you’d better do,” continued the Bird.
“Which—what?” asked the child, very much confused.
“Why, you’d better turn round and go the other way,” said the Bird.
“And meet the crocodile face to face! Thank you very much, but I’d rather not!” replied Coppertop with decision.
“Well, it’s the only way!” cried the Bird, with a shrug of his wings, “otherwise you and the crocodile will go round and round for ever! And that’s an awful long time.”
“I have it!” exclaimed Coppertop; “I’ll fly across the island and catch the crocodile in the flank!”
“Oh, yes!” said the Bird, but he didn’t really understand, and she couldn’t wait to explain any further.
So, spreading her wings, she flew across the island.
When she reached the other side an unexpected sight met her eyes!
Close by the water’s edge lay the crocodile, motionless as a rock. Its tail was still in the water, as though it had fallen asleep in the very act of crawling out.
“It looks very much like Mrs. Grudge!” thought the child. “Just her expression—especially about the teeth! I wonder if it IS Mrs. Grudge! It might be, in a kind of way.”
Coppertop flew nearer. “Is it asleep, or only pretending?” she muttered, and breaking off a large twig, she threw it at the monster. But he never stirred.
Then she came to the ground, and, picking up a large stone, she flew up with it and dropped it on to his forehead. But still he never moved an eyelid.
Perhaps he was only pretending, and would snap at her suddenly, as soon as she was within reach. But in spite of her fears she flew down and touched him with a trembling finger.
Nothing happened.
Growing bolder, she crept up and placed her ear against his side, and listened.
As she did so she heard a small voice say, “Wake up! Wake up, Kiddi! Something has happened! I can’t hear the old chap’s heart beating at all! And we’ve come to a full stop!”
“’Es, so we must have!” she heard Kiddiwee say, sleepily.
“Isn’t he simply too dear for words?” she cried out, forgetting the crocodile in her excitement. “I shall almost squeedge him to nothing when I see him. But how shall I let them know I’m here?”
With a trembling hand, she tapped three times on the side of the crusty, carnivorous crocodile. And, to her joy, she heard a faint tap, tap, tap, in reply.
“But that’s not much use unless they can find a way out, is it?” thought Coppertop.
She studied the crocodile carefully to find some way of escape for them. She noticed that there was a board fastened on to its back, upon which was written—
“GOOD ACCOMMODATION WITHIN!”
“That’s rather unusual!” exclaimed Coppertop.
“Not at all!” chirped the Bird. “It’s done to attract the young monkeys.”
“Well, it’s not the sort of place I should like to stay at!”
“You can’t help staying, once you’re there!” explained the Bird.
“No, I s’pose not! But it’s horrid of you to say so, when I’ve two brothers inside!”
“Cannibal!” shrieked the Bird, glancing at her disdainfully.
“Inside the crocodile, I mean!” cried Coppertop. “How stupid you are!”
And the Bird looked reassured.
“Well, the front door is closed,” he observed, after hopping round looking closely at the monster’s head.
“Yes, it is!” agreed Coppertop, in a depressed tone. Then she said, “Do you happen to remember any funny stories?”
“Why?” asked the Bird.
“Because if you do, tell one to the crocodile, and when he smiles my brothers can just hop out!”
“The only one I know was told me by a bear who had once been in a thing he called a circus.”
“Say it all in a loud voice,” interrupted Coppertop, “so that the crocodile can hear!”
“The man thing who looks after the animals,” began the Bird, chirping his loudest.
“You mean the Keeper!”
“Yes, the Keepit!” corrected the Bird, flurried by the interruption. “The Keepit man thing had to give the bear a powder. And so he put it in a long tube, and he put one end in the bear’s mouth and the other end in his own, ready to blow it down the bear’s throat. But the bear blew first!”
They both waited anxiously for the smile on the face of the crocodile. But it never came.
“I believe the joke has killed him—it’s a very old one,” said Coppertop. But she was sorry afterwards, as the poor Bird looked so very crestfallen.
“We’ll soon see!” he cried. And flying down, he perched upon the crocodile’s eyelid and pecked at it.
But it never flickered.
“Dead! Dead as a stone!” he remarked. And bursting into tears, he flew away, sadly twittering.
After he had gone, Coppertop sat wondering how she was to release Tibbs and Kiddiwee, when she saw a sharp-pointed stone lying near her feet.
“Why, it’s the very thing!” she exclaimed. “I’ll make a hole in the old reptile with this, and then they can crawl through.”
So saying, she set to work, and quickly removed a piece of his hard, leathery skin.
The hole was certainly not much larger than a penny, when to her surprise she saw the head and shoulders of Tibbs through the opening, and then Kiddiwee. The next moment they both flew out and rushed towards her, trying to throw their tiny arms round her neck.
Of course she was overjoyed to see them. But what had happened? They were no larger than dragon-flies.
Then she remembered all she had seen from Waomba’s arms—how the Mist Maidens had kissed them till they grew smaller and smaller and floated down like leaves on to the island.
“It was all the fault of those stupid Maidens!” apologised Tibbs, as soon as the excitement of their greeting was over. “They would keep on kissing us! And it made us feel small! And, of course, when you feel small, I suppose you become so!”
“Never mind,” said their sister, soothingly, as she snuggled them under her chin against her warm neck.
“Hurry up, my dears!” cried a voice near by, “or you’ll miss the East Wind, too.”
“Why, it’s old Mr. Atom!” cried Tibbs, in surprise.
“Where? Oh, where?” said Kiddiwee.
“There, sitting on that spider web,” replied Tibbs. “See!”
“I can’t see him,” said Coppertop, who was too large. “But I do believe I had forgotten all about the East Wind. Do let us hurry.”
“You mean the West Wind,” corrected Tibbs.
“No, I don’t. It’s the East Wind we’ve to find now. Isn’t it, Mr. Atom?”
“That’s so,” he replied. “And you’d better look sharp about it. But you two boys aren’t much use that size, are you? On the bank of the river you will find growing a fruit called the mabola. It is like a strawberry. Eat it, and you’ll soon be your natural size. Ta-ta!” And before they could thank him he had disappeared.
“He’s a dear!” cried Coppertop. “But I do wish he wasn’t so small.”
Quicker than words can tell, the little party flew across the river. And they had no trouble in finding the berry which Mr. Atom had described.
Tibbs tasted it, and immediately he began to grow.
“It’s scrumptious!” he cried, eating more and more as his mouth grew larger. Kiddiwee did likewise, and in less than no time they were restored to their right size.
Coppertop gave a little sigh. They couldn’t nestle against her neck any more, now.
“Oh, dear!” she thought. “I suppose it’s terrifikly greedy, but I did love them being so small and cuddly.”