Pippi Goes on Board Page 8

had to do everything that the leader did.

  "Okay," said Pippi. "That sounds like fun, and it would probably

  be best for me to be the leader."

  She began by climbing up on the laundry roof. To get there she

  first had to climb up on the garden fence and then crawl up the roof

  on her stomach. Pippi and Tommy and Annika had done this so often

  that it was easy for them, but the other children thought it was

  rather difficult. The sailors from the Hoptoad were used to climbing

  up the masts, so they made the roof without any trouble, but it was

  quite an ordeal for Captain Longstocking because he was so fat, and

  besides his grass skirt kept getting caught. He panted and puffed as

  he heaved himself up on the roof.

  "This grass skirt will never be the same again," he said sadly.

  From the laundry roof Pippi jumped down to the ground. Some of the

  smaller children didn't dare do this, but Fridolf was so nice that he

  lifted down all those who were afraid to jump. Then Pippi turned six

  somersaults on the lawn. Everyone did the same, but Captain

  Long-stocking said, "Someone will have to give me a push from behind,

  or I'll never be able to do it."

  Pippi did. She gave him such a big push that once he got started

  he couldn't stop, but rolled like a ball across the lawn and turned

  fourteen somersaults instead of six.

  Then Pippi rushed up the porch steps and into Villa Villekulla,

  climbed out through a window, and, by spreading her legs far apart

  managed to reach a ladder that stood outside. She ran quickly up the

  ladder, jumped onto the roof of Villa Villekulla, ran along the

  ridgepole, jumped up onto the chimney, stood on one leg and crowed

  like a rooster, threw herself down head first into a tree that stood

  near the corner of the house, slid down to the ground, rushed into

  the woodshed, took an ax and chopped a board out of the wall, crept

  through the narrow opening, jumped up on the garden fence, walked

  along the fence for fifty yards, climbed up into an oak, and sat down

  to rest at the very top of the tree.

  Quite a crowd had gathered in the street outside Villa Villekulla,

  and when the people went home they told everyone that they had seen a

  cannibal king standing on one leg on the chimney of Villa Villekulla,

  crowing "Cock-a-doodle-do!" so that you could hear it far and wide.

  Of course no one believed them.

  When Captain Longstocking tried to squeeze himself through the

  narrow opening in the woodshed, the inevitable happened-he stuck and

  couldn't get either out or in. This, of course, broke up the game and

  all the children stood around, watching Fridolf cut Captain

  Longstocking out of the wall.

  "That was a mighty good game," said Captain Long- stocking,

  laughing, when he was free at last. "What are we going to play

  next?"

  "In the good old days on the ship," said Fridolf, "Captain

  Longstocking and Pippi used to have a contest to see which was the

  strongest. It was a lot of fun to watch them."

  "That's a good idea," said Captain Longstocking, "but the trouble

  is that my daughter is getting to be stronger than I."

  Tommy was standing next to Pippi. "Pippi," he whispered, "I was so

  afraid you would climb down into our hiding place in the hollow oak

  when you played Follow the Leader, for I don't want anyone to find

  out about it, even if we never go there again."

  "No, that's our own secret," said Pippi.

  Her father took hold of an iron rod and bent it in the middle as

  if it were made of wax. Pippi took another iron rod and did the

  same.

  "Fiddlesticks!" said Pippi. "I used to amuse myself with these

  simple tricks when I was still in the cradle, just to pass the time

  away."

  Captain Longstocking then lifted off the kitchen door. Fridolf and

  seven of the other sailors stood on the door, and Captain

  Longstocking lifted them high into the air and carried them around

  the lawn ten times.

  It was now quite dark, and Pippi lighted torches here and there.

  They looked very pretty cast a magic glow over the garden.

  "Are you ready?" she said to her father after the tenth trip

  around the garden. He was.

  Then Pippi put the horse on the kitchen door and told Fridolf and

  three other sailors to get on the horse. Each of the sailors held two

  children in htheir arms Fridolf held Tommy and Annika. Then Pippi

  lifted the door and carried it around the lawn twenty-five times. It

  looked splendid in the light of the torches.

  "Well, child, you certainly are stronger than I," said Captain

  Longstocking.

  Afterward everyone sat down on the lawn. Fridolf played his

  accordion and all the other sailors sang the prettiest chanties. The

  children danced to the music. Pippi took two torches in her hands and

  danced more wildly than anyone else.

  The party ended with fireworks. Pippi got lots of rockets and

  pinwheels that lighted up the whole sky. Annika sat on the porch and

  looked on. It was so beautiful, so lovely! She couldn't see the

  roses, but she smelled their fragrance in the dark. How wonderful

  everything would have been if-if-Annika felt as if a cold hand were

  grip ping her heart. Tomorrow-how would it be then, and the whole

  summer vacation, and forever? There would be no more Pippi in Villa

  Villekulla, there would be no Mr. Nilsson, and no horse would stand

  on the porch. No more horseback rides, no more picnics with Pippi, no

  more cozy evenings in the kitchen at Villa Villekulla, no tree with

  soda pop growing in it-well, the tree would of course still be there,

  but Annika had a strong feeling that no more soda pop would grow

  there when Pippi was gone. What would Tommy and she do tomorrow? Play

  croquet, probably. Annika sighed.

  The party was over. All the children thanked Pippi and said

  goodnight. Captain Longstocking went back to the Hoptoad with his

  sailors. He thought that Pippi might just as well come along with

  them, but Pippi wanted to sleep one more night in Villa

  Villekulla.

  "Tomorrow at ten we weigh anchor. Don't forget," cried Captain

  Longstocking as he left.

  Pippi, Tommy, and Annika were alone. They sat on the porch steps

  in the dark, perfectly quiet.

  "You can come here and play, anyway," said Pippi at last. "The key

  will be hanging on a nail beside the door. You can take everything in

  the chest drawers, and if I put a ladder inside the oak you can climb

  down there yourselves, but perhaps there won't be so many soda pops

  growing there-it's not the season for them now."

  "No, Pippi," said Tommy seriously, "we won't come here any

  more."

  "No, never, never," said Annika, and she thought that in the

  future she would close her eyes every time she passed Villa

  Villekulla. Villa Villekulla without Pippi -Annika felt that cold

  hand around her heart again.

  9.

  Pippi Goes Aboard

  PIPPI locked the door of Villa Villekulla carefully and hung the

  key on a nail beside the door; then she lifted the h
orse down from

  the porch-for the last time, she lifted him down from the porch. Mr.

  Nilsson already sat on her shoulder, looking important. He probably

  understood that something special was going to happen.

  "Well, I guess that's all," said Pippi.

  Tommy and Annika nodded. "Yes, I guess it is."

  "It's still early," said Pippi. "Let's walk; that will take

  longer."

  Tommy and Annika nodded again, but they didn't say anything. Then

  they started walking toward the town, toward the harbor, toward the

  Hoptoad. The horse jogged slowly along behind them.

  Pippi glanced over her shoulder at Villa Villekulla. "Nice little

  place," she said. "No fleas, clean and comfortable, and that's

  probably more than you can say about the clay hut where I'll be

  living in the future." Tommy and Annika said nothing. "If there are

  an awful lot of fleas in my hut," continued Pippi, "I'll train them

  and keep them in a cigar box and play Run, Sheep, Run with them at

  night. I'll tie little bows around their legs, and the two most

  faithful and affectionate fleas I will call Tommy and Annika, and

  they shall sleep with me at night."

  Not even this could make Tommy and Annika more talkative.

  "What on earth is wrong with you?" asked Pippi irritably. "I tell

  you it's dangerous to keep quiet too long. Tongues dry up if you

  don't use them. In Calcutta I once knew a potter who never said a

  word. And once when he wanted to say to me, 'Good-by, dear Pippi,

  happy journey and thanks for your visit,' he opened his mouth and can

  you guess what he said? First he made some horrible faces, for the

  hinges to his mouth had rusted and I had to grease them for him with

  a little sewing-machine oil, and then a sound came out: 'U buy uye

  muy.' I looked in his mouth, and, imagine! there lay his tongue like

  a little wilted leaf, and as long as he lived that potter could never

  say anything but 'U buy uye muy.' It would be awful if the same thing

  should happen to you. Let me see if you can say this better than the

  potter did: 'Happy journey, dear Pippi, and thanks for your visit.'

  Go on try it."

  "Happy journey, dear Pippi, and thanks for your visit," said Tommy

  and Annika obediently.

  "Thank goodness for that," said Pippi. "You certainly gave me a

  scare. If you had said U buy uye muy' I don't know what I would have

  done."

  There was the harbor, there lay the Hoptoad. Captain Longstocking

  stood on deck, shouting out his commands, the sailors ran back and

  forth to make everything ready for their departure. All the people in

  the little town had crowded on the dock to wave good-by to Pippi, and

  here she came with Tommy and Annika and the horse and Mr.

  Nilsson.

  "Here comes Pippi Longstocking! Make way for Pippi Longstocking!"

  cried the crowd and made a path for Pippi to come through.

  Pippi nodded and smiled to the left and the right. Then she took

  up the horse and carried him up the gangplank. The poor animal looked

  around suspiciously, for horses don't care very much for boat

  rides.

  "Well, here you are, my beloved child!" called Captain

  Longstocking and broke off in the middle of a command to embrace

  Pippi. He folded her in his arms, and they hugged each other until

  their ribs cracked.

  Annika had gone around with a lump in her throat all morning, and

  when she saw Pippi lift the horse aboard, the lump loosened. She

  began to cry as she stood there squeezed against a packing case on

  the dock, first quietly and then more and more desperately.

  "Don't bawl!" said Tommy angrily. "You'll shame us in front of all

  the people here."

  The result of this was only to make Annika burst out in a regular

  torrent of tears. She cried so that she shook. Tommy kicked a stone

  so that it rolled across the dock and fell into the water. He really

  would have liked to throw it at the Hoptoad-that mean old boat that

  was going to take Pippi away from them. Really, if no one had been

  looking, Tommy would have liked to cry also, but a boy just couldn't

  let people see him cry. He kicked away another stone.

  Pippi came running down the gangplank and rushed over to Tommy and

  Annika. She took their hands in hers. "Ten minutes left," she

  said.

  Then Annika threw herself across tibe packing case and cried as if

  her heart would break. There were no more stones for Tommy to kick,

  so he clenched his teeth and looked murderous.

  All the children in the little town gathered around Pippi. They

  took out their bird whistles and blew a farewell tune for her. It

  sounded sad beyond words, for it was a very, very mournful tune.

  Annika was crying so hard that she could hardly catch her breath.

  Just then Tommy remembered that he had written a farewell poem for

  Pippi and he pulled out a paper and began to read. It was terrible

  that his voice should shake so.

  "Good-by, dear Pippi, you from us go. You may look high and you

  may look low, But never will you find friends so true As those who

  now say good-by to you."

  "It really rhymed, all of it," said Pippi happily. "I'll learn it

  by heart and recite it for the natives when we sit around the

  campfires at night."

  The children crowded in from all directions to say good-by to

  Pippi. She raised her hand and asked them to be quiet.

  "Children," she said, "hereafter I'll only have little natives to

  play with. I don't know how we'll amuse ourselves; perhaps we'll play

  ball with wild rhinoceroses, and charm snakes, and ride on elephants,

  and have a swing in the coconut palm outside the door. We'll always

  manage to pass the time some way or another." Pippi paused. Both

  Tommy and Annika felt that they hated those native children Pippi

  would play with in the future.

  "But," continued Pippi, "perhaps a day will come during the rainy

  season, a long and dreary day-for even if it is fun to run around

  without your clothes on a rainy day, you can't do more than get wet,

  and when we have got good and wet, perhaps we'll crawl into my native

  clay hut, unless the whole hut has become a mud pile, in which case,

  of course, we'll make mud pies. But if the clay hut is still a clay

  hut, perhaps we'll crawl in there, and the native children will say,

  'Pippi, please tell us a story.' And then I will tell them about a

  little town which lies far, far away in another part of the world,

  and about the children who live there. 'You can't imagine what nice

  kids live there,' I'll say to the native children 'They blow bird

  whistles, and, best of all, they know pluttification.' But then

  perhaps the little native children will become absolutely desperate

  because they don't know any pluttification, and then what shall I do

  with them? Well, if worst comes to worst, I'll take the clay hut to

  pieces and make a mud pile out of it, and then we'll bake mud pies

  and dig ourselves down into the mud way up to our necks. Then it

  would be strange if I couldn't get them to think about something else

  besides pluttificatio
n. Thanks, all of you, and good-by so much!"

  The children blew a still sadder tune on their bird whistles.

  "Pippi, it's time to come aboard," called Captain

  Longstocking.

  "Aye, aye, Captain," called Pippi. She turned to Tommy and Annika.

  She looked at them.

  How strange her eyes look! thought Tommy his mother had looked

  just like that once when Tommy had been very, very ill.

  Annika lay in a little heap on the packing case Pippi lifted her

  in her arms. "Good-by, Annika, good-by " he whispered. "Don't

  cry."

  Annika threw her arms around Pippi's neck and cried a mournful

  little cry. "Good-by, Pippi"  sobbed.

  Pippi took Tommy's hand and squeezed it hard Thenshe ran up the

  gangplank. A big tear rolled down Tommy's nose. He clenched his

  teeth, but that didn't help; another tear came. He took Annika's

  hand, and they stood there and gazed after Pippi. They could see her

  up on deck, but it is always a little hazy when you try to look

  through tears.

  "Three cheers for Pippi Longstocking!" cried the people on the

  dock.

  "Pull in the gangplank, Fridolf," cried Captain Long- stocking.

  Fridolf did. The Hoptoad was ready for her journey to foreign

  lands.

  Then- "No, Papa Efraim," cried Pippi, "I can't do it, I just can't

  bear to do it!"

  "What is it you can't bear to do?" asked Captain Longstocking.

  "I can't bear to see anyone on God's green earth crying and being

  sorry on account of me-least of all Tommy and Annika. Put out the

  gangplank again. I'm staying in Villa Villekulla."

  Captain Longstocking stood silent for a minute. "Do as you like,"

  he said at last. "You always have done that."

  Pippi nodded. "Yes, I've always done that," she said quietly.

  They hugged each other again, Pippi and her father, so hard that

  their ribs cracked, and they decided that Captain Longstocking should

  come very often to see Pippi in Villa Villekulla.

  "You know, Papa Efraim," said Pippi, "I think it's best for a

  child to have a decent home and not sail around on the sea so much

  and live in native clay huts-don't you think so too?"

  "You're right, as always, my daughter," answered Captain

  Longstocking. "It is certain that you live a more orderly life in

  Villa Villekulla, and that is probably best for little children."

  "Just so," said Pippi. "It's surely best for little children to

  live an orderly life, especially if they can order it

  themselves."

  Pippi said good-by to the sailors on the Hoptoad and hugged her

  Papa Efraim once more. Then she lifted her horse in her strong arms

  and carried him back over the gangplank. The Hoptoad weighed anchor,

  but at the last minute Captain Longstocking remembered something.

  "Pippi!" he cried. "You may need some more gold coins. Here, catch

  this!"

  Then he threw a new suitcase full of gold coins to Pippi, but

  unfortunately the Hoptoad had got too far away, and the suitcase

  didn't reach the dock. Plop! Plop! f The bag sank. A murmur of dismay

  went through the crowd, but then there was another plop! It was Pippi

  diving off the dock. In a few seconds she came up with the suitcase

  in her teeth. Climbing up on the dock, she brushed away a bit of

  seaweed that was caught behind her ear.

  "Well, now I'm as rich as a troll again," she said.

  Things had happened so quickly that Tommy and Annika were

  bewildered. They stood with wide open mouths and stared at Pippi and

  the horse and Mr. Nilsson and the suitcase of gold coins, and the

  Hoptoad in full sail, leaving the harbor.

  "Aren't you-aren't you on the boat?" asked Tommy, unable to

  believe his eyes.

  "Make three guesses," said Pippi and wrung the water out of her

  braids.

  She lifted Tommy and Annika, the suitcase, and Mr. Nilsson all up