Wandeen and the Bo Bo Dog

Dominion, Volume 23, Issue 75, 21 December 1929, Page 30

Wandeen and the Bo Bo Dog

A VISIT FROM SANTA CLAUS

By

Lauretta Maud Willoughby

For ’‘The Junior Dominion.”

At night the yellow cows and the green pigs, the red horses and the little buff-coloured cats that lived all together in Wandeen’s Noah’s Ark would moo and grunt and neigh and meow so plaintively to stretch their legs that Rabbit would climb out of bed and creep downstairs to let them out.

The cats would purr and thank him and go frisking across the room to play with the tassels of the window-blinds and the dangling fringes. The green pigs would grunt and climb on to the chairs and drink all the water out of the rose-bowl, and the red horses would help themselves to apples and sugar lumps, and the yellow cows to anything that happened to be on the sideboard, while poor Rabbit looked on, trembling a little at their daring and saying, every now and then—

•‘You—you’ll be sure to tell me when your legs feel stretched, won’t you?—because when your legs feel stretched you must go back, you know." Always the animals went back obediently, clambering one after the other into the Ark, with its brick-coloured roof and its little blue oblong windows, and Rabbit would close down the lid and go back to bed.

But to-night, when he asked them, with his polite little voice, to go back they stared at him. The horses with their mouths full of sugar, the pigs across the rose-bowl, the buff-coloured kittens stopped patting the tassels with their paws and looked scornfully at him, and the cows in the dim light looked quite ferocious. "Go back!" echoed a buff - coloured cat. "Go back, indeed, with Christmas happening three days after to-morrow and Santa Claus within walking distance? Dear, no! We’re going down town to see him." "Oh, pl-ease, don’t go to town!’ begged the little Rabbit. "Pl-ease—-pl-ease don’t go to town. You—you'll all get lost or trampled on and Wandeen will never forgive me. Go back, kind animals, to your nice Ark.”* But the red horses had swallowed their last red apple, and the green pigs had jumped down from the table and were scrambling after the yellow cows and the buff-coloured cats through the door. The Rabbit was left alone™ He ran after them.

"Comeback! Come back!” he cried. Tears blinded him and he stumbled out of the gate. "Oh, p-please come back!” He ran through a forest of big dark houses, prickly black hedges, and thick black trees.

Big black dogs with swinging cars rushed barking to their gates. The tails of the buff-coloured cats stood out like bristled brushes with fear and indignation. "Oh, wait!" cried the poor little Rabbit. "Y-you can’t go to town by yourselves. You'll all be arrested by a traffic policeman or r-run over by a crimson omnibus.”

But the yellow cows, snatching at mouthfuls of grass, and the green pigs, pulling greedily at thick green thistles, paid no heed. The red horses did not even turn their heads, and the buff-coloured cats had disappeared around the bend. “H-how f-foolish I was to have ever Llet them out,” he sobbed, holding up his dust-coat and following them as fast as he could. The lights of the town seemed to be coming up the hill to meet him. The wooden rocking-horses and the golliwog dolls came.crowding to the windows of the glittering shops to state at him and to point at the green pigs with their fingers. The little Christmas trees, gay with dazzling tinsel and orange and purple candles, pink celluloid ducks, and goldenpainted ships, trembled in their pots as a yellow cow peered enviously at their laden branches through the glass. Balloons like bubbles blown of deepblue mist hung in clusters above the heads of teddy bears and tiny china tea-sets. A jack-in-the-box peeped over the top of a jade-green bucket, and a clockwork mouse stood on the lid of a doll’s grand piano that stood on the top of a drum. The animais gazed and gazed—and as they gazed little Rabbit tried to count them to see if they were all there. "One, two," he began—"three, four—oh dear, oh dear, I believe I’m counting five with the pig that made three—five, six—please don’t dodge about so, little cats —I’m trying to count you.” But the buff-coloured cats did not want to be counted.

“Oh, come home!” begged the little Rabbit, in despair. "Home!” scoffed a yellow cow looking at an enormous Ark with a henna-painted roof and heliotrope-painted walls. "If we had a nice house like that to live in we might be anxious to go home." "Yes," agreed a red horse, "there would be no fear of waking up with a stiff neck in an Ark like that.” "We live in nothing more than a stuffy

little box,” exclaimed a green pig. "and not if you chase us all night or beg us on your bended knees will we go back to it. No! not until we’ve a beautiful home to go home to like that." And they left the shining window and ran down the shining street. "Oh, p-please, don’t go any further," cried Rabbit—"d-don’t go any further." He dashed after them. He bumped into people carrying bulgy paper parcels and bulky laden baskets. He tripped over people’s feet and trod on their toes. He turned a corner and bumped into a lamp-post — steadied himself and bumped into Santa Claus. • "Oh!" gasped the little Rabbit, "I—--I —” Santa Claus stooped down and helped him on to his feet and brushed a little dust off his dust-coat. Kindliness shone in his eyes, and joy and gentleness. He picked up the little Rabbit and walked to the edge of the pavement. “Are you hurt?" be "No-o, t-thank you,” murmured the little Rabbit—“l—l’m not . hurt, thank you. I was chasing the Ark people. I—" "The Ark people?” repeated Santa Claus. "Y-e-e-s,” he explained; "every evening when the house is quiet I let them out for a little exercise." "How kind!” said Santa Claus. "W-well, they get cramp in their legs, you see—and—and pins and needles, and things like that—l—l can’t bear to hear them cry," sighed Rabbit. "To-night I let them out, but they—they wouldn’t go back. They w-wouldn’t go back,” his eyes brimming with tears.

"They said they were coming to town to—to see you.”

-"Ah!” smiled Santa Claus—"so they wanted to see me?" "Y-e-e-s,” answered the little Rabbit, "they wanted to see you very badly indeed. They want—” "What is it they want?" asked Santa Claus. .

"Oh, dear me!" cried Rabbit, "they want — b-but they may have changed their minds by now—you see, they are always changing their minds—b-but the last thing they wanted was — was an enormous new Ark to live in—so they might go to sleep without twisting their necks or hunching up their knees." "I don’t blame them,” said Santa Claus. "No-o,” Rabbit agreed. "And I—l suppose you wouldn't blame a green pig for saying that he wouldn't go home until he had a nice home to go to." "No," replied Santa Claus, "it sounds quite a reasonable remark to—” There was a loud bellow, a highpitched neigh, and a terrified mew from a buff-coloured cat, as the animals came trundling up the street, driven by an excited policeman. "Ohl" cried Rabbit—"the Ark people —they—they’re being taken to the police station. Save them!: —save them!" “This is very serious," said Santa Claus. And he hurried into the middle of the road. "These animals are under arrest," shouted the policeman, "every coloured one of them. Out of my way. please! I’ll have no interference!" "Excuse me," cried the Rabbit, in dismay—"ex— ’’ "Out of. my way!" yelled the policeman. - ■ .... - - ... - "You’ll excuse ME?" said Santa Claus. "Yes—yes, indeed, yes," nodded the policeman. Santa Claus rested his bag of toys upon the ground and lifted out a huge Ark. “I’m going to, save you a lot of •trouble.” he said, “and I’m going to save your conscience from a lot of pricks, Mr. Policeman.”

“I—l was doing my duty,” stammered the policeman: “they were breaking the windows and eating the decorations.” "No doubt," said Santa Claus: "but it’s Christmas-time—a time we forget and forgive." “It’s—it’s not very easy to forget the horns of cows"—wept-the polieeptan—"or the kicks of horses. I—l’ve been scratched by the cats and trampled by the pigs. Oh, I have a lot to forgive—but it’s a long way to the police station, and what's to stop them from giving me another kick or two? I—l’ve half a mind —yes, I’ve a good mind to —” "Forgive them!" cried the little Rab-bit-—"to forgive them!"

"Yes,” nodded the policeman. Santa Claus opened the Ark and asked the animals to be kind enough to jump in.

The policeman went back to his "I hope you have a Merry Christmas,” called the Rabbit after him. The clocks struck a late hour, and the streets sank into darkness. A little wind that had followed Rabbit all the way dropped down* wearily. "Come home, little Rabbit," said Santa Claus, "come home.” And he ltd him through the sleeping town.