Freddy and Simon the Dictator (17 page)

Most of the animals who had besieged the pig pen had run away but the dogs had rounded up half a dozen cows, and there were as many wolves who were too exhausted to run. “If we let 'em go,” Freddy said, “we'll just have to fight 'em all over again. I bet Mr. Camphor would let us have his garage and stable—it's a big place and built of stone. Make a swell prison. Come on, you wolves. Up on your legs. We're going for a walk.”

It took them two hours to get to Mr. Camphor's. None of the wolves was seriously injured; they were worn-out rather than badly bitten; and the cows had had their ankles nipped until they had to hobble. As they stumbled through the gate, Mr. Camphor and his guests came out on the terrace to meet them.

“Goodness me,” said Mr. Camphor, “look at all the dogs. You going hunting, Freddy?”

“We've been,” said the pig, and explained.

Mr. Camphor said, of course, they could use the garage. “I'd like to move Simon out there too. We're pretty sick of his raving and threatening and calling names, and the only way we can stop him is to make him seasick—and that's sort of cruel. Out there, he can talk his head off, and we'll let his friends suffer.”

But when they went into the drawing room, Simon was gone, cage and all.

Nobody knew anything about it. Nobody had been in the room that morning; most of Mr. Camphor's involuntary guests avoided it, since they were tired of the rat's mingled threats and pleadings. Only Miss Anguish spent some time there; she said he was such an interesting conversationalist. But, of course, nobody could ever figure out what her idea of conversation was.

Freddy at first was inclined to suspect Miss Anguish. He thought that if in exchange for helping him to escape, Simon had promised her a high position in the new government, she might have released him. Or he might have promised her a new car; or a canary in a cage. There was no telling what kind of a bribe might have taken her fancy. But, presently, he had news that turned his suspicions in another direction.

Jacob and the five wasps who had been left to guard Mr. Garble came flying in to report that their prisoner had escaped. “We ought to have guessed what he was up to, Freddy. He had a pocketful of these cigars he smokes—I don't know the name of 'em and don't want to, they smell like burning rubber even before he lights 'em. Well, he started to smoke six of 'em at once—lit 'em all and then took a couple of fast puffs on each one. Boy, what a smell!

“We didn't do anything; if he wanted to poison himself, it was O.K. with us. But pretty soon, we began to get kind of groggy ourselves. And by then, it was too late. We passed out, Freddy. And when we came to—no Garble, no cigars, nothing but an awful smell. He'd forced up the window and got away.

“Gosh, Freddy, I'm awful sorry. But who could have suspected anything like that?”

“Nobody,” Freddy said. “You weren't to blame. He just outsmarted us. He probably got in touch with Ezra or Zeke and came up here and cut Simon down. Anybody could walk in after all the folks had gone to bed. We ought to have had a guard on him.”

For the next few days, nothing was heard of Mr. Garble and Simon. Mr. Garble would not have dared return to Mrs. Underdunk's, where he made his home, for a warrant was out for his arrest on the charge of attempting to overthrow the government. The order was out, too, to shoot Simon at sight. In the meantime, animals and farmers fought a guerrilla warfare over the countryside; farms were freed, and retaken; the Macy farm changed hands five times in one night. But whenever one of the dog regiments met a band of the wild northern horses and cattle, it was the dogs who won. And nearly all the wolves had disappeared. That one fight at the pig pen had been enough for them. Freddy felt sure that it was organizing the loyal dogs that had broken the back of the revolution.

Every day, more of the domestic animals, who in the first days had enthusiastically joined the revolutionists, gave themselves up and asked to be taken back by their human masters. Even the rabbits, now that they were no longer kept continually stirred up by Simon's speeches at the Grimby house, began to think that the dictatorship of a rat wasn't going to be much of an improvement on their old way of life. A number of them threw stones at Jinx—who they, of course, supposed was still managing the Bean farm for Simon.

If it was the fight with the dogs which had discouraged the wolves, and to a lesser extent the tough northern cows and horses, it was the “votes for animals” movement which had influenced many of the animals from local farms to abandon the revolutionists and return to their homes. A very short experience under a dictatorship had shown them how little freedom they could expect, and the thought of being able to vote for a candidate of their own choosing was very pleasing to them. Several delegations called secretly on Mr. Camphor and pledged their aid in case he should run for governor.

But although farms had been liberated, not all the exiled farmers had returned to their homes, and many farms were still run by the rebel animals. Jinx no longer pretended to run the Bean farm; now that Simon and Mr. Garble had escaped, both he and Freddy had been unmasked, and knew that their lives were in danger. For bands of revolutionists still roamed the countryside, and the A.B.I. reported that there were still heavy concentrations of the enemy in the woods to the west of the lake.

One evening after supper, Freddy was sitting at his typewriter in the pig pen, deep in composition of a poem entitled
The Charge of the Dog Brigade
. This effusion was to commemorate the famous fight at the pig pen, and more particularly, of course, Freddy's gallant leadership of the charge. For he had very prudently told nobody that it was a slip of the foot, and not a sudden gallant and fearless impulse, that had started him charging down that hill in the teeth of the enemy.

Half a field, half a field,

Half a field onward,

Down to brave Freddy's pen

Tore the one hundred
.

“
Forward the Dog Brigade
!

Charge!” gallant Freddy said
.

Into the valley of death

Rode the one hundred
.

Wolves to the right of them,

Cows to the left of them,

Horses in front of them

Hollered and thundered
;

Struck at with iron shoes,

Yelled at with howls and moos,

Into the jaws of death

Charged the one hundred
.

He had got this far when, at a light tap on the door, he looked out of the window. Charles and his family were walking around outside, guarded by two dogs. And in front of the door stood Mr. Camphor and Miss Anguish.

“Oh gosh,” Freddy said, “they would come when the place isn't picked up!”

Jinx was curled up on the bed. He got up, stretched, and joined Freddy at the window. “When would that be?” he asked. “To my knowledge, that piece of string has been on the floor in the same place since last Christmas when you unwrapped your presents. Anyway, who is it? Your window's so dirty I can't see.”

“I like it that way,” said Freddy. “Makes it more interesting, speculating. But I think I hear Mr. Camphor's voice.”

“Well, for Pete's sake, let him in!” exclaimed the cat. “You can't pick up this place in two minutes. Take more like two years. Oh, all right,” he said, as Freddy still hesitated; “I'll let 'em in myself.” And he went to the door and flung it open. “Enter, sir and lady,” he said, with a deep bow. “Enter the poet's lair. See the poet himself at work, hammering out the hexameters, enshrining in deathless verse his own two-cent exploits, his eye in fine frenzy rolling —nay, practically popping out of his head in self-admiration—”

“Oh, shut up, cat,” said Freddy. “How do you do, Miss Anguish. Hello, Jimson. Wish I'd known you were coming, I'd have picked up a little. I've had the chickens staying with me this week and the place is in rather a mess.”

“Thought maybe you and Jinx had been having a pillow fight,” said Mr. Camphor, and Miss Anguish said: “Oh, dear me, Dr. Hopper, I'm so glad you didn't pick up! It's nice to see your place just as you live in it. As another great poet sings: ‘It takes a heap o' livin' to make a house a mess.'” She fluttered about, looking at everything. “And this is you, isn't it?” she asked, stopping at a snapshot of Hank, hitched to the buggy. “Younger, I suppose. You're rather slimmer.”

Freddy started to explain, but she had fluttered on and was looking out the window. “And this lovely picture window. What a charming view!”

The window was small and the view so distorted by the crinkly panes and so dimmed by dust and cobwebs that you couldn't recognize anybody through it if they came close and peered in at you. Freddy liked it for that reason; he said his friends looked more interesting and—some of them—handsomer, when seen through it. He explained this to Miss Anguish, who for once seemed to agree; she said: “And all those little creatures walking around out there. Are they supposed to be chickens? There's one with four legs. And—how interesting—there's another with two—no, three—heads. Dear me!”

Mr. Camphor said; “If those chickens are staying with you, I suppose they'll be coming in to go to bed pretty soon. It's after eight. I guess we'd better be going. Miss Anguish was anxious to see your little house—”

“I'd heard so much about it,” said that lady. “Quite, quite charming! And to see you actually in the throes of composition—turning out one of your lovely poems! I wonder,” she fluttered; “would you make just a tiny one for me? Just for me alone?”

“My goodness,” said Freddy, “I don't know. I never …” He was very much flattered. “I wonder,” he thought. “What rhymes with ‘Anguish'—‘languish?' No. How about ‘Lydia?' Let's see. Lydia's hideous—oh, golly! But wait.” Then aloud, he said:

“
In comparison with Miss Lydia's

All other faces are hideous
.”

Miss Anguish clapped her hands with delight. “How sweet! Such a pretty compliment! Oh I can't tell you how—” She broke off, for outside there was a sudden outburst of flapping and squawking, and then a heavy knock at the door. “Open up, pig,” called Mr. Garble's voice. “We know you're in there.”

CHAPTER

17

Jinx ran to the window. It was beginning to get dark, but he could make out a mob of animals —cows and horses. “We can't escape,” he said. “We'll have to open up. Too bad the dogs aren't here. You know where they are, Freddy?”

“Two regiments, Bosco's and Robert's, have been mopping up to the east, north of Centerboro. They plan to make a sweep south of the lake and then up around the west end and drive the cattle up through the woods back where they came from. Look, Jinx; Garble doesn't know you're here. Go in the other room and get into the wig drawer. Curl up and cover your nose and your paws and if he searches, he'll think you're a black wig. Then you can get away and warn the dogs.”

It was the sensible thing to do and Jinx did it. Then Freddy opened the door. And immediately as Mr. Garble, with a pistol in his hand, entered the pig pen, Miss Anguish gave a loud scream and threw her arms around his neck. “Oh, save me, save me!” she wailed. “Save me, my noble deliverer, from these terrible kidnappers!”

Unfortunately, Mr. Garble was prepared for something of the kind. He swung her aside and kept the pistol trained on Freddy and Mr. Camphor, so that they didn't dare make a rush at him.

“Save me and take me back to my brother, Judge Anguish. He will repay you well,” she went on. And then she gave a scream and, letting go of Mr. Garble, climbed up into Freddy's easy chair, holding her skirts tight around her, as Simon, with Zeke and Ezra and half a dozen of his children and grandchildren, came in.