The Tale of Jolly Robin - Arthur Scott Bailey (small books to read txt) 📗
- Author: Arthur Scott Bailey
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“Yes!” Mr. Crow replied. “But it’s no joke to lose a tail-feather. And I wouldn’t think of laughing at what just happened.... Besides,” he continued, 31 “your laughter is altogether wrong. What you must try to do is to laugh very sadly. In fact,” he added, “I wouldn’t mind if you shed a few tears, because I feel quite upset over this unfortunate accident.”
Well, Jolly Robin saw at once that it was impossible for him to please Mr. Crow.
“My laughter,” he said, “is always merry. I couldn’t laugh sadly, no matter how hard I might try. And as for shedding tears, I couldn’t weep for you even if you lost all your tail-feathers, Mr. Crow.”
“Then you may leave at once!” Mr. Crow cried, just as if Farmer Green’s pasture belonged to him.
“Yes!” Jolly Robin answered. “I may—and then again, I may not!”
And since he stayed right there and laughed, old Mr. Crow himself flew away. 32 It was a long while, too, before he could bear to hear people laugh. For he thought they must be laughing at him, because he had lost a tail-feather.
And perhaps that was what amused Jolly Robin, though I never thought of that before.
The time had come when Jolly Robin was ready to begin his long journey to the South, for it was growing quite cold. On some days there was no sun at all. And even when the weather was fair the sun rose late and went to bed early. It was exactly the sort of weather Jolly Robin did not like.
“No doubt you’ll be leaving us soon,” Jasper Jay remarked to Jolly one day, when the two chanced to meet in Farmer Green’s woods, where the beeches grew.
“I expect to start to-morrow,” Jolly Robin answered with a short laugh. The 34 mere thought of his warm, light-flooded winter home in the Southland made him feel glad.
“Well, well!” Jasper Jay exclaimed. “I’m glad I happened to see you, for I know of a new way to travel.”
And Jolly Robin wanted to know all about it.
“If it’s a better way than the old, I’ll be pleased to try it,” he said.
“Oh! it’s much better,” Jasper told him. “If I hadn’t made up my mind to spend the winter in Pleasant Valley, I’d go the new way myself. But the beechnut crop is good this fall. So I shall stay right here to enjoy it.”
“Tell me how we’re to go, if you please!” Jolly Robin urged him.
“We?” said Jasper. “You don’t mean to say you are going with a crowd, do you?” 35
“Why, yes!” Jolly Robin replied. “All the Robins are leaving to-morrow. And I had intended to go with them.”
Jasper Jay shook his head.
“Take my advice and don’t do any such thing,” he said. “You’ll find it quieter travelling alone. And though you may not know it, it’s the fashionable thing to do.”
Jolly Robin laughed when Jasper said that.
“But I’m not a fashionable person!” he exclaimed.
“Then you should become one,” Jasper told him. “Besides, the new way is easier, as well as more stylish. But if you’re afraid to try something new, of course I wouldn’t think of urging you.”
“I’m not afraid!” Jolly Robin cried. “And if you’ll only tell me what I’m to do, I promise you I’ll do it!”
“Good!” said Jasper Jay. “Meet me 36 here day after to-morrow and I’ll start you on your journey. I can’t explain anything now, because I must hurry over to the woods at once, where my cousin, Mr. Crow, is waiting for me.” Then he flew away, screaming a loud good-by as he went.
So Jolly Robin hastened back to the orchard, to find his wife and tell her what he had decided to do.
He had no difficulty at all in finding her. But he had no end of trouble trying to persuade her to travel with him the new way, instead of going along with the crowd in the good, old-fashioned style. In fact, she raised so many objections, saying how lonely it would be and how dangerous it was to travel in a small party and that she didn’t want to be fashionable—she raised so many objections that at last Jolly Robin said very well! she might do 37 as she pleased. But as for him, he was going to meet Jasper Jay just as he had promised. And since the new way was easier, he expected to reach their winter home long before she arrived, even if he did start a day later.
But he was disappointed, all the same. And he kept up such a constant laughing and joking all the rest of that day that his wife knew he must be feeling quite out of sorts.
For that was a way Jolly Robin had. The worse he felt, the happier he always acted. And it was not a bad way, either.
All of Jolly Robin’s friends and relations were greatly surprised when they saw him bidding his wife and children good-by, on the day the Robin family started from Pleasant Valley for their winter home in the South.
“What’s this?” they cried. “Aren’t you coming with us?”
And Jolly Robin laughed and said to them gaily:
“Not to-day! But you’ll find me waiting for you when you reach your journey’s end.”
His wife, however, shook her head. 39
“It’s one of his queer notions—his and Jasper Jay’s,” she explained.
“Tut, tut!” her husband said. And he chucked her under the chin—and winked at his friends.
There was no time to say anything more, for everyone was eager to start. So the travellers called good-by to Jolly, while he waved a farewell to them.
It was not many minutes before he was the only member of the Robin family left in Pleasant Valley. He felt very lonely, all at once. And he wanted to hurry after the others. But he knew what Jasper Jay would say, if he did. Jasper would be sure to tell people that Jolly Robin was afraid to travel a new way.... Of course, Jolly didn’t want that to be said about him. So he looked as cheerful as he could; and he whistled the merriest tune he knew. Nobody—except his wife, maybe—would 40 have guessed that he wasn’t perfectly happy.
Jolly spent a very lonely night. When he went to the roost where the whole Robin family had been sleeping for several weeks, he found it distressingly silent, after the gay chatter that he had grown accustomed to hearing there. And try as he would, he could not keep just a hint of sadness out of his good-night song.
But in the morning he felt better. And he welcomed the dawn with a carol that was joyous enough for anybody. For this was the day when Jasper Jay was going to show him the new way to travel. Yes! he, too, would soon be hurrying southwards, where the sun was warm.
It was no wonder that he sang, “Cheerily-cheerup, cheerily-cheerup,” right merrily.
As soon as he had eaten his breakfast, 41 Jolly went to the place where the beeches grew, to find Jasper Jay. And Jasper was there, just finishing his own breakfast. But he was too busy, he said, to bother with Jolly Robin just then.
“You meet me in the orchard this afternoon,” he said, “when the sun’s over the mountain, and I’ll start you on your journey.”
So Jolly Robin had to wait all the long day, while Jasper Jay did a hundred silly things, such as mocking Farmer Green’s cat, and teasing a sleepy young owl, and making the woods echo with his hoarse screams. Jasper was late, too, in keeping his appointment in the orchard. Jolly Robin waited for him until almost sunset before Jasper Jay appeared. But Jolly was so glad to see Jasper that he never once thought of being angry with him.
“Come along!” said the blue-coated 42 rascal. “Follow me and you’ll soon learn the new way to the South. And if it isn’t a good one I hope I’ll never eat another beechnut.”
Jolly Robin laughed. He was sure, then, that he had nothing to worry about. For everybody knew that Jasper Jay was specially fond of beechnuts.
With Jolly Robin following close behind him, Jasper Jay flew directly to the crossroads, almost half-way to the village. Once there, he perched himself upon the sign-post at the four corners. And Jolly Robin seated himself upon one of the boards that were nailed to the post.
“Here we are!” said Jasper Jay. “You see how easy it is.”
“When will the post begin to move?” Jolly Robin inquired, a bit anxiously. He had waited a whole day to begin his long journey to the South, so it was only natural that he should want to start at once. 44
“What’s that you say?” asked Jasper Jay. And when Jolly repeated his question, Jasper began to scream with laughter. “Well, that’s a good one!” he said at last. “So you thought the post was going to pull itself out of the ground and fly away with you, did you?”
“Why, yes!” Jolly Robin replied. “Aren’t these wings?” he asked, looking down at the boards. “They’re already spread,” he observed.
It was some minutes before Jasper Jay could answer him, for he was laughing again. But finally he managed to speak.
“Those aren’t wings!” he cried. “They’re sign-boards, to tell you which road to take. Of course, you can’t expect to read a sign when you’re sitting on it. Just go over to the fence across the road and you can see the sign that you’re on now.” 45
So Jolly Robin fluttered over to the fence. And from there he could see the sign-board plainly. This is what it looked like:
TO SKY POND, 15 MILES
“There!” Jasper Jay cried, when Jolly had read the sign aloud. “You see how easy it is. All you need do is to follow this road to which the hand points.”
“Then I shall have to fly, after all,” Jolly Robin said. He had expected to have a ride. And naturally he was disappointed. Then he read the sign once more. “Sky Pond!” he exclaimed. “I don’t want to go to Sky Pond. I want to go to the South!”
“Well, Sky Pond’s south of Pleasant Valley,” Jasper Jay explained. “It’s right on your way to your winter home. 46 And all you have to do when you reach Sky Pond will be to find another sign, which ought to say something like this: ’To the South, one thousand miles.’ You see how simple it is,” Jasper Jay remarked. “With a sign-board to guide you, you can’t go wrong.”
But it seemed to Jolly that the new way of travelling was far more difficult than the old. He said as much to Jasper Jay, too. “I wish––” he added—“I wish I had started yesterday, with the others.”
At that Jasper Jay said, “Nonsense!” And he muttered something about dunces, and mollycoddles, and—yes! ’fraid-cats!
Perhaps Jasper hadn’t intended that Jolly Robin should hear those words—and perhaps he had. Anyhow, he was sorry afterward that he had spoken so loud. For the first thing he knew, Jolly Robin flew straight at him with shrill chirps of rage. 47 And Jasper was so surprised—and frightened, too—that he flew off as fast as he could go, following the road that led to Sky Pond, fifteen miles away, with Jolly Robin after him.
Jolly chased him for a long time, until at last Jasper Jay swerved to one side and turned toward home.
But Jolly Robin followed him no longer. He kept
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