I Know a Secret/Chapter 11

by Christopher Darlington Morley

The Escape of the Penguins

(A Story for Hot Weather)

WHEN the kittens were asked what they would like to do when they grew up and had to earn their living, there were two ambitions they often mentioned. Hops used to say he would try to get a job at the Fish Hatchery in Cold Spring Harbour. Going to picnics at Lloyds Neck they always passed through Cold Spring, and Hops would look earnestly at those interesting little pools and sluices where the young fish were bred. It was not certain whether any cats were employed in that establishment, but if there was ever a vacancy—perhaps as a night watchman or something of that sort—Hops intended to apply.

Malta's dream was to work at the Aquarium. She had heard that there was a cat there, and she imagined it must be the pleasantest position in the world. Malta had never seen the Aquarium, but it had been described to her, and it sounded marvellous. All those big glass tanks, with fish as bright and pretty as flowers turning and shimmering in the clear water!

It was very hot weather. It was the weather when Donny's long thick hair has to be cut, and you learn, after much patient work with a pair of scissors, that he is not nearly such a big dog as he seems. He looks rather absurd after a good clip, because you don't cut his shaggy head or his curly plumy tail, and with his body so diminished he looks like a small black and white lion. But he is so much more comfortable that no one minds.

It was the weather when two or three times a day the children put on their bathing suits and spray each other with the hose, and big motor trucks stand dripping in front of drugstores delivering ice cream, and you are surprised to see so many coal wagons going about. Nothing sounds so hot, on a July day, as next winter's coal rumbling into the cellar. And on those blazing days you don't need the gong to call you for lunch, because you hear the jug of iced tea chiming like a soft cool bell when it is carried in to the dining room.

The members of the Grape Arbor Tea Room, fortunate in having such a cool retreat in the hot season, thought of doing something for people in the sweltering city. They had the great idea of inviting the Aquarium Cat to come out and spend a country afternoon. And Malta particularly, who had dreamed of being an Aquarium cat herself some day, was thrilled at the thought of actually meeting such a celebrity.

Fourchette wrote a letter, on her best notepaper, which had a very twirly ornamental F stamped on it in green. It was addressed to. The Aquarium Cat. The Aquarium, Battery Park, New York City. It had to be rewritten several times, to get it just right, because they all made suggestions as to the best way to address such a famous person. It said:—

 

Dear Sir on Madam:

The members of the Grape Arbor Tea Room and Country Day School would be so pleased if you would honour us with a visit. Knowing how busy you must be, and your many responsibilities, we leave the choice of a date to you. In the hot weather we serve a cold salmon salad, with Spratt's biscuits, every afternoon at 4:30. Let us know what day you will come and Donny will meet you at Roslyn station. Donny is a dog, but very understanding. Friday is the best day, the Sea Food Market has everything fresh then. Respectful regards from your many admirers, and enclosing L. I. R. R. timetable, which gives approximate time of arrivals at Roslyn,

Yours,

(Mrs.) Fourchette.

 

Fortunately they consulted Christopher about the letter before they mailed it. Because Fourchette, not quite understanding about dollarmarks, had written "We serve cold salmon salad every afternoon at $4.30." She thought that a dollar sign should be put in front of all figures. Christopher explained the mistake, and it was corrected.

Malta at once asked if she could keep the Aquarium Cat's reply, if one came, to start an Autograph Collection.

After that the kittens hung about the post office until they almost wore out the letter-box opening it. They kept bothering Mrs. Breen by asking her if she was quite sure there wasn't a letter. She was almost tempted to write them one herself and put it in the box just to keep them quiet. You see, the Aquarium Cat was so surprised by the invitation that it took him some time to answer. At last a letter came, on official Aquarium notepaper which had little pictures of fish printed on it. It was very carefully written and punctuated. Evidently the Aquarium Cat had taken great pains:

 

The Aquarium

New York, N. Y.

July 15, 1927.

Dear Madam: In reply to yours of the 8th inst., would say, am very pleased by your friendly invitation and accept same with pleasure.

Am very fond of salmon myself, that will be a treat. If I have any luck will try to bring with me one or two small specimens for your pupils, in the interests of science.

Compliments to your Mr. Donny, you may inform him I will take train arriving Roslyn approximately 4.05 p.m. (Daylight Saving) on Friday.

Yours truly,

(Mr.) Jellicoe.

 

"What are specimens?" asked Hops and Malta. "Does it mean presents?"

There was great excitement the afternoon Jellicoe arrived. Fourchette and the kittens went with Donny to the station. Meeting trains at Roslyn is always an adventure, for they are real steam-trains with nice old-fashioned hissing locomotives. Waiting by the level crossing you can see the train coming far down the track. A spire of white steam shoots up and you hear the whistle. Then the crossing watchman blows his whistle and swings down the black and white gates. Then the gong begins to clang, and the engine rumbles past, and the passengers get off. Stout ladies and children have to be helped as it is a long step down to the ground. It will be sad when Roslyn is a smart suburban station like Great Neck or Garden City.

At first they were worried, because they didn't see a cat getting off anywhere. Then, as they might have guessed, they saw him descending from the smoker, at the front of the train. He was a handsome gray, rather thin. He carried a little wicker basket. Hops and Malta tried to be polite, and restrained themselves from asking if he had the specimens all right. While no one was looking, however, they managed to smell the little basket. Immediately they began to purr.

"You mustn't mention it to anyone," said Jellicoe, when they were in the car, "but I managed to get some small trout from one of the tanks, for you and the children. It is against the rules, but sometimes one is able to make an exception." He opened the basket, and there, carefully wrapped in cool cabbage leaves, were three very tiny fish, about an inch long. Jellicoe had fastened them to little sticks so they could be sucked like lollipops.

Fourchette was greatly pleased, and sucked hers slowly and with enjoyment. The kittens gobbled theirs down at once.

The tea was a great success. Escargot and all the others greeted Jellicoe with respectful politeness. Fourchette had been a little embarrassed when she learned he was a gentleman cat: she had feared he might think it was too forward of her to have invited him. But he was so easy in his manners, so plainly a cat of large worldly experience, that they were all delighted. Even Donny was quite friendly.

Jellicoe ate enormously. He seemed very hungry, and they began to suspect that he did not get as much fish at the Aquarium as they had imagined.

"How nice to be out here in the country," he said, when the cold salmon had been finished. "Of course I had heard of the Roslyn Estates, but I had no idea the neighbourhood was so attractive. This is a very refreshing change for me."

"I'm afraid it must seem very informal, after your important work at the Aquarium," said Fourchette. She had very little idea just what kind of work Jellicoe did there, but she felt certain it was important. "What a lovely place that must be to live."

"Oh, I don't know," said Jellicoe. "It gets very trying, to see all those fish and never be able to get at them. I would never advise anyone to take up the Aquarium as a career. The smell makes one constantly hungry, and the barking of the seals gets on your nerves. You know, they sound exactly like dogs, and they yelp continually. In fact," he added hastily, suddenly realizing that Donny might be offended, "they bark much more than dogs do. I rather enjoy a nice dog-bark, but it doesn't seem natural coming from a seal."

"But how deliciously cool it must be," said Escargot, who did not enjoy the heat and liked thinking about wetness.

"You'd be surprised to see how many people come in, on hot days, because it sounds like a cool place. In fact, a queer thing happened the other day——"

Jellicoe smiled a little to himself. Evidently it was the beginning of a story, and they all settled themselves to listen.

 

There were two very small (and active) girls who lived in Baltimore. Their family was a convenient one, for there were not only the two smallandactive girls but they had two parents. They called these parents Daddy and Mother, but as a matter of fact the real names of the parents were Uncle Felix and Aunt Isabel, and I shall refer to them as such.

Baltimore is a lovely city but in hot weather it is very hot indeed. You will sometimes hear people talk about pavements hot enough to fry an egg on, but Baltimore is the only town I know of where it has actually been done. It was on the pavement just outside Uncle Felix's office that the egg was fried, so you can understand how glad he was to get a vacation.

For their vacation Uncle Felix and Aunt Isabel were going to take the smallandactive girls (whose names were Lannie and Sistina) to an island called Martha's Vineyard. They had read in a booklet that this island was Swept by Ocean Breezes, and they bought their tickets at once. To get there they had to take a train to New York, then a steamer to New Bedford, and another steamer from New Bedford to Vineyard Haven. You will find these places on the map of Massachusetts.

It was a roasting July morning when Uncle Felix and Aunt Isabel, after all the labours of packing up and closing the house, got the two smallandactive girls on board a B. & O. train. Like a wise parent, Uncle Felix did not want to spend all the money at the beginning of the vacation; he hoped to have some left to get home with, after the egg-frying season was over. So he thought it would be better to travel in a day-coach, not in a Pullman. But a parent rarely knows what is going to happen. It was so hot, so dusty, and the smallandactive girls were so lively, so sticky, and so well-sprinkled with soot, that by the time the train had reached Philadelphia Uncle Felix had not only moved them all back to a Pullman car, but had even engaged one of those expensive private kennels called a drawing room where he and Aunt Isabel could conceal the energy of the children from the other passengers.

By the time the train had reached Trenton Junction Lannie and Sistina had three times been mopped down with ice-water in paper drinking cups. By the time the train got to Jersey City they were all rather tired and excited. By the time they had crossed the ferry to New York, and had got the baggage on board the New Bedford steamer, all were ready for some innocent amusement. There were two hours to pass before they need return to the steamer, and Uncle Felix thought it might be cool at the Aquarium, which was not far away.

I well remember (said Jellicoe) when they arrived, because of all the many children at the Aquarium that afternoon those two were the most smallandactive. They both had observant blue eyes, and little cotton pinafores, and large straw hats with little holes in the crown for ventilation. I was strolling about near the turtle tank when they rushed up to me and said I was theirs. Sistina, who was only two and a half, seriously thought I was her own cat from Baltimore, and it was difficult for me to persuade her otherwise. Then Uncle Felix, who had the anxious air of a parent who has been through a good deal, and has more ahead of him, spoke to me very politely. I could see at once that he was a man who understood cats.

"Since you have taken such a fancy to the smallandactive girls," he said, "perhaps you would keep an eye on them for a few moments so that Aunt Isabel and I can look at the fish."

It was not a question of my having taken a fancy to them; it was they who had taken a fancy to me. They were both embracing me at once, and the three of us were all tangled up together in such a way that probably Uncle Felix had imagined I was embracing them. The weather was warm for that sort of thing. But it is part of my job at the Aquarium to be polite to the public, so I assented. While Uncle Felix and Aunt Isabel had a nice refreshing stroll along the cool glass tanks, I took care of Lannie and Sistina.

I knew they would be amused by the penguins. There are two penguins who live in a tiled pool. Unless you are familiar with penguins you would not believe how comic they are to watch. There is a wooden platform in the water, up which they waddle, and then, crossing a gangplank, they love to totter round the upper rim of the enclosure. Crowds of people lean over the low railing, only a few inches from them, but the penguins are not at all shy. They toddle about, skipping over the braces of the railing with an absurd little tripping stumble, quite as funny as Charlie Chaplin.

Lannie and Sistina, climbing up by the railing, were enchanted at the sight of these doddering penguins. And indeed their nice white-tiled pool, like a big bathtub, with the green water in it, was very alluring. Just about that time the seals were being fed, and everyone else went to watch; I was left alone with the two children. Of course I was on the floor, as I am not allowed to jump up on the railings. I was trying to warn them not to climb over too far when Sistina remarked "Take a bath with funny duckie" and slipped inside the rail. Lannie followed her, and the two began trotting round and round the inside rim just as the penguins had been doing.

I looked anxiously for Uncle Felix and Aunt Isabel, but they were over at the other side of the building admiring the Groupers fish. And then, to my amazement, I saw the two penguins, each one wearing one of the children's straw hats, calmly climb over the rail and flop down onto the floor. Toddling about, with their little outstretched flippers and the big straw hats, they looked exactly like a smaller Lannie and Sistina.

About this time Uncle Felix began to realize it was getting late. And just then he and Aunt Isabel felt something cool and moist slipped into their fingers. Looking down, in the half darkness of the Aquarium, all they saw were large straw hats and small dark flippers, which they naturally thought were very grimy hands.

"Oh, here you are, children," they said. "Did you thank that nice cat for showing you the sights? Come now, we must hurry." And before I could catch them they were gone, hurrying out across the Park and into a taxi, the two penguins trotting along with them just like two very tiny children.

I was so afraid that in some way I would be blamed for all this, that I kept carefully in the background. But I could see from a distance that Lannie and Sistina were having a grand time. They trundled round about the pool until they were tired, then they splashed into it (it is quite shallow) and floundered about in great comfort. Some of the spectators looked at them in surprise, and went round again to read the sign about Not Handling or Feeding the Penguins: but it was such a warm day, anyone who had doubts probably thought it might be an illusion due to the heat. As for Uncle Felix and Aunt Isabel, they had so much to think about, and were so pleased at the quiet way the penguins sat in the taxi, that they did not look at them carefully until the New Bedford boat had left her pier and it was time to wash the children for supper.

When they found that they had two penguins with them instead of two children, the troubled parents were very upset. Uncle Felix, who had been looking forward all day to the quiet evening on the steamer, with a pipe to smoke and a book to read, at first refused to believe it. He thought that if they gave the two small creatures a good scrub, the dark colour (which he insisted was only the stains of travel) would come off and they would prove to be Lannie and Sistina. Finally he was convinced, and rushed to see the Captain. The Captain refused to put the steamer back, and the most Uncle Felix could do was to send a radio to the Director of the Aquarium. I saw the message when it arrived. It said:

 

Fear some mistake have two penguins here see if two smallandactive children left in penguin tank consult Aquarium Cat seven thirty is their bedtime arrive tomorrow.

Uncle Felix

 

The radio operator made Uncle Felix pay for "small and active" as three words although it was carefully explained to him that in that family it was always written as one word.

Of course when the radio telegram arrived the Director consulted me at once, and I had to explain the whole affair. He admitted that I was in no way to blame. The chief difficulty now was to persuade Lannie and Sistina to leave the pool, where they were playing house on the wooden platform. It was their bedtime, so they were feeling specially lively. But my likeness to their own cat in Baltimore was very useful: with me they felt entirely at home.

"There's only one thing to do," said the Director, after sending a radio to Uncle Felix that the children were quite safe. "If they won't leave the pool, you'll have to spend the night there with them. If we force them to come out they'll yell, and keep the fish awake all night."

It was the most uncomfortable night I ever spent. The Director himself served supper for all three of us on the platform in the pool. Lannie and Sistina tried to force me to go bathing with them, but at that I drew the line. At last they fell asleep, clutching me very tight. I wish I knew the address of their cat in Baltimore, I should like to send him a postcard of greetings and sympathy.

Meanwhile the penguins went on with Uncle Felix and Aunt Isabel. They sat up to supper on board the steamer and behaved beautifully; when they were tucked into their berths they slept without any trouble. By breakfast time Aunt Isabel refused to part with them. She took them on to Martha's Vineyard with her, while poor Uncle Felix rushed back to New York by train. He arrived in a dreadful state of agitation and humidity.

The Director was equally upset-when he found that Uncle Felix had not brought the penguins back with him. He had had to close the Aquarium to the public all that morning. For, as he said, if he exhibited two quite normal children instead of the amusing penguins his patrons expected, there would be complaints. The situation was painful. At first the Director refused to surrender Lannie and Christina until the penguins had been returned. They got Aunt Isabel on the telephone in Martha's Vineyard: she said that the penguins were so happy there she could not hear of their being taken away. The Director repiied fiercely that this was not fair. Children, he said, were numerous, but there are only a few penguins in New York.

While the Director was talking to Aunt Isabel on the phone, Uncle Felix simply seized Lannie and Sistina and ran with them to a taxicab. He hurried them onto a train, and they were in Martha's Vineyard that evening. I hear that they are having a perfectly wonderful holiday. The penguins are delightful playmates. They sleep in the same room with the children, and to see the four go in bathing together is one of the sights of the island. Uncle Felix sent me a postcard saying so.

Even the Director, when he went up to the Vineyard to try to cajole the penguins back, admitted it would be a pity to take them away from a place where they were having so much fun. If only, he says, the smallandactive girls don't embrace them to death.

 

"But what did the Aquarium do without any penguins?" the kittens asked.

"The Director had to get two more sent down at once from the Bronx Zoo," Jellicoe explained. "They have several up there."

Escargot spoke thoughtfully. "I always imagined that penguins must be very interesting birds," he said, "because a famous French writer, Anatole France, once wrote a book all about them. We must read it some day."