Snoutie and His Friends - страница 9

Snoutie also felt quite hungry.

At that moment they heard a strange rustling of leaves and a delicate little squeak.

A small, chubby grey mouse appeared between the trees. Her round tummy didn’t seem to prevent her from moving quickly, and on her back she was carrying a sack filled with grain, which was quite large for her height.

“Into the den! Everything into the den! Don’t block the path! Move aside!” she exclaimed by way of a greeting. “I have to get everything into the den or the rains will start and I’ll lose all my supplies! Then what will we eat all winter? Into the den! Everything goes into the den right away!”

“Let’s help her,” Michelle whispered into Snoutie’s ear. “She’s so small and those sacks must be so heavy for her.”

Snoutie and Michelle helped their new friend gather up the grain and carry it into her den. After that, Housey Mousey—for that is what this little mouse who stored her food wisely was called—offered them some dinner:

“We’ve done what we needed to do! My supplies of grain are safe and well-hidden! Now we should have a bite to eat.”

Housey Mousey took all the best things out of her cold cellar: little ears of oats and wheat, grains of buckwheat and corn, dried white mushrooms, and last year’s acorns, and laid them out on a wide stump. Then she invited her guests to start eating.

Snoutie and Michelle, who were starving, threw themselves at the food and quickly ate their fill. They warmly thanked their kindly hostess for the meal, but then they suddenly felt embarrassed: together they had probably eaten a year’s supply of the mouse’s food.

“Learn how to give generously and your gifts will be returned to you,” said Housey Mousey, as if in response to their thoughts. Then she bid them farewell.

As they continued on their way, the mouse’s song carried to them from somewhere behind the trees:

Give generously

And you’ll be a plump old Mousey!

Give generously

And you’ll be a wise old Mousey!

“We really need to get home,” worried Michelle. “It’s too bad we weren’t able to find our magical white flower,” she added sadly.

“It really is,” answered Snoutie. “We must have done something wrong or looked in the wrong place.”

“H-o-o-o-t!” rang out a voice from somewhere way up high in a pine tree. “As far as doing something wrong, well you sure got that right. For starters, you never should have gone out on such a long walk without permission from your parents. And that goes for both of you,” the voice scolded. “You must have known that your parents would get very worried and upset! Well, anyway, let’s get acquainted.”