The Ship of Adventure, Page 3

  She came to the lifeboat drill, and Lucy-Ann was certain she was upset because she had not a small life-jacket to wear. They all put theirs on, went to their right lifeboat and listened to a short talk from one of the officers about what they were to do if danger arose. Lucy-Ann hoped fervently that it wouldn’t .

  ‘We’re going to land in Lisbon tomorrow,’ said Mrs Mannering. ‘But none of you is to wander off alone. I’m not going to have any adventure starting up. You’ll all keep close to me – please understand that!’

  4

  Philip collects a pet

  Soon the days began to slip by quickly. After Lisbon Lucy-Ann and Dinah lost count of them. They did not even know if the day was Monday, Tuesday or any other. They knew Sunday because everyone went into the big lounge then and listened to the captain taking a short church service.

  For days they saw no land. Philip grew very excited when a shoal of flying fish flew out of the sea and stayed up in the air for some time. They were lovely little things.

  ‘What makes them do that?’ wondered Lucy-Ann.

  ‘Just being chased by some hungry big fish,’ said Philip. ‘Wouldn’t you leap out of the water and try and fly through the air if an enormous fish was after you, Lucy-Ann? Gosh, I wish one of the fish would fly on deck. I’d just love to see it close to.’

  ‘Well, you couldn’t possibly make it a pet, thank goodness, because it would die in your pocket,’ said Dinah. ‘It seems unusual for you to be without any pets at all, Philip. Very nice!’

  But she spoke too soon, because Philip collected a pet two days later! They had called at Madeira, left that island, and gone on to French Morocco. It was there that Philip collected his strange little pet.

  The children liked French Morocco. They especially liked the bazaars, although the air was so strongly scented that Mrs Mannering said it made her feel faint, and she walked along with smelling salts pressed to her nose. The children soon got used to the air, though Kiki didn’t, judging by the number of ‘Poohs’ she said. ‘Pooh! Gah! Pooh!’

  Dinah tried out her French on the black-eyed traders, and was pleased when they understood. She bought a tiny brooch, and Lucy-Ann bought a blue vase.

  ‘Don’t you see anything you like?’ she asked Philip. He shook his head.

  ‘I don’t want things like that. Now if I could see something really exciting – say an old dagger – or, I tell you what! Something I’ve always wanted and never had.’

  ‘What’s that?’ asked Lucy-Ann, determined to buy it for him if only she could see it.

  ‘You’ll laugh – but I’ve always wanted a ship in a bottle,’ said Philip.

  ‘I’ve never even seen one,’ said Lucy-Ann, astonished. ‘A ship inside a bottle, do you mean? What a peculiar thing? How is it put there?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Philip. ‘It’s daft of me to want it, really – it’s just one of those ideas you get, you know.’

  ‘I’ll be sure to look out for one for you wherever we go,’ promised Lucy-Ann. ‘Oh, do look at Kiki. She’s taking sweets from those little children there. She’ll make herself sick again!’

  Mrs Mannering insisted that they should all stay close to her, and keep with the ship’s party. The four children wished they could explore by themselves, for they liked the people and their strange, dark, narrow little shops.

  ‘Certainly not,’ said Mrs Mannering. ‘Why, didn’t you hear what happened to the man at the next table to ours on the ship? He and his wife went off by themselves in a taxi to visit some place or other – and the driver took them to a deserted hill, and wouldn’t take them back to the ship till they had given him all the money they had!’

  ‘Gracious,’ said Lucy-Ann, surprised.

  ‘He brought them back just as the gangway was being drawn up,’ went on Mrs Mannering, ‘so they had no time to make any complaint. Now you know why I want you to keep with the ship’s party. No more adventures for you, if I can help it! It would be just like you all to disappear somewhere, get into awful danger and put a few more grey hairs into my head!’

  ‘You haven’t really got very many,’ said Lucy-Ann. ‘Just about one for each of our adventures, that’s all! I will keep near to you, Aunt Allie. I don’t want an adventure either.’

  The next day there was to be a trip by motor coach to a famous place inland – an old town on the edge of the desert. ‘The motor coaches will be here on the quay at half past ten,’ Mrs Mannering told the four. ‘Be sure to wear your sun-hats. It will be terribly hot.’

  It was on that trip that Philip collected his new pet. The motor coaches duly arrived and everyone crowded into them, feeling extremely hot. Off they went at top speed down a sandy road that for a time seemed to run through what looked like a bare desert. Large cactus plants grew by the roadside. Lucy-Ann thought they looked ugly and spiteful with their numerous prickles and fat bulging bodies.

  After two hours they came to the old town. Its ancient arches and towers seemed to spring up suddenly out of the sand. Little dark-eyed children, with hardly anything on, ran to meet them, their hands held out.

  ‘Penn-ee, penn-ee,’ they said, and Kiki echoed them at once. ‘Penn-ee, penn-ee!’

  They all went into the narrow street of the old town. The guide took them to an ancient building and began to drone on about its history. Then one by one the party climbed steep, winding steps up an enormous tower.

  Halfway up Philip looked out of a great stone window. It had no glass, of course. The wall was so thick that he could sit on the window sill with his legs stretched right out. He hung on to the side of the window and slid forward to look down.

  Far below he could see a little crowd of excited children. They were pointing upwards and chattering. Some of them were throwing stones.

  ‘Now what are those little scamps throwing stones at?’ thought Philip. ‘If it’s something alive I’ll knock their heads together!’

  He slid down from the enormous window sill and ran down the great winding stairs. A stone flew through a window opening not far from the bottom, and he stopped.

  He heard a small whimpering noise and, hidden in a corner of the window opening, he saw a little heap of brown fur. He went over to it. What could it be?

  Click! A stone flew near him. Blow those kids! He stepped to the window and looked down sternly. ‘You stop that!’ he shouted. ‘Do you hear me? Stop it!’

  The small children looked in consternation at this sudden apparition. They disappeared in a hurry. Philip reached over to the brown bundle. A small wizened face peeped out at him with mournful brown eyes. Then it was covered by tiny hands.

  ‘Why – it’s a monkey – a tiny monkey!’ thought Philip. He knew how scared the small creatures were, and he was afraid of frightening this poor little mistreated animal. He had seen plenty of monkeys in that part of the country already, but not near – they always kept well out of the way.

  Philip spoke to the small creature in what Lucy-Ann called his ‘special animal voice.’ It uncovered its funny little face again, and then, with one bound, was cuddling into the boy’s shoulder, nestling against his neck, trembling. He put up a cautious hand and rubbed its soft fur.

  No animal had ever been able to resist Philip’s magic. Horses, dogs, cats, snakes, insects, birds – they came to him at once trustingly and confidingly. Not one could resist him. It was a gift that everyone marvelled at and envied him for.

  Philip sat down on the broad window sill and talked to the scared and miserable little monkey. It chattered back in a high, cheeping little voice. It looked at him shyly out of childlike brown eyes. Its tiny brown fingers wound themselves round one of his. It was Philip’s devoted slave from that moment.

  When the others came pattering down the stairs in front of the rest of the party, they were astonished to see the small monkey cuddling up to Philip.

  ‘There – I knew he’d get hold of something sooner or later!’ said Dinah. ‘Ugh! A nasty, dirty, smelly little monkey, full of fleas too, I e
xpect.’

  ‘Well, it is dirty and smelly, and I’m sure it’s got fleas,’ said Philip. ‘But it isn’t nasty. It’s been stoned by those wretched children down below. Both its legs are hurt.’

  ‘Poor little thing,’ said Lucy-Ann, almost in tears. Jack stroked the tiny thing’s head, but that only made it shrink closer to Philip.

  ‘You’re not to take it back to the ship with you,’ began Dinah. ‘I shall tell Mother if you do. I won’t have a monkey in our party.’

  ‘He’s coming with me,’ said Philip sternly.

  Dinah began to lose her temper. ‘Then I shall tell Mother I won’t have it. I shall—’

  ‘Dinah, it’s so small, and it’s hurt,’ said Lucy-Ann, in a shaky voice. ‘Don’t talk like that. It’s so unkind.’

  Dinah flushed, and turned away. She was cross, and horrified at the thought of having a monkey ‘tagging along’ with them, as she put it – but she did not want to go against the other three. She said no more, though she was unhappy for the rest of the day.

  How Philip hid the monkey till he got back to the ship only he knew. The fact is that no one even noticed it. Jack and Lucy-Ann helped him valiantly by standing in front of him whenever they thought anyone might see the monkey. Dinah would not help, but on the other hand she did nothing to give the secret away.

  Back in the cabin, the three children pored over the tiny creature. ‘It’s not even a grown monkey,’ said Philip. ‘How those children could stone a little thing like this beats me. But I suppose in every country there are cruel and unkind people – after all, we’ve seen boys back at home throwing stones at a cat. Look – its legs are bruised and cut, but they’re not broken. I can soon get those right. I wonder if it would let me wash it – it’s so dirty.’

  The little thing would let Philip do anything in the world he wanted to. The children spent two hours washing and drying it gently. Jack brought a small shoe-brush to brush its fluffy fur. It let Philip put iodine on its cuts and gave only a tiny whimper.

  ‘There!’ said the boy. ‘You look fine. What’s your name?’

  The monkey chattered something, and the children listened. ‘It sounds as if he’s saying “Micky-micky-mick”,’ said Lucy-Ann.

  ‘Right. If he thinks his name is Micky, Micky it is,’ said Philip. ‘I wonder what Kiki will think of him.’

  ‘She won’t like him much,’ said Jack. ‘She’ll be jealous. Good thing we left her in the girls’ cabin. She’d screech the place down if she saw us washing and brushing Micky.’

  Kiki certainly was most amazed to see Micky on Philip’s shoulder that night. She stared, and then, just as Jack had said, she screeched – one of her very best express-train screeches. Mrs Mannering put her head in at the cabin door to protest.

  She suddenly caught sight of the monkey and stepped forward in surprise, wondering if she had seen aright. ‘Oh, Philip! You oughtn’t to have brought it back to the ship. What a tiny thing!’

  ‘Mother, some children were stoning it. I had to bring it away,’ said Philip. His mother looked at him. It was just exactly the kind of thing Philip’s father had done when he was alive. How could she scold him for something that was in his very blood?

  ‘Well – I don’t know if a fuss will be made if you keep him on the ship,’ she said, stroking the monkey’s head. ‘What does Dinah say about it?’

  ‘She was very cross at first, but she didn’t say much,’ said Lucy-Ann. ‘She’s still in our cabin, I think. She’ll get over Micky. She’ll have to.’

  ‘Micky – Kiki – Micky – Kiki – Micky – Kiki,’ said Kiki triumphantly, as if she had suddenly discovered something very clever. She loved words that sounded the same. ‘Micky – Kiki, Micky – Kiki—’

  ‘Shut up, Kiki,’ said Philip. ‘I say, what a pity he’s called Micky – we’ll never stop Kiki saying those two words now. But he is Micky. We can’t alter his name now.’

  So Micky he was, and in a day or two he was everyone’s friend – yes, even Dinah’s! He had such a dear, comical face that it was impossible not to like him when he looked at you out of mournful brown eyes.

  ‘He’s such a baby and yet he’s got such a wise, wizened little face,’ said Lucy-Ann. ‘And I do like his tiny fingers – just like ours! Don’t you, Dinah?’

  ‘Well – he’s not as awful as I thought he was at first,’ admitted Dinah. ‘I can’t say I want him sitting on my shoulder all day long, like Philip – and I’m sure he’s still got fleas – but he’s really not bad.’

  ‘He hasn’t got fleas,’ said Philip, annoyed. ‘Don’t keep saying that.’

  Micky soon recovered his spirits, and from being a gentle, confiding little thing, he became a mischievous, chattering madcap. He leapt about the cabin as lightly as a squirrel, and Dinah was always scared he would take a flying jump on to her shoulder. But he didn’t . He was wise enough not to do that!

  Kiki was alarmed to see these acrobatics, and when the two were together in the same cabin she always turned to face Micky, so that she could jab him with her beak if he leapt at her. But he left her alone, and took very little notice. She didn’t like that at all!

  She took to calling his name in Philip’s voice, which she could imitate perfectly. ‘Micky! Micky!’

  The monkey would look round at once, but would see no Philip. ‘Micky!’ Kiki would say again, and the monkey would begin to leap all over the place, trying to find Philip.

  Then Kiki would cackle with laughter, and Micky would go off in disgust and sit on the porthole sill with his back to Kiki, looking through the thick glass out to sea.

  Kiki certainly had the best of it because she soon found that she could make noises that terrified Micky. If she barked like a dog the little creature went nearly frantic with fright. He was puzzled too. He watched Kiki closely, and soon realised that no dog barked unless Kiki was in the cabin. Then was Kiki some kind of bird-dog?

  The next time she barked she followed it with a fierce growl. This was too much for Micky. He picked up a tablet of soap from the basin and flung it at the surprised Kiki. It hit her full on the beak and she gave a squawk of alarm and nearly fell off her perch.

  Micky sent a toothbrush after the soap, and then the tooth-mug. He was a very fine shot, and soon Kiki was flying round the cabin trying to find a place to shelter from the volley of articles that Micky was sending after her – hairbrushes, combs, a roll of film, anything he could get hold of!

  Philip stopped the battle when he came in. ‘Micky! Pick them all up!’ he said sternly. ‘What did Kiki do to you to make you lose your temper like that? Bad Micky!’

  ‘Naughty Micky, bad boy!’ said Kiki at once, and went off into one of her cackles of laughter. Micky picked everything up humbly. Then he went to sit on Philip’s shoulder as usual. Kiki was jealous. She flew to his other shoulder.

  The monkey chattered at her. Kiki chattered back, in exactly the same monkey voice as Micky used. He stared in amazement, and answered excitedly. Philip listened, amused.

  ‘Well, I don’t really know if you understand one another or not,’ he said. ‘But it’s just as well you should. I don’t want to find my cabin strewn with all my belongings each time I come into it. So just be friends! Do you hear, Kiki and Micky?’

  ‘Pooh,’ said Kiki, in a friendly voice, and nibbled at him.

  ‘Pooh to you!’ said Philip. ‘And kindly stop nibbling my ear!’

  5

  Lucian arrives

  The children soon felt that the Viking Star was their home – a floating home, containing everything they wanted except the open countryside. They got to know every nook and cranny on the ship, they explored the engine room under the eye of Mac, the chief engineer, and they were even allowed up on the bridge by the first officer, a very great honour.

  Mrs Mannering made friends on the ship with two or three people she liked. There were only a few children on board besides Jack and the others, and they were much younger and so spoilt that nobody wanted to have much to do w
ith them.

  ‘I rather wish there were more children of your own age,’ Mrs Mannering said to her four. ‘It might be more fun for you.’

  ‘Well – we don’t want anyone else, thanks,’ said Philip. ‘We’re all right on our own. It’s bad enough having those other spoilt kids around – always wanting to mess about with Micky, and trying to get Kiki to talk to them.’

  ‘She’s too sensible,’ said Jack. ‘Kiki just looks at them and says “Shut up!” whenever she sees them.’

  ‘How rude of her!’ said Mrs Mannering. ‘I do hope you stop her when she talks like that to the other children.’

  ‘Well, actually I don’t,’ said Jack. ‘She only says what I jolly well would like to say myself. Spoilt little brats! I’m going to push that nasty little yellow-haired girl into the swimming pool one of these days – coming whining round me asking me if she can hold Kiki. Hold Kiki! What does she think Kiki is – one of her frightful dolls?’

  ‘You mustn’t push the child into the pool,’ said Mrs Mannering, horrified. ‘I do agree she wants slapping – but she’s only a little girl, Jack.’

  ‘She’s a human mosquito,’ said Jack. ‘I just wish I had a fly-swatter when she comes near.’

  ‘Well, all the kids are getting off at the next stop,’ said Philip, fondling Micky who, as usual, was on his shoulder. The boys looked a curious pair, one with a parrot on his shoulder, the other with a monkey. The passengers smiled whenever they saw them.

  ‘I’m glad to hear those tiresome children will soon be gone,’ said Dinah, who was not very fond of youngsters. ‘But I expect some equally dreadful ones will embark in their place.’

  She was wrong, as it happened. Only one boy embarked; no girls at all. All the spoilt youngsters left, stumbling down the gangway at Naples, screaming and complaining to the last, certainly a most unpleasant collection of small children. Jack and the others watched them go with pleasure, and Kiki screeched after them. ‘Goodbye, good riddance, goodbye, good riddance!’