Ellen's Lion (3 page)

“H
ave you been doing any thinking about what you're going to be when you grow up?” asked Ellen.

“No,” said the lion. “Have you?”

“It never occurred to me,” said Ellen, raising her eyebrows. “Should I?”

“I think so,” the lion said. “Why don't you? While I take a nap.”

Ellen stared at him.

“I should think you'd show a little more interest,” she said.

“I'm sorry,” said the lion. “I didn't mean to be impolite.”

“That's all right,” said Ellen. “Now, suppose I think of a few suggestions. And you can decide.”

“Me?” said the lion. “I can't decide. It's not my problem, Ellen.”

“Of course it's your problem,” Ellen said.

“Well,” said the lion, sounding a little doubtful. “I'm willing to try to help.”

Ellen put her chin on her fist and she began to think.

“How would it be—to be—a tiger?”

“A tiger?” said the lion.

“A real tiger. With stripes. And a big ferocious growl.”

Ellen sprang about the playroom on all fours, growling ferociously.

“Your mother wouldn't like it,” the lion said. “Neither would I.”

“But you'd be in Africa or someplace,” said Ellen. “You wouldn't live here any more.”

“I certainly wouldn't,” said the lion. “Not with a tiger in the house.”

“You're being silly,” Ellen said, frowning at him.

“Humorous,” said the lion. “After all, this hardly can be called a serious conversation, can it?”

“Well!” said Ellen indignantly, and she turned her back on him. “I guess it can't!”

“Come,” the lion said. “You don't really believe you can grow up to be a tiger.”

Ellen's eyes opened wide and she whirled around to face him.

She laughed and laughed.

“Not me!” she shouted. “I'm going to be a lady fireman. We were talking about what you are going to be when you grow up.”

“Ridiculous,” said the lion.

“No it isn't,” Ellen said. “You could be a tiger easily. I could cut off your mane and paint stripes on you and all you'd have to do is grow big, and learn to growl—”

“I am going to take a nap,” the lion said, and he began to snore.

Ellen frowned at him.

“You're not really asleep,” she said. “Your eyes are open.”

“I always sleep with my eyes open,” said the lion. “You know they don't close.”

“I keep forgetting,” Ellen said. “But why don't you want to talk about what you'll be when you grow up? Have you decided already?”

“I am not going to grow up,” the lion said. “I am grown up.”

“Oh,” said Ellen.

For a while she sat looking at the lion, and he began to snore again.

“Tell me,” she said, poking at him to make sure he was awake and not really asleep.

“What?” he said.

“Why did you ever decide to grow up to be a stuffed lion?”

But the lion definitely had lost interest in the conversation.

A
star looked down on the lion. And the star spoke to him.

“I am your lucky star. How do I look?”

“Hello, Ellen,” said the lion. “You look fine.”

“It's my costume for the nursery school play,” said Ellen, sitting down on the footstool and admiring the sequins on her star suit. “You knew right away that I was a star, didn't you?”

“Yes,” said the lion. “I knew as soon as you said ‘I am your lucky star.' ”

“That's what I say when I come on in the play,” Ellen said. “I say it to Gertrude Wilson. She's the queen of the carrots.”

“What else do you say?” asked the lion.

“Nothing. Right after that the queen of the carrots marries Michael Kramer while we all sing ‘God Bless America' and it's the end of the play.”

“Then you don't come on till the end?” said the lion. “It isn't much of a part, for a star.”

“I have to stand with my feet spread and my arms stretched out,” Ellen said, and she got up and demonstrated.

“It's very tiring.”

“Oh, yes,” said the lion sympathetically. “It must be.”

“Anyway, I have the best costume,” said Ellen. “Michael Kramer is king of the rabbits and he has a kind of bunny suit. But the other kids just stand around with vegetables on their heads. They're supposed to be vegetables, you see.”

“It sounds like a very interesting play,” said the lion.

“It is,” said Ellen. “You ought to see it.”

“I haven't been invited,” said the lion.

Ellen thought.

“All the seats are for the mothers and fathers,” she said.

“I understand,” the lion said. “And, anyway, I have something else to do today.”

“You're not doing anything,” Ellen said. “You're just lying on the floor.”

“That's something,” said the lion.

“I'll invite you,” said Ellen. “I'll hold you during the play.”

“But you're in the play,” said the lion.

“So will you be,” Ellen said, and she swooped down on him, picked him up, and rushed off with him. “I'll tell my mother you're going to be in it.” The door slammed behind her.

A few minutes later the door opened and Ellen came in again, frowning, and still carrying the lion. She set him down in the big chair.

“I'm sorry you can't be in the play,” she said.

“That's all right,” said the lion. “Besides, there was one argument your mother didn't think of.”

“What was that?” said Ellen.

“If you held me in one of your arms you'd only have four points.”

“That's right,” Ellen said, after thinking about it. “Nobody would know I was a star.”

“Nobody would know,” the lion said. “And everybody would miss the point of the play.”

“It starts at three o'clock,” said Ellen. “I have to go now.”

“Good-bye,” said the lion.

“I'll tell you all about it when I get back,” Ellen said from the doorway.

“I'll be waiting to hear about it,” said the lion.

“Good luck.”

Ellen left, walking with her arms stretched out and with her feet spread, like a star.

“W
hat are you making, Ellen?” asked the lion, suppressing a yawn.

“Statues,” Ellen told him, without looking up from the modeling clay.

“Statues of whom?”

“Just statues.” Ellen pointed at two figures, one tall and thin and the other short and fat, and set them facing the lion. “Don't they look like statues?”

“No,” said the lion. “Crude figurines perhaps, not statues.”

The tall figure let his head fall slightly to one side. He looked at the lion as he spoke.

“Nevertheless, I am a statue.”

“See?” said Ellen, making a face at the lion. “He said so himself. He is a statue.”

“A statue of whom?” the lion said. “A statue has to be a statue of somebody.”

“That's right,” said the statue, tossing his head farther to the side. “I am a statue of General Jones.”

The head of the other statue dropped forward on his fat chest in a nod.

“And I am a statue of Admiral Smith.”

Ellen straightened up their heads with her thumbs.

“The tall one is a statue of General Jones,” she said. “And the short one is a statue of Admiral Smith.”

“A statue has to be a statue of somebody,” the lion repeated. “Who in the world are General Jones and Admiral Smith?”

The statue of Admiral Smith bowed from his fat waist.

“I am General Jones,” he said.

The tall statue of General Jones bowed lower.

“I am Admiral Smith.”

“They are statues of each other,” Ellen explained to the lion. “Admiral Smith is a statue of General Jones and General Jones is a statue of Admiral Smith.”

At the mention of their names both statues bowed again, so low that Ellen had to grab them to stop them from falling forward. As she straightened them up their legs bent and they broke into a slithering sort of jig. Despite Ellen's grasp on each of them they continued to dance. They hopped and leapt and bounced all over the place.

“That's enough,” said Ellen, whose arms were getting a bit tired trying to hold them. “Statues are not supposed to dance.”

Both statues kept on dancing and the Admiral began to sing.

“Oh, I am a statue of General Jones,” he sang, in time to the dancing.

“Oh, I am a statue of Admiral Smith,” sang the General.

“And he is a statue of me!” they sang, pointing at each other.

“Statues are not supposed to sing, either,” said Ellen, turning to the lion. “Are they?”

“I would prefer it if they didn't,” said the lion. “I'm thinking.”