The Wombles to the Rescue (10 page)

‘Who tidied that up?' asked Orinoco.

‘Nobody. Miss Adelaide and I made them,' said Alderney, stopping her usual headlong rush, so that she could admire her own work. ‘There was all that old paper Tobermory and Cousin Botany and Wellington had drawn their maps and diagrams on, and it seemed a pity to waste it completely, so we scrunched it all up and soaked it in water and when it got nice and soft we made it into all kinds of things which we varnished. Mugs, plates, bowls, jugs, dishes. Miss Adelaide's got all the Womblegarten making things now.'

‘But what about the painting on the outside?' asked Orinoco. ‘When I was in the Womblegarten we made things out of paper and water too, but they never looked like this!'

‘That's Shansi,' said Alderney. ‘She's ever so good at painting. She calls it Womble Willow Pattern. Isn't that nice?'

‘It's not bad,' agreed Orinoco, squinting at the picture which showed three fat little Wombles crossing a bridge carrying their tidy-bags while a couple of pigeons flew overhead.

‘Shansi started painting on old plastic cups that were tidied up on the Common, but they don't last. They split and crack. The things that the Womblegarten are making will go on for ages, unless they're dropped. And I'll tell you what,' Alderney lowered her voice and beckoned to Orinoco. ‘Miss Adelaide's not nearly as cross as she was, now that the Womblegarten's working so well. But she does need unused paper for sums and writing and stuff like that. So if you see any, don't forget. Another daisy syrup?'

‘OK, I'll remember. Thanks, don't mind if I do.'

It was a great deal of hard work to transfer all Botany's underwater farm and by the finish everybody was exhausted, although very pleased with themselves as they went from tank to tank looking at these strange plants. Not everybody was sure that they were going to fancy this new food but, as the Wombles are the most polite creatures in the whole world, nobody quite liked to say so.

‘
Tiens
,' said Madame Cholet, who had had a taste or two herself and who like Orinoco had found the plants rather bitter. ‘I shall have to think of some new recipes. This is how a real cook should be! Ready to welcome a challenge, and as I am a very good cook indeed I shall overcome this trifling difficulty. Ah yes, a little clover honey perhaps and a touch of bark syrup and then maybe a
soupçon
of dandelion oil . . .'

Madame Cholet rolled up her sleeves, got out a bowl or two, some spoons, a measuring jug, a couple of saucepans and got down to work. She mixed, tasted, rolled things round her tongue, rinsed out her mouth, adjusted this and that and then began to smile as she said to herself, ‘Ah yes, of course . . . now then, mixed with a little grass flour and kneaded out flat and fried carefully, that would be most tasteful. What should I call it? Ah, of course . . .
quel dommage!
'

‘Well, that's that then,' said Cousin Botany, taking off his awful old hat and wiping round the inside of it with a corner of his apron. ‘Thanks very much, all. Hallo then, who's that?'

‘It's me,' said Wellington, emerging out of the shadows with his oil rig and bucket on the faithful wheelbarrow. He knew the rig was a failure, but somehow he couldn't quite bear to part with it. It had seemed such a
very
good idea at the time.

‘That bucket doesn't half smell, young Wellington,' said Botany. ‘What you got in it, eh?'

‘Just bits of the bottom of Queen's Mere,' replied Wellington who was tired and cold and dispirited. Inventing a new way of using old throwaway glass bottles is not the same as discovering how to drill for oil.

‘It does pong,' agreed Tomsk, holding his nose. ‘I should leave it there if I was you. 'Night all.'

And off went Tomsk, shaking the last of the Queen's Mere water out of his thick fur as he made for the burrow and bed. Cousin Botany gave Wellington a pat on the back and then returned to his underwater farming tanks. He still couldn't quite believe that they really existed and that all his work of years and years had at last been proved useful.

Wellington heaved one of his great big sighs and then jumped as a gentle voice said from the shadows, ‘What is in bucket, please?'

‘Dredgings from Queen's Mere.'

‘Oh yes.'

Shansi edged forward and looked into the bucket, wrinkling up her nose.

‘I know it pongs,' said Wellington crossly.

‘Not smell which makes me stop. Is what is made of and colour of same. Most interesting.'

‘Now look here,' said Wellington, sitting up with a jerk. He had begun to nod off. ‘If
you're
going to have an Idea, please don't. Wombles have had Ideas all round me recently and . . .'

Shansi didn't say anything, but just handed the bucket over to him. Wellington took it and sniffed and then looked and finally put one finger into it. The finger came out very black indeed.

Wellington looked at Shansi and then back at the bucket.

‘Oh, my word,' said Wellington and he licked his finger, rubbed his spectacles, screwed up his eyes and sniffed. ‘Hold on,' he said. ‘I think I
am
having another Idea. Oh dear, dear, dear
ME
!'

.

Chapter 10

Orinoco on Television

Everything now began to happen so quickly that none of the Wombles seemed to have time to draw breath, let alone quarrel or fight among themselves. Even the arrival of Great Uncle Bulgaria's next letter was, although interesting, no more than a nice thirty minutes in which to have a sit down while sipping a refreshing bracken juice.

Orinoco, recuperating from all his pipeline digging, was only too glad to go and help Madame Cholet in the kitchen and to taste, mix, add and generally give his advice. Alderney was kept at full stretch filling and labelling all the new jars which Wellington had made with Orinoco's help. Cousin Botany was forever going round and round his precious under-Common tanks, making sure that his plants were getting enough fresh water and light. He had even begun to feed them some compost from the pile he had started beneath the undergrowth by the Mere.

Tobermory, having had a good rest, was now working on adapting the tidied-up plastic sheets. The brace and bit which he had repaired earlier was coming in useful as the plastic was very hard indeed.

‘It'll never wear out or get woodworm, that's for certain,' said Tobermory, who was wearing his goggles again. ‘The only difficulty is, it won't look the same as the old door.'

‘Ah,' said Shansi, a wicked gleam in her round little eyes as she bowed politely. ‘Can promise it will!'

‘All right, cleversticks,' growled Tobermory, ‘just hold that side still, while I saw this one. Plastic is all very well in its way, but it's not the same as wood, say what you like!'

‘We see,' said Shansi with a slight giggle.

Meanwhile Wellington had set up his own particular tests at the back of the Workshop. Tests which included a bucketful of the bottom of Queen's Mere. The smell was so awful that he had to tie his scarf across his mouth, but he was quite determined to carry on with what he was doing, because it might at last make his ex-oil rig become useful.

And it was some days later that Wellington slid off his workbench stool holding up two glassfuls of liquid. He gazed at them and nodded happily. The glass in his left paw was full of a thick yellow liquid, while the glass in his right paw was blacker than the night when there is no moon.

‘Now,' said Wellington, ‘all I need are a couple of felt tips and I'll show 'em all!'

By ‘them' Wellington meant Miss Adelaide and Tobermory, and although both these older Wombles happened to be very busy discussing some important news in the Workshop, they knew at once that Wellington's polite invitation to see his invention must be accepted instantly.

‘Back so soon. And a good thing too,' growled Tobermory, putting down the letter he had been reading.

‘Which must mean that the whole business has been a great success,' said Miss Adelaide. ‘One hopes.'

‘Taste this, please,' said Madame Cholet, bustling in from the kitchen. ‘I have put just a touch of my new paste on these grass biscuits.
C'est
OK?'

‘Um. Rather,' agreed Tobermory, crunching up his biscuit and then licking his lips while wiping the back of his paw along his grey moustache. ‘Smashing. Have you read Bulgaria's letter?'

‘Oh yes, Adelaide passed it to me yesterday. I think, Tobermory, that for you in particular it will be good to have Bulgaria back home. You have lost weight, and for a Womble to do that is very bad. It reflects, you see, on my cooking!'

‘
Tsk, tsk, tsk
,' said Tobermory, taking off his bowler hat and running a handkerchief round the inside of it. ‘Never, never. Ho-hum. It's young Wellington that we must think of now. He hasn't invented all that he felt he should have done, but he does come up with some very good ideas from time to time and now I believe he's done it again. All right, young Wellington, in you come.'

Wellington edged into the Workshop rather shyly and then, reassured by the smiles and nods of the older Wombles, he produced two flasks from behind his back. In one flask was a thick yellow liquid while in the other the liquid was blacker than the blackest night.

Wellington bowed jerkily and said, ‘I think I've discovered an oil, sort of, which will stop all the doors making horrible noises when they're opened and shut. I discovered it quite by accident. This is it.' And he held up the flask which was yellow-coloured.

‘What's in it?' asked Tobermory.

‘I'm not too sure really,' said Wellington. ‘It's some buttercup juice mixed with part of the stuff which came up with my ex-oil rig. But it is
ever
so oily.'

And Wellington tipped the flask slightly so that a few drops of yellow liquid slowly fell,
glup, glup, glup
, on to the table.

‘And what is in the other bottle?' enquired Miss Adelaide, as Tobermory put one cautious finger into the mixture and first sniffed and then tasted it.

‘Ink. Or paint,' said Wellington. ‘Honestly, Miss Adelaide, it's
ever
so black, and you dip a felt tip into it and then draw on a plastic blackboard. Look, Shansi will show you . . .'

Wellington stood aside and Shansi came into the Workshop, ducking her head rather shyly. In her hands she held a pile of small sheets of coloured plastic. She sat down at the workbench and, taking a felt-tipped paintbrush out of her pocket, she dipped it into the flask which held the black liquid, pressed it gently against the side to get rid of the excess and then, with what looked like half a dozen quick strokes, she painted the Womble Willow Pattern on a piece of scarlet plastic.

‘Very good,' said Miss Adelaide, ‘very good indeed, dear. But then you always were top of the painting class. This really could be hung on the wall as a picture. We do miss your skills in the Womblegarten, Shansi. Indeed I have been wondering if . . .'

‘But, Miss Adelaide,' burst out Wellington, who could stand the suspense no longer, ‘it's not a picture. It's a new kind of slate which you use in the Womblegarten instead of paper exercise books. You can wipe off the drawing or the writing or whatever it is frightfully easily with a cloth. Then you have a clean slate again. Do you like it? Do you think it's a good Idea?'

Young Wombles, even young working Wombles, hardly ever interrupt Miss Adelaide and get away without a telling-off or a cuff round the ear. Sometimes they get both. But even as Wellington realised what he had done and began to gulp nervously, Miss Adelaide nodded and smiled.

‘Yes, it is a good Idea,' she agreed. ‘Helpful, practical and
simple
. . .'

This was said with a sideways glance at Tobermory, who pretended to be busy trying to re-mend the brace and bit, which had started giving trouble again after having to deal with heavy duty plastic. He knew jolly well that Miss Adelaide didn't altogether approve of the underwater farming scheme. But then she was rather set in her ways and anything that was as new as that would be sure to take her a while to get used to.

‘These boards and pens will also solve the chalk shortage,' Miss Adelaide went on. ‘I should like a big board for my own use when I am teaching. Congratulations, Wellington. Now, as I was saying before I was – ahem – interrupted, I think it would be a good idea if Shansi stopped doing tidying-up work and returned to help me in the Womblegarten.'

‘Am not clever,' said Shansi.

‘Yes, you are. You're very good at making things and painting and decorating. I shall put you in charge of the paw-craft class.'

Shansi thought this over for all of five seconds and then nodded violently.

‘Would like,' said Shansi, ‘would like
VERY
much.'

‘Some Wombles have all the luck,' said Orinoco, when he heard this latest piece of news. ‘Now that's just the kind of job I ought to have really. I'm quite a good artist, you know.'

‘No, I didn't,' said Wellington truthfully.

‘Oh yes, I can draw terribly good pin-Wombles and . . .' Orinoco stopped suddenly and then went on quickly, ‘Well, I'd better nip off and finish my tidying-up. See you later.'

‘I thought you'd finished for today,' said Wellington, but he spoke to the empty air for Orinoco, moving at a fair speed, was already yards away and heading for the open Common. His strange behaviour was explained almost instantly, for at that moment Tobermory and Tomsk came into view carrying between them, and with much groaning and grunting, a large piece of brown plastic.

‘New front door,' puffed Tobermory. ‘Don't just stand there, young Wellington, come and lend us a paw. You need to build up your muscles or you'll get as fat as Orinoco. Funny, I thought I saw him here a minute ago. We could have done with his help too.'

Wellington looked in the direction of his friend, who was now a mere round furry dot on the horizon. It was very odd about Orinoco – he sometimes took a lot more exercise avoiding work than the actual work would have needed.

However, once he was well clear of the burrow, Orinoco slowed to a walk and then a saunter while he kept a weather eye open for somewhere to have a nice forty winks. There was what looked like a promising little line of trees over there with some nice cosy bushes growing round them, and beyond there was an old green van, which would make a good windbreak.

From his tidy-bag, Orinoco shook out the coat he'd picked up from the storeroom, for the wind was still a bit nippy, and put it on. It trailed round his feet, but that made it even cosier and, tying his hat on with his scarf, Orinoco slid a pair of dark glasses on to his nose, a toffee into his mouth and prepared to snuggle down in the bracken.

‘Excuse me,' said a somewhat irritable voice, ‘but you are knocking against our microphone, sir.'

Orinoco, not a Womble to get flustered, turned round and saw a largish man wearing headphones, coming out of the bushes on all fours.

‘Sorry,' said Orinoco, and couldn't resist asking, ‘What is the microphone
for
?'

‘We're from WTV,' the man said importantly. ‘We're doing a TV programme on the wildlife of Wimbledon Common.'

‘Wild?' said Orinoco, faintly surprised. ‘I didn't know there was much
wild
life, it always seems fairly tame to me. The squirrels tear about a bit sometimes in the spring, but they're not exactly
wild
. Silly sort of animals really, you can never get a sensible word out of 'em.'

The man stared very hard at Orinoco, who hitched up his trailing skirts, shunted the toffee to the other side of his mouth and prepared to move on. Great Uncle Bulgaria had always told his Wombles not to get involved with Human Beings if it was possible.

‘Are you – are you a naturalist?' the man asked.

‘No, I don't think so. I'm too busy for hobbies and games and things. I've had to find all sorts of ways round this silly old shortage business, you know.'

A shorter, dark-haired man had now appeared holding an unusual-looking camera on his shoulder. Orinoco wasn't too keen on having his photograph taken, but at the same time he couldn't resist showing off a little. Nobody back at the burrow had been listening to him much recently, and it was rather pleasant having an audience, even if they were only Human Beings.

‘What sort of shortages?' the larger man asked.

‘Food,' said Orinoco in an offhand voice. ‘I mean, it's obvious that to stop us running out of it we have to grow more stuff underwater. There's plenty of water about still. And then you can use plastic instead of wood for all kinds of things like doors and shelves and drawing boards. You can produce oil out of deep sludge if you add crushed buttercups. Then, of course, old lemonade bottles properly ground down make jolly good jars and old newspapers are easy to turn into plates and cups and so on . . .'

Orinoco became aware that both the men were continuing to stare at him in an unblinking silence which made him start to feel nervous.

‘Well, well,' said Orinoco, regretfully deciding that he'd better look for somewhere else to have his forty winks, ‘I must be moving on.'

‘Yes, yes, of course,' said the dark-haired man. ‘It's been most interesting listening to you. Underwater farming –
of course!
'