LITMIR.BIZ

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hand for pie.

      ‘Take that thing out of here!’ said Mrs Zuckerman.

      ‘He’s hot,’ said Fern. ‘He’s almost dead, that frog.’

      ‘He is not,’ said Avery. ‘He lets me scratch him between the eyes.’ The frog jumped and landed in Mrs Zuckerman’s dishpan full of soapy water.

      ‘You’re getting your pie on you,’ said Fern. ‘Can I look for eggs in the henhouse, Aunt Edith?’

      ‘Run outdoors, both of you! And don’t bother the hens!’

      ‘It’s getting all over everything,’ shouted Fern. ‘His pie is all over his front.’

      ‘Come on, frog!’ cried Avery. He scooped up his frog. The frog kicked, splashing soapy water on to the blueberry pie.

      ‘Another crisis!’ groaned Fern.

      ‘Let’s swing on the swing!’ said Avery.

      The children ran to the barn.

      Mr Zuckerman had the best swing in the county. It was a single long piece of heavy rope tied to the beam over the north doorway. At the bottom end of the rope was a fat knot to sit on. It was arranged so that you could swing without being pushed. You climbed a ladder to the hayloft. Then, holding the rope, you stood at the edge and looked down, and were scared and dizzy. Then you straddled the knot, so that it acted as a seat. Then you got up all your nerve, took a deep breath, and jumped. For a second you seemed to be falling to the barn floor far below, but then suddenly the rope would begin to catch you, and you would sail through the barn door going a mile a minute, with the wind whistling in your eyes and ears and hair. Then you would zoom upwards into the sky, and look up at the clouds, and the rope would twist and you would twist and turn with the rope. Then you would drop down, down, down out of the sky and come sailing back into the barn almost into the hayloft, then sail out again (not quite so far this time), then in again (not quite so high), then out again, then in again, then out, then in; and then you’d jump off and fall down and let somebody else try it.

      Mothers for miles around worried about Zuckerman’s swing. They feared some child would fall off. But no child ever did. Children almost always hang on to things tighter than their parents think they will.

      Avery put the frog in his pocket and climbed to the hayloft. ‘The last time I swung on this swing, I almost crashed into a barn swallow,’ he yelled.

      ‘Take that frog out!’ ordered Fern.

      Avery straddled the rope and jumped. He sailed out through the door, frog and all, and into the sky, frog and all. Then he sailed back into the barn.

      ‘Your tongue is purple!’ screamed Fern.

      ‘So is yours!’ cried Avery, sailing out again with the frog.

      ‘I have hay inside my dress! It itches!’ called Fern.

      ‘Scratch it!’ yelled Avery, as he sailed back.

      ‘It’s my turn,’ said Fern. ‘Jump off!’

      ‘Fern’s got the itch!’ sang Avery.

      When he jumped off, he threw the swing up to his sister. She shut her eyes tight and jumped. She felt the dizzy drop, then the supporting lift of the swing. When she opened her eyes she was looking up into the blue sky and was about to fly back through the door.

      They took turns for an hour.

      When the children grew tired of swinging, they went down towards the pasture and picked wild raspberries and ate them. Their tongues turned from purple to red. Fern bit into a raspberry that had a bad-tasting bug inside it, and got discouraged. Avery found an empty candy box and put his frog in it. The frog seemed tired after his morning in the swing. The children walked slowly up towards the barn. They, too, were tired and hardly had energy enough to walk.

      ‘Let’s build a tree house,’ suggested Avery. ‘I want to live in a tree, with my frog.’

      ‘I’m going to visit Wilbur,’ Fern announced.

      They climbed the fence into the lane and walked lazily towards the pigpen. Wilbur heard them coming and got up.

      Avery noticed the spider web, and, coming closer, he saw Charlotte.

      ‘Hey, look at that big spider!’ he said. ‘It’s tremenjus.’

      ‘Leave it alone!’ commanded Fern. ‘You’ve got a frog – isn’t that enough?’

      ‘That’s a fine spider and I’m going to capture it,’ said Avery. He took the cover off the candy box. Then he picked up a stick. ‘I’m going to knock that ol’ spider into this box,’ he said.

      Wilbur’s heart almost stopped when he saw what was going on. This might be the end of Charlotte if the boy succeeded in catching her.

      ‘You stop it, Avery!’ cried Fern.

      Avery put one leg over the fence of the pigpen. He was just about to raise his stick to hit Charlotte when he lost his balance. He swayed and toppled and landed on the edge of Wilbur’s trough. The trough tipped up and then came down with a slap. The goose egg was right underneath. There was a dull explosion as the egg broke, and then a horrible smell.

      Fern screamed. Avery jumped to his feet. The air was filled with the terrible gases and smells from the rotten egg. Templeton, who had been resting in his home, scuttled away into the barn.

      ‘Good night!’ screamed Avery. ‘Good night! What a stink! Let’s get out of here!’

      Fern was crying. She held her nose and ran towards the house. Avery ran after her, holding his nose. Charlotte felt greatly relieved to see him go. It had been a narrow escape.

      Later on that morning, the animals came up from the pasture – the sheep, the lambs, the gander, the goose, and the seven goslings. There were many complaints about the awful smell, and Wilbur had to tell the story over and over again, of how the Arable boy had tried to capture Charlotte, and how the smell of the broken egg drove him away just in time. ‘It was that rotten goose egg that saved Charlotte’s life,’ said Wilbur.

      The goose was proud of her share in the adventure. ‘I’m delighted that the egg never hatched,’ she gabbled.

      Templeton, of course, was miserable over the loss of his beloved egg. But he couldn’t resist boasting. ‘It pays to save things,’ he said in his surly voice. ‘A rat never knows when something is going to come in handy. I never throw anything away.’

      ‘Well,’ said one of the lambs, ‘this whole business is all well and good for Charlotte, but what about the rest of us? The smell is unbearable. Who wants to live in a barn that is perfumed with rotten egg?’

      ‘Don’t worry, you’ll get used to it,’ said Templeton. He sat up and pulled wisely at his long whiskers, then crept away to pay a visit to the dump.

      When Lurvy showed up at lunchtime carrying a pail of food for Wilbur, he stopped short a few paces from the pigpen. He sniffed the air and made a face.

      ‘What in thunder?’ he said. Setting the pail down, he picked up the stick that Avery had dropped and pried the trough up. ‘Rats!’ he said. ‘Phew! I might a’ known a rat would make a nest under this trough. How I hate a rat!’

      And Lurvy dragged Wilbur’s trough across the yard and kicked some dirt into the rat’s nest, burying the broken egg and all Templeton’s other possessions. Then he picked up the pail. Wilbur stood in the trough, drooling with hunger. Lurvy poured. The slops ran creamily down around the pig’s eyes and ears. Wilbur grunted. He gulped and sucked, and sucked and gulped, making swishing and swooshing noises, anxious to get everything at once. It was a delicious meal – skim milk, wheat middlings,

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