David Blaize and the Blue Door

The registrar had been drawing pictures of David on the blotting-paper.

‘When I have counted ten,’ he said. ‘You’ve got to choose. If you don’t, I shall choose for you. What’s that?’ he added, looking up at the window.

A large mild face was pressed against the glass, and there was the cow outside, moving her mouth round and round, and breathing so heavily against the window that it was almost impossible to see out. Then the glass gave way under the pressure of her nose, and she put her head into the room.

‘Moo! Put my name down,’ she said. ‘I’m incognito, so call me a porter.’

‘You’re too late for this morning,’ said Noah.

‘No, I’m not,’ said the cow.

‘You are,’ said Noah angrily. ‘Don’t interrupt. One – two – three – four – ’

The cow breathed heavily into the room.

‘Why, it’s the boy who went Anywhere,’ she said, seeing David. ‘I never thought the express called here, dearie.’

David ran across to that kind, mild creature.

‘Oh, do knock the whole place down,’ he said. ‘They want to marry me, and it’s all so beastly. Butt at it, as you did at my luggage.’

‘Five – six,’ said Noah.

‘All right, dearie,’ said the cow, shaking bits of broken glass from her ears. ‘You just get behind the door, and I’ll see to them all. But you must promise not to go milking me again.’

‘Never, never,’ shrieked David. ‘But be quick; he’s counted six already.’

‘Seven – eight,’ said Noah.

The cow backed into the village street, and David saw her tail fly up with a spring. She put her head down, and came galloping towards the house, and he ran behind the door.

‘Nine – ten!’ said Noah. ‘Choose, or be chosen for.’

At that moment the cow’s head crashed into the wall below the window. Miss Muffet gave one faint scream, and said, ‘Spider, dear!’ Miss Bones whirled her ox-tail round her head like a sling, and, intending to hit the cow, hit Noah the most awful slap on his false whiskers, which fell off. The giraffe’s head went up the chimney with a pop and a shower of soot descended into the room.

‘Now, run, dearie,’ said the cow to David. ‘Run for your life. The whole lot of them will be after you.’

David had no thought but to get back to the blue door, and into his bedroom again, and as the shortest way was across the marriage-meadow, and over the bridge, and up the garden path, and in at the garden door, and up the stairs, and past the game-cupboard, he no longer cared what enemies he might meet on his way. The pike might have come up into the meadow, and the soldiers might be on the lawn, but nothing mattered except to get back to the blue door by the shortest possible route.

All the adventure of being a Field-Marshal was nothing to this.

So out he ran, and there, on the threshold, was the pike, which had flopped its way all across the meadow when Noah called it, and it gave a fearful snap at David, and pulled off one of his shoes. The other stuck in a piece of marshy land near the bridge, but he didn’t stop for that, and just ran and ran.

Behind him he heard a noise growing louder every minute: there were lions roaring and elephants trumpeting, and marbles rolling, and sounds of gimlets and hammers that showed the happy families were on his track, and whistles from engines, and bells ringing as if the whole village had caught fire, or was just going to have dinner; and when he came to the bridge, he heard bugles and drums in the camp, and the fat voice of the Brigadier-General giving orders. The stupid trout had put its head through the ice, and was shouting, ‘Here he comes,’ and a machine-gun began peppering away, and a huge cannon-ball flew by him. Mixed up in this he heard the canter of the spider, and the parrot sneezing, and the hoarse voice of Miss Bones shrieking ‘My papa will make cutlets of him, and I’ll eat him.’

Then from the elms there came a sound of cawing, and from the bushes a sound of twittering, and chirping from the long garden wall. He had never heard so much bird-noise, even at the meeting of the flying committee.

‘It’s the birds,’ thought David. ‘If they’re against me, I’m done!’

For one moment he stood quite still, feeling that it was no use to go on if the birds, too, were his enemies. But then he heard a whistle of wings close above him, and a voice said:

‘Fly in their faces, and confuse them. There’s a trout down there, kingfisher, giving the alarm. Go and peck him.’

David wasted no more time, except to call out, ‘Thanks awfully, birds,’ and ran on up the garden-path. He could see jays settling on the tents, and woodpeckers tapping to see if they had come to the right place, and on he ran till he came to the garden door. It was open, and he rushed up the stairs, and felt his way past the game-cupboard, for it was quite dark here, and turned the corner into the nursery passage where the flame-cats had danced.

But now there were no flame-cats here, unless one tiny glimmer of light on the wall was the remains of one, and he had to grope his way – and, oh, how long it seemed – to the end of the passage, where he remembered that the blue door was. He had left the key hanging up on a nail beside it, but now he could not remember which side it was, and as he groped for it, he knocked down the bottle which had something to do with the electric light. As it gurgled away on the floor, he remembered that he had shaken it, to shock the flame-cats and made them stop dancing, and now he felt for it at his feet, meaning to shake it, and get the electric light to flare out again, so that he might find the key of the blue door. But the stopper had come out, and it was empty, and when he shook it nothing whatever happened.

Meantime the pursuit had got much nearer, and he could hear that a lion or two, and some soldiers had come to the garden door.

‘He went in here,’ roared a lion. ‘I can smell him.’

Then the Brigadier-General spoke.

‘Bring up the machine-guns,’ he said, ‘and rake the passage from end to end. Then advance in open order.’

David heard the bullets rattling against the wall of the passage at the corner, and knew that when they had turned that, he would be exposed to their full fire again. There was no cover of any sort or kind; when once they had advanced to the corner, he had nowhere left to go, unless he could find the key of the door.

Then he heard the voice of the Brigadier-General when the firing stopped.

‘Up the stairs and right turn,’ he said. ‘Then open fire again. I’m behind you, so don’t be afraid.’

David pressed his hands to his head, and squeezed it to see if there was a single idea left in it. There was just one.

‘Oh, flame-cats,’ he said. ‘I did stop shocking you when you asked me. Do show a light just for a minute.’

Then the one little glimmer on the wall began to grow brighter, and he saw it was the eye of a flame-cat. Then another eye lit up, as if a gas-lighter in the street had turned it on, and after that the apricot-and-poppy-coloured tabby appeared. ‘Set to partners,’ it said, and disappeared again, like water running out of the hole at the bottom of a basin. But in that moment’s light, David had found the key and fitted it into the lock of the blue door.

‘There’s just time to take the key with me,’ he said, and pulled the door open. Before he had shut it after him, and locked it again, he heard a voice say ‘Fire,’ and there was a tremendous explosion.

He had fallen forward on his bed, and the pillow went with a soft thump on to the floor. But tight clenched in his hand was the golden key, and the door was shut and locked behind him.

David didn’t remember having taken off his sailor clothes and put on his pyjamas, but here he was in them now, and his sailor clothes were in a heap on the floor, and the light of the dawn was coming in through his windows. He felt tremendously sleepy, but before he turned round to get under his bed-clothes, he opened his hand to look at the golden key. But there was no key there: it was only the pin-partridge.

For the moment he was horribly disappointed, but almost instantly he cheered up again.

‘It doesn’t matter a bit!’ he said. ‘I know how to get through the door now. Oh, what an exciting night. I wonder – ’

But before he knew what he wondered he fell fast asleep.

When he went down to breakfast next morning, he found his father and mother already there. One was munching toast, and the other was reading the paper, in their dull way.

‘Good morning, David,’ said his mother. ‘You’re rather late, darling.’

His father stopped munching toast for a second.

‘Did the birds awake you, too, David?’ he said. ‘I never heard such a noise as there was about dawn.’

‘I heard them,’ said David. ‘I went to sleep again afterwards.’