The Water Horse by Dick King-Smith

Author:Dick King-Smith
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Random House Children's Books
Published: 1990-04-07T04:00:00+00:00

6

Home Is the Sailor

KIRSTIE WAS SO excited at the thought of Father coming home on leave that she could not manage to eat much. Angus was excited too, but that didn’t keep him from finishing his own breakfast and Kirstie’s leftovers.

Because they knew what time the bus arrived at the stop at the bottom of the glen, they were ready and waiting on the road outside the small white house when the distant blue-clad figure appeared, duffel bag on shoulder, packages under one arm, waving happily with the other.

“Home is the sailor, home from sea,” said Grumble contentedly to himself as he watched Mother and the children running to greet him.

At first it was all excitement in the house as the packages were opened, presents from far, distant lands. For Mother there was a length of beautiful silk, for Grumble a packet of strange foreign seeds to plant in the garden, for Kirstie a necklace made of sharks’ teeth, and for Angus a four-masted ship with a full spread of canvas, sailing eternally within its bottle.

“How you’ve grown!” said Father to the children. “Why, last leave I was carrying you about easily, Angus. I wouldn’t be able to now.”

“He likes his food,” said Mother.

All this reminded Kirstie of the Water Horse and how he had grown too heavy to carry.

“Grumble!” she cried. “We haven’t fed Crusoe yet!”

“Who’s Crusoe?” said Father.

“He’s our monster!” shouted Angus. “We found him on the beach and he hatched in the bathtub, and he lives in the goldfish pond, and we catch fish for him every day, and he gobbles them up, chomp, chomp, chomp. You should see his teeth, Father, miles bigger than the ones on Kirstie’s necklace, they are!” and Angus made frightening chewing faces.

“Whatever’s the boy talking about?” said Father, and the others explained everything to him.

“You couldn’t have come home at a better time,” said Grumble. “We must get him into the lochan, the quicker the better, and he’s too heavy for me to manage. Getting him out of the goldfish pond won’t be easy, to begin with, so my idea is not to feed him at all today, and then he’ll be so hungry that he might manage to climb out himself if we tempt him with something tasty.”

“Come and see him, Father,” said Kirstie, and they all went out to the pond where Crusoe was calling hungrily.

They took off the wire frame, and Kirstie said “Crusoe!” and the Water Horse came and laid his head on the rim of the pond.

“Holy mackerel!” said Father. “I’ve sailed the seven seas and never seen such a creature! Is it some kind of sea serpent?”

“A Water Horse,” said Grumble.

“I’ve heard you speak of such a thing. Was there not one in Loch Morar, I think you told me once?”

Grumble nodded. “Gentle him,” he said. “He’s an amiable beastie.”

And Father bent down and scratched and pulled at Crusoe’s ears. “When shall we try to move him, then?” he said.

“In the morning, I thought,” said Grumble.

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