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Chapter VI. Mr. Toad
It was a bright morning in the early part of summer; the river had resumed its wonted
banks and its accustomed pace, and a hot sun seemed to be pulling everything green
and bushy and spiky up out of the earth towards him, as if by strings.
The Mole and the Water Rat had been up since dawn, very busy on matters connected
with boats and the opening of the boating season; painting and varnishing, mending
paddles, repairing cushions, hunting for
missing boat-hooks, and so on; and were finishing breakfast in their little parlour
and eagerly discussing their plans for the day, when a heavy knock sounded at the
'Bother!' said the Rat, all over egg. 'See who it is, Mole, like a good chap,
since you've finished.' The Mole went to attend the summons, and
the Rat heard him utter a cry of surprise.
Then he flung the parlour door open, and announced with much importance, 'Mr.
Badger!'
This was a wonderful thing, indeed, that the Badger should pay a formal call on
them, or indeed on anybody.
He generally had to be caught, if you wanted him badly, as he slipped quietly
along a hedgerow of an early morning or a late evening, or else hunted up in his own
house in the middle of the Wood, which was a serious undertaking.
The Badger strode heavily into the room, and stood looking at the two animals with
an expression full of seriousness.
The Rat let his egg-spoon fall on the table-cloth, and sat open-mouthed.
'The hour has come!' said the Badger at last with great solemnity.
'What hour?' asked the Rat uneasily, glancing at the clock on the mantelpiece.
'WHOSE hour, you should rather say,' replied the Badger.
'Why, Toad's hour!
The hour of Toad! I said I would take him in hand as soon as
the winter was well over, and I'm going to take him in hand to-day!'
'Toad's hour, of course!' cried the Mole delightedly.
'Hooray! I remember now!
WE'LL teach him to be a sensible Toad!'
'This very morning,' continued the Badger, taking an arm-chair, 'as I learnt last
night from a trustworthy source, another new and exceptionally powerful motor-car
will arrive at Toad Hall on approval or return.
At this very moment, perhaps, Toad is busy arraying himself in those singularly
hideous habiliments so dear to him, which transform him from a (comparatively) good-
looking Toad into an Object which throws
any decent-minded animal that comes across it into a violent fit.
We must be up and doing, ere it is too late.
You two animals will accompany me instantly to Toad Hall, and the work of rescue shall
be accomplished.' 'Right you are!' cried the Rat, starting
up.
'We'll rescue the poor unhappy animal! We'll convert him!
He'll be the most converted Toad that ever was before we've done with him!'
They set off up the road on their mission of mercy, Badger leading the way.
Animals when in company walk in a proper and sensible manner, in single file,
instead of sprawling all across the road and being of no use or support to each
other in case of sudden trouble or danger.
They reached the carriage-drive of Toad Hall to find, as the Badger had
anticipated, a shiny new motor-car, of great size, painted a bright red (Toad's
favourite colour), standing in front of the house.
As they neared the door it was flung open, and Mr. Toad, arrayed in goggles, cap,
gaiters, and enormous overcoat, came swaggering down the steps, drawing on his
gauntleted gloves.
'Hullo! come on, you fellows!' he cried cheerfully on catching sight of them.
'You're just in time to come with me for a jolly--to come for a jolly--for a--er--
jolly----'
His hearty accents faltered and fell away as he noticed the stern unbending look on
the countenances of his silent friends, and his invitation remained unfinished.
The Badger strode up the steps.
'Take him inside,' he said sternly to his companions.
Then, as Toad was hustled through the door, struggling and protesting, he turned to the
chauffeur in charge of the new motor-car.
'I'm afraid you won't be wanted to-day,' he said.
'Mr. Toad has changed his mind. He will not require the car.
Please understand that this is final.
You needn't wait.' Then he followed the others inside and shut
the door.
'Now then!' he said to the Toad, when the four of them stood together in the Hall,
'first of all, take those ridiculous things off!'
'Shan't!' replied Toad, with great spirit.
'What is the meaning of this gross outrage? I demand an instant explanation.'
'Take them off him, then, you two,' ordered the Badger briefly.
They had to lay Toad out on the floor, kicking and calling all sorts of names,
before they could get to work properly.
Then the Rat sat on him, and the Mole got his motor-clothes off him bit by bit, and
they stood him up on his legs again.
A good deal of his blustering spirit seemed to have evaporated with the removal of his
fine panoply.
Now that he was merely Toad, and no longer the Terror of the Highway, he giggled
feebly and looked from one to the other appealingly, seeming quite to understand
the situation.
'You knew it must come to this, sooner or later, Toad,' the Badger explained
severely.
You've disregarded all the warnings we've given you, you've gone on squandering the
money your father left you, and you're getting us animals a bad name in the
district by your furious driving and your smashes and your rows with the police.
Independence is all very well, but we animals never allow our friends to make
fools of themselves beyond a certain limit; and that limit you've reached.
Now, you're a good fellow in many respects, and I don't want to be too *** you.
I'll make one more effort to bring you to reason.
You will come with me into the smoking- room, and there you will hear some facts
about yourself; and we'll see whether you come out of that room the same Toad that
you went in.'
He took Toad firmly by the arm, led him into the smoking-room, and closed the door
behind them. 'THAT'S no good!' said the Rat
contemptuously.
'TALKING to Toad'll never cure him. He'll SAY anything.'
They made themselves comfortable in armchairs and waited patiently.
Through the closed door they could just hear the long continuous drone of the
Badger's voice, rising and falling in waves of oratory; and presently they noticed that
the sermon began to be punctuated at
intervals by long-drawn sobs, evidently proceeding from the *** of Toad, who was
a soft-hearted and affectionate fellow, very easily converted--for the time being--
to any point of view.
After some three-quarters of an hour the door opened, and the Badger reappeared,
solemnly leading by the paw a very limp and dejected Toad.
His skin hung baggily about him, his legs wobbled, and his cheeks were furrowed by
the tears so plentifully called forth by the Badger's moving discourse.
'Sit down there, Toad,' said the Badger kindly, pointing to a chair.
'My friends,' he went on, 'I am pleased to inform you that Toad has at last seen the
error of his ways.
He is truly sorry for his misguided conduct in the past, and he has undertaken to give
up motor-cars entirely and for ever. I have his solemn promise to that effect.'
'That is very good news,' said the Mole gravely.
'Very good news indeed,' observed the Rat dubiously, 'if only--IF only----'
He was looking very hard at Toad as he said this, and could not help thinking he
perceived something vaguely resembling a twinkle in that animal's still sorrowful
eye.
'There's only one thing more to be done,' continued the gratified Badger.
'Toad, I want you solemnly to repeat, before your friends here, what you fully
admitted to me in the smoking-room just now.
First, you are sorry for what you've done, and you see the folly of it all?'
There was a long, long pause.
Toad looked desperately this way and that, while the other animals waited in grave
silence. At last he spoke.
'No!' he said, a little sullenly, but stoutly; 'I'm NOT sorry.
And it wasn't folly at all! It was simply glorious!'
'What?' cried the Badger, greatly scandalised.
'You backsliding animal, didn't you tell me just now, in there----'
'Oh, yes, yes, in THERE,' said Toad impatiently.
'I'd have said anything in THERE.
You're so eloquent, dear Badger, and so moving, and so convincing, and put all your
points so frightfully well--you can do what you like with me in THERE, and you know it.
But I've been searching my mind since, and going over things in it, and I find that
I'm not a bit sorry or repentant really, so it's no earthly good saying I am; now, is
it?'
'Then you don't promise,' said the Badger, 'never to touch a motor-car again?'
'Certainly not!' replied Toad emphatically.
'On the contrary, I faithfully promise that the very first motor-car I see, poop-poop!
off I go in it!' 'Told you so, didn't I?' observed the Rat
to the Mole.
'Very well, then,' said the Badger firmly, rising to his feet.
'Since you won't yield to persuasion, we'll try what force can do.
I feared it would come to this all along.
You've often asked us three to come and stay with you, Toad, in this handsome house
of yours; well, now we're going to. When we've converted you to a proper point
of view we may quit, but not before.
Take him upstairs, you two, and lock him up in his bedroom, while we arrange matters
between ourselves.'
'It's for your own good, Toady, you know,' said the Rat kindly, as Toad, kicking and
struggling, was hauled up the stairs by his two faithful friends.
'Think what fun we shall all have together, just as we used to, when you've quite got
over this--this painful attack of yours!'
'We'll take great care of everything for you till you're well, Toad,' said the Mole;
'and we'll see your money isn't wasted, as it has been.'
'No more of those regrettable incidents with the police, Toad,' said the Rat, as
they thrust him into his bedroom.
'And no more weeks in hospital, being ordered about by female nurses, Toad,'
added the Mole, turning the key on him.
They descended the stair, Toad shouting abuse at them through the keyhole; and the
three friends then met in conference on the situation.
'It's going to be a tedious business,' said the Badger, sighing.
'I've never seen Toad so determined. However, we will see it out.
He must never be left an instant unguarded.
We shall have to take it in turns to be with him, till the poison has worked itself
out of his system.' They arranged watches accordingly.
Each animal took it in turns to sleep in Toad's room at night, and they divided the
day up between them. At first Toad was undoubtedly very trying
to his careful guardians.
When his violent paroxysms possessed him he would arrange bedroom chairs in rude
resemblance of a motor-car and would crouch on the foremost of them, bent forward and
staring fixedly ahead, making uncouth and
ghastly noises, till the climax was reached, when, turning a complete
somersault, he would lie prostrate amidst the ruins of the chairs, apparently
completely satisfied for the moment.
As time passed, however, these painful seizures grew gradually less frequent, and
his friends strove to divert his mind into fresh channels.
But his interest in other matters did not seem to revive, and he grew apparently
languid and depressed.
One fine morning the Rat, whose turn it was to go on duty, went upstairs to relieve
Badger, whom he found fidgeting to be off and stretch his legs in a long ramble round
his wood and down his earths and burrows.
'Toad's still in bed,' he told the Rat, outside the door.
'Can't get much out of him, except, "O leave him alone, he wants nothing, perhaps
he'll be better presently, it may pass off in time, don't be unduly anxious," and so
on.
Now, you look out, Rat! When Toad's quiet and submissive and
playing at being the hero of a Sunday- school prize, then he's at his artfullest.
There's sure to be something up.
I know him. Well, now, I must be off.'
'How are you to-day, old chap?' inquired the Rat cheerfully, as he approached Toad's
bedside.
He had to wait some minutes for an answer. At last a feeble voice replied, 'Thank you
so much, dear Ratty! So good of you to inquire!
But first tell me how you are yourself, and the excellent Mole?'
'O, WE'RE all right,' replied the Rat. 'Mole,' he added incautiously, 'is going
out for a run round with Badger.
They'll be out till luncheon time, so you and I will spend a pleasant morning
together, and I'll do my best to amuse you.
Now jump up, there's a good fellow, and don't lie moping there on a fine morning
like this!'
'Dear, kind Rat,' murmured Toad, 'how little you realise my condition, and how
very far I am from "jumping up" now--if ever!
But do not trouble about me.
I hate being a burden to my friends, and I do not expect to be one much longer.
Indeed, I almost hope not.' 'Well, I hope not, too,' said the Rat
heartily.
'You've been a fine bother to us all this time, and I'm glad to hear it's going to
stop. And in weather like this, and the boating
season just beginning!
It's too bad of you, Toad! It isn't the trouble we mind, but you're
making us miss such an awful lot.' 'I'm afraid it IS the trouble you mind,
though,' replied the Toad languidly.
'I can quite understand it. It's natural enough.
You're tired of bothering about me. I mustn't ask you to do anything further.
I'm a nuisance, I know.'
'You are, indeed,' said the Rat. 'But I tell you, I'd take any trouble on
earth for you, if only you'd be a sensible animal.'
'If I thought that, Ratty,' murmured Toad, more feebly than ever, 'then I would beg
you--for the last time, probably--to step round to the village as quickly as
possible--even now it may be too late--and fetch the doctor.
But don't you bother. It's only a trouble, and perhaps we may as
well let things take their course.'
'Why, what do you want a doctor for?' inquired the Rat, coming closer and
examining him.
He certainly lay very still and flat, and his voice was weaker and his manner much
changed. 'Surely you have noticed of late----'
murmured Toad.
'But, no--why should you? Noticing things is only a trouble.
To-morrow, indeed, you may be saying to yourself, "O, if only I had noticed sooner!
If only I had done something!"
But no; it's a trouble. Never mind--forget that I asked.'
'Look here, old man,' said the Rat, beginning to get rather alarmed, 'of course
I'll fetch a doctor to you, if you really think you want him.
But you can hardly be bad enough for that yet.
Let's talk about something else.'
'I fear, dear friend,' said Toad, with a sad smile, 'that "talk" can do little in a
case like this--or doctors either, for that matter; still, one must grasp at the
slightest straw.
And, by the way--while you are about it-- I HATE to give you additional trouble, but I
happen to remember that you will pass the door--would you mind at the same time
asking the lawyer to step up?
It would be a convenience to me, and there are moments--perhaps I should say there is
A moment--when one must face disagreeable tasks, at whatever cost to exhausted
nature!'
'A lawyer! O, he must be really bad!' the affrighted
Rat said to himself, as he hurried from the room, not forgetting, however, to lock the
door carefully behind him.
Outside, he stopped to consider. The other two were far away, and he had no
one to consult. 'It's best to be on the safe side,' he
said, on reflection.
'I've known Toad fancy himself frightfully bad before, without the slightest reason;
but I've never heard him ask for a lawyer!
If there's nothing really the matter, the doctor will tell him he's an old ***, and
cheer him up; and that will be something gained.
I'd better humour him and go; it won't take very long.'
So he ran off to the village on his errand of mercy.
The Toad, who had hopped lightly out of bed as soon as he heard the key turned in the
lock, watched him eagerly from the window till he disappeared down the carriage-
drive.
Then, laughing heartily, he dressed as quickly as possible in the smartest suit he
could lay hands on at the moment, filled his pockets with cash which he took from a
small drawer in the dressing-table, and
next, knotting the sheets from his bed together and tying one end of the
improvised rope round the central mullion of the handsome Tudor window which formed
such a feature of his bedroom, he scrambled
out, slid lightly to the ground, and, taking the opposite direction to the Rat,
marched off lightheartedly, whistling a merry tune.
It was a gloomy luncheon for Rat when the Badger and the Mole at length returned, and
he had to face them at table with his pitiful and unconvincing story.
The Badger's caustic, not to say brutal, remarks may be imagined, and therefore
passed over; but it was painful to the Rat that even the Mole, though he took his
friend's side as far as possible, could not
help saying, 'You've been a bit of a duffer this time, Ratty!
Toad, too, of all animals!' 'He did it awfully well,' said the
crestfallen Rat.
'He did YOU awfully well!' rejoined the Badger hotly.
'However, talking won't mend matters.
He's got clear away for the time, that's certain; and the worst of it is, he'll be
so conceited with what he'll think is his cleverness that he may commit any folly.
One comfort is, we're free now, and needn't waste any more of our precious time doing
sentry-go. But we'd better continue to sleep at Toad
Hall for a while longer.
Toad may be brought back at any moment--on a stretcher, or between two policemen.'
So spoke the Badger, not knowing what the future held in store, or how much water,
and of how turbid a character, was to run under bridges before Toad should sit at
ease again in his ancestral Hall.
Meanwhile, Toad, gay and irresponsible, was walking briskly along the high road, some
miles from home.
At first he had taken by-paths, and crossed many fields, and changed his course several
times, in case of pursuit; but now, feeling by this time safe from recapture, and the
sun smiling brightly on him, and all Nature
joining in a chorus of approval to the song of self-praise that his own heart was
singing to him, he almost danced along the road in his satisfaction and conceit.
'Smart piece of work that!' he remarked to himself chuckling.
'Brain against brute force--and brain came out on the top--as it's bound to do.
Poor old Ratty!
My! won't he catch it when the Badger gets back!
A worthy fellow, Ratty, with many good qualities, but very little intelligence and
absolutely no education.
I must take him in hand some day, and see if I can make something of him.'
Filled full of conceited thoughts such as these he strode along, his head in the air,
till he reached a little town, where the sign of 'The Red Lion,' swinging across the
road halfway down the main street, reminded
him that he had not breakfasted that day, and that he was exceedingly hungry after
his long walk.
He marched into the Inn, ordered the best luncheon that could be provided at so short
a notice, and sat down to eat it in the coffee-room.
He was about half-way through his meal when an only too familiar sound, approaching
down the street, made him start and fall a- trembling all over.
The poop-poop! drew nearer and nearer, the car could be heard to turn into the inn-
yard and come to a stop, and Toad had to hold on to the leg of the table to conceal
his over-mastering emotion.
Presently the party entered the coffee- room, hungry, talkative, and gay, voluble
on their experiences of the morning and the merits of the chariot that had brought them
along so well.
Toad listened eagerly, all ears, for a time; at last he could stand it no longer.
He slipped out of the room quietly, paid his bill at the bar, and as soon as he got
outside sauntered round quietly to the inn- yard.
'There cannot be any harm,' he said to himself, 'in my only just LOOKING at it!'
The car stood in the middle of the yard, quite unattended, the stable-helps and
other hangers-on being all at their dinner.
Toad walked slowly round it, inspecting, criticising, musing deeply.
'I wonder,' he said to himself presently, 'I wonder if this sort of car STARTS
easily?'
Next moment, hardly knowing how it came about, he found he had hold of the handle
and was turning it.
As the familiar sound broke forth, the old passion seized on Toad and completely
mastered him, body and soul.
As if in a dream he found himself, somehow, seated in the driver's seat; as if in a
dream, he pulled the lever and swung the car round the yard and out through the
archway; and, as if in a dream, all sense
of right and wrong, all fear of obvious consequences, seemed temporarily suspended.
He increased his pace, and as the car devoured the street and leapt forth on the
high road through the open country, he was only conscious that he was Toad once more,
Toad at his best and highest, Toad the
terror, the traffic-queller, the Lord of the lone trail, before whom all must give
way or be smitten into nothingness and everlasting night.
He chanted as he flew, and the car responded with sonorous drone; the miles
were eaten up under him as he sped he knew not whither, fulfilling his instincts,
living his hour, reckless of what might come to him.
* * * * * *
'To my mind,' observed the Chairman of the Bench of Magistrates cheerfully, 'the ONLY
difficulty that presents itself in this otherwise very clear case is, how we can
possibly make it sufficiently hot for the
incorrigible rogue and hardened ruffian whom we see cowering in the dock before us.
Let me see: he has been found guilty, on the clearest evidence, first, of stealing a
valuable motor-car; secondly, of driving to the public danger; and, thirdly, of gross
impertinence to the rural police.
Mr. Clerk, will you tell us, please, what is the very stiffest penalty we can impose
for each of these offences?
Without, of course, giving the prisoner the benefit of any doubt, because there isn't
any.' The Clerk scratched his nose with his pen.
'Some people would consider,' he observed, 'that stealing the motor-car was the worst
offence; and so it is. But cheeking the police undoubtedly carries
the severest penalty; and so it ought.
Supposing you were to say twelve months for the theft, which is mild; and three years
for the furious driving, which is lenient; and fifteen years for the cheek, which was
pretty bad sort of cheek, judging by what
we've heard from the witness-box, even if you only believe one-tenth part of what you
heard, and I never believe more myself-- those figures, if added together correctly,
tot up to nineteen years----'
'First-rate!' said the Chairman. '--So you had better make it a round twenty
years and be on the safe side,' concluded the Clerk.
'An excellent suggestion!' said the Chairman approvingly.
'Prisoner! Pull yourself together and try and stand up
straight.
It's going to be twenty years for you this time.
And mind, if you appear before us again, upon any charge whatever, we shall have to
deal with you very seriously!'
Then the brutal minions of the law fell upon the hapless Toad; loaded him with
chains, and dragged him from the Court House, shrieking, praying, protesting;
across the marketplace, where the playful
populace, always as severe upon detected crime as they are sympathetic and helpful
when one is merely 'wanted,' assailed him with jeers, carrots, and popular catch-
words; past hooting school children, their
innocent faces lit up with the pleasure they ever derive from the sight of a
gentleman in difficulties; across the hollow-sounding drawbridge, below the spiky
portcullis, under the frowning archway of
the grim old castle, whose ancient towers soared high overhead; past guardrooms full
of grinning soldiery off duty, past sentries who coughed in a horrid, sarcastic
way, because that is as much as a sentry on
his post dare do to show his contempt and abhorrence of crime; up time-worn winding
stairs, past men-at-arms in casquet and corselet of steel, darting threatening
looks through their vizards; across
courtyards, where mastiffs strained at their leash and pawed the air to get at
him; past ancient warders, their halberds leant against the wall, dozing over a pasty
and a flagon of brown ale; on and on, past
the rack-chamber and the thumbscrew-room, past the turning that led to the private
scaffold, till they reached the door of the grimmest dungeon that lay in the heart of
the innermost keep.
There at last they paused, where an ancient gaoler sat fingering a bunch of mighty
keys.
'Oddsbodikins!' said the sergeant of police, taking off his helmet and wiping
his forehead.
'Rouse thee, old loon, and take over from us this vile Toad, a criminal of deepest
guilt and matchless artfulness and resource.
Watch and ward him with all thy skill; and mark thee well, greybeard, should aught
untoward befall, thy old head shall answer for his--and a murrain on both of them!'
The gaoler nodded grimly, laying his withered hand on the shoulder of the
miserable Toad.
The rusty key creaked in the lock, the great door clanged behind them; and Toad
was a helpless prisoner in the remotest dungeon of the best-guarded keep of the
stoutest castle in all the length and breadth of Merry England.