PEDRO

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22513, 22 September 1938, Page 7 (Supplement)

PEDRO

(By Helen Shaw)

The best thing about the summer holidays was Uncle Lawreirces puppet show. . Everyone thought that. For a number of days he had been very mysterious, hiding himself away from the others, even from the painter, slipping something into his pocket if he happened to meet Nicky coming home from a bathe, asking for tubes of Nicholas Dill’s paints, walking by himself along the beach, sitting on rocks with a, note-book and pencil, scribbling, scribbling; and if he were surprised they would hear him muttering to , himself. .Then there was a wet day. It rained and rained, and there were no bathes, and the river seemed very full and the tussocks dripped with water and you needed gumboots and raincoats waltang. At night they lit a great fire of log? and pine cones, and they all sat round it except Uncle Lawrence, who was creeping about in his tent. But at last he came _ in, carrying a covered box under his arm. “00100. 00100, birds and rfnbow fishes.” he whispered, I bring to the Gourians an entertainment. It has taken me long to train the pe - formers, and longer to paint the scenery,’ and still longer to write the play.” „ . ~ He nut his box on to the table, uncovered the dark cloth, and then stood with his arms folded behind his entertainment, _ “It's a toy theatre. Uncle Lawrence, isn’t it?” i IHI “Nicky, just look at the little curtain. It has real silver .tassels cd§G. . , . iirtViic “And footlights, too, baby lights with blue shades.” , . , First the lamp had to be turned low. Then Uncle Lawrence put on a long black robe winch he tied with a scarlet and gold cord, 00100, . 00100, the play will now begin, sky-blue flowers and amhei fruit, I draw the curtain and introduce to you my players.” At the back of the little stage was a high cone-shaped hill. A road

wound down from it into a valley where the squares of gardens were full of flowers, red anemones and jonquils and japonica trees and cherry blossom trees. On the right side of the gardens stood a small cottage. It had a pink roof, a red chimney, and pale grey walls, and at the bottom of its very bright green lawn was a windmill, a grey windmill with blue flowers and amber berries decorating its door. That was the scenery. Uncle Lawrence worked his players by wires, which went through the back of the theatre and were attached to the arms and legs of the characters, who were: Pedro, who liked wandering, was a gipsy with a green feather in his cap and - a silver bell on-his wrist. The While Donkey belonged to Pedro. He pulled his cart of things to sell. He had especially flopping ears and a bright blue velvet saddle. Jane was the girl who lived m the cottage by the grey windmill. Her hair was the colour of gorse, and she wore . blue shoes and a yellow cotton pinny. Each figure had been cut from wood and painted and dressed in scraps of materials. The limbs had real joints, so that when Uncle Lawrence pulled the wires they moved. He had to speak in a low voice for Pedro, and in a soft high one for Jane. ... By this time Jima was terribly impatient, and so was Nicky. “Begin, begin, dear 00100, Ooloo,’ Nicky said, and it did begin, and this is the story of Uncle Lawrence’s Pedro, who liked wandering. He is coming over the cone shaped hill driving, his white donkey and leaning on the blue velvet saddle. The anemones and jonquils swim at his feet and the air is full of bees and spring blossom. Down in the valley Jane hears the gipsy’s silver bell tinkling as he lifts his hand which holds the reins. Jane comes out of her grey mill house, closing the painted door behind her. She stands with her back to the amber berries and. shades her eyes with her,, left hand.

“I hear a bell ringing,” she says. “I wonder who rides down.the hill, ’ and as she looks she sees the blue saddle of the donkey shining to the sun and she goes into her cottage and puts a kettle on the stove and cuts slices of'cake and then, as the bell sounds louder and louder,- , she runs to the gate and opens it and stoops for some grass to give the donkey, and picks a twig of pink blossom for the gipsy. . “Good morning, Jane,” the gipsy says. “Good morning, too, but I don’t know your- name,” Jane, answers. “Pedro, the Gipsy,” and he ties up. his donkey to the mill house door, for he has been unharnessing it all this time. “I’m thirsty,” he says, looking at the little windmill, so grey, and whirring like a seagull. “Can you drink tea and. cake, Pedro?” she asks. _ ■ “I like tea and cake better .than all other things. What sort of cake is it?”

“It’s made with butter and eggs and oranges and other- things, and it has pink icing on the top.” ; Then Jane brings the tea and the cake out into the garden.

“I; like your cups. . I like the daisies round the edge.”

“But you’ll like them better when you’ve finished your tea, because then you’ll see the green and white dragon on the bottom.” “What if I’m frightened of dragons, Jane?” “Even if you. are, these are only painted ones.” “Will you have honey in your tea? It’s wild honey, sweeter than wine.” •"

And Pedro pours honey into their cups out of a long golden bottle. “It’s nice cake. May I leave my icing until the very end?” “Do you do that? I do, too. Now isn’t that strange?” “Do you know that I can play a mandolin?”

“Gan you, Pedro. What do you play?”

“I know ‘The Little Nut Tree’ and ‘Silver Shillings’ and several others, but I’m going to make one up myself to-day.”

“Why are you going to do that-to-day?” > - ... “Because you gave me case witn. pink icing and. tea in daisy cups,and let me tie my donkey to the door of your mill house.” Then .Pedro takes out his xnanco- ■ Hrij which is the colour of tussocks, and he sits on the grass, leaning’ against the grey walls of the cot- ’ tage and he plays a new tune toJane, and she hears in the new tun* the tinkling of the gipsy bell and. the wind as it rustles through tna,. anemones and jonquils, and the donkey munching grass and tho kettle boiling on the stove and tba. whirring of the grey windmill and the bees humming all over the blossom trees. Suddenly the mandolin changes its tune and Jane bests new sounds, the hard dippety, • clippety of polished hooves on ■ frozen snow, the rush of wheel* ‘ flying down a hill, the crackling of - dry twigs and cones burning, the ringing of sleigh bells, and the wind crying .through leafless branches. ‘Why are you playing of winter? .: Winter is over, Pedro.” “I play of winter because it « cold and sad, and as I must soon say good-bye .1 think of winter.’’ ‘Why must you go? Stay in this . valley, gipsy. My mill makes more - water than X can .use, and my bens ' lay more eggs than I. need for cakes, and there is enough wood In the forest for one more fire. Don* go away.”: “I like pink icing and tea with wild honey and the soft whirring osyour windmill as it moves in the wind, but I am a gipsy, and I love ito wander. My donkey would grow too fat if I stay here. Perhaps I. too, would grow fat and no longer be able to run barefooted over the fields searching for clover and berries. Besides, I have things m my cart which must be sold to many people." He goes slowly down to the grey mill house and unties his donkey. The donkey rubs its nose on Pedro’* coat and its flopping ears glisten is the sun. He puts on the saddle of blue velvet and harnesses tho donkey into its cart. (Continued on page 8.) i