“I can hardly believe it!” said the priest, his heart swelling with gratitude and happiness. “So my prayers have been answered after all, and Good has banished Evil, just as I said. We must have a service of thanksgiving as soon as possible, and I will tell the congregation all about it. I must gather them all together! But first, we must ring the bells!”
Gobbolino and the little wooden horse stared at him in amazement, but the next moment each of them found himself at the end of a bell-rope. The old priest took a third, and directed them as he rang:
“One.. two.. three! One.. two.. three! One.. two.. three!”
The merry chimes rang out crystal clear, since the cleaning of the bronzes and scraping of the ropes had brought back the very best of their tones.
The notes were unmistakably clear and harmonious, and all round the parish where people had grown to dread the sound of the bells, they now stopped to listen.
“It is like the old days before the church was haunted!” the older ones said to each other. “The priest is calling us to church. We had better go!”
One by one, or in twos and threes, even in family parties, they left their homes and walked to church, curious at the merry sound coming out of the church tower, a little apprehensive too, but trustful of their priest’s bidding.
The priest begged Gobbolino and the little wooden horse to stay and take part in the service of thanksgiving. He wanted his parishioners to meet them, and to realize what had been done for them, once he had explained to them all that there was nothing more to fear. The bats who had been the cause of all the dread and terror were now many miles away in the mountains, and would never come back to the church.
Gobbolino and the little wooden horse were anxious to leave, for the day was far advanced, and they had many miles to go. It was all very well for the bats with their wings, they could fly leagues at a time without effort. But for wooden wheels, and paws unused to travelling, the distance was likely to be very exhausting. There was also the faint risk that the hounds might return during the afternoon, and the sooner they took to the road the better.
However, the old priest was so insistent that they agreed to stay for a short while, and to slip out of the church before the sermon began. In this way they planned to avoid shaking hands and being introduced to all the congregation when the service was over. They felt they could not face a further delay in resuming their journey.
But now Gobbolino insisted that the little wooden horse should leave him to do the rest of the journey alone.
“Think how they are missing you at your home in the forest!” he reproached him. “Uncle Peder is old, and so is his wife. Every evening they will be looking up the forest path and calling for you. You should have been sitting at home by the fire with them by now! I can see my destination ahead of me, and it cannot be very far away Do go back, my kind little friend, and give me the pleasure of knowing that you are on your homeward journey!”
The little wooden horse was terribly reluctant to agree. He wanted to see Gobbolino safely across the plain to the foot of the mountains.
Yet all that he had said was true. The danger was over. There was not the smallest whisper of a hound’s cry on the still afternoon air, while he knew how anxiously his dear old master would be looking for his return. The village was behind them, and they had travelled three parts of the plain. The little wooden horse had no fears that he would not be able to gallop back to the forest before darkness fell, and he would be home by early morning.
They stood looking at one another on a little hummock in the plain, one pleading for the other to go, the other pleading to stay.
“Just a little further!.” begged the little wooden horse.
“Not one step, my kind friend!” said Gobbolino.
At last, very, very reluctantly; the little wooden horse agreed to say goodbye. He rubbed his wooden nose against Gobbolino’s soft fur and asked him over and over again to come back as quickly as possible; and not to fail to call in at the cottage in the forest and relate all his adventures. Both of them knew that Gobbolino must cross the plain again on his homeward journey and this time he would be all alone. Neither of them dared to think much about that.
For the second time the friends parted and proceeded in different directions. But this time the little wooden horse did not go far on his way. He crouched down in the grass to watch Gobbolino out of sight; quite determined to keep an eye upon him until he reached the mountains.
And so he saw what for a long time Gobbolino did not notice. A small black shadow was forming over the peaks; a shadow that circled and gyrated and gradually became bigger and bigger. For a while it looked like one of the small stormclouds that creep up into the sky on a summer’s afternoon; and sometimes develop and sometimes come to nothing.
[Êàðòèíêà: i_013.jpg]
For the second time the friends parted…
The little wooden horse took it for no more, no less than that. But as he watched his friend plodding purposefully onwards he realized that the cloud had left the peaks and was advancing to meet him. A summer thunderstorm would hurt nobody very seriously, however unpleasant it might be. But this cloud was different from a thunderstorm.
For one thing, there was no thunder. But there was a strange high noise of a kind one might meet in a tropical storm… a high, screaming, whistling sound, almost beyond the normal range of an ear. And the cloud that had seemed so high now swooped lower and lower, till it was flying just above the level of the plain.
The bats were coming back!
7 THE BATTLE OF THE BATS [Êàðòèíêà: i_014.jpg]
The awful realization struck the little wooden horse like a thunderclap. He stood up trembling on his little wooden legs.
It was not Gobbolino he was worrying about. It was not himself. What had brought the bats back out of the mountain caves he could not tell. Gobbolino had been responsible for their going there, but the agonizing thought in his own mind was the memory of the assembled congregation they had left behind them, all rejoicing in answer to their pastor’s prayers, the sparkling clean church, the shining bells, and above all, the silence that he and Gobbolino had assured the priest would last for ever. Was it to be shattered so soon? Nobody would ever trust the priest’s word again.
He hurried after Gobbolino, catching him just as the little cat stopped, and, raising himself on his hind legs, suddenly became aware of the advancing cloud of bats.
There were hundreds of them… no, not hundreds, butthousands! And they darkened the land beneath them as they flew southwards, uttering their shrill and indignant cries.
There was no doubt at all that they were angry.
At first it looked as if they would be passing to the right of the two friends, but at the last moment they caught sight of them, and the great cloud wheeled and dived on them, their cries even shriller as they screamed aloud:
“They’re here? After them! Revenge! Revenge!”
The little wooden horse had arrived at Gobbolino’s side. Both instinctively ducked their heads against the bats attack, and the next minute they were in the centre of a whirling mass of raking claws, flashing teeth, and buffeting wings.
True enough, these made less impression on the wooden flanks of the little wooden horse than they did on Gobbolino, but on the other hand the cat was better equipped to fight back with all four feet, and claws outstretched. He too bit and scratched and hooked and tore, till the earth around him was strewn with wounded bats, but still they dived down row after row, and still Gobbolino bit and fought and the little wooden horse battered.
[Êàðòèíêà: i_015.jpg]
There were hundreds of them… no… thousands!
When there came the briefest pause in the fighting the little wooden horse jumped on to his hind legs and shouted at the top of his voice: