Tales From Moominvalley by Tove Jansson

comfort the hemulen by promising him the ticket

    punching job again as soon as they could get things going.
    'No,' the hemulen suddenly said. 'No, no, no. I don't want to. I want my pension. I want to do what I feel like doing, and I want to be absolutely alone in some silent place.'
    'But my dear nephew,' one of his uncles said with enormous astonishment, 'Do you mean what you say?'
    'I do,' said the hemulen. 'Every word of it.'
    'But why haven't you told us before?' the perplexed relatives asked him. 'We've always believed that you've enjoyed yourself.'
    'I never dared tell you,' the hemulen admitted.
    At this they all laughed again and thought it terribly funny that the hemulen had had to do things he disliked all his life, only because he hadn't been able to put his foot down.
    'Well, now, what do you want to do?' his maternal aunt asked cheerfully.
    'I'd like to build myself a doll's house,' the hemulen whispered. 'The most beautiful doll's house in the world, with lots and lots of rooms, and all of them silent and solemn and empty.'
    Now the hemulens laughed so hard that they had to sit down. They gave each other enormous nudges and shouted: 'A doll's house! Did you hear that! He said a doll's house!' and then they laughed themselves into tears and told him:
    'Little dear, by all means do exactly as you like! You can have grandma's big park, very probably it's silent as a grave nowadays. That's the very place for you to rummage

    about in and play to your heart's content. Good luck to you, and hope you like it!'
    'Thanks,' the hemulen said, feeling a little shrunken inwardly. 'I know you've always wished me well.'
    His dream about the doll's house with the calm and beautiful rooms vanished, the hemulens had laughed it to pieces. But it really was no fault of theirs. They would have felt sincerely sorry if anyone had told them that they had spoiled something for the hemulen. And it's a risky thing to talk about one's most secret dreams a bit too early.
    The hemulen went along to grandma's old park that was now his own. He had the key in his pocket.
    The park had been closed and never used since grandma had set fire to her house with fireworks and moved elsewhere with all her family.
    That was long ago, and the hemulen was even a little uncertain about the way to the park.
    The wood had grown, and ways and paths were under



water. While he was splashing along the rain stopped as suddenly as it had started eight weeks ago. But the hemulen didn't notice it. He was wholly occupied with grieving over his lost dream and with feeling sorry because he didn't want to build a doll's house any more.
    Now he could see the park wall. A little of it had tumbled down, but it was still quite a high wall. The single gate was rusty and very hard to unlock.
    The hemulen went in and locked the gate behind him. Suddenly he forgot about the doll's house. It was the first time in his life that he had opened a door of his own and shut it behind him. He was home. He didn't live in someone else's house.
    The rain clouds were slowly drifting away and the sun came out. The wet park was steaming and glittering all around him. It was green and unworried. No one had cut or trimmed or swept it for a very, very long time. Trees were reaching branches down to the ground, bushes were climbing the trees, and criss-crossing, in the luscious grass tinkled the brooks that grandma had led through the park in her time. They didn't take care of the watering any longer, they took care only of themselves, but many of the little bridges were still standing even if the garden paths had disappeared.
    The hemulen threw himself headlong into the green, friendly silence, he made capers in it, he wallowed in it, and he felt younger than he ever had before.
    Oh, how wonderful to be old and pensioned at last, he thought. How much I like my relatives! And now I needn't even think of them.



He went wading through the long, sparkling grass, he threw his arms around the