Moominland Midwinter by Tove Jansson Page B

thrust his sticks in the snow and said imploringly: 'Don't you see, I like little dogs so terribly much. I've always thought that one day I'd have a dog of my own who would like me too. Why won't you play with me?'

    'I really don't know,' Sorry-oo mumbled, blushing. As soon as he had the chance, he slunk back to the bathing-house, and there he continued to dream about the wolves.
    It was the wolves he wanted to play with. What boundless happiness, he thought, to hunt with them, to follow them everywhere, to do everything they did and everything they wanted one to do. Then, by and by, he himself would change and become as free and wild as they were.
    Every night, when the moonlight glittered in the ice-ferns on the windows, Sorry-oo awoke in the bathing-house and rose to listen. Every night he pulled his woollen cap over his ears and padded softly out.
    He took the same path every time, across the sloping shore and into the wood. He continued on his way until the wood became more open and he could see the Lonely Mountains. There Sorry-oo sat down in the snow and waited for the howling of the wolves. Sometimes they were very far away, sometimes nearer. But he heard them neatly every night.
    And each time Sorry-oo heard them he put up his muzzle and answered.
    Towards morning he crept back again and went to sleep in the bathing-house cupboard.
    Too-ticky once looked at him and said: 'You'll never forget them that way.'
    'I don't want to forget them,' replied Sorry-oo. 'I want to think of them always.'
    *
    Strangely enough it was the most timid of them all, Salome the Little Creep, who really liked the Hemulen. She longed to hear him play the horn. But alas! the Hemulen was so big and always in such a hurry that he never noticed her.
    No matter how fast she ran he always left her far behind, on his skis, and when she at last overtook the music, it ceased and the Hemulen began doing something else.
    A couple of times Salome the Little Creep tried to explain how much she admired him. But she was far too shy and ceremonious, and the Hemulen never had been a good listener.

    So nothing of any consequence was said.
    One night Salome the Little Creep awoke in the meerschaum tram, where she had settled down on the back gangway. It was no comfortable sleeping-place because of the many buttons and safety-pins the Moomins, in the course of time, had collected in their magnificent drawing-room decoration. And Salome the Little Creep of course was much too considerate to remove them.
    Now she could hear Too-ticky and Moomintroll talking under the rocking-chair - and at once she understood that they talked about her beloved Hemulen.
    'This is the limit,' said Too-ticky's voice in the dark. 'We simply have to have some peace again. Ever since he started his bugle-tooting my musical shrew has refused to

    play the flute. Most of my invisible friends have gone away. The guests have a lot of nerves and colds from sitting under the ice all day long. And Sorry-oo hides in the cupboard until nightfall. Somebody has to tell him to leave.'
    'I haven't the heart,' said Moomintroll. 'He's so convinced that we like him.'
    'Then we'll have to swindle him,' said Too-ticky. 'Tell him the hills in the Lonely Mountains are much higher and better than ours.'
    'There are no skiing grounds at all in the Lonely Mountains,' said Moomintroll. 'Only abysses and snaggy cliffs, and not even any snow.'
    Salome the Little Creep shivered, and her eyes suddenly filled with tears.
    Too-ticky replied: 'Hemulens always manage. And do you suppose it's better to have him understand that we don't like him? Think about it.'
    'Can't you do it?' Moomintroll asked wretchedly.
    'He lives in your garden, doesn't he?' said Too-ticky. 'Pull yourself together. Everybody'll be the better afterwards. He too.'
    Then all was silent. Too-ticky had crawled out through the window.
    Salome the Little Creep lay awake and staring out in the darkness. They wanted to send the Hemulen and his horn