The Quaint and Curious Quest of Johnny Longfoot, The Shoe King's Son, Catherine Besterman [ebooks children's books free txt] 📗

JOHNNY'S FATHER put the twine away and rubbed his bald head.

"Johnny," he said, "Johnny my boy, shoemaker's apprentice and shoemaker's son, it is beautiful outside and the sun is as bright as a new-polished shoe. But here, in our shop, it is dark and damp, and I see that your cheeks are pale. That's a bad sign. How about a trip to the country?"

Johnny snatched up a pair of shoes, slapped their heels together smartly and exclaimed happily, "Father, what a good idea! Not only are my cheeks pale, but I feel ill from the smell of all these leathers: calf leather and raw leather and doeskin. If you do really send me to the country, I'll come back so happy and healthy that I'll be able to make quite extraordinary shoes!"

At this the father hugged his son, because he loved him dearly. Then, wiping his stained hands on his leather apron, the old shoemaker said, "I have no money for your trip, of course. So many people go without shoes nowadays that I don't earn much. But never mind. We have relatives in the north, and relatives in the south, relatives in the west and relatives in the east. All these kinfolk of ours live in the country and any one of them would be very happy for the son of old Peter the Shoemaker to pay him a visit. Because -- and you should know this, my son -- I am the pride and glory of the Longfoot family. It all started when I won a gold medal at the Shoemakers' Fair years ago."

"Was it a big medal?" asked Johnny, who always wanted to know every detail.

"Very big. It was the size of the heel of a six-months-old baby's shoe," said old Peter with pride. "But don't interrupt when your father speaks, or God won't bless you. Your needle will break while you work. The twine will give way. And the precious leather will rot. What was I talking about? Oh, yes, I said that any one of them would be happy to have you as their guest, Johnny, shoemaker's apprentice and son of Peter the Shoemaker, called the Shoe King."

Johnny sighed, because he knew that now he was going to hear the long story all over again. The story of all the shoes his father had made, of all the letters of praise and thanks he had received from kings and princes, of his deep belief that the most beautiful thing in life was to make shoes.

And, indeed, Peter the Shoemaker talked about all these things for half an hour and four minutes. Then he repeated again, "What was it I was talking about? Oh, yes, that everyone in our family -- "

"Would be happy to see me," interrupted Johnny. "I am obviously a very remarkable child."

"You are a remarkable jackass," said old Peter severely. "You interrupt your father and you don't understand that your family will greet you with joy only because you happen to be my son. But to whom shall I send you? There is Matthew Longfoot, and Theocutus Longfoot, and Lucas, and Christopher, and Aunt Matilda -- all of them Longfoots. I only wonder where you would be the happiest?"

Peter the Shoemaker sat down comfortably, lighted his long-stemmed pipe, frowned his forehead into eighteen wrinkles, closed his right eye and thought.

It was quiet in his workshop. A hungry mouse nibbled on one of the newly finished shoes and Johnny looked at her, wondering at her taste in food.

Obviously this damp air doesn't hurt her appetite, he thought.

Suddenly old Peter got up and, putting his pipe away, said briskly, "You will go to Uncle Lucas Longfoot, who lives at his own country place.

Do you understand, good child of a poor man? In his own country house, in a manor. And besides this house your Uncle Lucas owns two thousand acres of land and forest. He is so very rich that he could wear -- if he wanted to -- not one, but twenty pairs of shoes at the same time."

"But he doesn't wear twenty pairs of shoes, because he doesn't have that many legs," observed Johnny brightly.

"Because he doesn't have that many legs..." repeated old Peter absent-mindedly. But suddenly he shouted: "You! You dare to make fun of your own father! Now, one more word, just one more word, and I'll..."

Johnny put his whole fist in his mouth and with the other hand made signs that not one little word would pass his lips again.

"Well, remember then," grumbled his father more calmly. "You don't seem to realize what luck could come to you if Uncle Lucas took an interest in you. He is very rich, lonely, childless and thrifty. Known for his thriftiness. That's why he has such a fortune."

"Why do you repeat that Uncle Lucas is so very thrifty?" asked Johnny uneasily.

"Oh, little birdie mine! You don't like that, do you? You would prefer for him to throw his money out the window, as I do. And you would prefer to spend your money on caviar and whipped cream. Oh, no! You shall go to Uncle Lucas. You will learn thriftiness and you will have a good rest, too."

"But, Father, you never throw money out the window and I never eat caviar and whipped cream," Johnny argued. "If this Uncle Lucas of ours is really so stingy, he will starve me and you will be sorry."

"I didn't say he was stingy. I said he was thrifty. That's why he has money and I don't. And if I don't have any, you won't have any either, because you are too much like me. For which I'm sorry night and day."

Old Peter didn't look like a man who was sorry night and day. But he insisted on Johnny's visit to his Uncle Lucas and there was nothing Johnny could do but go.

After all, this thrifty uncle won't eat me up, thought Johnny. And if he is really so proud of my father, he will welcome me and I will have a wonderful vacation.

THE NEXT DAY, when Johnny left, his father gave him a handsome red leather box and said, "Neither I, nor my father, nor any of my shoemaker ancestors ever traveled without this box. It contains the best set of shoemaking tools in all the world, the best of twines, and scissors so sharp they can cut a crocodile's skin like butter, and awls that pierce even heavy metal. Take this box, and if ever you need to, you can make shoes as I have taught you. Be a credit to me, son, for I am the Shoe King and you are my prince."

Crying a little, old Peter kissed Johnny heartily. Johnny wept, too, deeply touched, because he loved his good father very much.

Then the driver of the stagecoach climbed to his seat, the postilion blew his horn, and Johnny jumped in. He waved through a window to his father standing in the street. Old Peter was waving an enormous red handkerchief with green stripes.

The coach began to move.

I'll be homesick for my father, thought Johnny, sitting silently in his seat. He is a good and kind father, and I don't think I shall like it at Uncle Lucas' house. But nobody will hurt me, because of course I am a prince since I am the son of the Shoe King.

As a matter of fact the "prince" looked more like a scarecrow. He was wearing his father's coat that reached below his knees, an oversized hat that fell onto his nose, and high, very shiny boots, polished by his father in person for all of three hours.

Through the window Johnny saw flowering fields, ripening corn, green hills and silvery streams that glistened in the sunlight. At each inn along the way where the coach stopped, some of the passengers got out. Sometimes new passengers got in.

Once when they stopped the driver came up to Johnny and asked with a friendly smile, "Where are you going, young man?"

"To Shoestring Manor, sir -- Mr. Lucas Longfoot's country house," answered Johnny politely.

"Then you get out at the next stop," said the driver. He added with a smile, "Very, very thrifty, that Mr. Longfoot."

He was still smiling and nodding his head as he climbed up to his high seat.

Evidently Uncle Lucas is as well known for his thriftiness, thought Johnny, as Father is for his art of shoemaking. But, anyhow, I'll very soon find out for myself.

The coach stopped again and the driver called out in a thin voice, "Shoestring Tavern, one-minute stop -- Shoestring Tavern!"

Johnny got out. The coach was standing in a little innyard.

"Excuse me, sir," he said to the innkeeper, "where does Mr. Lucas Longfoot live?"

The innkeeper looked down at the little boy in the long coat. He backed away three steps. He thought a moment, looked once more at Johnny, this time with what seemed to be pity, and said kindly, "My poor child, why do you want to know where Mr. Lucas Longfoot lives?"

"He is my uncle, my very own uncle," answered Johnny with dignity, "and he will be extremely glad to see me. I am to spend my vacation at his home."

"Well, it may be that he is your very own uncle," said the innkeeper, even more kindly. "It may be also that you will spend your vacation at his home. But don't tell me that he will be glad, because that simply cannot be! Mr. Longfoot is a little odd and he certainly won't be glad to see you, even if you are wearing such a long coat and..."

The innkeeper acted as if he was very embarrassed. He stuttered and said finally, "You see, your uncle is thrifty -- very thrifty. Maybe you'd better go back home...."

"I have a very good father," answered Johnny, "but he would gladly break his pipe on my neck if I came back home in such a short time. And it is a very precious pipe and he would certainly be very sorry to lose it. So as soon as you are kind enough to show me the way to my beloved, though unknown uncle's, I shall go to him right away."

The innkeeper stretched out his long, thin arm and said, "After you leave the inn you turn to the left. Then you go by forest and field, forest and field, field and hill, field and hill. Finally, dogs will bark at you, steel traps will catch your feet, a bear will jump on you, somebody will throw stones at you, and still worse things may happen. Thus you will know you have reached your Uncle Lucas'."

Johnny's eyes blinked three times while he listened to these directions. He bowed politely and went to the left, by forest and field, by forest and field, field and hill.

Probably my father shouldn't have sent me to my Uncle Lucas, he thought, a little worried. The innkeeper seemed to shudder when he talked about my uncle, and he was plainly scared. I don't like the queer voice in which everyone says