Mr. Plum and the Donkey’s Breakfast

Otto had very short legs and a very heavy sled.

The sled had been Grandpa’s. He had built it out of oak, to last, and it had lasted. It weighed about as much as a small pig and was about as keen on going uphill.

Otto lived in a village at the foot of a long white hill, where the snow came in sideways and stayed all winter. Every morning Mom wound a scarf around his neck and put a spare in his pocket, because sideways snow gets into everything. His lunch went in the other pocket: a cheese sandwich, an apple and a carrot.

Every morning he dragged the sled up the hill, and every morning his legs ran out at the big flat rock. That was nowhere near halfway. He would sit on the sled to get his breath back and slide down from there, which is a sled ride, but a short one.

What Otto wanted was to reach the very top with enough puff left to come all the way down. Then he wanted to do it again, as many times as he liked, all winter.

One afternoon, for a rest from trying, he built a snowman instead, at the bottom of the run against the donkey paddock fence. It had sticks for arms and a carrot from the kitchen for a nose. Down its front went two buttons off Otto’s old coat and then, because he ran out, a teaspoon. The teaspoon had come out of the plum jam not quite licked clean, so Otto named him Mr. Plum.

That night was the first really cold night of the winter. In the morning, when Otto came down the lane, Mr. Plum said, “Good morning,” and walked over to say it properly, with a creak and a squeak and a crunch at every step.

He was very proud of his nose. He crossed his eyes to look at it. “First-class carrot,” he said. “I am a carrot man. Always have been, since yesterday. Put anything else on my face and I’ll sneeze it straight off.”

Then, over the fence, came Buttons.

She was the paddock donkey, sweet-faced and soft-eared, and she thought about one thing, which was carrots. She stretched her neck over the rail and had a go at Mr. Plum’s nose. Mr. Plum leaned back. Buttons leaned further. Mr. Plum had to take two crunching steps away before she gave up and went back to her hay.

“Every morning from now on, I expect,” said Mr. Plum. “I sleep very soundly. One of these mornings I’ll wake up with a donkey and no carrot.” He tapped the teaspoon. “And this she is definitely not allowed to lick. It still has jam on.”

“She hasn’t tried to lick it,” said Otto.

“Good,” said Mr. Plum. “Let’s keep it that way.”

Moving Mr. Plum away from the donkey fence was out of the question. A snowman sleeps where he was built. You would not like to be told to sleep on the other side of the bed, and neither would he.

Then Mr. Plum looked at the sled, and at the hill, and at Otto.

“I’ll make you a bargain,” he said. “I’ll pull that sled up that hill like a carthorse, with you on it, as often as you like, all winter. And you keep my nose on my face.”

Otto thought about it for exactly as long as it takes to say yes. They shook on it, a mitten and a stick.

Off they went, creak, squeak, crunch. Past the big flat rock. Past the bigger children, who stopped with their mouths open. All the way to the top, where the sideways wind kept the ground bare and stony. Mr. Plum picked up a pebble and pressed it into his chest, just under the teaspoon.

“That’s one more,” he said, “and the nose is still on.”

Otto sledded all the way down. All the way. At the bottom he lay in the snow for a while, just to be glad about it.

* * *

Mr. Plum kept his side cheerfully and loudly. He pulled Otto up before breakfast and after lunch and whenever asked, and at the top, every time, another pebble went into his chest. “That’s one more,” he said each time, “and the nose is still on.” The pebbles went round and round in a wobbly spiral, because Mr. Plum could not see his chest very well past his nose.

Otto’s side was harder.

First he tried a spare nose. If Mr. Plum wore a parsnip in the mornings, the carrot could stay safe in Otto’s pocket. Otto pushed the parsnip on. Mr. Plum’s eyes watered. His top half began to shake.

“Ah,” he said. “Ah. Ah-ah-AH-CHOO!”

The parsnip flew clean across the paddock and landed in the water trough. Buttons went and looked at it and walked away. She did not want a parsnip either.

“Carrot man,” said Mr. Plum. “I did say.”

Next Otto tried a disguise. He painted Mr. Plum’s nose bright blue with the paint left over from the front door, so that Buttons would not know it for a carrot. It was still a carrot underneath, so Mr. Plum did not sneeze. He crossed his eyes at it and said he looked very distinguished.

Buttons had never seen a blue carrot. She had not known there was such a thing. The next morning she leaned so far over the fence for it that Mr. Plum leaned back until he sat down in the snow. Buttons came away with a blue smudge on her own nose and looked delighted about it for a week.

“Still on,” said Mr. Plum, from the snow. “Only just.”

Last, Otto stood guard. He got up while the lamps were still lit in the windows, took the big wooden spoon from the kitchen drawer, and stood by the fence with it on his shoulder like a soldier. When Buttons came over, Otto held up the spoon and said, “Not today.”

Then he sat down on Grandpa’s sled, only for a minute, with both scarves on. The sled was comfortable. His coat was warm.

He woke up with warm donkey breath in his ear. Buttons was leaning over him as far as a donkey can lean, and Mr. Plum was leaning back as far as a snowman can lean, holding his nose on with both sticks.

“Good borning, Otto,” said Mr. Plum. “The dose is still od.”

Buttons had stopped looking at the nose. She was looking hard at Otto’s pocket.

Otto took out his lunch carrot. It was the crunchiest thing in there, and he liked it best. He looked at it, and he looked at Buttons and her hopeful ears. Then he went to the gate and held the carrot out flat on his mitten.

Buttons ate it in four crunches. Then she leaned her big grey head against Otto’s coat and kept it there.

The next morning Otto brought her his carrot again, and every morning after that. Buttons waited at the gate for him with her ears straight up, and she never looked at Mr. Plum’s nose again.

“Well,” said Mr. Plum, crossing his eyes at it fondly. “The best guard for a carrot is another carrot.”

* * *

By midwinter Buttons followed Otto up and down the fence all day. So the farmer opened the paddock gate, found an old sled in the barn, and said she might as well make herself useful.

After that Buttons pulled a second sled up the hill beside Mr. Plum, loaded with bigger children. She wore Otto’s spare scarf, because a donkey has a great deal of neck for the snow to get into. She had her carrot every morning and pulled all day without being asked. That was a bargain too, kept by a donkey who had never heard of one.

By then Mr. Plum’s chest was pebbles from top to bottom, ninety-nine of them, round and round in their wobbly spiral. On the hundredth climb he picked up a pebble at the top, looked down at himself, and stopped.

“Otto,” he said. “I’ve run out of me.”

So Otto went round behind him and pressed the hundredth pebble into Mr. Plum’s back, the first of a brand-new row.

Then Buttons leaned over and gave the teaspoon one long lick. It still tasted faintly of plum jam, and it was the first thing Buttons had ever wanted that was not a carrot.

Mr. Plum looked at the teaspoon. He looked at Buttons in her scarf. “That is the teaspoon you are definitely not allowed to lick,” he said. Then he said, “Just the once. It’s the hundredth.”

Otto pushed off. He went down the long white hill on Grandpa’s heavy sled, past the big flat rock, past the open gate, making the loudest noise a small boy can make when he is perfectly happy. Up at the top Buttons brayed, and Mr. Plum shouted down after him:

“That’s a hundred, Otto, and the nose is still on!”

Otto still had very short legs and a very heavy sled, and it did not matter one bit. He went down that long white hill as many times as he liked, all winter, shouting every time.