Mr. Popper's Penguins Read online

  Both Greta and Captain Cook were tremendously pleased with all that ice. They would go up on the snowdrift at one end of the living room, and run down, one behind the other, onto the ice, until they were running too fast to keep their balance. Then they would flop on their stomachs and toboggan across the slippery ice.

  This amused Bill and Janie so much that they tried it, too, on the stomachs of their overcoats. This in turn pleased the penguins greatly. Then Mr. Popper moved all the furniture in the living room to one side, so that the penguins and the children would have plenty of room for real sliding. It was a little hard at first to move the furniture, because the feet of the chairs had frozen into the ice.

  Toward afternoon the weather got warmer and the ice began to melt “Now, Papa,” said Mrs. Popper, “you really must do something. We can’t go on like this.”

  “But Captain Cook and Greta are both fat and sleek, and the children have never been so rosy.”

  “It may be very healthy,” said Mrs. Popper, as she mopped up the flood, “but it’s very untidy.”

  “I will do something about it tomorrow,” said Mr. Popper.

  Chapter XII

  More Mouths to Feed

  SO THE NEXT DAY Mr. Popper called an engineer and had a large freezing plant installed in the cellar, and took Captain Cook and Greta down there to live. Then he had the furnace taken out and moved upstairs into the living room. It looked very odd there, but, as Mrs. Popper said, it was a relief at least not to have to wear their overcoats all the time.

  Mr. Popper was quite worried when he found that all these changes were going to be very expensive. The refrigerating engineer was worried, too, when he found that Mr. Popper had practically no money. However, Mr. Popper promised to pay as soon as he could, and the man let him have everything on credit.

  It was a good thing that Mr. Popper got the penguins moved when he did, because Mrs. Popper had been right about the eggs. The rookery had scarcely been moved to the basement when Greta laid the first egg. Three days later the second one appeared.

  Since Mr. Popper knew that penguins lay only two eggs a season, he was astonished when, a little later, the third egg was found under Greta. Whether the change in climate had changed the penguins’ breeding habits, Mr. Popper never knew, but every third day a new one would appear until there were ten in all.

  Now penguin eggs are so large that the mother can sit on only two at a time, and this created quite a problem. Mr. Popper solved it, however, by distributing the extra eggs under hot-water bottles and electric heating-pads, kept just at penguin-body heat.

  The penguin chicks, when they began to hatch, were not so handsomely marked as their mother and father. They were fuzzy, droll little creatures who grew at a tremendous rate. Captain Cook and Greta were kept very busy bringing food to them, though, of course the Poppers all helped, too.

  Mr. Popper, who had always been such a great reader, had no difficulty in thinking of names for the penguin children. They were Nelson, Columbus, Louisa, Jenny, Scott, Magellan, Adelina, Isabella, Ferdinand, and Victoria. Still, he was rather relieved that there were no more than ten to name.

  Mrs. Popper, too, thought that this was about enough penguins for anybody, though they really did not make much difference to her in her housework — as long as Mr. Popper and the children remembered to close the cellar door in the kitchen.

  The penguins all loved to climb the stairs that led up to the kitchen, and never knew when to stop unless they found the kitchen door closed. Then, of course, they would turn around and toboggan down the steps again. This made rather a curious noise sometimes, when Mrs. Popper was working in the kitchen, but she got used to it, as she had got used to so many other strange things this winter.

  The freezing plant that Mr. Popper had got for the penguins downstairs was a large and good one. It made very large blocks of ice, instead of small ice cubes, so that soon Mr. Popper had made a sort of ice castle down there for the twelve penguins to live in and climb over.

  Mr. Popper also dug a large hole in the cellar floor and made a swimming and diving pool for the birds. From time to time he would throw live fish into the pool for the penguins to dive for. They found this very refreshing, because, to tell the truth, they had got a little tired of canned shrimps. The live fish were specially ordered and were brought all the way from the coast in tank cars and glass boxes to 432 Proudfoot Avenue. Unfortunately, they were quite expensive.

  It was nice that there were so many penguins because when two of them (usually Nelson and Columbus) got into a fight, and began to spar at each other with their flippers, the ten other penguins would all crowd around to watch the fight and make encouraging remarks. This made a very interesting little scene.

  Mr. Popper also flooded a part of the cellar floor for an ice rink, and here the penguins often drilled like a sort of small army, in fantastic marching movements and parades around the ice. The penguin Louisa seemed especially fond of leading these marching drills. It was quite a sight to see them, after Mr. Popper had the idea of training Louisa to hold a small American flag in her beak while she proudly led the solemn parades.

  Janie and Bill would often bring their little friends home from school with them, and they would all go down and watch the penguins for hours.

  At night, instead of sitting and reading and smoking his pipe in the living room, as he had done before, Mr. Popper would put on his overcoat and take his things downstairs. There he would sit and read, with his mittens on, looking up from time to time to see what his pets were doing. He often thought about the cold, distant regions in which the little creatures really belonged.

  Often, too, he thought how different his life had been before the penguins had come to keep him occupied. It was January now, and already he dreaded to think of the time when spring would come, and he would have to leave them all day and go back to painting houses.

  Chapter XIII

  Money Worries

  THERE CAME A NIGHT, however, when Mrs. Popper, having put the children to bed, stopped Mr. Popper on his way to the cellar.

  “Papa,” she said, “I must talk to you. Come and sit down.”

  “Yes, my love,” said Mr. Popper, “what is on your mind?”

  “Papa,” said Mrs. Popper, “I’m glad to see you having such a nice vacation. And I must say that it’s been easier than usual to keep the place tidy, with you down in the basement all the time. But, Papa, what are we to do for money?”

  “What is the trouble?” asked Mr. Popper.

  “Well, of course, the penguins have to eat, but have you any idea what the bills for all those live fish are? I’m sure I don’t know how we’re ever going to pay for them. And the engineer who put in the basement freezing plant keeps ringing the doorbell and asking for his money.”

  “Is our money all gone?” asked Mr. Popper quietly.

  “Practically all. Of course when it is all gone, maybe we could eat the twelve penguins for a while.”

  “Oh no, Mamma,” said Mr. Popper. “You don’t mean that.”

  “Well, I don’t suppose I really could enjoy eating them, especially Greta and Isabella,” said Mrs. Popper.

  “It would break the children’s hearts, too,” said Mr. Popper. He sat there thoughtfully for quite a while.

  “I have an idea, Mamma,” he said at last.

  “Maybe we could sell them to somebody, and then we would have a little money to live on,” said Mrs. Popper.

  “No,” said Mr. Popper, “I have a better idea. We will keep the penguins. Mamma, you have heard of trained seals, acting in theaters?”

  “Of course I have heard of trained seals,” answered Mrs. Popper. “I even saw some once. They balanced balls on the ends of their noses.”

  “Very well then,” said Mr. Popper, “if there can be trained dogs and trained seals, why can’t there be trained penguins?”

  “Perhaps you are right, Papa.”

  “Of course I am right. And you can help me train the penguins.”r />
  The next day they had the piano moved down into the basement at one end of the ice rink. Mrs. Popper had not played the piano since she had married Mr. Popper, but with a little practice she soon began to remember some of the pieces she had forgotten.

  “What these penguins like to do most,” said Mr. Popper, “is to drill like an army, to watch Nelson and Columbus get in a fight with each other, and to climb up steps and toboggan down. And so we will build our act around those tricks.”

  “They don’t need costumes, anyway,” said Mrs. Popper, looking at the droll little figures. “They already have a costume.”

  So Mrs. Popper picked out three different tunes to play on the basement piano, one for each different kind of act. Soon the penguins knew, from hearing the music, just what they were to do.

  When they were supposed to parade like a lot of soldiers, Mrs. Popper played Schubert’s “Military March.”

  When Nelson and Columbus were to fight each other with their flippers, Mrs. Popper played the “Merry Widow Waltz.”

  When the penguins were supposed to climb and toboggan, Janie and Bill would drag out into the middle of the ice two portable stepladders and a board that Mr. Popper had used when he was decorating houses. Then Mrs. Popper would play a pretty, descriptive piece called “By the Brook.”

  It was cold in the cellar, of course, so that Mrs. Popper had to learn to play the piano with her gloves on.

  By the end of January, Mr. Popper was sure the penguins were ready to appear in any theater in the country.

  Chapter XIV

  Mr. Greenbaum

  LOOK HERE,” said Mr. Popper at breakfast one morning. “It says here in the Morning Chronicle that Mr. Greenbaum, the owner of the Palace Theater, is in town. He’s got a string of theaters all over the country; so I guess we had better go down and see him.”

  That evening — it was Saturday, the twenty-ninth of January — the Popper family and their twelve trained penguins, two of them carrying flags in their beaks, left the house to find the Palace Theater.

  The penguins were now so well trained that Mr. Popper decided that it was not necessary to keep them on leashes. Indeed, they walked to the bus line very nicely in the following line of march: —

  The bus stopped at the corner, and before the astonished driver could protest, they had all climbed on and the bus was on its way.

  “Do I pay half-fare for the birds, or do they go free?” asked Mr. Popper.

  “Janie goes half-fare, but I’m ten,” said Bill.

  “Hush,” said Mrs. Popper as she and the children found their seats. The penguins followed in an orderly fashion.

  “Say, mister,” said the driver, “where do you think you’re going with that exhibit?”

  “Downtown,” said Mr. Popper. “Here, let’s call it fifty cents, and let it go at that.”

  “To tell the truth, I lost count when they went past me,” said the driver.

  “It’s a trained penguin act,” explained Mr. Popper.

  “Are they really birds?” asked the driver.

  “Oh yes,” said Mr. Popper. “I’m just taking them down to the Palace to interview Mr. Greenbaum, the big theater owner.”

  “Well, if I hear any complaints, off they go at the next corner,” said the driver.

  “Fair enough,” said Mr. Popper, who wanted to ask for transfers in that case, but decided to let well enough alone.

  The penguins were behaving very well. They were sitting quietly two in a seat, while the other passengers looked on.

  “Sorry,” said Mr. Popper, addressing everyone in the bus, “but I’ll have to open all the windows. These are Antarctic penguins and they’re used to having it a lot colder than this.”

  It took Mr. Popper quite a while to open the windows, which were stuck fast. When he had succeeded, there were plenty of remarks from the other passengers. Many of them began to complain to the driver, who told Mr. Popper to take his birds off the bus. He had to repeat this several times. Finally he refused to take the bus any farther until Mr. Popper got off. By this time, however, the bus had got so far downtown that none of them minded having to get out into the street.

  Only a block ahead of them shone the lights of the Palace Theater.

  “Hello,” said the theater manager, as the Poppers and the penguins trooped past him. “Sure, Mr. Greenbaum’s here in my office. You know I’ve heard about these birds of yours, but I didn’t really believe it. Mr. Greenbaum, meet the Popper Penguins. I’ll be leaving you. I’ve got to go backstage.”

  The penguins, now standing politely in two rows of six each, looked curiously at Mr. Greenbaum. Their twenty-four white-circled eyes were very solemn.

  “All you people crowding around the door, go back where you belong,” said Mr. Greenbaum. “This is a private conference.” Then he got up to shut the door.

  The Poppers sat down while Mr. Greenbaum walked up and down the double row of penguins, looking them over.

  “It looks like an act,” he said.

  “Oh, it’s an act, all right,” said Mr. Popper. “It’s Popper’s Performing Penguins, First Time on any Stage, Direct from the South Pole.” He and Mrs. Popper had thought up this name for the act

  “Couldn’t we call them Popper’s Pink-toed Penguins?” asked Mr. Greenbaum.

  Mr. Popper thought for a moment. “No,” he said, “I’m afraid we couldn’t. That sounds too much like chorus girls or ballet dancers, and these birds are pretty serious. I don’t think they’d like it.”

  “All right,” said Mr. Greenbaum. “Show me the act.”

  “There’s music to it,” said Janie. “Mamma plays the piano.”

  “Is that true, madam?” asked Mr. Greenbaum.

  “Yes, sir,” answered Mrs. Popper.

  “Well, there’s a piano behind you,” said Mr. Greenbaum. “You may begin, madam. I want to see this act. If it’s any good, you people have come to the right place. I’ve got theaters from coast to coast. But first let’s see your penguins perform. Ready, madam?”

  “We’d better move the furniture first,” said Bill.

  Chapter XV

  Popper’s Performing Penguins

  AT THAT MOMENT they were interrupted by the manager, who came in with a groan.

  “What’s the matter?” asked Mr. Greenbaum.

  “The Marvelous Marcos, who close the program, haven’t turned up, and the audience are demanding their money back.”

  “What are you going to do?” asked Mr. Greenbaum.

  “Give it to them, I suppose. And here it is Saturday night, the biggest night of the week. I hate to think of losing all that money.”

  “I have an idea,” said Mrs. Popper. “Maybe you won’t have to lose it. As long as it’s the end of the program, why don’t we just have the penguins rehearse in there on a real stage? We’d have more room, and I think the audience would enjoy it.”

  “All right,” said the manager. “Let’s try it.”

  So the penguins had their first rehearsal on a real stage.

  The manager stepped out on the stage. “Ladies and gentlemen,” he said, raising his hand, “with your kind indulgence we are going to try out a little novelty number tonight. Owing to unforeseen circumstances, the Marvelous Marcos are unable to appear. We are going to let you see a rehearsal of the Popper Performing Penguins, instead. I thank you.”

  In a dignified way the Poppers and the penguins walked out on the stage, and Mrs. Popper sat down at the piano.

  “Aren’t you going to take off your gloves to play?” asked the manager.

  “Oh, no,” said Mrs. Popper. “I’m so used to playing with them that I’ll keep them on, if you don’t mind.”

  Then she started Schubert’s “Military March.” The penguins began to drill very nicely, wheeling and changing their formations with great precision, until Mrs. Popper stopped playing in the middle of the piece.

  The audience clapped vigorously.

  “There’s more to it,” explained Mrs. Popper, h
alf to the manager and half to the audience, “where they form in a hollow square and march in that formation. It’s so late we’ll skip that tonight and jump to the second part.”

  “You’re sure you don’t want to take your gloves off, madam?” asked the manager.

  Mrs. Popper smilingly shook her head and began the “Merry Widow Waltz.”

  Ten of the penguins now formed in a semicircle as Nelson and Columbus in their midst put on a wild sparring contest. Their round black heads leaned far back so that they could watch each other with both round white eyes.

  “Gork,” said Nelson, punching Columbus in the stomach with his right flipper, and then trying to push him over with his left flipper.

  “Gaw,” said Columbus, going into a clinch and hanging his head over Nelson’s shoulder as he tried to punch him in the back.

  “Hey! No fair!” said the manager. Columbus and Nelson broke loose as the other ten penguins, looking on, applauded with their flippers.

  Columbus now sparred politely with Nelson until Nelson hit him on the eye, whereupon Columbus retreated with a loud “Ork.” The other penguins began to clap, and the audience joined them. As Mrs. Popper finished the Waltz, both Nelson and Columbus stopped fighting, put down their flippers and stood still, facing each other.

  “Which bird won? Who’s ahead?” shouted the audience.

  “Gook!” said all the ten penguins in the semicircle.

  This must have meant “Look!” for Nelson turned to look at them, and Columbus immediately punched him in the stomach with one flipper and knocked him down with the other. Nelson lay there, with his eyes closed. Columbus then counted ten over the prostrate Nelson, and again the ten other penguins applauded.

  “That’s part of the act,” explained Janie. “The other penguins all like Columbus to win, and so they all say ‘Gook!’ at the end. That always makes Nelson look away, so Columbus can sock him good.”