Piccaninnies | Page 7

it was some kind of gun, and a baby's woollen
bootee, which the Piccaninnies found most useful as an enormous bag
to be filled with berries. But most mysterious, and therefore most
interesting, though a little frightening, was a large heap of grey
smoking ashes where the picnic fire had been.
The Piccaninnies circled round and round this queer grey pile
wondering what on earth it could be. One boy venturing a little nearer
than the others trod on a live cinder, for the fire was not as dead as it
ought to have been, and jumped back howling and hopping round and
round on one foot, holding the other.
When they crowded round him asking what had happened he cried in
fear:
"The Red Enemy bit me. He lives under that grey mound, and I saw his
red eye flash as I went near. That is his breath you see rising up through
the trees."
The Piccaninnies looked frightened and backed away from the grey
mound, but all the rest of that evening they came again and again to
stare upon the Red Enemy, and each time they came his red eyes
seemed to flash brighter, his thick white breath to grow denser as it
wound up through the trees, and he seemed to be purring and growling

to himself.
[Illustration: "All the rest of the evening they came again and again to
stare upon the Red Enemy."]
When the Piccaninnies went to bed that night they were very uneasy
and could not sleep well. The sound of the Red Enemy's breathing
seemed to fill the bush with a low roaring, and his breath stole in and
out of the trees like a reddish mist; the air was very hot and dry. One of
the Piccaninnies, a brave little fellow, said that he would go and see
what their strange new enemy was doing, and sliding down his
sleeping-tree he set off.
He had not gone far before the heat and the stifling air drove him hack,
and rushing back to his friends he cried:
"Run for your lives! Quick! Quick! The Great Red Enemy is coming.
He is roaring with anger and tearing the trees down as he comes. None
of us can hope to escape him, for he has a million bright red eyes which
he sends flying through the bush in all directions to find us, and his
breath is so thick that we will be lost in it if we don't run now. Run!
Run!"
The Piccaninnies did not wait to be told twice. Without waiting to pack
up they slid down the trees and started to run through the dark bush,
and soon there were hundreds of little bush creatures all joining in the
race for life.
On, on they ran in fear and excitement, hearing the angry roaring of the
Great Red Enemy behind them, feeling his hot breath scorching them
as it writhed and twisted through the trees in reddish-black billows.
Some of his millions of angry, red searching eyes flew or drifted past
them, but they never stopped for a moment. And now they had left the
trees behind them and were running over clear ground, and before long
they reached the edge of the swamp, lying dark and cool before them.
In their haste and fear they all plunged in headlong and found the water
so fresh and cool and delightful after their heat and hurry, that they

burrowed deeper into it, only leaving their little black heads sticking
out.
All that night they lay and watched the Great Red Enemy in his wrath
worrying and tearing their poor trees to pieces, and all next day and the
next it lasted, and then nothing was left of their beautiful bush but a
few black, ugly stumps and a great grey waste of ashes.
And from the ashes rose the smoking dense breath of the Red Enemy,
and every now and then he flashed an angry red eye. The Piccaninnies
who had lived in that part of the bush could never again return to the
cool green shades of the forest, never slide down a fern leaf, or swing
on the branches, or pick puriri berries, or pelt the morepork in the
daytime.
What could they do? Where could they go? Poor, poor little
Piccaninnies!
Well, this is what they did. Having no home to go to, and finding the
water very delightful they decided to make their home in it. At first
they would only stay timidly near the edges where the water was not
deep, but by-and-by through living entirely in the water they grew
webbed-toes (you try it!) and became as much at home in the swamp as
any other water-creature. Some of them even grew elegant little tails
(believe