Moominpappa at Sea Read Online Free PDF Page B

isn’t an island that’ll be easy to get to know,’ Moomintroll thought. ‘It wants to be left in peace.’
    The heather disappeared in a mossy swamp in the middle of the island, came out the other side, only to vanish in a low thicket of spruce and dwarf birch. It was odd that there wasn’t a single tall tree. Everything seemed to grow so close to the ground, groping its way across the rock. It occurred to Moomintroll that he, too, should make himself as small as he could. He began to run towards the point.
    *
    Far out on the western end of the island stood a little house made of stone and cement. It was fixed firmly to the rock with lots of iron clamps. Its back was round like a seal’s, and it looked straight out to sea through a tiny substantial window-pane. The house was so small that you could just about sit in it if you were the right size, and the fisherman had built it for himself. He was lying on his back with his arms under his head, gazing at a cloud moving slowly across the sky.
    ‘Good morning,’ said Moomintroll. ‘Is this where you live?’
    ‘Only when it’s stormy,’ replied the fisherman vaguely.

    Moomintroll nodded seriously. It was just the right way to live if one liked big waves. Sitting in the middle of the breakers, watching the waves as high as mountains coming and going and listening to the sea thundering on the roof. Moomintroll wanted to ask: ‘Can I come and watch the waves sometime?’ But this house was obviously built just for one.
    ‘Mamma sends her compliments,’ he said. ‘She asked me to inquire about the key of the lighthouse.’
    The fisherman made no answer.
    ‘Pappa can’t get in,’ Moomintroll explained. ‘We thought that perhaps you might know where…’
    Silence. More clouds appeared in the sky.
    ‘There
was
a lighthouse-keeper, wasn’t there?’ Moomintroll asked.
    At last the fisherman turned his head and looked at him with his watery-blue eyes.
    ‘No. I don’t know anything about a key,’ he said.
    ‘Did he put the light out and go away?’ continued Moomintroll. He had never met anybody before who didn’t answer when asked a question. It worried him and made him feel uncomfortable.
    ‘I can’t really remember,’ said the fisherman. ‘I’ve forgotten what he looked like…’ He got up slowly and pottered off over the rock, grey and wrinkled and as light as a feather. He was very small and had not the slightest desire to talk to anyone.

    Moomintroll stood watching the fisherman for a while, then turned and walked back across the narrow strip of land. He went in the direction of the beach
where the boat was in order to fetch the copper can. They would be eating soon, and Moominmamma would make a fire between some stones and lay the meal out on the steps of the lighthouse. Then somehow or other things would be all right.
    *
    The beach was full of completely white sand. The bay was like a half-moon stretching from one headland to the other, and it formed a trap for all that the winds swept round the island towards the leeward side. Driftwood lay piled up at the high-water mark under the alder bushes, but lower down on the beach the sand was empty and as smooth as a polished floor. It was nice to walk on. If you walked along the edge of the water, your paws left little holes that filled up immediately, like springs. Moomintroll started to look for shells for his mother, but the only ones he could see were broken. Perhaps they’d been smashed by the sea.
    He saw something shining in the sand that wasn’t a shell. It was a tiny little silver horseshoe. Quite close by there were hoof-marks in the sand, leading straight into the sea.
    ‘A horse must have jumped into the sea just here and lost one of his shoes,’ Moomintroll observed to himself
seriously. ‘That’s what it must be. A very tiny horse indeed. I wonder whether it’s made of real silver, or only silver-plate?’ He picked up the horseshoe and decided that he would give it to his