BUMP BUMP BUMP
HERE is Edward Bear, coming downstairs now, bump, bump, bump, on the back of his head, behind Christopher Robin. It is, as far as Christopher Robin knows, the only way of coming downstairs, with Winnie-the-Pooh — bump, bump, bump — going down the stairs behind him. The bump, bump, bump went up the stairs, too. Here is Edward Bear, up and down the stairs, bumping Christopher Robin. Christopher Robin has bruises on the back of his legs and the front of his arms.
Every time Christopher gets a new bruise, there is a giggle to go with the bump. “I’ve let the blood loose inside of you.” Bump. Bruise. Giggle. “Now you’re wearing the memory of me on your skin.” Bump. Bruise. Giggle. Up and down the stairs.
The Buzzing Noise
One day when Christopher Robin was out walking, he came to an open place in the middle of the forest, and in the middle of this place was a large oak tree, and, from the top of the tree, there came a loud buzzing noise.
Christopher Robin didn’t mind the noise. He sat down at the foot of the tree, put his head between his knees, and closed his eyes. He would only be alone for a minute. You were never alone for long in the Hundred-Acre Wood. (The Hundred Aches’ Wood, Pooh would giggle at him. One hundred aches, one hundred pains for Christopher Robin.)
Finally he said to himself: “That buzzing noise means something. You don’t get a buzzing-noise like that, just buzzing and buzzing, without its meaning something. If there’s a buzzing noise, somebody’s making a buzzing noise, and the only reason for making a buzzing noise that I know of is because you’re a bee.”
There were other reasons for making a buzzing noise, but Christopher Robin didn’t know about them yet.
Then he thought another long time, and said: “And the only reason for being a bee that I know of is making honey.” There was never anything to eat in the Hundred-Acre Wood, but Christopher Robin was too hungry to remember that he knew better.
And then he got up, and said: “And the only reason for making honey is so as I can eat it.” So he began to climb the tree.
Winnie-The-Pooh wandered out from behind the tree and looked up at his friend. While Christopher Robin climbed, Winnie-The-Pooh sang a little song.
Isn’t it funny
How a boy likes honey?
buzz, buzz, buzz
I wonder why he does?
He climbed and he climbed and he climbed and as he climbed the song got louder, even though Winnie-The-Pooh got further away.
It’s a very funny thought that, if boys were bees,
They try to build nests and escape to the trees.
And that being so (if the Bees were Bears),
We’d always find them at the top of the stairs.
Winnie-The-Pooh circled the tree and sang his song. “Why don’t you come down, Christopher Robin?” he said in a friendly way. “I don’t think you’ll find anything up that tree but more noise.”
“I can do it,” Christopher Robin called back.
“No, you can’t,” Winnie-The-Pooh said sorrowfully. “Your hands are tired. Your wrists are aching. Your head hurts. There’s a buzzing in your ears and splinters in your feet. And the higher you climb, the worse it gets.”
The buzzing, Christopher Robin suspected, knew his name and didn’t like it. It knew who he was, and it didn’t like that either. It knew where he was trying to go, and it liked that least of all. It was a grey sort of buzzing, heavy and dull, and it made his head spin.
“Why don’t you come down the tree, where are all your friends are here to see you,” Winnie-The-Pooh said cheeriably.
“I haven’t got any friends,” Christopher Robin said.
“How can you say that,” Piglet said, stepping out from just behind Winnie-The-Pooh, “when you know we’re the best friends you have in the whole world.”
Christopher Robin came down the tree. His head hurt, and his wrists were aching, and there were splinters in his feet, and it didn’t get any better when he reached the ground. And he was still hungry. He was so hungry that he fell over, and he tasted blood and dirt in his mouth.
“What a mess,” Piglet said.
“I’m hungry,” said Christopher Robin. “I’m sorry. It’s because I’m hungry.”
“How can you be hungry,” Winnie-The-Pooh said, “when you’ve just eaten all the honey those poor bees were storing for their own children?”
“I haven’t had any honey,” Christopher Robin said, and tried to lift his arm to wipe his mouth. “I haven’t had anything at all.”
“It was very rude of you,” Piglet said, “to take all the honey for yourself and not to offer even a little tiny bite to your friends.”
“I’m sorry,” Christopher Robin said to the dirt.
EEYORE GETS A TAIL
“You’ve got to nail it on, just like so,” Winnie-The-Pooh said, as Christopher Robin bent over Eeyore. “A donkey has got to have a tail.
“I don’t want to have a tail,” Eeyore said, but he did not move.
“But I don’t want to hurt him,” Christopher Robin said, holding the hammer and the nail in his small hands.
“Of course you want to hurt him,” Winnie-The-Pooh explained. “Eeyore is your friend. And friends share everything. And you hurt, yourself. Your hands hurt right now, don’t they?”
“Not very much,” Christopher Robin said.
“You mustn’t lie to me,” Winnie-The-Pooh said. “You mustn’t ever lie to me.”
“They hurt a little,” Christopher Robin said. “They hurt more than they used to.”
“If you hurt,” Winnie-The-Pooh explained patiently, “it will help to make someone else hurt. And Eeyore needs a tail.”
“I don’t want a tail,” Eeyore said.
The first blow struck a bit of bone at the end of the spine and glanced right off. The place for the tail was slick with blood now, and would be that much harder to attach a nail to.
“Now look at what you’ve done,” Winnie-The-Pooh said. “You’ll have to do it again, and with a steady hand this time. You can’t just hurt him for no reason, Christopher Robin. You’ve got to give him a tail as well as the pain.”
“I don’t want to give him anything,” Christopher Robin said, and he began to cry. Eeyore began to cry too.
Winnie-The-Pooh waited patiently until Christopher Robin had finished crying. “Again,” he said. He was very gentle with Christopher Robin, when the work was finished. He gave him a glass of water.
CHRISTOPHER ROBIN GOES TO SCHOOL
It was a sad day in the Hundred Acre Wood, because Christopher Robin was leaving them, and was no longer to be allowed to do Nothing, because he was being sent to School.
“Do you hear that,” Pooh said to Piglet. “Christopher Robin thinks he’s going to school.”
“To boarding school,” Piglet said. “Not just any school. That wouldn’t be good enough for Christopher Robin.”
“Thinks he’s going to leave us behind,” Eeyore said. “Thinks he’s too good for his friends, too good to know us or to stay here or to even say hello if we passed on the street. That’s what you’d like, isn’t it?” he said to Christopher Robin. “To go away to boarding school and make like we didn’t even exist.”
“Things wouldn’t be any different there if you went anyhow,” Pooh said. “No one would like you any better there. No one would treat you any better than here. No point in going away at all.”
“Boarding school, boarding school; soared, explored, rewarding school,” Tigger sang as he rocked back on his tail. “Bored, ignored, and hoarding school.”
“I have to go,” Christopher Robin said. “My mother says…”
“Christopher Robin can have school right here,” Piglet said. “We can teach him everything he needs to know. He doesn’t have to go anywhere.”
“My mother says…” Christopher Robin said.
“I’ll teach him,” Eeyore said.
“What mother,” Owl said. “I don’t see any mothers.”
“I’ll teach him,” Rabbit said. “We’ll all teach him.”
The buzzing sound was full and sharp again in Christopher Robin’s ears. “My m…” He leaned over into the bushes and was sick. Nobody made a move to clean it up.
“What a mess,” Piglet said, and the buzzing sound grew louder.
