Dunno's Adventures

by Nikolai Nosov

Translated by Margaret Wettlin
freebooksforkids.net
Illustrated by Viktor & Kira Grigorievs

Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30

Chapter Twenty
BLOBS AT WORK

While Bendum and Twistum were in Kite Town, important events were taking place in Greenville. The first thing that happened was that Blobs painted a portrait of Snowdrop. It took him almost two hours to do it, but the time was well spent. The picture was the very image of Snowdrop. Some of the girl-Mites said it was even better than Snowdrop, but that wasn't true. It would have been hard to improve on Snowdrop. Perhaps Blobs succeeded in making the beauty of her features more striking and expressive, but that, surely, is the purpose of all true art.

The portrait was hung on the wall of the room downstairs where all might see it. And all who did see it straightaway demanded that Blobs do portraits of them. But Snowdrop would not let anyone reach Blobs in the room upstairs where he was busy painting a portrait of Cornflower.

Dunno, who kept dancing about Blobs and giving him all sorts of unnecessary advice to show how much he knew about painting, heard a great noise downstairs.

Dunno's Adventures

"What's all this noise? What's all this noise?" he shouted as he ran down the stairs. "Get out of here, all of you!"

The poor girls were so anxious to reach the artist that they did not even take offence at Dunno's rudeness. On the contrary, they swarmed round him and called him "dear, good Dunno", and begged him not to send them away.

"Then form a queue," shouted Dunno, shoving the girls roughly against the wall. "A queue, I said or I'll shoo you all away!"

"Ugh, what a beast you are!" said Snowdrop. "That's no way to talk. You make me quite blush for you."

"Go ahead and blush," said Dunno.

Just then another girl-Mite came into the room, and in the general disorder she managed to reach the steps before she was seen. Dunno made a dash for her and was about to seize her by the arm when she stopped, and, turning a withering look on him, shook her finger in his face.

"Don't dare to touch me!" she said.

"I don't have to queue up. I'm a poetess."

Dunno's Adventures

This was so unexpected that Dunno just stood there gaping while the poetess went calmly up the steps.

"Who is she?" asked Dunno, pointing after her. "A poetess. She writes poetry," said the girls.

"What of it?" drawled Dunno. "We've got a poet where I come from, too. He's my pupil. I taught him how to write poetry, and now he does it himself."

"And so you're a poet, too?" gasped the girl-Mites.

"I am."

"Think of that! An artist and a poet!" "And a musician," added Dunno proudly.

"Read one of your poems to us," they asked.

"Later," said Dunno with the air of one who had too many matters of more importance to think of.

"What's the name of your poet?"

"Posey."

"Posey?" cried the girls, clapping their hands. "Yours is called Posey and ours is called Blossom. Don't you find they are alike?"

"They are a little," admitted Dunno.

"Do you like her name?"

"It's not bad."

"You should hear her poems!" cried the girls. "They're too sweet for anything! Go upstairs and she'll recite them to you. Then tell us what you think of them."

"I s'pose I may as well." said Dunno.

When he entered the upstairs room Blobs was putting the finishing touches to Cornflower's portrait and Blossom was sitting beside Trills on the sofa, discussing music with him. Dunno clasped his hands behind his back and began pacing the floor, casting sidelong glances at the poetess from time to
time.

"Why do you keep going back and forth like a pendulum?" said Blossom.

"Please sit down. You make me dizzy."

"Mind your own business or I'll tell Blobs not to paint your portrait," said Dunno.

"Why, can he give orders to you?" Blossom asked Blobs in astonishment.

"He can. He can do anything," said Blobs, who was so busy painting he did not hear what Dunno had said.

"See?" said Dunno. "Everybody's got to take orders from me because I'm
the chief."

Seeing how important he was, Blossom decided to make up to him.

"Was it you who made the balloon?" she said.

"Who else?" said Dunno.

"Some day I'll write a poem about you."

"I don't want any of your poems," snorted Dunno.

"Don't say that," murmured Blossom. "You don't know what pretty poems I write. Would you like me to recite one of them to you?"

"Go ahead if you want to," said Dunno indifferently.

"I'll recite one of my latest. It's about a frog:

I caught a froggy by the toe,
Tra-la-la, and let him go.
I'm very fond of frogs and mice,
Tra-la-la, they're very nice.
Then I caught a bumble-bee,
I didn't see his sting, you see.
The sting saw me, boo-hoo! boo-hoo!
And stung my finger through and through.
I've had enough of frogs and bees,
Of playing tricks and climbing trees,
Such things won't cultivate my head;
I ought to read a book instead."

Dunno's Adventures

"Hurrah! Hurrah!" exclaimed Blobs and even clapped his hands.

"A very nice poem," said Trills. "It not only treats of frogs, but encourages the young to read books. Very instructive."

"Here's another one," said the poetess. This time it was about a firefly instead of a frog and ended with the words "I ought to go and make my bed" instead of "I ought to read a book instead". The next one was about a gnat and ended: "I
ought to see the chickens fed", and the last ended with: "I ought to paint the poultry shed".

By that time Blobs had finished Cornflower's portrait. Everyone was delighted with it.

"Charming!" they said. "Delightful! A masterpiece!"

"Couldn't you paint me in a blue dress like that?" said Blossom to Blobs.

"But your dress is green," said Blobs.

"What difference does it make? You can paint it blue, even if it is green. Do, that's a dear, I'd have put on a blue dress if I'd known Cornflower's picture would turn out so well in blue."

"I suppose I can," said Blobs.

"And make my eyes blue, too."

"Your eyes? But they're brown," said Blobs.

"Does that matter so much? If you can make a green dress blue, why can't you make brown eyes blue, too? Come, that's a dear," she coaxed.

"There's a big difference between eyes and dresses," said Blobs. "You can change your dress, but you can't possibly change your eyes."

"I see. Well, then, paint them brown if you must, but make them as big as possible."

"They're big enough as it is."

"Just the least bit bigger. Do, please. And give me long, long lashes."

"Very well."

"And golden hair. My hair's almost golden as it is, isn't it?"

"Almost," said Blobs.

He began to paint the poetess. Every minute or so she would jump up to look at the picture and exclaim:

"Make the eyes bigger — bigger still, bigger still!"

"Make the lashes longer — longer still, longer still."

"Make the mouth smaller — smaller still, smaller still!"

When finished, the portrait had enormous eyes, a mouth no bigger than the head of a pin, and hair that might have been made of pure gold. It bore almost no resemblance to Blossom, but she was pleased with it and said she could not wish for anything better.

Dunno's Adventures