Wobbly's Day

I was at the gatepost at ten while Tidy drew the plan, and I asked what if the wicks run out.

I want to be fair to myself here, which I am not often. That was a reasonable question. There was one supply of wicks and fifty-five lanterns and no second shop.

"Then we're on the second picture instead of the third," said Tidy, "and I draw a new one."

That answer has stayed with me all day. Not because it fixed the worry — it did not, I had eleven more before lunch — but because of the shape of it. Tidy did not tell me it would be fine. Tidy told me what we would do if it was not.

Those are completely different sentences and only one of them is any use to me.

I had a middling sort of afternoon. I carried things. I checked the glass twice, and then a third time, and then made myself walk away from the glass.

At twenty past four Cloudy came and found me in a great hurry with a thing about the hedge tunnel — not hanging them, standing them on the ground down each side.

"But what if somebody kicks one?" I said.

Which got a look. I am used to the look.

"Then put them in the roots," said Cloudy, "where the hedge is thick."

And that is the second time in one day that somebody has answered one of my what-ifs instead of stepping over it — and both times the answer made the thing better. The tunnel in the roots is the best stretch of the entire path. It would not have been in the roots if I had kept my mouth shut.

Then at half past five the path was lit and everybody stood about at the gate feeling pleased, and I said: "What if one of them goes out?"

There was a small silence of the sort I know extremely well.

"What if the wind gets up. What if the ones in the roots fall over. What if somebody's put one where the hedge can reach it and it catches —"

"Wobbly," said Tidy.

And here it came. Don't spoil it. Try not to worry. It'll be fine.

"— will you go and check them?" said Tidy. "All of them. Start at the far end and walk back. You'll see things the rest of us won't."

I stopped mid what-if.

"...All of them?"

"You're the only one who'd actually do it properly."

So I walked the whole path backwards through the dusk, far end down to Winky's gate, with Shivvy along for the dark bits. Five things you can see, four you can hear, three you can touch — I do that on the move now, which took years.

And I found: one lantern in the roots leaning on a dry twig. One hung close enough to scorch the hedge. Two standing on soft ground that would have tipped the first time a foot went past.

Four. Four things wrong, on a path that fifty-five fluffs had just declared finished and were standing about admiring.

I fixed all four and got to the gate as the last of the light went.

And the worry had gone somewhere. Not answered. Used. There is an enormous difference and I had never once felt it before.

"What if it goes okay?" I said to Shivvy, trying it out.

"It's going to," said Shivvy, who does not say that lightly.

I checked the fire twice at Winky's. I am not going to pretend otherwise; there were fifty-five fluffs in one room and a fire and a great deal of blanket.

But I did it twice and then I sat down, which for me on a night like that is close to miraculous.

Beamy read the envelope out and my four things were on it, all four, listed as four separate items — lean, scorch, soft ground, soft ground — which made somebody laugh, and I did not mind, because they were on the list.

Then Rainbow stood up and started the counting-off, and the very first thing he said was the worried one checked twice.

First. Before the cross one, before the shy one, before any of it.

I went hot all over and looked at my paws and Shivvy, next to me, did not say anything, which was exactly right.