Kanga and Roo

One morning there was someone new in the Hundred Acre Wood. Two someones, actually. A tall mother animal called Kanga, and her tiny baby called Roo. Nobody knew quite how they got there. But there they were.

Pooh went to Piglet's house beside the beech tree to talk about it, and Rabbit was already there.

"Here we all are," said Rabbit. "You, Pooh. You, Piglet. Me. Eeyore. Owl. We have always lived here. And now, suddenly, there is a Strange Animal! An animal who carries her baby around in her pocket! If I carried my family around in my pockets, I would need eighteen pockets! I haven't got time for that."

There was a long, thoughtful silence.

Then Pooh said, "I make it fifteen."

"Fifteen what?" asked Rabbit.

"Your family."

"Never mind, Pooh," said Piglet. "The question is, what do we do about Kanga?"

"The best way," said Rabbit, "would be to take Baby Roo and hide him. And when Kanga says, 'Where is Baby Roo?' we all say, Aha!"

"Aha!" said Pooh, practicing. "Aha! Aha!" He tried it loud. He tried it soft. He was not quite sure it meant what Rabbit thought it meant.

"There is j-j-just one thing," said Piglet in a very small voice. "Christopher Robin says a Kanga can be one of the fiercer animals. And if a fierce animal loses its baby, it gets even fiercer. So maybe Aha is not the best thing to say."

"Piglet," said Rabbit, "you are not very brave."

"It is hard to be brave," said Piglet with a sniff, "when you are only a Very Small Animal."

"But that is exactly why you will be useful!" said Rabbit. And he told them his plan.

Here was the plan. Piglet was very small, just like Roo. So when Kanga was not looking, Piglet would hop into her pocket. Roo would hop out. Rabbit would run away with Roo. And Pooh? Pooh would talk to Kanga so she looked the other way.

"What do I talk about?" asked Pooh.

"Anything you like," said Rabbit. "Poetry or something."

"Splendid!" said Pooh.

And so, with a plan that felt very clever to Rabbit and a little bit wobbly to Piglet, they went off to find Kanga.

Kanga and Roo were in a sandy part of the Wood. Baby Roo was practicing very small jumps in the sand. Boing! Boing! He fell down a mouse hole. He climbed back out again. Boing! Down he went again.

"Good afternoon, Kanga," said Pooh.

"Good afternoon, Pooh," said Kanga.

"Look at me jumping!" squeaked Roo, and fell into another mouse hole. Plop!

Rabbit winked at Pooh. That meant, start talking!

"Kanga," said Pooh, "I don't know if you like poetry at all?"

"Hardly at all," said Kanga.

"Oh," said Pooh. But he took a breath and began anyway. "On Monday, when the sun is hot, I wonder to myself a lot, Now is it true, or is it not, That what is which and which is what? On Tuesday, when it hails and snows, The feeling on me grows and grows, That hardly anybody knows, If those are these or these are those. On Wednesday, when the sky is blue, And I have nothing else to do, I sometimes wonder if it's true, That who is what and what is who. On Thursday, when it starts to freeze, And frost goes twinkle on the trees, How very readily one sees, That these are whose, but whose are these? On Friday..."

"Yes, very nice," said Kanga, not waiting to hear about Friday. "One more jump, Roo, and then we really must go home."

"Look at that tree over there!" said Pooh quickly, pointing behind Kanga's back.

"Where?" said Kanga.

"Is that a bird in it?" asked Pooh. "Or is it a fish?"

"It can't be a fish," said Piglet.

And Kanga turned her head to look.

Quick as a flash, Piglet jumped into Kanga's pocket.

At the very same moment, Rabbit scooped up Roo and hurried away.

Piglet made a squeaky little Roo-noise from inside the pocket.

"Rabbit had to go," said Pooh. "He thought of something. Suddenly."

"Well," said Kanga, "we must get home. Good-bye, Pooh."

And in three huge bouncy jumps, boing, boing, boing, she was off through the Wood.

Poor Piglet! He bounced up and down inside that pocket like a rubber ball. Every time he went up he said, "Ooooooo!" and every time he came down he said, "Ow!" Ooooooo-ow! Ooooooo-ow! All the way to Kanga's house.

When Kanga opened her pocket, she saw right away that this was not Roo. This was Piglet. But Kanga was clever. She thought, "If they are having a joke with me, I will have a joke with them."

"Now then, Roo, dear," she said sweetly. "Bath time."

"Aha!" said Piglet. But it was not a very good Aha. Kanga did not seem to understand it at all.

"Bath first," said Kanga in a cheerful voice.

Piglet looked around for Pooh and Rabbit. But Pooh was back at the sandy place practicing jumps. And Rabbit was at his hole, playing with Baby Roo and liking him more every minute.

Piglet was all alone.

"I think," said Kanga, "a nice cold bath tonight."

Piglet shivered. He did not like baths. Not one little bit.

"Kanga!" he said in his bravest voice. "I see the time has come to speak plainly. I am not Roo. I am Piglet!"

"Yes, dear, yes," said Kanga, getting the bath water ready. "And doing Piglet's voice too! So clever." She took out a big bar of yellow soap.

"Can't you see?" shouted Piglet. "Look at me!"

"I am looking, Roo, dear," said Kanga. "Now into the bath."

Splash! Before he knew it, Piglet was in the water and Kanga was scrubbing him with a big soapy cloth. Scrub, scrub, scrub.

"Ow!" cried Piglet. "Let me out! I'm Piglet!"

"Don't open your mouth, dear, or the soap goes in," said Kanga.

Bleh! Too late.

"You did that on purpose!" sputtered Piglet.

Splish, splosh. Out of the bath. Kanga rubbed him dry with a towel. Rub, rub, rub.

"Now," said Kanga, "here is your medicine, and then bed."

"W-w-what medicine?" said Piglet.

"To make you grow big and strong, dear. You don't want to stay small and weak like Piglet, do you?"

Just then, knock knock knock, and in came Christopher Robin.

"Christopher Robin!" cried Piglet. "Tell Kanga who I am! She keeps saying I'm Roo!"

Christopher Robin looked at him very carefully. "You can't be Roo," he said. "I just saw Roo playing at Rabbit's house."

"Well!" said Kanga. "Fancy that! Fancy my making a mistake like that."

"There you are!" said Piglet. "I told you so. I'm Piglet."

Christopher Robin shook his head. "Oh, you're not Piglet. I know Piglet well, and he is quite a different color."

Piglet opened his mouth to explain that he had just had a bath, and that was why he looked different. But the moment he opened his mouth, Kanga popped the medicine spoon right in. Gulp!

"I wonder who it can be," said Kanga.

"Perhaps some relation of Pooh's," said Christopher Robin. "We shall call it Pootel. Henry Pootel for short."

And just at that moment, Henry Pootel wriggled free and jumped to the ground. The door was open! Out he went. And never, ever, had Piglet run so fast. His little legs went pat-pat-pat-pat-pat all the way through the Wood. And when he was almost home, he stopped running and rolled the rest of the way. He rolled and rolled and rolled until he was his own nice comfortable color again.

And so Kanga and Roo stayed in the Hundred Acre Wood. Everyone decided it was much friendlier with them there. Rabbit even found he quite liked having Roo visit, as long as he didn't bounce on the important lists.

Every Tuesday, Kanga would try to teach Pooh how to jump. Pooh was not very good at it, but he did find that a little bounce sometimes helped a good Hum come into his head. And Piglet made quite sure to stay his own comfortable color, and thought that perhaps baths weren't so worrisome after all, so long as there was no yellow soap involved.