Ninnyhammer Read online

  “So now you believe in magic, do you, Jack?”

  Peter came into the room in time to hear his mother’s question. “Do you, Father?” he said.

  “Sort of. I believe our friend Ninnyhammer has some very special gifts.”

  “Oh, that reminds me,” Peter said. “He told me to ask you about rainbows. Something about a pot of gold…”

  “Oh, that!” laughed his father. “That’s just an old saying: there’s supposed to be a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow. If you can see the end. Which you never can.”

  Spring turned into summer, and haymaking began. The weather was perfect throughout, and with the help of a couple of men from the village, Farmer Frost made a lot of good hay. The two big horses pulled in cartload after cartload, and by the end of June there was a huge haystack at the top of the yard.

  “First of July tomorrow,” Sally Frost said to her husband that night.

  “I know that. So what?”

  “Only that Peter’s birthday is getting near.”

  “I know. July the tenth.”

  “When he will be ten.”

  “I know that too, Sally.”

  “But do you know what he wants?”

  “Why, has he told you?”

  “Yes. He wants a pony.”

  “A pony!” cried Jack Frost. “That’d cost a fortune. I’m not made of money, you know.”

  “Oh, all right! Buy him a packet of licorice.”

  While he was milking his cows next morning, Farmer Frost tried to figure out how he could afford what Peter wanted. Even with the extra money he was getting now that Ninnyhammer was making his cows produce more milk, his hens lay more eggs and his sow have twelve piglets, it was still a stretch. It wasn’t just the price of the animal. There was the tack it would need – a saddle alone cost pounds and pounds – and then there was its keep. I could borrow some money, I suppose, he thought, but who from? Who could help me?

  At that very moment the large figure of Ninnyhammer came quietly into the cowshed Buttercup gave a low moo of pleasure, and all the other cows followed suit.

  “Good mor-ning, Mis-ter Frost,” said the wizard, pointing his wand at the farmer, and instantly Jack Frost felt that somehow he need worry no more; somehow he would be able to get Peter his pony.

  “Good morning, my friend,” he replied. “What can I do for you?”

  “Not worry,” Ninnyhammer said. “Mis-ter Frost not worry about present for Pe-ter.” Then he turned and went out of the cowshed.

  He is a wizard, Jack Frost thought.

  He finished milking the last cow, Buttercup, carried the pail up to the dairy and poured the milk into the cooler. He looked out of the dairy door and then up at the sky, and there was a rainbow! It was a big rainbow that arched out of the sky and curved down to end close by, in the orchard next to the yard.

  A voice in the farmer’s head said, Quick, get a spade! So he did. Then Dig where you saw the rainbow end. So he did, and there was a clanking noise as the spade struck something in the ground. Dig it out! said the voice, so he did.

  Under the turf was a rusty old tin box, and when Jack Frost knelt in the grass, lifted it out and opened it up, he was somehow not in the least surprised to find that it was full of golden guineas.

  “Enough for pony?” said a deep voice, and he looked up to see Ninnyhammer grinning down at him.

  Jack Frost got to his feet, holding the box. Feeling the weight of it, he thought, I could buy a dozen ponies. I’ll be able to get a really good one for Pete’s birthday, and I can buy Sally anything she wants. I might even treat myself to something.

  “Thank you, my friend,” he said to the wizard.

  Ninnyhammer grinned even more widely and pulled at his beard and raised his bushy eyebrows and waved his magic wand.

  You know everything, don’t you? thought the farmer. You probably know who buried this box many years ago, and you somehow made the rainbow end here. But you mustn’t tell Peter – I want the pony to be a surprise.

  “Ninny-hammer not tell Pe-ter,” said the wizard, and he turned and walked away.

  On 8 July 1901 Farmer Jack Frost, his pockets bulging with golden guineas, got out his old bicycle (I must get myself a new one, he thought) and cycled off to market. There he bought an Exmoor pony, a lovely, sturdy, brown filly, and arranged for her to be delivered to his farm on the following Sunday, 10 July.

  On the Saturday Peter walked down to the old wooden bridge, hoping to meet Ninnyhammer. He looked up at the fox’s earth even though he knew Ninnyhammer wouldn’t be there any longer. There was nothing to see, for the cubs had grown up and left. As he neared the bridge, he heard the familiar “Cheee-chee-cheeky!” call and saw the kingfisher flashing upstream.

  Standing on the bridge, wand in hand, was the wizard.

  “Hullo, Pe-ter,” said Ninnyhammer. “Tomorrow is birth-day, eh?”

  “Yes.”

  “Mis-ter Frost give Pe-ter nice present?”

  “I don’t know,” Peter said. “What I really want is a pony of my own, but I don’t think Father could afford it. They’re very expensive.”

  Ninnyhammer nodded a great many times, but he had a special big smile on his face. I wonder why, thought Peter.

  All his long life Peter Frost never forgot the morning of his tenth birthday. At first all his mother and father said to him was, “Happy birthday!” But then they said, “After breakfast you can have your present.”

  “Can’t I have it now?”

  “No, it’s too big.”

  Too big, thought Peter. Could it be …? Yes, it could, he told himself, if Ninnyhammer had anything to do with it!

  He bolted his breakfast and then they all went up to the stables, and there, in a little stall next to the two big carthorses, was a beautiful brown Exmoor pony.

  “Many happy returns!” said Peter’s parents.

  “Oh, isn’t she lovely!” Peter cried. “Oh, thank you so much!”

  At the moment a deep voice behind them said, “Hap-py birth-day, Pe-ter.”

  “Thank you, Ninnyhammer.”

  “Yes,” said Jack Frost. “You certainly should thank our friend.”

  “Yes,” said Peter, stroking the pony’s neck in a daze of happiness. “But what shall I call her?”

  “I’m sure Ninnyhammer will suggest a good name,” said Sally Frost.

  “Go on then, Ninnyhammer,” said Peter. “Please.”

  The wizard grinned and nodded, and then he said, “Pe-ter call her Ma-gic.”

  THE END