The pond was in the middle of a wood, surrounded by thickets of bramble and weeds. A small stream tumbled over a waterfall from it and trickled away through the fields into the big river. It was a peaceful sort of place; no one ever came there.
On one bank, all twisted and gnarly with its roots sticking out in the brown water, was an old willow tree. There were holes between its roots that you may think were made by water rats, until you saw the little boats half hidden in the shadows. There was a landing stage made out of splinters, about as long as your little finger, and even wicker pots for catching caddis-fly larvae and fine nets hung up to dry.
On this particular day Darby was right out in the middle of the pond, rowing himself along in his walnut-shell boat and whistling. The other people who lived beneath the willow dared not to go out as far, but here the duckweed grew thickly and the tadpoles swam in shoals. Tadpole didn’t taste very nice, but eating them was good for you.
“Quack!” went a duck, landing right by the boat and giving him a deeply menacing look.
Darby looked round, gulped, and dived for his life.
That was a long swim back to the willow! He only dared to come up for air when he was in some weeds, and all the time he could see the duck’s feet paddling through the water above him.
He finally crawled onto the landing stage, dripping wet, and the people clustered around. There were all sorts: mothers, babies, granddads, uncles—all about a centimeter tall.
“It’s the duck again,” gasped Darby. “Nearly got me that time!”
“That means all our food will be scared away,” said Han the chieftain. “Or eaten. Us too.”
The professor stepped forward, stroking his long white beard. “I think this is the time to try our antiduck device,” he said.
So the people ran down the long tunnels inside the willow until they came to a cavern. It was a hollow place inside the roots, and from it a narrow passage went out to the water.
A tiny submarine was tied to the wall. The professor opened the hatch and clambered inside, followed by Darby and the chieftain. Then they closed the hatch and opened the valves, and the submarine glided down into the dark water.
It came out from the roots into a fairyland of golden light, as the sunlight shimmered down through the brown water and shone from every sunken stone. The submarine was made out of a whole big walnut and powered by an elastic band. It had taken Darby and the professor years to build it, but it was a fine craft—it even had a working periscope and, instead of torpedoes, a long hawthorn spike fitted to its prow.
Slowly it drifted through the water, leaving a little trail of bubbles. Darby was looking through the periscope.
Then he saw the duck, which from underneath looked like a fat boat with legs.
“Duck ahead!” he cried. “Stand by the ram! Full elastic!”
Han pulled back a lever and the submarine gathered speed.
The nasty duck didn’t know what hit it. The tiny submarine shot up and rammed it amidships, and the bird whizzed out of the water with a quack. Back at the willow tree landing stage all the people cheered.
Again the submarine headed for the duck. But it had had enough. Before the craft reached it, it was flying away over the reeds. It never came back. Not surprising, really.
In the walnut-shell sub, the professor, Han, and Darby were so busy cheering and patting one another on the back that they didn’t notice that the elastic-band motor had completely unwound itself. But the people on the shore did.
They were heading for the waterfall!
“Hey!” said Han. “We seem to still be moving.”
“Righto, Professor, reverse engines,” said Darby, grasping the steering wheel.
“I can’t! The elastic would have to be wound up again!”
Darby could hear a far-off roaring. “Dive! It’s our only chance!”
The professor grabbed the little hand pump that worked the ballast tanks.
He was too late! The waterfall wasn’t very big—just a trickle of water over some stones—but for people only a centimeter high, it was quite big enough. It led into a little stream. The sub shot over the falls, spun round rapidly in a whirlpool, rolled over twice, and plopped into the water. Then it began to drift with the current.
“I think I’m going to be very sick,” said the professor. He rolled under a bunk.
Han was clinging to the periscope column while Darby struggled with the wheel. “Don’t,” he said. “Wind up the motor instead.”
“We’ll never make any headway against this current,” muttered Han.
To the people back on the landing stage it looked like they were sailing toward unknown lands. In truth, the submarine was drifting between giant hawthorn trees, where mysterious creepers of old-man’s beard hung down as far as the water. Strange birds were singing in the trees.
The stream was higher than usual, and bits of driftwood and dead leaves were floating in it. In the middle of all this the tiny submarine spun slowly to the surface.
The hatch opened, and the professor and Darby climbed out. On all sides there was nothing but water, and the waterfall was a long way behind them.
“Well, what are we going to do—” And as he said that, the professor slipped and fell into the water with a plop.
“All right, all right, don’t panic,” said Darby, and he dived in to pull him out—the old man couldn’t swim very well, and he was already blowing bubbles.
As Darby surfaced and looked around, he heard Han calling. The chieftain was jumping up and down and shouting at the top of his voice.
“Stickleback! Look out behind you! Stickleback!”
Darby turned and could see a fin shooting through the water toward him. It was a spiny stickleback—the most feared fish in the stream!
Quickly he pushed the half-drowned professor onto a floating twig and dived down. Underwater the light was yellow and dim, and he could hear a rushing noise in his ears. He put his knife of tough bramble thorn between his teeth and looked about him for the stickleback.
It came rushing at him with its fearsome jaws open, and he ducked just in time. Then it turned for another attack, and Darby plunged his thorn-knife into its belly. It was a bitter struggle, and the water turned red with stickleback blood as the fish thrashed around trying to get Darby between its long teeth. He felt as though his head would burst; it was such a long time since he had taken a breath.
Up on the surface Han pulled the professor onto the submarine and watched the churning water anxiously. Just when he was about to give up, Darby clambered aboard.
“Quick! Wind up the motor, there might be more of them about!”
The submarine went on down the stream. It had portholes, and the adventurers looked through at a strange underwater world.
Tadpoles and water beetles swam up and peered in at them, and the three adventurers had their lunch while the creatures swam around the sub.
The stream went under a small bridge and wound out into the river, and the little submarine whirled out into the current.
“I say,” said Han, pushing his plate away. “The stream seems to have got bigger all of a sudden.”
“Yes, it has,” said Darby. “Up periscope!”
“Hey, the bank looks a long way away,” he said after a while, “and there’s a great big—
Dive, quickly!”
The others grabbed the pumps and pulled with all their might. Overhead came the sound of powerful engines, and the water foamed.
“What on earth was it?” said the professor, after the noise had gone.
“I’m not sure—it looked like a giant boat. Nearly hit us too. Stay submerged for a while. You never know.”
The water was muddy, and they could see nothing outside.
“Well, how are we going to get out of this mess?” asked Han.
“I’m more concerned with staying alive, quite frankly,” said Darby. “Anyway, how about we play a game of dominoes?”
After a while the professor raised the periscope again. “Can you hear anything?” he said. “Like a sort of faraway rushing?”
There was a sudden gurgling noise and a roar, and the lights of the sub were reflected off nearby walls. They were in a pipe!
The current swept them along faster and faster, round bends and through thrashing pumps—bang! bang! bang! went the big engines of the waterworks (for that was what it was), and the tiny craft was bowled over and over and sent rushing along smaller and smaller pipes.
With a thud the submarine wedged in the pipe, upside down. The water trickled underneath it.
“I think we ought to abandon ship,” said Darby, “mainly because there is a big crack opening in the wall.”
They all stared at it.
Darby wrenched a pipe out of the wall and fiddled with it. “If you tie this to your head and make a funnel here so that it fits over your mouth, I think you’ll have a good snorkel tube,” he said. Then he waited until the professor and Han had made one for themselves, and opened the hatch.
The light glimmered on the damp walls of a long dark tunnel that stretched upward; there was a tiny point of light at the far end. In the distance he could hear rumblings and bangings.
Unknown to him, Mr. Arnold Grapeshot was banging on the cold-water tap and wondering why the water had stopped coming out. “Have to send for the plumber,” he muttered. He wrapped a towel around himself and dripped his way downstairs.
As the door closed, a very small head looked out of the tap.
“Well I never!” gasped Darby. He was looking out at a gigantic porcelain valley filled with soapy water, and half hidden in the steam a copper geyser rumbled like a volcano. A floating loofah looked bigger than a whale to him, and a soap dish seemed like a mountain.
“This looks the sort of place where you get giants,” said the professor in a matter-of-fact voice.
“Lost in the plumbing,” said Han.
“I say! Look at that!” cried Darby. On the far end of the bath lay a boat, a big clockwork one with a red hull. “What a magnificent machine! Do you think we could reach it?”
“But why?” grumbled Han. “This pond is too small, and there’s no way out.”
“Yes, but that’s exactly the sort of boat that giants sometimes sail on our pond,” said Darby. “Remember? We always have to hide.”
Taking a deep breath, he made a beautiful swallow dive and disappeared in the soapy water. Han followed him more slowly, towing the professor carefully behind him.
It took a long time to swim to the other side of the bath, and climbing the slippery side took a lot of effort. But tiny hands and feet found holds in the porcelain.
“Hey, this is not at all bad,” said Han when they had all climbed into the boat. “Look, a motor and sails. And a rudder. Funny sort of motor, though.”
“I think you have to wind it up,” the professor said.
“Well, I suppose we’ll just have to sit here and wait,” said Darby. “I don’t suppose there’s anything to eat?”
“I saw some spiders’ webs on the ceiling,” said Han.
“Well, we’ll see what we can find later. In the meantime I’m going to get a bit of kip,” said Darby.
“We’re being picked up!” cried Han.
“About time,” muttered Darby. “I’m getting fed up with this.”
The three of them had been living in the toy boat on the bathroom shelf for several days, living on earwigs and other insects that dropped into the bath. They didn’t taste very nice, but there you are.* The professor had spent his time examining the clockwork motor.
They clung to the sides as the boat was picked up and dumped into a giant bag, with towels and bathing costumes.
“Now here’s the plan,” said Darby as they bumped along. “As soon as the boat is put in the water I want you, Han, to grab the tiller. Professor, can you work the motor?”
“It’ll need winding up every now and then.”
“Yes, well, if possible we’ll abandon this one and find a better boat.”
Hours later, a giant hand reached down and wound up the motor, then put the boat into a pond.
“Right!” cried Darby. “Everyone to action stations.”
Han grabbed the tiller and wrenched it round so that the boat whizzed out into the middle of the boating pool. The little boy who owned it looked on in amazement.
“Hmm, this is freshwater,” said Darby, looking over the side. “It must come in somewhere. Hey, look at that!” That was a big electric-driven boat that dwarfed their own.
“What a craft!” said the professor. “Think we can board her, Darby?” He brought the boat up alongside it.
“We’ll try,” said Darby. “Follow me.” He leaped across, climbed up the side of the model, and peered into the bridge. A couple of big switches were screwed into the floor. “This looks pretty easy to operate,” he said. “All aboard!” He threw down a rope and the others scrambled across to join in.
The big model shot across the pond toward the water inlet tunnel while Darby struggled with the tiller. Then it was through and out onto the river, shooting along and leaving a trail of foam behind it.
“Hold tight!” Darby shouted as they narrowly missed a swan. “And look out for the stream!”
“There’s an opening over there!”
Darby pulled hard on the tiller and the boat skimmed across the river and up the stream. A few minutes later it buried its nose in the bank by the waterfall.
“Ah, back home at last,” the professor sighed with relief. “I hope I never have another ride like that in my life.”
They waded out and began to climb up the stones around the waterfall.
“You know,” said Darby thoughtfully, “with a proper crew I’m sure we could have a lot of fun with that boat. I don’t think there is anything more grand than messing about on the water.”
“You are right,” said the professor. “Three men in a boat!”