Chapter 1: The Sisters

Midway between the blue mountains of Appalachia and the snow capped Rockies, on a small suburban farm, two white pigs shared a large, comfortable pen. One pig had three extra hairs growing from out the top of his head so that his head looked like an old bristle brush. The other pig in the pigpen proudly flaunted an extraordinary pink nose.

"Here they come," the pink nosed pig would oink with excitement. "Here come the sisters with our corn mush."

Although the pig with the three stout hairs adored his corn mush, he was always late to greet the sisters. It was difficult for him to roust himself out of the rich gooey mud hole. "Just one more squish," he would call out and then watch the black muck ooze up between his cloven hooves. He loved to feel the mud, cool and dry on his flaky white pig-skin.

Or he might reply, "Just another story," and then beg the yellow butterfly who lighted every morning with the daily news:

"The geese are making travel plans again. The squirrels had a big party to celebrate the end of nut gathering season. And the lost lamb came home safe after a harrowing adventure in the ravine."

The bristle headed pig loved stories and would hale any and all passing animals. He even saved bits of his corn mash for the birds who told tales of, "Over the ocean." They told of colorful species, spectacular sights, the Washington Monument, the Great China Wall, the pyramids, Big Ben, and the Eiffel Tower. They told of daring adventures or foolhardy feats.

The daily news, and almost anything else, always made his best friend Mantis pray. It seemed like Mantis was always praying. That is how he got the reputation throughout the country as the praying-Mantis. He would fold his gossamer wings behind him and his hands in front, stand very still and utter, "Lord the Almighty, thank you for watching over your humble animals."

When the pink nosed pig heard the rusty gate open she would get so excited she squealed and oinked, oinked and squealed. Then both pigs put their front hooves on the wooden fence and stood upright on their dimpled hind legs. They squealed in harmony as the sisters came with a full-to-the-brim bucket of warm corn mush and behind-the-ear scratches.

Julia, the little sister, always climbed into the pen with her beloved pigs. She scratched, and rubbed and rubbed and scratched behind their ears and down their necks. The pigs would purr like a barnyard cat if they could but pigs can't purr so they make high pitched squeals or low toned sighing grunts.

After the Julia and her older sister Rosey finished the scratches and rubs they glopped thick corn mush into the long pig-trough, said good-bye and trotted off to school.

"Now what are you making?" asked the pink nosed pig when Julia and Rosey left.

"The Eiffel tower."

The three haired pig loved to hear the daily news, loved adventure stories and like children with mashed potatoes, loved to play with his food. When he was a wee piglet he piled his corn mush into large smooth domes. Then he learned that by using his left hoof as well as his snout he could create walled castles, the Chinese Wall and moon craters. Now as an adult pig, he learned that the best mush-sculptures are tall and lean. The Big Ben or Eiffel Tower types.

"Watch. Watch me," he would squeal to the pink nosed pig who ate her mush in a non-creative style.

She tried to ignore him but every time, at the last minute, she raised her head to watch as the stout haired pig stood on his hind legs, stretched his front piggy arm into the air and then . . . SPLAT! His arm crashed right down the middle of the gooey mush-structure. The sudden impact shot mush high into the air spraying the entire area with a corn mush tidal wave. After that the pig with the stout hairs, usually couldn't help himself and clamored into the trough pouncing on the demolished structure with all four feet.

This would invariably ignite the pink nosed pig. She would climb into the trough with her pig-pen friend and sing a squeally piggy song as she danced round and round in the mush. The two pigs would then laugh uproariously as the round bottomed pig-trough rocked back and forth. Their roly-poly bellies jiggled and shook with hysterical laughter as the trough rocked so hard that it tumbled them back out onto the ground.

"Oh, my, such foolery," said the pink nosed pig as she wiped tears of laughter from her eyes and corn mush from her belly.

They were a joyful couple who had none other then the same sense of pig-humor that their mother, father and the generations of pigs before them exhibited.

One morning after the peals of laughter subsided they snuggled down in the mud for a nap. The pink nosed pig sighed, "they are the most beautiful two sisters in the whole world."

"Julia and Rosey are not only beautiful," replied the second pig drowsily, "They are also kind to animals and wise about the wind and mud. But how can you talk about the whole world when we've lived all our lives together in this pen?"

"Of course we've only lived in this pen. We're pigs not butterflies. We are supposed to live in a pig­pen." She sighed again. And as her sleepy eyes lids closed she mumbled, "even when I grow to be an old gray sow, I will never have enough of the way little Julia scratches behind my ears."

"And I'll never get enough head rubs."

But unfortunately, the sisters' father worked for a very big company that transfered him to a whole nother country, far, far away. He took his daughters and their mother with him leaving the pigs' feeding to Grandfather.

Chapter 2: Grandfather

Grandfather fed the pigs, but he gave them only half a bucket of morning mush and he never scratched the ears of the pig with the pink nose or rubbed the head of the pig with the three stout hairs. In fact, he would throw their mush into the pen and totally ignore the pigs.

At first the pig with the three stout hairs jumped around Grandfather and nudged his legs oinking, "scratch me, rub me, even kick me but don't ignore me." Grandfather neither scratched, rubbed nor even lifted an eyebrow to either one of the pigs.

After a while the pigs no longer put their hooves on the wooden fence and squealed in the mornings. They were very sad pigs.

And the sisters were sad too in their new home so far away. They had good hearts, and like their pigs, didn't complain. But one night the full moon peeked in the window at little Julia and woke her. She sat up in bed. For a moment she thought she was back on her farm and it was time to get up and feed her pigs. Then she remembered that she was now far, far away in a new country and she began to cry. This woke up Rosey oldest sister who was sleeping in the same room.

"What's the matter?" whispered Rosey as she climbed into Julia's bed.

"I don't like it here in this new country," cried Julia. "No one understands my language. The other children tease me about my cloths and they don't know how to play our games. I don't want to go to school anymore. I want to go back home to our farm and the pig with the pink nose and the pig with the three stout hairs on his head. I miss our pigs. And I'm sure they miss us to!" Then Julia began to cry and cry. She cried so hard that the moon, looking in her window, felt so sad that he had to pull a dark rain cloud over his bright face and cried along with her. Rosey laid next to Julia and listened to the rain against the window. She missed the farm and the pigs too and began to cry silently beside Little Sister.

"Mother feels better when she gets a letter from the farm," sniffled Julia. "Maybe we'll feel better too if we get a letter. Let's write to the pigs and tell them that we miss them and ask them to write us a letter back."

Chapter 3: The Letter

Rosey knew writing letters to pigs is a silly idea but, it was late at night. The wind howled and the rain trickled down the window like her little sister's tears so she said, "Ok, we'll write the pigs a letter but you must stop crying." This made Julia wipe her eyes dry.

The pigs received the letter four weeks later because they lived so far away and because it was difficult for the postman to locate the home of Mr. and Mrs. Pig.

"Oh, oh," exclaimed the pig with the pink nose. "Our dear sisters are having a hard time in their new country."

After they read the letter, the pig with the three stout hairs, hung his head. He didn't wallow in his cool mud but laid in the dust in the far corner of the pig-pen. He didn't say a word all day. He slept restless that night, grunting, sighing.

The next morning, when Butterfly came to deliver the news, the three haired pig asked many strange questions. And Mantis seemed to keep his hands folded longer then usual.

The pink nosed pig wondered if her friend was becoming sick. So after Grandfather fed them their morning corn mush, cold, lumpy and a lesser amount then usual, she asked, "What's the matter with you? Are you catching the swine flu? Come and lay beside me."

The sad pig plodded through the mud. He watched it, black and gooey squash up between the cleft in his hooves but today he did not squeal with delight. He laid beside his pig-pen friend and took a deep sigh.

"I don't like it here in our pen anymore," began the three haired pig. "I'm always hungry. I don't have extra corn for my friends. Without the two sisters, we don't get head scratches. Grandfather ignores us. The place is just not the same anymore."

"That's true. Our pig­pen is no longer as happy as it once was," answered the pink nosed pig.

"Well, I've thought and pondered all yesterday, consulted with the yellow butterfly, prayed with Mantis and well . . .picture . . .picture us finding the sisters and all living together again."

"What do you mean?" quizzed the other pig. "Do you mean leave our pig-pen?"

"I mean, let's do what ever we have to do to be happy pigs again. If it means leaving our pig-pen, well . . .well . . .I'm a little afraid, but . . . let's do it! The Sisters' address is here on the upper corner of the letter."

"Oh, no," responded the pink nosed pig firmly, "I can't leave the farm. I'm a pig. I'm not a bird or a butterfly. My piggy legs are too short to carry me all the way to another country. Go if you want. I'm staying right here!"

"I hate cold, lumpy mush and I hate to be ignored," argued the three haired pig. "But how can I go without you? We've always been together. You must come with me. Please."

"No, this is ridicules. I'm a pig, always was and always will be." She then took the sisters' letter and dropped it on the outside the pen. The pig with three stout hairs growing out of his head, got up very slowly. The mud made a sucking sound around him as if it was trying to hold him down. "Please," he begged. "Please."

But "ridicules," was all he heard before the pink snout sank deep into the muddy ooze.

His heart wept like the willows. His grunt was the sound of the lonesome dove. He slowly dug a hole under the wooden fence. When he finished he turned again to the pig with the pink nose. She merely twitched her ears and snorted, "ridicules." So he slipped beneath the fence, picked up the letter and waddled away from the pig-pen and his soul mate.

The pig with the pink nose laid down in the pen and tried to take a nap but couldn't sleep. "I'm a good pig," she said to herself. "I don't go tramping around to other countries. No, I'm a good pig and lay quietly in my little pig-pen. Pigs can't go to other countries. They have to stay on the farm." But no matter what she said to herself and no matter how hard she tried to fall asleep for her nap, a big tear rolled from her blue pig eye. "The sisters left me. My life-long pig companion is gone too. We've lived together since we were piglets and now he's gone. I miss him already. I miss his dry bristle head.

I guess I'll live in this pigpen all alone for the rest of my life," she said as she squeezed her fat pig-butt through the hole under the wooden fence. Finding herself outside the pig-pen for the first time in her life, the pig with the pink nose became afraid. "I'm not really leaving the pig-pen," she comforted herself. "I'm just going to find that unreasonable pig with the three stout hairs on his head." She then followed his tiny pig tracks that lead right into the cornfield.

Chapter 4: The Axe

"Look at you! You are such a pig," she said when she saw her friend gorging himself on Grandfather's new corn.

Just then Grandfather came running toward them, waving an ax over his head shouting, "You dirty pigs. Get out of my cornfield. When I catch you I'm going to kill you and turn you into bacon."

The two pig friends looked at each other then at Grandfather who was getting closer and closer. "Bacon!" They screamed in terror and ran as fast as their little piggy legs could carry them. They could now feel the swish of Grandfather's ax on the backs of their necks.

"Quick, you go right and I'll go left," shouted the three haired pig. He darted across the lawn and under the laundry that Grandmother had just hung out to dry. Grandfather swung his ax, missed the pigs, but hit the cloths lines and cut it clean in two. All Grandmother and Grandfather's cloths sprayed out across the yard covering the pigs as they ran. The line then snapped back and tangled up around Grandfather's ankles causing him to fall flat on his face.

"Come back here you good­for­nothing lard barrels. Stop your running you pork slabs," he yelled and shook his fist. The two pigs didn't look back. They just continued to run and run until they crossed the road and leaped behind a rose hedge where they could hide.

The pigs laid panting behind the hedge for a long time. Their fat pig-bellies heaved in and out as they tried to catch their breaths.

At last, after they recovered, they realized that they had dragged some of Grandmother's laundry with them.

"Look at this," said the pig with the pink nose, "it's Grandmother's blue flowered dress."

"It's the same color as your eyes. You'd probably fit it as good as Grandmother," snorted the other pig.

With that invitation she donned the blue flowered dress. She then stood upright on her hind legs like they did when they waited for the two sisters to feed them and found that she did indeed look just like Grandmother.

While she was admiring herself, the pig with three hairs sprouting from his head squirmed into Grandfather's trousers and coat.

"Oh my, look at you. You look just like Grandfather and not a pound lighter either!"

It was difficult for the trousered pig to stand on his hind legs because he was so very fat. So he looked around and found a stick with a crooked handle to use as a cane.

As they held hands and practiced standing upright, a truck came down the dusty road, passed, and then backed up until it was right beside them. An old man stuck his head out of the window, looked at the pig with the pink nose dressed in Grandmother's blue flowered dress and the pig with three hairs, who stood beside her in Grandfather's jacket and trousers.

"I can't see too well any more," hollered the truck driving farmer out the window. "Aren't you the Grandparents of the two sisters?"

The pigs didn't know what to do because as everyone knows pigs belong in a pig-pen and they certainly don't wear dresses and trousers and they of course can understand human talk, but they themselves are incapable of human speech.

So the only thing they could do was stand there hand in hand and grunt.

"Oh, so you are those two's kin. Well, if you need a ride to town just hop in the back of my truck. I'm going to the train station to pick up some supplies and then to the auction."

The two pigs, looked at each other again for courage, grunted louder and scrambled into the back of the truck and settled down for their first ride outside of the pigpen.

Chapter 5: Julia's Resolution

Julia, in her country far, far away, announced one morning, "I'm sick. I can't go to school."

"Let me feel your forehead and stick your tongue out," commanded Mother unsympathetically. "No, you are not sick," she said with an exasperated sigh. "Your sister doesn't have problems with her school. She left fifteen minutes ago. So you'd better be out of bed and out the door before the clock strikes eight, or you'll be one sorry little sister."

Julia scrambled into her school cloths, grabbed her books and slammed the back door without Mother needing to weld another threat.

"I don't like school," muttered Julia to her self as she trudged along the sidewalk. "I don't even like cement sidewalks. What's wrong with dirt? What's wrong with walking on soft spongy dirt? My pigs would understand. They like dirt."

Julia then stopped and slipped off her shoes and socks. She tried to continue barefooted on the cold cement but stubbed her great toe. When she looked down at her injury and saw a trickle of dark red blood, she let out a sob and threw herself on a patch of nearby grass.

"This is it! I can't go on," she wailed holding her toe.

The manual pressure eventually stopped the bleeding. But no pressure could stop Julia from skipping school that day and for weeks to come.

Chapter 6: In Town

The truck driving farmer who had such poor vision that he couldn't tell the difference between a pig wearing a blue flowered dress and Grandmother, stopped the truck and rolled the window down.

"Get out here," he said. "I'm going to the train station and will meet you at Pete's."

The pigs crept out of the back of the truck, stood upright with the help of the cane, grunted and stared across the street at a sign that said, "Pete's restaurant."

"This is fun," said the trousered pig lightly. "Our first adventure. One moment we are starving bacon slabs and the next moment we're standing smack-dab in the middle of the town. I guess Mantis's praying paid off. All that running gave me an appetite. Let's see what food and fun we can find at Pete's."

"We're not going in there," answered the other pig with a voice that left no room for argument.

"No. No, we're not," agreed the stout haired pig but then added. "Why not?"

"Because we're just a couple of pigs. We live in a pig-pen. We don't belong parading around town and eating in restaurants. I think we better get ourselves back to the farm. In fact, I'm leaving right now."

"You don't think it's just a teeny-weenie bit fun dressing up in Grandmother's cloths and going off in search of the two lonesome sisters stuck in a far off country?"

"Well," said the blue eyed pig with the pink snout, "maybe just a teeny-weenie bit. But I was scared when Grandfather chased us with the ax. And my knees were as soggy as corn mush when the near-sighted farmer thought I was Grandmother wearing a blue flowered dress."

"And how about that truck ride?" chortled the pig with three stout hairs growing out of his head. He then poked his pig friend in the ribs.

"No more foolery. I'm afraid and I'm going back to the safe pig-pen right now!"

"No, no don't go," implored the trousered pig softly. "I'm afraid too. Really. So don't leave me. Let's just get something to eat and then we'll both go back to the farm together."

The blue eyed pig agreed by crinkling her pink snout and taking his arm. They then strolled together into Pete's.

They found a booth near the back where the light was dim and proceeded to look over the menu. While they were still trying to decipher the words a waitress came and stood impatiently over them.

"Well, what do you want?" she snapped.

Not knowing what to say or even how to say it in human speech, the trousered pig lifted his little piggy arm and pointed randomly at the printed page.

"Will that be two of them?" snapped the waitress again.

The pigs grunted in unison and wondered what they had ordered.

Chapter 7: A Name

The pigs sitting in a shadowy corner of Pete's restaurant, didn't have long to wait before they heard the cook call out, "Mable, your order's up." The surly waitress then sloped two bowls of warm cream of corn soup in front of the dressed up pigs.

"Hum, this smells like corn," said the blue eyed pig.

"So now you agree with me. It was a good idea to stop off at the restaurant before we go back to the farm?"

"Good idea," said the other pig as she alternated between trying to use her soup spoon and sticking her pink snout into the bowl and sucking up the smooth warm pottage.

"Another bowl?" asked the waitress. "Another table cloth?"

"Grunt," replayed the pigs.

After three bowls of cream of corn soup and three changes of the table cloth, the pigs decided their fat bellies could hold no more.

"I was thinking," began the pig with the three hairs sticking out of his head, "before we go back to the farm I would like to find me a name. A human type name, just for fun."

"We never had names before. It would be nice to call you by name. If you get a name then I want one too!"

"Then you shall have one," whispered the three haired pig. He then got up, went to the phone booth and returned with the phone book.

"We can look up names in this book and decide which one we like the best for ourselves," he said.

They started with A's; Agnes, Arthur, Anna, Arty.

"Make the sound come from the back of your throat," suggested the stout haired pig, as they twisted their mouths this way and that, curled their lips and spun their thick tongues, trying to form the A words. By the time they turned to the B's both pigs were snorting and squealing with so much laughter that they kept sliding off their chairs and falling onto the floor. Once the blue eyed pig tried to get back on her chair and accidentally pulled the table cloth on top of her. This made the stout haired pig pound on the bare table and laugh so hard that his fat belly ached. And then when Blue Eyes finally squirmed onto the chair she had put the table cloth around her head and knotted it under her double chin like she had seen women do. This of course brought another round of howling, snorting and yucking. The pigs laughed so hard that tears spritzed out of their eyes. "We haven't laughed like this since we were piglets," they said picking themselves up off the floor again.

It wasn't until they got to the G's that they found names that they could actually make sound correct.

So they decided that from now on they would call themselves, Gus and Gertrude.

Chapter 8: The Bill

"Well Gus," said Gertrude trying the name out, "I had a great adventure but now I think we should be good pigs and go back to our pig-pen."

"You're probably right Gertrude," said Gus as he stood up, took her arm and headed to the restaurant's door.

"Hay, wait a sec.," yelled the waitress. "How about paying the bill before you leave? What are you? A couple of pigs or something?"

Gus and Gertrude, froze in their tracks. Puckers of worry lines furrowed Gus's brow. Gertrude felt faint. "She knows were pigs! What do we do now?" they wondered as they stood in front of the waitress, grunting at each other.

"Well?... Well?... How about some money, you slobs?" the waitress snapped again.

The cook then stuck his head out from the kitchen and barked, "don't just stand there, grunting at the little misses for loosing your wallet, look in your pockets."

Gus didn't know he needed money. He didn't even know he had pockets much less where they were located in Grandfather's jacket and trousers. He was still puffing and patting the borrowed cloths looking for pockets and money when the near-sighted truck driving farmer came into the restaurant. "Here you are, my friends," he said and stood between then with one arm around Gus's shoulder and his other arm around Gertrude's thick piggy waist. "Forgot your money, friend?" he asked. Before either of the pigs could answer the truck driver said to the cook and waitress, "these are the Two Sisters' Grandparents. Their credit's good. Send the bill to their farm. We've got an auction to go to."

He then pinched Gertrude on the butt and ushered them both out the door.

Chapter 9: The Auction

The farmer walked between the two pigs. He was a head and shoulders above them, even with Gus's bristle brush hair. It wasn't that the farmer was such a big man but rather that Gus and Gertrude, stretching on their hind legs, only measured 4 feet, 10½ inches. They made a perfect couple.

As the three ambled to the auction yard, the farmer said in a low confidential tone, "I'm getting pretty darned old and my memory isn't what it use to be. I plum forgot your first names."

"Gus and Gertrude," the pig with the three hairs answered smartly, and then winked at Gertrude.

"Oh, yes, of course, now I remember," said the truck driver. ""Gertrude," he whispered through the table cloth kerchief on her head, "you're even more beautiful now then that day in the hay mound."

Gertrude made a high pitched squeal.

When they got to the dusty auction field, Gertrude's knees began to tremble. "People are buzzing around like bees in May," she thought. Just then the auctioneer jumped up on a make-shift platform. Another man hoisted a bushel basket of corn beside him on the platform for him to sell.

Actually it was Grandfather's basket of corn that was on the platform. By rationing the pigs' mush, Grandfather saved a whole bushel of corn that he submitted for today's auction.

A hush fell over the crowd. The auctioneer began . . ."What'll I get for this fine basket of corn? 50 dollars, do I hear 50, 75, 75 dollars, 100, 100 dollars. 100 dollars once, twice, sold! for 100 dollars."

The near sighted truck driver slapped Gus on the back. "Mighty fine corn," he said. "You better go over there and collect your money. I'll wait here."

"We have money," whooped Gus as he and Gertrude headed in the direction the truck driver pointed. "We have money!"

"We're going home now," snorted Gertrude.

"Let's just get the money first. We might need it someday and when else could we get it?"

Gertrude couldn't argue with his logic. So she went with Gus to the teller who gave them 100 dollars--cash.

The fragrance of fresh roasting chestnuts from the next booth whiffed around Gertrude's snout. "Oh, my, what's that delicious aroma?" she asked. When they went to investigate, the booth keeper sold them a big bag of steamy hot chestnuts.

"Hum, these are wonderful nuggets," said Gertrude. "But so difficult to hold."

Then they saw another booth. It was the basket booth. Scattered around it were piles of giant baskets, Thumbulina baskets and baskets shaped like ducks. There were baskets for eggs and baskets for wine. Gus found a straw basket with a handle and a wooden cover that hinged in the middle so it could open on either end. He bought the basket and gave it to Gertrude for her tasty nuggets.

They were joking together about dressing in Grandmother and Grandfather's cloths, eating in a restaurant, finding a name for themselves and now having money to buy baskets and chestnuts. When suddenly Gus looked up just in time to see the real Grandmother, Grandfather and the nearsighted truck driver walking toward them.

"We have to hide, quick!" But where? They scampered this-way and that; circled that-way and this. Just before Grandfather rounded the corner of the chestnut booth, the two pigs dove into one of the giant baskets.

As they huddled inside the basket they heard Grandfather, "I spent all morning looking for those stupid pigs. They caused me to be late to the auction and now there's a mess up with my payment. Pork roast and bacon, that's what they'll be when I get my hands on those swine."

"Now, Gus," said the truck driver. "They're only pigs."

"Would you stop calling us Gus and Gertrude," scowled Grandfather.

The poor nearsighted truck driver knew he had lost his hearing and vision but now he wondered if he was loosing his mind too. It seemed that Grandmother was more rounded just a few minutes ago and a lot better looking too. And Grandfather had a more pleasant disposition just minutes before. "I don't think I feel so good," said the truck driver weakly. "I'd better be going home now to take a nap. Good-bye Gus, Gertrude."

"This bad day is all because of those pigs," growled Grandfather when the truck driver left. "Let's make an appointment with the butcher," he added grimly.

By the time Grandmother and Grandfather left, both pigs were trembling so hard that they could only crawl out of the basket and slink behind the booth.

"Oh, what have we done?" squalled Gertrude. "Bacon! Pork roast! Butcher! What if Grandfather catches us? I can't think. I can't breath." She paused a moment to catch her breath and settle her thumping heart and then sat upright and cried, "And I can't go back to our pig-pen!"

Chapter 10: Gus's Remorse

Gus didn't know what to do. He felt responsible. If I only hadn't listened to all those adventure stories, he thought. If I only stayed in my pen like a reasonable pig. But no, I had to dig a hole and end in Grandfather's cornfield. I had to have just one more adventure in the restaurant. He hung his head.

Gertrude laid down beside a log, put her head between her front legs and cried.

When Gus started to go over to comfort her, he tripped over something. He looked down and found a stray ear of corn; then another and another. By the time he got to Gertrude he had a whole armload of sweet maize. He didn't say a word, only dropped his armload in front of her. Gertrude looked up from her lamenting and saw the pile of her favorite treat. She looked at Gus. "One more adventure?" he asked meekly and then both laughed at their ridiculous plight and began to munch the corn.

They put the leftover corn in Gertrude's basket along side the chestnuts and the sisters' letter. The pig with the bottle brush hair wearing Grandfather's jacket and trousers and the pink nosed pig wearing Grandmother's blue dress that matched her blue eyes and a table cloth kerchief on her head, decided the best thing for them to do now is to get out of town.

"Let's go to the train station," suggested Gus.

Gertrude was too weak with fear to protest, so they ambled down the sidewalk to the train station.

"Hum," said the station master as he read the address on the sisters' letter. "It looks like you folks want to go far away, across the ocean. You best go to the airport."

He gave them a ticket and then because of their stubby pig legs, helped them board the train.

"Soon we'll be safe and sound with the two sisters," said Gus when they settled in their seats. "Isn't this a great adventure?"

Gertrude wasn't too sure, but she had to admit that not even one stout hair on Gus's bristle head had been damaged. And when she looked at her reflection in the train window, she saw that her nose was pinker than it ever was.

Chapter 11: Francis

After they had been riding for a while, the train became crowded. A pudgy dumping of a boy stood in front of the empty half of the bench seat that Gus sat on. The young fellow, who was around ten years old, had just about the same height and girth as Gus. The lad wore a black turtle-neck sweater. It fit a snug so that a gash of white belly peeked out between it's hem and the boy's black pants. He was very pale except for pink dumpling cheeks and water blue eyes that looked older then Methuselah's. Stout bristlely hair jutted out, half hidden by a black beret that perched on his head, cocked over the left ear, just so.

Gus and Gertrude waited to see what he would do. To their surprise, he bent at the waist and made twirling motions with his arms and stabs at the air with his fingers, "May I?" he inquired formally. "May I join your seat?" Still gesturing wildly, he put a rough hewn cane with a crooked handle on the floor and sat next to Gus.

"What do you do for a living?" asked the dumpling boy when he was settled.

Gus and Gertrude didn't do anything for a living. They had listened to the praying Mantis's teachings and didn't know they had to work. They thought, "God the Almighty," took care of the animals. So Gus gave his usual answer and grunted.

With orderly but enthusiastic gestures, the boy replied, "Well, I don't actually work either. I'm a boy. Not just any boy mind you. You are now enjoying the company of the world's most precosious child and the world's one and only famous French poet." His arm waving and air stabbing crecendowed as he added, "And my name is . . .he paused dramatically . . .Francis. Francis The Famous French Child-Poet."

Gus grunted.

"Don't sound so negative, my man. Poets are important to the world."

Gertrude grunted.

"Who else talks to the butterflies,- more arm waving- admires the winged insects,- air stabs- and takes flight with the birds. Poets are the world's last great adventures. Poets are liaisons, interpreters of the Earth's wisdom and the heart's passion. Poets take it to the limit.

His old looking eyes rolled back into his head so that only the whites showed. His arm circling became frantic, stormy. "Poets are bridges linking heaven and earth. Walk on me. I will show you heaven. Quick," he yelled to Gertrude. "Paper, quick. Hurry! I need paper."

Gertrude shrank at his raging gestures.

"Paper!"

She grabbed her basket with the hinged lid, rumpled through it looking for paper.

"Quick before the inspiration leaves."

Gertrude thrust the only paper she had at him, the sisters' letter. He snatched it out of her hands like a wild wolf. Then all was quiet except for the intense furor of pen scratching on paper.

After about fifteen minutes of writing, Francis gently laid his pen down. His shoulders slumped. His arms hung quiet. "Have either of you two ever written any poetry?"

Both Gertrude and Gus wide-eyed with astonishment at their strange seat partner, grunted.

"The writing part is easy. The difficult part of poetry is letting the sentiment, the feeling, the passion well up inside oneself so that you have no choice but to erupt like Mount Vesuvius, spilling hot molten words all over your paper. Here let me demonstrate: It was a dark and stormy night, When the birds took flight."

Gertrude was afraid that the arm waving would start up again but a women sitting directly behind Francis turned to face their seat.

"Is he bothering you two?" she asked in a voice as soft and sweet as a Spring brease.

Both Gus and Gertrude made a "no, of course not," grunt.

"Sometimes he gets a little carried away with himself. After his father died last year he's just been a little lost soul. And with no school for the poor boy. Well, enough, enough." She fliped her wrist around a few times and muttered, "I just don't know where he gets it all from," and then turned in her seat so her back was once again to Francis'.

"Who was that women, Gertrude wondered and why isn't this boy in school? She then puckered her pig lips and somewhat formed the word, "school."

"Yes, yes," the usual humdrum question," said Francis as if Gertrude had actually asked a question.

"I am so smart that most of the schools won't accept; me and those that will, I refuse to attend. I've lectured and gave poetry readings around the world three times now. I know all the world leaders and all their gross national products. Nevertheless, I'm still seeking out the inaccessible, culturally unique places on, above or beneath the earth. I have a memory of steel and a heart as frail as Venetian glass. Now I ask you, what fifth grade teacher would want someone like me in their class? Mama's been my tutor for a year now. That was her that turned around. She's tried to enroll me in school but the schools that will accept me," the boy waved his arms and continued without taking a breath, "survive on sports not on classical academic accreditation. Can you imagine what sports team wants an intellectual, hypersensitive butterball like me?"

Gertrude grunted compassionately and then decided it must be time to eat the corn in her basket. She set three ears on the small train table that separated her seat from Gus and Francis's.

"Eat," she managed to grunt.

Like all gesticulating, adventuring child-poets, he was famished. He greedily picked up the offered corn and began to devour it. Gertrude and Gus felt cozy and snug in their train seats eating corn together with their new famous French friend. All three splattered and splashed corn juice over their plump faces, on the table, the train window, and down the aisle. When they had eaten their fill all three let out a large co-compatriot burp and fell asleep to the rocking of the train.

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