The Flat Stanley Collection. Jeff Brown
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Название: The Flat Stanley Collection
Автор: Jeff Brown
Издательство: HarperCollins
Жанр: Учебная литература
isbn: 9781405295161
isbn:
Stanley swooped right and then left in long, matched swoops. He held his arms by his sides and zoomed at the ground like a rocket and curved up again towards the sun. He sideslipped and circled, and made figure eights and crosses and a star.
Nobody has ever flown the way Stanley Lambchop flew that day. Probably no one ever will again.
After a while, of course, people grew tired of watching and Arthur got tired of running about with the empty spool. Stanley went right on though, showing off.
Three boys came up to Arthur and invited him to join them for a hot dog and some soda pop. Arthur left the spool wedged in the fork of a tree. He did not notice, while he was eating the hot dog, that the wind was blowing the string and tangling it about the tree.
The string got shorter and shorter, but Stanley did not realise how low he was until leaves brushed his feet, and then it was too late. He got stuck in the branches.
Fifteen minutes passed before Arthur and the other boys heard his cries and climbed up to set him free.
Stanley would not speak to his brother that evening, and at bedtime, even though Arthur had apologised, he was still cross.
Alone with Mr Lambchop in the living room, Mrs Lambchop sighed and shook her head. ‘You’re at the office all day, having fun,’ she said. ‘You don’t realise what I go through with the boys. They’re very difficult.’
‘Kids are like that,’ Mr Lambchop said. ‘Phases. Be patient, dear.’
Mr and Mrs O. J. Dart lived in the flat just above the Lambchops. Mr Dart was an important man, the director of a famous Museum of Art in the city.
Stanley Lambchop had noticed in the lift that Mr Dart, who was ordinarily a cheerful man, had become quite gloomy, but he had no idea what the reason was. And then at breakfast one morning he heard Mr and Mrs Lambchop talking about Mr Dart.
‘I see,’ said Mr Lambchop, reading the paper over his coffee cup, ‘that still another painting has been stolen from the Famous Museum. It says here that Mr O. J. Dart, the director, is at his wits’ end.’
‘Oh, dear! Are the police no help?’ Mrs Lambchop asked.
‘It seems not,’ said Mr Lambchop. ‘Listen to what the Chief of Police told the newspaper. “We suspect a gang of sneak thieves. These are the worst kind. They work by sneakery, which makes them very difficult to catch. However, my men and I will keep trying. Meanwhile, I hope people will buy tickets for the Policemen’s Ball and not park their cars where signs say don’t.”’
The next morning Stanley Lambchop heard Mr Dart talking to his wife in the lift.
‘These sneak thieves work at night,’ Mr Dart said. ‘It is very hard for our guards to stay awake when they have been on duty all day. And the Famous Museum is so big we cannot guard every picture at the same time. I fear it is hopeless, hopeless, hopeless!’
Suddenly, as if an electric light bulb had lit up in the air above his head, giving out little shooting lines of excitement, Stanley Lambchop had an idea. He told it to Mr Dart.
‘Stanley,’ Mr Dart said, ‘if your mother will give her permission, I will put you and your plan to work this very night!’
Mrs Lambchop gave her permission.
‘But you will have to take a long nap this afternoon,’ she said. ‘I won’t have you up till all hours unless you do.’
That evening, after a long nap, Stanley went with Mr Dart to the Famous Museum. Mr Dart took him into the main hall, where the biggest and most important paintings were hung. He pointed to a huge painting that showed a bearded man, wearing a floppy velvet hat, playing a violin for a lady who lay on a couch. There was a half-man, half-horse person standing behind them, and three fat children with wings were flying around above. That, Mr Dart explained, was the most expensive painting in the world!
There was an empty picture frame on the opposite wall We shall hear more about that later on.
Mr Dart took Stanley into his office and said, ‘It is time for you to put on a disguise.’
‘I had already thought of that,’ Stanley Lambchop said, ‘and I brought one. My cowboy suit. It has a red bandanna that I can tie over my face. Nobody will recognise me in a million years.’
‘No,’ Mr Dart said. ‘You will have to wear the disguise I have chosen.’
From a closet he took a white dress with a blue sash, a pair of shiny little pointed shoes, a wide straw hat with a blue band that matched the sash, and a wig and a stick.
The wig was made of blonde hair, long and done in ringlets. The stick was curved at the top and it, too, had a blue ribbon on it. Stanley was so disgusted that he could hardly speak. ‘I shall look like a girl, that’s what I shall look like,’ he said. ‘I wish I had never had my idea.’
But he was a good sport, so he put on the disguise.
‘In this shepherdess disguise,’ Mr Dart said, ‘you will look like a painting that belongs in the main hall. We do not have cowboy pictures in the main hall.’
Back in the main hall Mr Dart helped Stanley climb up into the empty picture frame. Stanley was able to stay in place because Mr Dart had cleverly put four small spikes in the wall, one for each hand and foot.
The frame was a perfect fit. Against the wall, Stanley looked just like a picture.
‘Except for one thing,’ Mr Dart said. ‘Shepherdesses are supposed to look happy. They smile at their sheep and at the sky. You look fierce, not happy, Stanley.’
Stanley tried hard to get a faraway look in his eyes and even to smile a little bit.
Mr Dart stood back a few feet and stared at him for a moment. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘it may not be art, but I know what I like.’
He went off to make sure that certain other parts of Stanley’s plan were being taken care of, and Stanley was left alone.
It was very dark in the main hall. A little bit of moonlight came through СКАЧАТЬ