The Accidental Conductor

Once upon a time, on the morning before Christmas, Joonatan and his friend Ruby were sweeping snow from the flat stones below the Waterfall.

Old Sigrid sat on a tree stump with her fiddle across her knees, and she was glaring at it. One of its four strings had snapped in the frost and curled up like the tail of a very small pig.

"No string, no tune, and no tune, no dance," said Sigrid.

Joonatan leaned his broom against a rock and stood up very straight. He had never made a promise to a fiddle before, but he made one now.

"I will bring you a new string before the moon is over the Waterfall," said Joonatan.

"A promise is a promise," said Ruby, and she fetched her mittens at once.

The string maker lived in the village on the far side of the hill. The road went the long way round through the fields, but a narrow path climbed straight up beside the Waterfall, over the icy ledges, and down the other side.

"The road takes all day," said Joonatan. "The path takes half of it."

So they chose the path, and that one choice started everything that followed. They scrambled up the first ledge, where a row of icicles hung from the rock like the teeth of a comb. Ruby's sleeve brushed them, and they rang out, high and bright, like spoons tapping a row of jugs.

Ruby stopped and tapped one again with her mitten. Joonatan tugged her elbow, because the sun was already climbing, and they hurried on.

Halfway up the Waterfall, in a crack between two stones, there was a tiny round door. In front of it a mouse in a grey shawl was sweeping her doorstep with a feather, as carefully as if the Queen were coming to tea.

"Good morning, Minna the Mouse," said Joonatan.

Minna put down her feather and looked at them over her whiskers. "State your business," she said. "This is a respectable ledge."

Joonatan had to shout over it.

"We are going for a string for Sigrid!" he called.

Minna's ears went up like two little sails. "A sing for Sigrid?" she said. "The mice of the Waterfall have not sung since the summer. We accept."

Before Joonatan could open his mouth, she had darted through her round door. They heard her running through the rock, knocking on other little doors, and calling in a voice like a squeaky hinge.

"Not a sing!" shouted Joonatan into the crack. "A string!"

Minna popped her head out again. "Spring?" she said. "Do not be silly. It is the middle of winter. We shall sing a winter song."

Then she vanished, and the knocking grew louder. Out of every crack and cranny on the ledge came mice, mice in scarves, mice in shawls, mice carrying their best handkerchiefs. They lined up across the narrow path in four very straight rows, and they cleared their throats all together.

Ruby looked at the path, which was now completely covered with mice. "We cannot step over them," she whispered. "We might step on them."

Joonatan knelt down so that his nose was level with Minna's. "Minna, we must get past," he said. "I made a promise."

Minna folded her paws. "No one passes during a rehearsal," she said. "It is the rule of the Waterfall."

"A promise is a promise," said Joonatan.

"A rule is a rule," said Minna, and she lifted her feather like a little baton.

The mice began to sing. It was a song about snow falling on a haystack, and it was very serious. The first verse told how the snow fell. The second verse told how the snow fell some more. By the ninth verse the snow was still falling, and the sun had slid from the top of the sky to the edge of the hill.

Joonatan did not interrupt them, because interrupting a choir is rude, even a choir that has made a mistake. Instead he watched the sun sink, and he chewed his lip, and he counted the verses.

"How many verses are there?" whispered Ruby.

"Forty," said a very small mouse in the front row, without stopping singing.

Joonatan stood up. He could not walk through the choir, and he could not wait for forty verses, so he looked for another way. Above the path, the ice bulged out from the Waterfall in a smooth, slippery hump, and beyond it the path went on, empty and clear.

"I am going over the top," he said.

The ice was as slick as a buttered plate. Ruby pushed his heel from below, and he crawled up onto the hump on his knees.

Then the singing stopped, all at once, in the middle of verse twelve. Joonatan looked down and saw a hundred small faces staring up at him.

"The conductor is leaving," said Minna. "The choir follows the conductor."

"I am not the conductor," said Joonatan.

But it was too late. Minna scampered up his boot, and the whole choir scampered up after her. They climbed his trouser legs, they swarmed over his coat, and they settled in rows along his arms and in a heap on his hat, still holding their handkerchiefs.

The hump of ice gave a long, slow creak. Joonatan held his breath and did not move a single finger.

"Ruby," he said, very quietly, "how many mice is a hundred mice?"

Below them, the ice gave another creak, louder than the first, and far away, over the edge of the hill, the sun was just beginning to go down.

"Exactly one hundred," said Ruby. "That is the trouble."

Joonatan thought hard while a mouse on his hat hummed the next note under her breath. If the choir followed the conductor, then the conductor could tell the choir what to do. He lifted one finger very slowly, the way Minna had lifted her feather.

"Rehearsal is over," said Joonatan.

The mice looked at one another, and then they looked at Minna. Minna nodded once, because a rule is a rule. At once the whole choir trotted down his coat in four straight rows, hopped off his boots, and stood neatly on the far side of the hump. The ice gave one small sigh and kept still.

Joonatan slid down after them on the seat of his trousers. Ruby scrambled over behind him, and they ran along the empty path while the sun sank lower.

But the mice ran too. They pattered at his heels, scarves flapping, because the conductor was still the conductor.

"Where are we performing?" asked Minna.

"We are going to Tobias the string maker," said Joonatan.

"Then we shall perform for Tobias," said Minna.

They raced down the far side of the hill and into the village, and the choir followed in four rows the whole way. People leaned out of their windows to watch. Tobias opened his door just as the first mouse reached his step, and he blinked at the boy, the girl, and the hundred mice in handkerchiefs.

"One fiddle string, please," panted Joonatan. "I made a promise."

Tobias wrapped a string in brown paper, but before Joonatan could thank him, Minna raised her feather. The choir sang verse thirteen about the falling snow, and Tobias was so pleased that he refused to take a single penny.

Then they turned and ran back. The sky went pink, then purple, and the first star pricked through it like a needle through cloth. They hurried down the path, past the round door, and over the hump of ice, and the mice swarmed after them, still singing.

At the icicles Ruby did not stop, but she brushed every one of them with her mitten. They rang out high and bright behind her, like spoons on a row of jugs, and the mice sang louder to keep up.

Joonatan jumped down onto the flat stones just as the moon slid over the top of the Waterfall. He held out the brown paper with both hands.

"A string for Sigrid," said Joonatan.

Sigrid fitted it to her fiddle and turned the peg until the note was sweet. Then she looked at the hundred mice lined up on the stones and at Ruby beside the singing icicles.

"I wanted a string for a dance," said Sigrid. "Now I want that choir."

So Sigrid played her fiddle, Ruby rang the icicles with a stick, and Minna's choir sang the snow song while the Waterfall poured silver in the moonlight. The village folk came down the hill with lanterns and danced on the swept stones, and nobody minded how many verses there were.

When the song finally ended, Minna climbed onto Joonatan's boot and bowed.

"Merry Christmas, Joonatan, and merry Christmas, Ruby," said Minna. "Same time next year, conductor."

The very small mouse from the front row tugged at Joonatan's lace and told him that this had been verse forty, and that the choir would start the next Christmas from verse one.

And that is the end of that.