Gus and the Welcome Bell

“That bell is mine to ring!” Gus said, before he had even climbed the first stair.

Marnie, a castle elf carrying a basket of blue cushions, looked up at the little castle’s bell tower. Gus was an elf, too, with pointed ears that poked out beneath his hat. He usually painted signs for the castle.

“You’re sure?” Marnie asked.

“I can paint a straight line on a sign while riding a rolling barrel,” Gus said. “How tricky can a bell be?”

“Last time you rode a barrel, you painted a mustache on the mayor’s goose.”

“The goose looked very dignified.”

Gus liked choosing each letter and making every arrow point exactly the right way. But this afternoon, musicians were coming to play in the courtyard. A fiddle player, a flute player, and a drummer with a drum nearly as wide as himself were due at the gate. Someone needed to ring the tower bell to welcome them.

Gus wanted that someone to be him.

“Please, Marnie?” he asked. “Just one afternoon as bell-ringer.”

Marnie set the cushions by the tower door. “All right. I’ll come with you. The stairs are steep, and the bell is bigger than your paint pot.”

“Nothing is bigger than my paint pot,” Gus said. “It has a very important lid.”

They climbed the narrow stairs. Gus went first, counting each step. “One, two, three—”

“Careful,” called Marnie. “You’re counting the same step again.”

Gus looked down. His boot was stuck on a stair’s little bump. “That step wanted a second count.”

At the top, the bell hung in a wooden frame. Its bronze sides were wide enough for Gus to see his own ears in them. A thick rope dangled from the bell, down the tower, and onto the floor below.

Gus stretched both arms toward the bell’s clapper. His fingertips found only air.

“Too high,” he said.

“That’s why there’s a rope,” said Marnie.

Gus looked down through the doorway. The rope curled around the blue cushions and looped over one of them like a sleeping snake wearing a pillow for a hat.

“Oh,” said Gus. “The bell has already tied itself a knot.”

From below came the distant sound of a cart approaching the castle gate. The musicians were nearly there.

“Then we’d better untie it,” said Marnie.

Gus hurried down the stairs. He gave the rope a tug. One cushion scooted across the floor. Another turned over and flopped onto its plump side.

“Stop!” said Marnie. “You’re pulling the cushions, not the bell.”

Gus let go. “The cushions are very strong for things that are mostly fluff.”

He tried to reach the clapper from the floor, stretching onto his toes. His fingers wiggled far below it. He jumped once, then landed with a soft thump.

“Nope,” he said. “Still too tall.”

Marnie studied the rope. “You paint signs. What do you do when a painted line gets messy?”

“I lay the brush down. I make the line flat. Then I follow it from one end to the other to see where it went wrong.” Gus stared at the rope. “We could do that!”

Together, they moved the cushions aside. Gus laid each twist of rope flat on the floor, smoothing it with his palms. Marnie kept the loose end from slipping beneath a cushion.

“Flat as a pancake,” Gus said.

“Please don’t put syrup on the bell rope,” Marnie replied.

Gus followed the rope with one finger. It ran from the tower ceiling, down the wall, past the doorway, and across the floor. Then it curled around the leg of a little wooden stool. The cushions had hidden the snag.

“There you are,” Gus said to the rope. “You’ve been going around in circles.”

He carefully lifted the rope free of the stool. Marnie held the cushions out of the way. The rope lay straight at last, all the way up toward the bell.

Gus stood where the rope hung down. His hand felt a little wobbly, but he remembered how slowly he guided a brush along a sign.

“Small and steady,” Marnie said.

“Small and steady,” Gus repeated.

He gave the rope a careful pull.

BONG!

The bell boomed through the castle. A little dust puffed from the rafters. Gus’s hat jumped up, landed backward, and covered one ear.

“That was the welcome bell!” Marnie laughed.

Down below, the courtyard gate opened. The musicians came in, smiling and waving. The drummer tapped a cheerful beat on his drum.

Gus straightened his hat. “I think bell-ringing takes practice.”

“And sign painting takes practice,” said Marnie.

“Good thing we know both kinds.”

The musicians gathered in the courtyard, where the drummer set down his wide drum and the fiddle player tuned a string. The flute player gave a tiny note that sounded like a bird asking for a snack.

“Welcome to the castle!” called Marnie.

“Did the bell-ringer ring for us?” asked the fiddle player.

“I did,” said Gus. He tried to bow, but his hat slipped over one eye. “The hat did most of the bowing.”

The musicians laughed, and Gus pushed the hat back into place.

They began to play. The fiddle made a skipping tune. The flute curled around it, and the drum kept a quiet, happy beat. The music wandered between the courtyard stones and up the castle walls.

Gus sat beside Marnie on the blue cushions. This time, the cushions stayed right where they were.

“I thought ringing a bell would be easy,” he said.

“I thought the bell rope would behave,” said Marnie.

“Perhaps it was nervous.”

“Perhaps it wanted to practice going around that stool.”

Gus chuckled. He listened as the tune grew slow and sleepy. The drummer tapped so softly that the beat sounded like little feet walking home. The fiddler played a long, warm note, and the flute answered with a quiet trill.

Marnie leaned her elbows on her knees. “You found the snag by following the rope.”

“And you helped me see what to do,” Gus said. “A bell has its own kind of line.”

“Not quite as easy to paint.”

“Maybe I’ll try painting one tomorrow. A very long, wiggly line.”

The musicians played on, filling the courtyard with their gentle tune. Gus watched the drummer’s hands rise and fall, then glanced at the tower above them. The bell was still, and the rope hung straight behind the doorway.

“I’m glad I got to welcome them,” he said.

“So am I,” said Marnie. “And I’m glad we didn’t ask the cushions to ring the bell.”

“They would have needed a very large hat.”

When the tune ended, Gus found a scrap of signboard and a small paintbrush. He painted a neat welcome sign for the musicians and set it beside the courtyard door. Then he sat with Marnie and listened to one last quiet tune, while the castle settled around them and the evening became still.