Bobby Brewster is an ordinary small boy with a jolly face and a nose like a button, and he has the most extraordinary adventures.
One fine summer's day Bobby Brewster was playing in the garden. He stooped down to pick up his ball, and, lying in the middle of the lawn, he saw a spoon.
`I wonder how on earth that got there,' he said to himself. `We haven't had tea on the lawn for a long, long time. I know I'm right, because the last time we did have tea on the lawn Mother gave me something very special to eat. It was sardines!'
So he picked up the spoon, took it into the kitchen, and put it back in the drawer with the knives, forks and other spoons.
Well, in the middle of that night, Bobby woke up, and he thought he heard a clattering in the kitchen. He wasn't quite sure though, and he was still very sleepy, so he closed his eyes and was soon fast asleep again. By the next day he had forgotten all about it.
It was another lovely day, so Bobby went out to play in the garden again.
And, lying in the middle of the lawn again, what do you think he saw? The spoon.
`Well,' said Bobby to himself `This really is most extraordinary.'
At least-he thought he said it to himself, but he can't have done, because the spoon answered. `I know it is,' said the spoon.
`I beg your pardon?' said Bobby Brewster.
`I said I know it's extraordinary,' said the spoon. `But please don't pick me up and take me in the kitchen and put me back in the drawer with the other knives, forks and spoons.'
`Do you mean to lie there in the middle of the lawn and tell me you're a talking spoon?' said Bobby.
`Yes, I do,' said the spoon. `And, let me repeat, PLEASE don't pick me up and take me in the kitchen and put me back in the drawer with the knives, forks and other spoons.'
`Why not?' asked Bobby. `Don't you like theme' `It's not that,' said the spoon. `But I'm jolly well, tweebly well fed up with being a spoon.' `Why?' asked Bobby.
`Perhaps I'd better explain.' said the spoon. So it did.
`Every morning,' said the spoon, `I'm dumped on the breakfast table. Some one fills me up with porridge and keeps pushing me in and out of his mouth. After that I am thrown into a bowl full of boiling water and soap flakes, and then rubbed hard with a wiping up cloth that isn't always quite clean. Then-back into the drawer until dinnertime. At dinner I feed someone with custard or sticky treacle pudding, and this time perhaps it's a man with a nasty prickly moustache. Into the boiling water again, dried with a cloth-then back into the drawer. And the same again for supper.
`It isn't that I don't like the knives, forks and other spoons,' went on the spoon. `Poor things, they don't have any better time than I do. That drawer is so dark, and we've got very little to talk about. Perhaps the knives complain about the toughness of meat nowadays, or the spoons discuss the sweetness of sugar. And as for the fish forks, they never talk about anything but sardines-I get so tired of it all. Day in and day out with nothing but small talk in a drawer, being pushed in and out of people's mouths, and thrown into boiling soapy water. How would you like it?'
`Not much,' said Bobby Brewster.
`No more do I,' said the spoon. `I'm jolly well,tweebly well, fed up with it'-and he started to cry.
Have you ever heard a spoon cry? It really is a very sad thing. Bobby Brewster is a kind little boy, and it upset him very much.
`I only came out here on the lawn for a holiday,' sobbed the spoon. `Little boys like you go for a whole fortnight to Blackpool every year, but spoons never have a rest-and I want to see the world-'
`So you shall,' said Bobby. `You shall have a fortnight's holiday just like I do. Only of course,' he added, `I can't take you to Blackpool'
`No, of course not,' said the spoon. `I didn't expect that.'
`I'll tell you what I'll do,' said Bobby. `Last year my father took my mother for a tour round Devon in their car. Well, I've got a wooden car on a string, and I'll take you on a tour round the garden.'
`Oh, goody, goody. That would be lovely,' said the spoon.
And, do you know, that's just what happened. Every day Bobby Brewster took his wooden car out into the garden and pulled the spoon for lovely rides up the paths and under the trees in the meadow. At nights and during the day when Bobby had to go out with his mother, he found the most lovely places for the spoon to stay. One night it slept by the fishpond-which is every bit as beautiful as the Lake District. Another time it spent the whole afternoon in the meadow by the hay rick. Once it even slept in the chicken run-at least, it didn't sleep very well because it was afraid the chickens might come and peck it. But they didn't, so that was all right.
When the fortnight was over, Bobby thought he'd better put the spoon back in the drawer with the knives, forks and other spoons, especially as he heard his mother say how short of spoons she seemed to be getting. Besides the spoon had had a lovely holiday, so it didn't mind. In fact, when Bobby Brewster picked it up to take it into the kitchen and put it back in the drawer with the knives, forks and other spoons, the spoon said: `Thank you very much. I've had a lovely time.'
And, do you know, a very funny thing has happened. Nowadays Bobby Brewster always eats with that spoon, and from that day to this he has never needed sugar with anything, because all his food tastes lovely and sweet without it.