Sredni Vashtar

by Saki

Conradin was ten years old, and the doctor had given his professional opinion that the boy could not live another five years. The doctor counted for little, but his opinion was shared by Mrs. De Ropp, who counted for everything. Mrs. De Ropp was Conradin's cousin and guardian and, in his eyes, she represented the world that was necessary and disagreeable and real. One of these days, Conradin supposed, he would give in to the terrible pressure of tedious necessities – such as illness and rules and long boredom. Without his imagination, which was only made stronger by his loneliness, he would have died long ago.

Mrs. De Ropp did not even realise that she disliked Conradin, though she was aware that disciplining him 'for his own good' was a duty which she enjoyed. Conradin hated her with a desperate intensity which he could hide completely. The few pleasures that he could make for himself had an added excitement from the likelihood that they would annoy his guardian. From the kingdom of his imagination, she was locked out – an unclean thing, which must not find the entrance to his private world.

In the dull, cheerless garden, overlooked by so many windows that often opened for his cousin to shout not to do this or to do that, or a reminder that it was time to take his medicine, there was little to interest him. He was not allowed to go near the apple trees in case he touched the fruit (although there was very little of this, anyway). In a forgotten corner, however, hidden behind some dry bushes, was a disused shed, a place that was both a playroom and a church for Conradin.

Two creatures of flesh and blood lived here. In one corner was an old hen. The boy gave her all the affection he could not show anyone else. But further back in the semi-darkness stood a large cage, which housed a large ferret, smuggled into the shed by a friendly butcher's boy for a bag of small silver coins that Conradin had saved for many months. Conradin was afraid of the sharp-toothed animal but it was his most valued possession. Just the fact that the ferret was there was a terrifying happiness, which had to stay a secret from his cousin.

One day, out of nowhere, Conradin thought of a magical name for the ferret, Sredni Vashtar, and from that moment it grew into a god for him, a religion. His cousin had her weekly meeting with religion too and, on Sundays, took Conradin to the church with her, but this cold appointment with God meant nothing to him. Every Thursday, in the dark silence of the shed, he worshipped in front of the cage where Sredni Vashtar, the Great Ferret, lived.

Here he offered red flowers in the summer and red leaves in winter, because he was a god that demanded gifts, not like the one that lived in the icy-cold of the stone church where his cousin worshipped. And on great festival days, cloves were put in front of Sredni Vashtar's cage, important because Conradin had to steal these from his cousin's kitchen. These festivals did not take place regularly, but were held to celebrate important events. On one occasion when Mrs. De Ropp had toothache for three days and could not leave her room, the boy kept up the festival for the whole time and almost convinced himself that Sredni Vashtar was responsible for the pain his cousin felt. If the toothache had gone on any longer, there would have been no cloves left in the kitchen.

The hen never shared the prayers with which Conradin worshipped the ferret. His love for the hen was homely, that of a friend he could try to talk away his unhappiness and loneliness with.

After a while, Conradin's regular visits to the shed began to attract his guardian's notice. "It's not good for the boy to be there in cold weather", she quickly decided, and at breakfast one morning she announced that the hen had been sold and taken away the evening before by the butcher. With her short-sighted eyes, she stared at Conradin, waiting for anger or sorrow, which she was ready to control with a river of excellent reasons. But Conradin said nothing: there was nothing to be said. He only decided to lock the shed in future.

Something, perhaps, in his white stony face, gave his cousin a moment of regret, because at tea that afternoon there was toast on the table, a luxury which was usually forbidden because it was bad for him and also because it 'made life difficult' for his cousin. "I thought you liked toast," she said, noticing that he didn't touch it.

"Sometimes", answered Conradin.

In the shed that evening, something changed. Conradin had always worshipped Sredni Vashtar before, but tonight he asked a favour.

"Do one thing for me, Sredni Vashtar."

He did not say the thing. As Sredni Vashtar was a god, he must know what was in Conradin's mind. And, trying not to cry, as he looked at the other empty corner of the shed, Conradin went back into the house and the world he hated. And every night in the welcome darkness of his bedroom, Conradin's bitter prayer was repeated:

"Do one thing for me, Sredni Vashtar."

Mrs. De Ropp noticed the visits to the shed did not end and, one day, she made another inspection.

"What are you keeping in that shed?" she asked. "Have you got pets in there? I'll have them all taken away."

Conradin shut his lips tight, but his cousin searched his bedroom until she found the carefully hidden key to the shed, and immediately marched down there to make her discovery. It was a cold afternoon and Conradin had been told to stay in the house. From the window of the dining room, the door of the shed could just be seen past the bushes, and there Conradin stood and waited.

He saw the woman enter and then he imagined her opening the door of the cage, staring down with her short-sighted eyes into the thick straw, where his god lay hidden. Perhaps she would get a stick and annoy the god in her impatience. And Conradin breathed his prayer for the last time:

"Do one thing for me, Sredni Vashtar."

But even as he prayed, he knew that he did not believe. He knew that his cousin would soon come out, with the bitter smile that he hated so much on her face, and that, in an hour or two, the gardener would come and carry away his wonderful god. It would no longer be a god, but a simple brown ferret in a cage. And he knew that his cousin would win, as she always won, and that he would grow sicker till one day nothing would matter anymore and the doctor would be proved right. And in his misery, he began to shout the prayer to his threatened god.

And then, all of a sudden, he stopped and moved closer to the window. The door of the shed still stood slightly open as his cousin had left it when she entered, and the minutes were passing. They were long minutes, but they still passed. He watched the birds running and flying across the grass; he counted them over and over again, with one eye always on the shed door. A servant came in and got the table ready for tea, and still Conradin stood and waited and watched. Hope had grown little by little in his heart and now a look of victory began to burn in his eyes.

Under his breath, he began once again to say his prayer to Sredni Vashtar. And soon his prayers and his patience were rewarded: out through that doorway came a long yellowish-brown animal, eyes blinking in the daylight, and dark, wet stains around its mouth and throat. The great ferret made its way down to a small river at the bottom of the garden, drank for a moment and then was lost in the bushes. Sredni Vashtar was gone.

"Tea is ready," said the servant girl, "Where is Mrs. De Ropp?"

"She went down to the shed some time ago," said Conradin.

And while the girl went to call her employer to tea, Conradin got a fork out of the cupboard and made himself a piece of toast over the fire. And while he was toasting the bread and covering it thickly with butter and eating it, Conradin listened to the noises and silences from the garden. The loud and stupid screaming of the servant girl, the answering shouts from the kitchen, the noise of feet running down the garden path and the calls for outside help, and then, after a while, the crying of those who carried his cousin's lifeless body into the house.

"Who will tell the sad news to the poor child? I can't do it", cried a voice. And while they argued about this among themselves, Conradin made himself another piece of toast.