“We’re trapped here now, aren’t we?” whimpered Peep.

“Yippee!” cried the two Mymbles in unison and jumped off Imy’s shoulder and into the damp, grey sand.

“There’s nothing to be so pleased about!” hissed Imony.  These Mymbles, Little Me and Little Min, paid no attention to the other Moomins.  It would not have mattered to them if the others were deliriously happy or frantically frightened.  They only ever thought of themselves, and now, they wanted to build sandcastles.

“What are we going to do now Moominpapa?” asked Sparrow who was peering intently into the forest of dead trees before him, certain he could make out Grokes hiding behind every silvery tree trunk.

“We must leave the island,” decided Moominpapa.  He said this, staring off thoughtfully into the distance, as if it was something very profound that he had given a lot of thought to, even though to the rest of the group, it was the obvious course of action.  

“How are we going to leave when the currents are going in the wrong direction?”  inquired Sneep.

“Hmmmm …..” pondered Moominpapa as he gazed intently at the forest as if this would provide him with the inspiration he required.  

“Oh!” cried Moominmama who had not been paying that much attention to the conversation but had been staring in horrified silence at the Grokes.  These sinister, shadowy beings were ambling slowly towards the party of vulnerable Moomins, not from the forest, but from around the small rocky headland less than fifty metres away!

“Run!” cried Sparrow, and at once they all took to their heels, hurtling into the forest that had before seemed very frightening but was now a place to hide!  Peep and Imy quickly snatched up the Mymbles who had not noticed anything that had been going on for they had been totally engrossed in there sandcastles which had been just about finished when Peep and Imy stepped on them.

The Grokes too began running, but for them running was not very quick at all.  They’re just not fast creatures although sometimes they think they are.

Both Moomins and Grokes raced through the skeleton-like trees, across dried up creek beds and across rocky, uneven terrain as Little Min and Little Me squealed with delight at the chase.  Moominmama dropped her handbag, causing the whole party to pause in order that she could retrieve it.  Peep’s copy of Great Expectations slipped from her grasp.  When she knelt down to pick it up, she was horrified to notice that it had a few smudges of dirt on the cover and therefore proceeded to throw a silent temper tantrum as she caught up to the others.  Imy had a magpie swoop down and steal her pink feather hair decorations and she was just about to say that she wasn’t going to go any further until her feathers were returned when a Groke, that had managed to catch up to them amidst all of the commotion, suddenly grabbed her ankle.

Imy screamed and her brother was just about to pick up a large branch with which to hit the Groke when Little Me leapt from Peep’s shoulder onto the Groke’s arm and sank her sharp little teeth into it. With a grunt of pain the Groke relinquished its grasp on Imy’s ankle and she was yanked to her feet by Imony as Little Me scrambled hurriedly back onto Peep’s shoulder and the party continued to flee the terrifying Grokes which were still hot on the Moomin’s heels. As soon as the Moomins were in the safe confines of one of the few living shrubs on the island they silently crept back down towards they’d landed their boat but to the Moomin’s dismay they could see no sign of their boat, only a smallish speck on the horizon that just might of been a boat. There was a long silence.

“That’s our boat,” remarked Sparrow.

“Of coarse it’s our boat, nitwit!” snapped Sneep.

“Oh!” said Sparrow.

“Oh,” said Sneep.

“What shall we do?” asked Peep in a terrified whispered.

“We must build a shelter,” answered Moominpapa at once. “A storm is coming and we must prepared for it!”

Everyone quickly gathered up enough sticks to build a temperamental house, except the mymbles, who only brought enough for their own little teepee, which was placed inside the larger one. Just as everyone crammed inside, the storm Moominpapa had predicted, hit. 

Autumn was approaching fast. But instead of the weather getting cooler as winter drew in, it had nearly doubled in heat. Sparrow hadn’t been fishing for days because he said the fish didn’t taste as good in such hot weather but it was clear his real reason was because it was cooler inside than out. Sneep and Imony had taken to irritating Imy and Peep, and Peep and Imy had started annoying Imony and Sneep, and Little Min and Little Me just annoyed and irritated everyone. Little Min stole Imy’s pink feather tail decorations, while Imy stole Little Me’s pocket knife, who took Sneep’s spade, while he decided to ‘borrow’ Imony’s butterfly net, while Imony pinched Peep’s copy of ‘Great Expectations’ by Charles Dickens, who was so furious she took Sparrow’s fishing rod, who told Moominmamma, who scolded all of them.

“Children, children,” she cried. “You must control yourselves!”

“Fine!” they all chorused.

“Everybody!” shouted Moominpappa who had just come bursting through the door. “Look at this! There is this group of performing hemulens coming to town so how about we go see them?”

“Oh, yes!” shouted the children.

They were all made give back the items they had taken and quickly got dressed in their best clothes, (including Imy’s pink feather tail decorations which Min had stolen.)

“This is exciting,” whispered Peep to her brother as they trooped through the woods. Ahead they could see light and soon they broke through the last of the trees and saw a giant theatre, a theatre on legs. Well, not quite legs, they were really stilts so the theatre could travel around the world and put on performances anywhere. There was a frame, (evidently meant to be used for balancing and tightrope-walking on,) several acrobats and clowns and a hemulen in a top hat and black cape on stage talking to each other and acting as if the crowd around them did not even exist.

“Hello!” squeaked a small wood mouse.

“Hello,” replied Imony politely.

“Good evening, ladies and gentlemen!” a voice boomed across the chatter of the audience. They looked up and noticed that the performers had stopped talking and were in peculiar poses all around the stage.

“Presenting the amazing acrobats!” At once, the acrobatic moomins started their routine. One walked across the frame on her finger tips while the other balanced on one foot and spun a ribbon around her head whilst the crowd all clapped and cheered.

The clowns began juggling little round beach-ball-like toy clowns and skipping across the stage while the crowd laughed.

“And now!” cried the Hemulen in the top hat. “I shall do magic!”

“It’ll just be an illusion,” muttered Sneep.

The magician took off his hat, showed it to everyone and then reached inside and pulled out a black rabbit which blinked sleepily at the audience and started to snore peacefully. The crowd blinked back, and then laughed. The rest of the evening passed in a similar fashion.

At approximately nine o’clock, there came a rumble from a distant mountain not far from Moomin House. Although the moomins did not know it, this certain mountain  was a volcano and right now, it was erupting.

“Look!” cried a small squirrel, pointing to the larva coming from the cliff. “There’s fire coming from that hill!”

“It must be a volcano!” cried Moominpappa. “We need to get out of here!”

“No, please, be calm!” called the now worried magician over the fearful chatter of the crowd. But the moomin family paid no heed and raced down to the beach where they had a boat they could use to sail away. As they all clambered in Imy noticed several other families hopping into their boats and sailing away from the valley.

Moominpappa started readying the sail while Imony took the oars and at once the six moomins, the two mymbles and the one whomper started to sail away from Moomin Valley.

“Where will we go?” asked Sneep.

“There!” called Peep, who was at the prow, looking for rocks, reefs and islands. “There! There’s one!”

“We shall dock there for the night,” answered Moominpappa. “For I fear there is a storm coming.”

As the crew drifted slowly closer the Island, Imony noticed there were a lot of peculiar grey lumps all other the place. And Sneep noticed that, despite the day being rather hot, there was a cold chill coming from the island. And when Moominmamma picked up the telescope and looked through it at the island, she saw why.

“Grokes!” she cried. “That island is covered with grokes! We have to change course!”

“But we can’t possibly change course because of the wind!” Imony shouted over the wind.

“Oh-no,” whimpered Imy as their boat slowly bumped up against the sand of the Island’s beach.

To be continued…

Before long, Imy and Imony, Peep and Sneep were very hungry as they hadn’t had much to eat that day. They had walked from almost one end of Moomin Valley to the other searching for those pesky Mymbles but they’d had no luck.  The poor little moomins were sticky with heat, their feet were exceedingly sore, and they were bored.

“How about we go home for a bit?” suggested Imy. “I mean, for all we know, Me and Min could have drifted all the way out to sea!”

“I agree!” said Imony. “Moominmamma says we’re never to leave the valley, and the Mymbles are probably way further than the mountains by now!”

“Yes! Let’s go home!” cried Peep and she led the race back home towards Moomin House.  

“Hey! Wait!” called Sneep and ran after her.

The thought of soon being home where they would have cold drinks and cool baths, made them practically skip through Moomin valley’s shadowy forests.  Usually, the foursome spent hours in the forests, looking for treasure, hoping for adventure and watching the funny little folk who lived among the tree.  But, now there was no time or energy left to notice the creeps and woodies.  

Before long Imy, Imony, Sneep and Peep burst through the last of the tall trees and found themselves on the edge of Moominpapa’s vegetable garden and there was Moomin house, dappled rosy and comforting in the sunset.  And there were Moominmamma and papa, strolling through the flower beds.  They had set up the picnic table on the lawn, decorated with flowers from the garden and lanterns of glow worms.  Even better, the picnic table was laden with jugs of icy cold lemon tea, platters of cold roasted chicken pancakes, bowls full of juicy peaches, and a one of Moominmamma’s famous bread and berry puddings.  Yum!

The four moomins galloped through the vegetable garden and much to the surprise of Moominmamma and papa who were just about to sit down, threw themselves with a clatter and whoop of glee into their chairs.  

“How did your search for those poor wee Mymbles progress?” inquired Moominmamma, as she snatched the lemon tea jug out of Imony’s slippery hand, “I’ll pour that!” she added.

Between crumbly mumbles and greedy mouthfuls, the foursome all began chattering at once. 

“You did what!?  Please!  Please!  Stop! Empty your mouths and try again!” exclaimed Moominpappa.

“Well, because it was nearly dinner and we were out of food and the Mymbles had probably drifted out of the valley we decided to come back and ask you what to do,” explained Imony.   Moominpapa looked disappointed and all at the table could tell he was about to launch into a serious telling off of the unsuccessful moomins. But Moominmamma came to their rescue.

“They really couldn’t have done anything more, dear,” said Moominmamma, who had taken the serving bowl of pudding away from Sneep who had been about to tackle it with his spoon, and was now serving each moomin their own bowlful.

“Fine,” replied Moominpappa reluctantly.

Just then, Moominmamma heard a crash from the kitchen.

“Goodness gracious me!” cried Moominmamma. “What was that?”  

“I’m sure I don’t know,” replied Moominpappa and he rose from the table, stalked up to the kitchen door and peered through the gloom.

“Can you see anything?” asked Imy, who had followed close behind.

“Just an awful lot of flour on the ground,” said Moominpappa.

“Hmm,” said Imony and he crept into the house. “Something’s knocked over the flour jar!” he cried. “And it’s smashed on the floor!”

“Oh dear,” said Moominmamma, reaching to light the kitchen lamp.  ”Don’t walk across there until I have swept up the glass.”

But Sneep’s curiosity was sparked because he could see that the large sack of flour, slumped on the floor beside the oven, was wobbling  He carefully picked his way across the splinters of glass that were now glinting in the lamplight, and reached into the flour sack.

“Get off!” squeaked a high pitched voice from within the depths of the bag. Sneep, up to his armpit in the sack, searched about with his hand until he caught hold of two wriggling creatures.  He yanked them out.

“What are you two doing here?” he demanded for, covered in flour and struggling, were Little Min and Little Me.

“I told you clambering into other moomins’ kitchens and playing in their flour was not a good idea!!” came a voice from outside. Sparrow stuck his head through the window, smiled and nodded at Moominmamma and glared at the Mymbles.

“Who are you?” asked Sneep suspiciously who was still clutching the writhing and cross mymbles.

“Sparrow,” said Sparrow.

“But you look like a whomper.” said Sneep, depositing Min and Me onto the bench before they gnawed off his hand.

“Why does every always ask that,” sighed Sparrow, who, because he lacked much imagination or knowledge of birds, was always baffled by people’s reaction to his name.

“Sneep dear, ” said Moominmamma, tipping the last of the glass and flour from the dustpan into the waste paper basket, “You’re not sounding very friendly.  Sparrow dear, have you eaten.  No?  Well you must be hungry.  Come - my greedy little moomins have surely left something on the picnic table for you to enjoy. Come!  Come!  Yes, and you two!” And she scooped the mymbles into her apron pocket and led the way back to the garden.

“Who’s that?” inquired Imy, as the group strolled back to the garden.  

“Sparrow the whomper!” cried Little Min.

“You’re back!” cried Imony.

“Yes, yes!” said Little Me impatiently.

“Is Sparrow going to live here?” asked Moominpappa.

“If he wants to,” said Imony.

“Maybe..” began Sparrow but before he could protest, Moominmamma had poured him a glass of iced lemon tea, Peep had tucked a napkin onto his lap, and Imy had piled his plate with delicious chicken pancakes.  

It looked like Sparrow had a new home.

To be continued…

Peep and Imy were bored. The four had eaten the food Moominmamma had prepared for them so the boys had sat down on the river bank to fish. And fish. And fish. With no luck.

“Here he comes!” Sneep would always cry when the hook got caught on something. But when he brought it up it would only be tangled with slimy, green seaweed.

“Oh let’s not bother with fishing any more!” said Imy after two hours of doing nothing.

“Yes, let’s just go!” agreed Peep.

“Fine, fine!” cried Imony, “but I was just about to catch him!”

“Were not!”

“Were too!”

“Were-”

“Just about to stop arguing,” interrupted Peep. The rest of their day was rather dull. They found not a trace of Little Min and Little Me. They did, however, see a whomper yanking hard on his own fishing rod.

“Show off,” muttered Imony as the whomper produced a large salmon. They saw a couple of hemulens with their silly old butterfly nets examining a ladybug and a mymble with an ant-lion on a lead.

“What’s that mymble doing with an ant-lion?” asked Imy with a shudder, remembering all the warnings her mother had impressed upon when she was small.

“It seems tame enough,” observed Peep.

“Hmm,” said Imony. The foursome continued on. 

Meanwhile, Min and Me were waiting for the whomper who had caught the salmon to finish fishing. They hadn’t noticed the Moomins passing them for they had been asleep under the shade of a small lilac bush most of the time Sparrow fished. They were starting to wish they were back with Peep, Sneep, Imy and Imony, eating pancakes on the back veranda.  Anything was better than fishing.

“I’m bored,” remarked Min.

“I’m sleepy,” said Me.

“Shush!” shushed Sparrow. “You’ll scare him away!”

“Scare who away, pray tell?” demanded Little Min.

“The non-existent fish, of course!” replied Little Me, as if the answer was obvious.

“If it’s no-existent how can we scare them?” asked Little Min.

“Dunno,” said Little Me. Just then a hemulen came along to speak to the trio.

“Hello,” he said mournfully.

“Hello!” shrieked the two mymbles.

“You sound gloomy,” remarked Sparrow.

“I am gloomy,” replied the hemulen, dabbing at his eyes with a huge checked handkerchief.

“Why are you so sad?” asked Little Min.

“I’ve finished my collection of butterflies!” cried the hemulen and at this, he burst into tears, his face now hidden behind the damp handkerchief.

“Isn’t that a good thing?” asked Little Me puzzled.  She knew she would be ever so thrilled if she could show off a finished collection.

“No!” wept the hemulen. “What shall I do now?”

“You don’t have to collect stuff, you know,” whispered Little Min timidly.

“But all the other hemulens do it!” exclaimed the hemulen.

“Just because they do it doesn’t mean you have to,” replied Sparrow.

“You mean, I can do what ever I like?” asked the hemulen.

“Course,” said Little Me. The hemulen stopped crying and smiled. Without another word he ran off towards the entrance to the Moominvalley and disappeared through the hills.

“Wonder what that was about,” wondered Sparrow.

“Hmm,” pondered Little Min.  She’d never particularly liked hemulens. They were always so bossy and annoying.  But he was gone now, so they went back to their fishing. 

To be continued…

When Sneep, Imony, Peep and Imy got home and related the story of how Little Me and Little Min had floated away, Moominpappa scolded them for letting the mymbles drift away and Moominmamma proceeded to make them lunch, even though though the four had only just had breakfast.

“Here you are, dears,” said Moominmamma handing the meals to them, “this should be enough for your journey.”

“Journey? What journey?” asked Imy.

“The journey down river of course!” exclaimed Moominmamma.

“To find Min and Me!” “Oh,” said Imony. “Yes,” growled Moominpappa.

Before they knew it, Peep, Imy, Sneep and Imony were standing by themselves beside the river with nothing but the current for company.

“I guess we should get going,” muttered Sneep.

“Yep,” agreed his sister.

“Let’s go,” said Imy.

“Will every one just stop talking about going and actually get going?” yelled Imony, who was getting frustrated.

“Oh, right, right!” cried Peep. And they set off.

But now we go back to Little Me and Little Min who had just reached the two mountains that announced the beginning of Moominvalley.

“Ha! They’ll never catch up now!” Min rubbed her little hands together with glee.

“Oh, yes, yes, yes!” laughed Me. But at that moment a fishing line flew out of nowhere and caught on the log they were riding on.

“Hey!” Me cried. Alas, they were already being reeled onto land where the two could see a whomper standing on the bank with the fishing rod that was pulling them as hard as it possibly could to land. The mymbles were just about to dive into the water and swim away when the log hit solid ground and they could properly see the whomper. For a while, the three just stared at each other until the whomper broke the silence.

Sparrow the whomper and the floating Mymbles who are not fish!

“You two are some of the most peculiar fish I have caught,” he remarked.

“We’re not fish!” shouted Little Min.

“You’re not? Then what were you on the end of my fishing line?” enquired the whomper.

“We’re not on the end of your fishing line the log’s on the end of your fishing line!” yelled Little Me.

“If it’s a log what’s it doing on the end of my fishing line?” the whomper said.

“Enough with the fishing line!” cried Little Min.

“Who are you anyway?” demanded Little Me.

“Sparrow,” replied the Whomper.

“You look like a whomper to me,” observed Little Min.

“I am a whomper,” said Sparrow.

“Whatever,” said Little Me.

“Why were you riding a log out of Moominvalley?” asked Sparrow.

“We wanted to,” explained Little Min even though it wasn’t a very good explanation.

“Well I don’t suggest you try it. Who knows what might be on the other side of the mountains? In fact, I’m sure you’d find it’s full of Grokes and hemulenic police,” replied Sparrow.

“Can we stay with you then?” asked Little Me.

“Fine, just don’t steal my fish!” said Sparrow and pocketed the pair. And that was how the two mymbles ended up travelling with a whomper named Sparrow, for now.

To be continued…

Long ago in the valley of the Moomins there lived four Moomins by the names of Imy and Imony, Sneep and Peep. Recently some squirrels had been stealing all the bread, milk and honey from the pantry so the poor little foursome had only had boiled eggs without toast for breakfast the past few days.

Peep and Sneep Moomin

Their parents had assigned them to set a trap outside the pantry to catch the troublesome creatures but one by one they had started to slack off. “I wonder what’s been going on with those trouble makers,” remarked Imy.

Imy and Imony Moomin

“Perhaps…” said Sneep, very sarcastically, “they’re hungry!”

“Ha, ha, Sneep,” Imony rolled his eyes.

“Let’s just get a move on with the trap ‘cause I want some milk tomorrow!” cried Peep, and the four went back to their work. Setting the trap was boring and occasionally painful for now and again Peep would get her fingers caught and then Sneep would get his fingers caught trying to get his sister’s out. For dinner they had soup which Imy refused to eat without bread so she was sent to bed without any dessert.

That night Peep and Imy heard a deafening crash from the kitchen and some furious muttering.

“What was that?” whimpered Imy.

“Shhh!” shushed Peep and crept towards the door. They notice that Sneep and Imony were also edging carefully out of their room and towards the kitchen. When they were at the foot of the stairs they observed that the trap they had set had two miniscule, squirming Mymbles in it!

The thieving Mymbles struggling in the trap

“Lemme out! Lemme out!” one squealed while the other proceeded to eat the lock.

“Be quiet-” Imony began but the one that had been trying to eat the lock interrupted him.

“Oh, yes! Put us in a cage you do and then expect us to behave like obedient little puppies!”

“Oh, yes indeed! Aren’t they a foursome of smart little things!” the other remarked and they both cackled loudly.

“Shhh! Or you’ll wake the whole house!” Imony snatched up the cage and hurried with it into his bedroom, the other Moomins following right behind him.

As soon as they were all through the door Sneep slammed it shut and Imony carefully opened the cage. “Who are you?” Imy asked.

“We are the little Mymbles,” one Mymble said. “Min and Me.”

Min and Me Mymble

“Have you been the ones stealing our honey?” Imy asked. “And our bread?”

“As well as our milk?”

Little Min smiled slyly and exchanged a glance with Little Me. “So what if we have,” said Me and laughed.

“So you have!” Imony cried.

“We’ll stop…” Min looked at Me, “If you let us stay here for a while. We just have pinecones in the forest so…”

“You promise not to steal from the pantry?” asked Peep. Little Me and Little Min nodded eagerly.

“Oh, all right!” shouted Imony. “You can stay for as long as we like-”

But the two Mymbles had already dashed downstairs to find a good place to sleep. Peep and Imy shrugged and walked back to their room and were soon fast asleep.

The next day Peep, Imy, Sneep and Imony found the two Mymbles sitting on the table on the front porch eating a pancake and fighting over the last crumb.

“Children!” cried Moominmamma. “Stop fighting at once!”

“Gimme!” Little Me shouted. “NEVER!” screamed Little Min.

“Hurry up you two! We’re all ready to go adventuring! Wouldn’t you like to come?” Sneep interrupted. At once the pair dropped the pancake they had been squabbling over and ran down towards the river.

“Hey, hey!” Little Me called. “The river’s flooding!”

“Yippee!” cried Little Min and the two threw themselves onto a large smooth log beside the riverbank so that they could watch the rising water. But as soon as Me landed beside Min the log slid down the bank, into the swirling water and started to float down the river, pushed faster and faster by the fierce current.

“Come back!” Peep shouted but the Mymbles had already drifted too far away to paddle back to the bank.

“Goodbye!” called Min.

“For now!” added Me and Sneep could just hear her laugh as she disappeared with her companion around the bend.

“Oh no! Shouldn’t we follow along the bank and try to save them?” started Imy but the others knew it would be futile so they went back to Moomin House, hopeful that Moominmamma had made more pancakes.

To be continued…