Kristin E. Andersen's Word Studio

Too Many Gnomes

When they first appeared, people in Hamelin thought nothing of it.

“One turned up in my garden the other day,” Mrs. MacGregor told Mrs. Symes. “Dear wee little thing – it was hiding in the lettuces.”

“Mine favored the sweet peas.”

“You had more than one, did you?”

“Yes, a pair. They were so cute, I didn’t have the heart to turn them out.”

First it was gardens. Then, flower beds. Eventually they started popping up on porches, back as well as front. Soon, windowsills.

In the beginning they arrived in ones and twos but they quickly multiplied.

“Well,” Mrs. Braverman told Mrs. Toth, “I said to my Harold, I said, `Harold, if we don’t nip this in the bud, they’ll take over the lawn.’ They’re worse than dandelions, they are.”

People started calling the mayor to complain.

“It’s nothing serious,” the mayor told them. “What we need is a good, hard rain.”

But rain didn’t help. In fact, after each storm they mushroomed. Soon, they started moving indoors.

“Did I tell you? I had some in my attic,” Mrs. Gordon told Mrs. Meyerhoff.

“Really? What did you do?”

“I threw them out on their ears but they came right back.”

“I know. They’re like mildew. And they make the most awful racket, don’t they?”

“Oh, they do,” said Mrs. Gordon. “It keeps us up at night. Something must be done.”

But no one seemed to know what to do. It wasn’t long before they spread from attics to basements all over town.

People began discovering them in the strangest places.

“My knitting basket!” cried Mrs. Meyerhoff.

“My slippers!” cried Mr. Meyerhoff.

Mrs. MacGregor reported finding half a dozen under her kitchen sink.

Mrs. Toth caught some in her breakfast nook, reading her newspaper and drinking her coffee. With cream.

“I found a whole family living in my sock drawer!” old Mr. Peavey told his son young Mr. Peavey.

“That’s nothing, dad. We’ve got them in the parlor. I picked half a dozen out of the chandelier yesterday.”

“Did you hear about Mrs. Symes? She went to the cupboard for a dish and one jumped into her hand. You’ve never heard such screeching.”

“Startled was she?”

“Not Mrs. Symes. The wee creature started singing to her without so much as a by your leave.”

“I’ve heard they can’t carry a tune in a bucket.”

“Oh, aye, but that doesn’t stop them. Don’t they have any manners?”

They didn’t apparently. And the more of them there were the worse they behaved.

“My jewelry is missing,” Mrs. Toth told Mrs. Braverman.

“They’ve taken my shoes,” Mrs. Braverman told Mrs. Symes.

“Suddenly we’re all out of spoons,” Mrs. Symes told Mrs. MacGregor.

“They stole your spoons? Why ever would they do that?”

“I haven’t the foggiest, but if this keeps up we’ll be eating with our hands before the week’s out.”

“That’s just not civilized.”

“So true. Decent people can’t eat sandwiches at every meal.”

Mrs. Symes was right. But dinnertime wasn’t the only thing that had Hamelin in a stew.

“When it was one or two we didn’t mind,” Mrs. Toth told a newspaper reporter. “Now it’s getting so bad, I’m afraid to sit down.”

“You have to watch where you step,” said Mr. Toth.

“You don’t dare go out after dark,” said Mrs. Toth.

Indeed each evening at dusk outlaw bands of them roamed the streets, swilling bottles of sassparilla* and singing at the top of their lungs under street lights. It was worse in June when they crooned by the light of the moon.

“And do you know,” Mrs. Braverman told the reporter, “they give no thought whatsoever to the example they’re setting for small children.”

TOWN SINGS BLUES OVER GOONS’ TUNES roared the front page headline of the Hamelin Herald Gazette.

“We can’t go on like this,” Mrs. Meyerhoff told Mrs. Gordon.

“Something must be done,” Mrs. Gordon agreed.

“We need a good mouser,” the mayor told people at a hastily arranged town meeting.

“Nonsense,” said Mrs. Gordon. “Besides, my cat’s afraid of them.”

“I’ve shoveled them off my patio three times today,” said young Mr. Peavey. He glared at the mayor. “What am I supposed to do?”

“Get a bigger shovel?” said the mayor.

“I say we spray,” said old Mr. Peavey. “It works on weeds.”

“They’re worse than weeds,” said Mrs. Gordon. “No sooner do you root one out than two pop up in its place. Anyway, spraying only encourages them.”

It was the same with garlic. Instead of scaring them off, it attracted them. Worse, it give them bad breath. One treatment and it wasn’t just their songs that stunk.

“They’re impossible, they are,” said Mr. MacGregor.

“There must be something we can do!” cried Mrs. Meyerhoff.

“Move?” suggested the mayor.

Some people liked this idea.

“I’ve heard Maine’s very nice,” said Mrs. Toth.

But most people were on young Mr. Peavey’s side. “We can’t just sit idly by while they take over our town,” he said.

“Come on, people, think,” said Mrs. Gordon. “There must be some way to get rid of a few gnomes.”

“Did someone say … gnomes?”

All heads turned. A tall dark handsome stranger was standing in the doorway.

“Who are you?” asked the mayor.

“Pete Piper, former prizewinning pro wrestler,” he said with a smile. He strode to the front of the room. “At your service.”

“I’ve heard of you,” said young Mr. Peavey. “Isn’t your nickname The Pie?”

“Pete `The Pie’ Piper, that’s me. Any way you slice it – cherry, apple, peach, I can never get enough of the fruit-filled pastry.”

“Is your father Big Piper, the bag piper?” asked old Mr. Peavey.

“None other. After wrestling, I tried pickled peppers but there was no pension plan, so I got into plumbing and pest management.” He handed the mayor his card – Pest Problem? Pick Pete! “How can I help?”

The townspeople filled him in. Quickly he proffered a plan.

“I’ll have you gnome-free in no time,” he assured them.

“Is this going to cost a lot?” wondered the mayor.

“Spare no expense,” the townspeople cried. “Send those pesky gnomes home!”

Next morning the tall dark handsome stranger built a “gnome-removal machine,” using three vacuum cleaners and miles worth of pipe. Hard work was no problem for Pete. He was a galvanized piper from way back.

The townspeople, meanwhile, baked fruit cakes galore, though it wasn’t in season.

“To lure them with,” Pete explained. And he brought in barrels of their favorite beverage on a truck. “Fruit cake and sassparilla – a meal no gnome can resist.”

When all was ready, Pete piled a long table with gnome-tempting treats and plenty of spoons, then hid in the bushes.

Soon here they came, a few at a time, then tens, then twenties and more and still more. They feasted and sang. They raised such a din – the sound could strip paint. No ordinary mortal could stand it. But Pete wasn’t perturbed. While they swilled sassparilla, Pete powered his machine up and sucked them all up in a bag, every last one.

“What are you going to do with them?” young Mr. Peavey asked him.

“I know a range** way out west that’ll have them,” he said. “There’s plenty of room and they can sing all they want far from sensitive ears.”

The townspeople thanked him and begged him to stay. But Pete shook his head.

“Hear that?” he said. “Beyond the horizon, more towns just like this one cry out for pest management. I must go.”

Everyone waved as the tall dark handsome stranger rode off into the sunset.

And the legend lives on – of Pete “The Pie” Piper, the proud pest manager, who saved Hamelin town from gnomes.

THE END

*Invasive gnomes like their beverages "sassy" not "sarsy."

**Gnome Home on the Range where there’s a hotel called “Gnome Sweet Home.”