The Hot-Footed Godwit

Stories for Another Day

One hot, sunny day, a black-tailed godwit was bobbing his head in and out of the water near a muddy bank when he saw a fat, curly worm just coming out of its hole in the side of the bank. The godwit gave a flap of his wings and flew up onto the bank, but he happened to land on some rocks that were so hot that they burned his feet.

He hopped up and down, first on one foot then on the other saying, “Ow, ow! Ow, ow, oww!” The worm quickly wriggled back to safety inside its hole. The godwit flew off angrily.

A flock of flamingos standing nearby had seen what the godwit was doing. “That was a very interesting dance the godwit was doing, don’t you think?” said one of the flamingos, who was called Fay.

Her sister, Pim, said, “Yes, interesting, and unusual. Shall we try it?”

The flamingos, who were well known for their elegance, bent their knees and lifted their legs gracefully and elegantly, and held out their wings so that the wind ruffled the tips of their feathers.

A herd of deer were standing nearby, watching the flamingos out of the corners of their eyes. The deer, who often came down to drink at the side of the river, spent a great deal of their time watching the flamingos and trying to copy everything they did. “Ooh, a new dance!” they said to each other. They kicked up their hooves and shook their heads so that their ears flapped, glancing at the flamingos now and then to check that they were doing it right.

The flamingos, who were very modest by nature and hated being stared at, blushed a beautiful shade of pink and stood with their heads bowed, drawing one leg up under their wings.

Now, hidden in the undergrowth nearby, a streak of tigers was watching the deer, for their own reasons, which included it being around lunchtime and feeling peckish and knowing for a fact that deer are foolish, feckless creatures. The tigers watched the deer kicking up their heels and knocking their knees together and they said to each other, “What are they doing?”

They stared hard at the deer without blinking, which is something tigers are very good at. “Is that dancing, or do they have fleas?” said one, whose name was Dallas.

“They may call it dancing,” said the leader, whose name was Begley, “but personally I would be embarrassed to do anything like that in public.” He stretched and yawned. “My family has always been known as the most beautiful dancers in the whole of the seven kingdoms,” he said, which was complete rubbish, but as you know, tigers are the most vain of all animals.

The other tigers bristled when they heard this. “My grandfather won a prize for his slow waltz,” Dallas claimed. “I still have the trophy somewhere.”

“Ladies have been known to faint when they see me salsa,” said the oldest and fattest of the tigers. A young tiger snickered unwisely and received a sharp tap on the nose.

“I’ve always found,” Begley said, not wanting to be left out, “that the tango suits my body shape perfectly. Not to mention my wonderful feeling for rhythm.”

None of the others were sure what a tango was, so they kept quiet. The youngest one thought it might be a kind of fruit.

“Why don’t you have a competition?” said a squeaky voice. It was the worm, who had wriggled over to see what was happening and whether or not he could get mixed up in it.

“A competition?” sniffed Begley. “We might do, if there were a prize worth competing for.” The last thing he wanted was a competition, since he had no idea what a tango was either.

“Didn’t someone say they had a trophy?” the worm asked. For a small creature, he had an extraordinary sense of hearing.

Dallas looked uncomfortable. The trophy his grandfather had won had not been for dancing at all. It had ‘Prettiest Baby’ engraved on it in big letters. He shuddered to think how the other tigers would laugh if they ever saw it. He would never be able to look any of them in the face again. He would simply have to win the competition himself so that he could keep the trophy and no-one would ever see it. And there was only one way to do that.

He got to his feet with a graceful leap and said, “As to who should judge the competition, it will have to be someone experienced in the whole range of dancing, from modern to old-fashioned, to… everything else. In all modesty, I think that would have to be me.”

A long snort, or perhaps a snore, came from further along the bank, where Shukshu, the old hawksbill turtle, had been half-snoozing and half keeping an eye on the tigers while they watched the deer. He cleared his throat and asked mildly, “Do you think it’s a good idea for one of the competitors to be the judge?”

The tigers jumped up to see who was speaking. “Oh, Shukshu, magnificent one!” Begley said. “You speak wisely, as always.”

Shukshu snorted again. Tigers always spoke to him that way, very differently from the way they spoke about him when they thought he wasn’t listening. He yawned and said, “So you want me to judge your dancing competition, do you?”

Dallas said uncomfortably, “I meant someone with experience. A dancer, himself, I thought, who knows about dancing, and so on.”

“Experience?” Shukshu said, executing a very nice pirouette, balanced on one foot. “Someone who know what they’re talking about, eh?” He tap-danced on his back feet and finished with an expert soft-shoe shuffle. He sat down again and said, “Who’s first then? You, Dallas?”

Dallas didn’t have any choice but to step forward, but as he did so, he suddenly began to limp violently. “Ow! Ow! My ankle!” he yelped. “I think I’ve twisted it.” He stood on three legs, holding his front paw in the air. “Possibly even sprained it,” he said. “I couldn’t possibly dance today, I’m sorry.” He sat down again.

Shukshu sniffed. “Next!” he said.

Begley coughed and said, “Any other day I’d love to be in your little competition but my gout is playing up today.” He slid away into the forest.

The next tiger excused himself because he was having a dizzy spell, and the next one had a bad case of eye-strain, and the next thought he might be coming down with a cold. One by one the tigers made excuses and melted away into the forest.

Dallas was the only one left. “That seems to be the end of the competition,” he said. He shrugged, grinning to himself. The trophy was still his, and no-one would see it. He went to walk off, limping on the wrong foot, when Shukshu stopped him.

“Speaking as the judge, I think we have a clear winner,” Shukshu said, showing off his highland fling.

“You?” Dallas said. “Wasn’t it you who said that the judge can’t be a competitor?”

“No, not me,” Shukshu said, frostily. “The best dancer for miles around is Pim.”

“Pim?” Dallas said, looking around. The youngest, prettiest flamingo looked down modestly, and gave a graceful bow.

“The trophy, if you please,” Shukshu said, firmly.

Dallas went red from the tip of his tail to the tip of his nose with anger. He snarled, and if Shukshu hadn’t been standing on his tail, he would have sprung. Instead, he brought out the trophy and gave it sulkily to Shukshu, who held it up high for all the world to see.

“The winner of the dancing competition, AND Prettiest Baby, is Pim!” Everyone clapped, except Dallas who had stalked off, and the rest of the tigers, who were rolling around on the ground laughing.