The House at Pooh Corner. A. A. Milne

should come knocking at the door but Eeyore.

      ‘Hallo, Eeyore,’ said Christopher Robin, as he opened the door and came out. ‘How are you?’

      ‘It’s snowing still,’ said Eeyore gloomily.

      ‘So it is.’

      ‘And freezing.’

      ‘Is it?’

      ‘Yes,’ said Eeyore. ‘However,’ he said, brightening up a little, ‘we haven’t had an earthquake lately.’

      ‘What’s the matter, Eeyore?’

      ‘Nothing, Christopher Robin. Nothing important. I suppose you haven’t seen a house or what-not anywhere about?’

      ‘What sort of a house?’

      ‘Just a house.’

      ‘Who lives there?’

      ‘I do. At least I thought I did. But I suppose I don’t. After all, we can’t all have houses.’

      ‘But, Eeyore, I didn’t know – I always thought –’

      ‘I don’t know how it is, Christopher Robin, but what with all this snow and one thing and another, not to mention icicles and such-like, it isn’t so Hot in my field about three o’clock in the morning as some people think it is. It isn’t Close, if you know what I mean – not so as to be uncomfortable. It isn’t Stuffy. In fact, Christopher Robin,’ he went on in a loud whisper, ‘quite-between-ourselves-and-don’t-tell-anybody, it’s Cold.’

      ‘Oh, Eeyore!’

      ‘And I said to myself: The others will be sorry if I’m getting myself all cold. They haven’t got Brains, any of them, only grey fluff that’s blown into their heads by mistake, and they don’t Think, but if it goes on snowing for another six weeks or so, one of them will begin to say to himself: “Eeyore can’t be so very much too Hot about three o’clock in the morning.”And then it will Get About. And they’ll be Sorry.’

      ‘Oh, Eeyore!’ said Christopher Robin, feeling very sorry already.

      ‘I don’t mean you, Christopher Robin. You’re different. So what it all comes to is that I built myself a house down by my little wood.’

      ‘Did you really? How exciting!’

      ‘The really exciting part,’ said Eeyore in his most melancholy voice, ‘is that when I left it this morning it was there, and when I came back it wasn’t. Not at all, very natural, and it was only Eeyore’s house. But still I just wondered.’

      Christopher Robin didn’t stop to wonder. He was already back in his house, putting on his waterproof hat, his waterproof boots, and his waterproof macintosh as fast as he could.

      ‘We’ll go and look for it at once,’ he called out to Eeyore.

      ‘Sometimes,’ said Eeyore, ‘when people have quite finished taking a person’s house, there are one or two bits which they don’t want and are rather glad for the person to take back, if you know what I mean. So I thought if we just went –’

      ‘Come on,’ said Christopher Robin, and off they hurried, and in a very little time they got to the corner of the field by the side of the pine-wood, where Eeyore’s house wasn’t any longer.

      ‘There!’ said Eeyore. ‘Not a stick of it left! Of course, I’ve still got all this snow to do what I like with. One mustn’t complain.’

      But Christopher Robin wasn’t listening to Eeyore, he was listening to something else.

      ‘Can you hear it?’ he asked.

      ‘What is it? Somebody laughing?’

      ‘Listen.’

      They both listened … and they heard a deep gruff voice saying in a singing voice that the more it snowed the more it went on snowing, and a small high voice tiddely-pomming in between.

      ‘It’s Pooh,’ said Christopher Robin excitedly …

      ‘Possibly,’ said Eeyore.

      ‘And Piglet!’ said Christopher Robin excitedly. ‘Probably,’ said Eeyore. ‘What we want is a Trained Bloodhound.’

      The words of the song changed suddenly.

      ‘We’ve finished our HOUSE!’ sang the gruff voice.

      ‘Tiddely pom!’ sang the squeaky one.

       ‘It’s a beautiful HOUSE … ’

       ‘Tiddely pom … ’

       ‘I wish it were MINE … ’

       ‘Tiddely pom … ’

      ‘Pooh!’ shouted Christopher Robin …

      The singers on the gate stopped suddenly.

      ‘It’s Christopher Robin!’ said Pooh eagerly.

      ‘He’s round by the place where we got all those sticks from,’ said Piglet.

      ‘Come on,’ said Pooh.

      They climbed down their gate and hurried round the corner of the wood, Pooh making welcoming noises all the way.

      ‘Why, here is Eeyore,’ said Pooh, when he had finished hugging Christopher Robin, and he nudged Piglet, and Piglet nudged him, and they thought to themselves what a lovely surprise they had got ready. ‘Hallo, Eeyore.’

      ‘Same to you, Pooh Bear, and twice on Thursdays,’ said Eeyore gloomily.

      Before Pooh could say: ‘Why Thursdays?’ Christopher Robin began to explain the sad story of Eeyore’s Lost House. And Pooh and Piglet listened, and their eyes seemed to get bigger and bigger.

      ‘Where did you say it was?’ asked Pooh.

      ‘Just here,’ said Eeyore.

      ‘Made of sticks?’

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘Oh!’ said Piglet.

      ‘What?’ said Eeyore.

      ‘I just said “Oh!” said Piglet nervously. And so as to seem quite at ease he hummed tiddely-pom once or twice in a what-shall-we-do-now kind of way.

      ‘You’re sure it was a house?’ said Pooh. ‘I mean, you’re sure the house was just here?’

      ‘Of course I am,’ said Eeyore. And he murmured to himself, ‘No brain at all, some of them.’

      ‘Why, what’s the matter, Pooh?’ asked Christopher Robin.

      ‘Well,’ said Pooh … ‘The fact is,’ said Pooh … ‘Well, the fact is,’ said Pooh … ‘You see,’ said Pooh … ‘It’s like this,’ said Pooh, and something seemed to tell him that he wasn’t explaining very well, and he nudged Piglet again.

      ‘It’s like this,’ said Piglet quickly … ‘Only warmer,’ he added after deep thought.

      ‘What’s warmer?’

      ‘The other side of the wood, where Eeyore’s house is.’

      ‘My house?’ said Eeyore. ‘My house was here.’

      ‘No,’