The Forest Spring

Deep in the forest, a small spring rose from under a grey rock. Its water was cold and so clear that the tops of the pine trees and a little piece of sky were mirrored in it.

Deer, hedgehogs and tired travellers came to drink there. Squirrels scampered down the trunks to it, and birds came to bathe in the little pool beside the rock. No one knew where the spring came from, but everyone knew one thing. If it got clogged, the whole forest would be left without water.

A boy named Timur spent every summer with his grandfather in a house at the edge of that forest. On the very first morning, Grandfather woke him at dawn.

"Come on," he said. "I want you to meet an old friend of mine."

They walked along a path wet with dew. The air smelled of pine resin and mushrooms, and somewhere a woodpecker was knocking. Then Timur heard a thin, merry ringing, as if someone were playing tiny bells. It was the spring, singing.

Timur scooped up the water in his hands and took a sip. It was so cold it made his teeth ache, and so delicious that he laughed out loud.

"Grandpa, where does it come from? Who pours it in there?"

"The rain and the snow," Grandfather answered. "For years and years they soak down through the earth, like water through a great big sieve. The earth makes them clean, and then gives them back right here by the rock. This spring is very old. It gave water to my own grandfather."

Then Grandfather taught Timur the forest rules. You don't wash dishes at a spring. You don't throw anything into it. You don't trample its banks, or they crumble. And if you see dry leaves and twigs in the water, you lift them out gently with your hand.

All summer Timur ran to the spring. He lifted out the little leaves, watched the deer drink, and once he even saw a mother hedgehog with three prickly babies. They drank one after another and snuffled in the funniest way.

At the end of July a storm came. All night the wind howled in the chimney, the trees creaked and swayed, and the rain drummed on the roof. Timur lay under his blanket thinking about the spring.

In the morning the forest was wet and still. Timur ran down the path and stopped short. He couldn't hear the spring at all. The rock was buried under sticks, branches and old leaves, and the water was barely trickling out from beneath them in a thin little thread. A hedgehog sat beside it, sniffing the wet branches, unable to reach the water.

"Hang on, hedgehog," said Timur. "I'll help you."

He crouched down and began to clear the pile. First the big branches, then the smaller sticks, then the leaves, handful by handful. His hands grew cold and red, and water ran down his knees, but Timur didn't hurry. Grandfather had said the banks must be looked after, so he lifted out every twig carefully.

And suddenly the spring began to babble under the rock again. Softly at first, then louder, and soon it was ringing merrily, just as before. The hedgehog trotted up to the little pool and began to drink with tiny slurps.

Just then Grandfather appeared on the path. He looked at the clear water for a long time, and then he put his hand on Timur's shoulder.

"Now this spring is a little bit yours," he said. "You looked after it."

That night Timur fell asleep very quickly. He dreamed of the ring of clear water, of deer and hedgehogs and birds drinking at the spring, while the pine trees swayed softly above them.

Goodnight.