The guardian of ants. . .

By Kirsten Nour Namskau

I was about 7 years old and as usually I run out in the forest to search for the beauty of the nature. I have always been fascinated by the nature and all it can provide of flowers, berries, mushrooms, nuts, roots which tasted like liquorices . . . .
I was on my way home again, when I heard some boys’ jollity shouting.
I decided to sneak at them . . .
I laid down on the ground and crawled closer and closer to them to have a peek.
I hid behind a bush and peeked carefully through.
They played “Cowboy and Red Indian.”
They had made a fire-place and some of them was dressed up as Red Indian and were dancing around a tree. Some were sitting in a circle and “smoked” peace-pipe.

Suddenly an arrow came through the air, landing right in front of my face.
I turned slowly around . . . there he was . . .The chief of the Red Indians.
He was standing with his arms across over his chest, looking at me . . .
“Ugh” he said : “I’m the guardian of ants.”
“ I am sure you have been laying an ant to death. Stand up, so I can have a look!” he commanded
I stood up and he started to search the ground for any harmed ant . . . and of course he found a small ant.
He picked it up . . . looked at it and said: “It’s half dead, you have to make first-aid at it to rescue it . . . or you will die.”
He gave me the ant . . . carefully, I tried to give mouth to mouth to the ant to prevent it from dieing.
Have you ever tried to give first-aid to an ant? That’s not easy . . . and of course . . .I didn’t succeed.
So, he brought me to the tree and tied me to the tree and gagged me.
They all gathered around the tree and started to dance around me, patting their mouth as they “sung”.
The play went on for a while as I was still tied to the tree.
Little by little, I felt as if they disappeared . . . “had they gone home and forgotten me” I was thinking.
Yes, they had . . .
Hour after hour passed, but no one came to release me. I could feel the ants started to crawl up my legs, but couldn’t do anything about it.
I tried to loosen the rope I was tied with, but it was tied rather hard.
It started to get dark . . .
I could hear that it was still some people in the forest, so I tried to shout through the gag.
But it only sounded like; “hubb, buhh, uuh, mmmfnnn”
No one heard me.
It started to get dark, and I seriously started to get afraid I had to spend the night there tied and gagged to the tree.
At certain point I could hear a couple passing quite close to where I was and I gave my best “shot” and shouted so loud I could through the gag.
I could hear the woman stop and say to her husband: “Did you hear that?”
They stopped and listened. I tried again the best I could: “Mmfffnnn, ahhh, “
The man said: “Stay here . . . I will go and see what it is.”
I could see him coming slowly over the edge of the hill, hiding behind a tree.
When he saw me, he shouted out: “Ohhh, my God . . . it’s a child. Tied and gagged to the tree.”
He came fast up to me and untied me, as he at the same time asked me; who had done this to me . . . had a crime been taking place?
I told him the truth, that we had played cowboy and Red Indian, but they all had gone home and forgotten me at the tree.
I run home, but later that evening, my father came to me and asked why I was so late home?
I asked why?
He told me that it had just been a message in the news, that a small girl was found tied and gagged to a tree close to where we lived and that the parents of the child had to call the police, to ensure that nothing criminal had taken place.
Well knowing that I was a girl of adventure, he suspected it was about me at the same moment the news was told.
Happily, this time when he called the police, he could ensure them that nothing criminal had taken place.