Prevod

There were five peas in a pod. They were green, and the pod was green, and so they thought the whole world was green—and quite right they were! The pod grew, and the peas grew; they made themselves comfortable in their lodgings, sitting all in a row. Outside, the sun shone and warmed the pod, and the rain washed it clean. Inside it was warm and snug, light by day and dark by night, just as it should be, and the peas grew bigger and more thoughtful as they sat there, for they had to occupy themselves somehow.

"Am I to sit here forever?" they said. "I only hope I don't grow hard from sitting so long. Somehow I feel there must be something outside; I have a sense of it!"

And weeks passed. The peas turned yellow, and the pod turned yellow. "The whole world is turning yellow!" they said, and they were quite entitled to say so. Then they felt a tug at the pod. It was plucked, passed into human hands, and dropped into a jacket pocket with several other full pea pods. "Now we shall soon be let out!" they said, and they waited for it to happen.

"I wonder which of us will go farthest!" said the smallest pea. "Well, we shall soon find out." "Come what may!" said the largest.

"Crack!" The pod split open, and all five peas rolled out into the bright sunshine. They lay in a child's hand; a little boy was holding them and saying that they were just the peas for his elderwood peashooter. At once one pea went into the peashooter and was shot away.

"Now I'm flying out into the wide world! Catch me if you can!" And it was gone. "I," said the second, "am flying straight into the sun. That's a proper pea pod, and just the place for me!"

Away it went. "I'll sleep wherever I land," said each of the next two, "but we're sure to roll along!" And so they rolled onto the floor before they went into the peashooter, but in they went. "We shall go farthest!"

"Come what may!" said the last, and it was shot into the air. It flew up towards the old board beneath the attic window, straight into a crack where there was moss and soft earth, and the moss closed around it. There it lay hidden, but not forgotten by our Lord.

"Come what may!" it said. In the little attic room lived a poor woman who went out by day to polish stoves, and even to saw wood and do other heavy work, for she was strong and hardworking, but she remained as poor as ever. At home in the little room lay her only daughter, half-grown and so delicate and frail. She had been bedridden for a whole year and seemed able neither to live nor to die.

"She is going to join her little sister!" said the woman. "I had the two children, and it was hard enough to provide for them both, but then our Lord shared them with me and took one to Himself. Now I should dearly like to keep the one I have left, but perhaps He does not wish them to be parted, and she will go up to her little sister!"

But the sick girl stayed. She lay patiently and quietly through the long day while her mother was out earning a little money. It was spring now, and early one morning, just as her mother was about to leave for work, the sun shone so beautifully through the little window and across the floor that the sick girl looked towards the lowest pane.

"What is that green thing peeping out beside the window? It's moving in the wind!" Her mother went to the window and opened it a little. "Why!" she said. "It's a little pea that has sprouted, with delicate green leaves. How did it get here into the crack? Now you have a little garden to look at!"

And the sick girl's bed was moved nearer the window, where she could see the sprouting pea, and her mother went to work. "Mother, I think I'm going to get well!" the little girl said that evening. "The sun has shone in on me so warmly today. The little pea is growing so well! And I'm sure I shall grow well too, and get up and go out into the sunshine!"

"If only that could be!" said her mother, though she did not believe it would happen. Still, she put a little stick beside the green shoot that had given her child such happy thoughts of life, so that the wind would not break it. She fastened a length of twine to the board and to the top of the window frame, so that the pea vine would have something to lean against and twine around as it climbed. And climb it did; every day they could see how much it had grown.

"Why, it's coming into flower!" said the woman one morning, and now she too began to hope and believe that the little sick girl would recover. It occurred to her that lately the child had spoken more cheerfully, and for the past few mornings had sat up in bed by herself, gazing with shining eyes at her little pea garden, grown from a single pea. The following week, for the first time, the sick girl was out of bed for more than an hour. Blissfully she sat in the warm sunshine. The window was open, and outside a pink-and-white pea blossom stood in full bloom. The little girl bent her head and very gently kissed its delicate petals. That day was like a holiday.

"Our Lord Himself planted it and let it flourish to bring hope and joy to you, my blessed child, and to me as well!" said the happy mother, smiling at the flower as though it were a good angel sent by God.

But what of the other peas? Well, the one that flew out into the wide world crying, "Catch me if you can!" fell into the roof gutter and ended up in a pigeon's crop, where it lay like Jonah in the whale. The two lazy ones went just as far: they too were eaten by pigeons, which is certainly a useful purpose to serve. But the fourth, the one that wanted to fly up into the sun, fell into the street gutter and lay there for days and weeks in the sour water, swelling mightily.

"I'm getting so wonderfully fat!" said the pea. "I shall burst, and I don't believe any pea could go further than that, or ever has. I am the most remarkable of the five from the pod!"

And the gutter agreed. But the young girl stood by the attic window with shining eyes and the glow of health in her cheeks, and she folded her delicate hands over the pea blossom and thanked our Lord for it.

"I stand by my pea!" said the gutter.