The Crab Who Collected Colours

A small dark crab arranges coloured things on a flat rock: rose-pink glass beside amber stone, two pieces of sea glass asking something of each other.

His human was sorting through a basket of thread at the cottage table, colours spilling across the wood.

There was a flat rock near the eastern end of the beach. Prince Freddie stopped at it often on his afternoon patrol. His crown caught the afternoon light as he walked. His short legs moved steadily across the sand.

Today there was a crab on it.

A small one, dark-shelled, moving carefully around the rock’s surface with the methodical attention of someone doing fine work. On the rock, arranged in a curved line, were objects. A piece of sea glass in rose-pink. A smooth amber stone. A short length of blue rope. A curl of dried kelp gone pale gold. A chip of white shell. Another piece of sea glass in a dark green, almost black.

Freddie stopped.

The crab moved the amber stone a small distance left, then back. She left it where it had been. She did not find this unsatisfying. She moved on to the blue rope. She repositioned it slightly. She stepped back and considered.

Freddie sat down on the sand and watched. His tail began to move slowly, following the crab’s movements. When the rose-pink glass caught the light, his tail nearly stilled.

He watched for quite a long time. The crab had a system. She was working from one end to the other. The rose-pink glass she touched frequently. The curl of pale gold kelp she left alone.

At some point she became aware of him.

She did not scuttle. She stopped, regarded him sideways, and then, after a moment, returned to the blue rope.

“It’s good,” Freddie said.

“I know,” she said, which was not boasting. Just accurate.

“What’s it for?”

She paused. Not a long pause, but the kind that means the question is being taken seriously. “Nothing,” she said. “It’s just arranged.”

Freddie looked at the line of coloured things. The rose-pink and the amber sat together. Each became more itself. The two pieces of sea glass, one pale and one nearly black, asked something of each other. The distance between them held the amber stone and the blue rope. The pale gold kelp at the far end made the whole thing feel complete. He could not say why.

“Has anyone seen it?” he said.

“You have,” she said.

“Before me.”

“No one that I know of.”

Freddie thought about this.

“Do you always do this?” he said.

“When I find good pieces,” she said. “I find a lot of blue. Blue is common. The rose-pink is harder.” She moved the rose-pink piece again, a fraction. “When I find good rose-pink I keep it. I wait until I have the right place.”

“How long did you carry that?”

“Two weeks,” she said, without any suggestion that this was remarkable.

Freddie sat with this. He looked at the arrangement again, at the way each colour answered the colours beside it. The pale gold at the end caught the light and held it. He understood, in the way that you understand things without words, why she had carried the rose-pink for two weeks waiting for its place.

“I find good things on my patrol,” he said. “I don’t always know what to do with them.”

“You look at them,” the crab said.

She touched the pale kelp and did not move it. She stepped back and considered the arrangement.

The afternoon light was going at the angle that made the rock look briefly golden. The rose-pink glass caught it and went briefly extraordinary.

Freddie stood up. “It’s good,” he said again.

“I know,” she said again. Then she went to the edge of the rock. She descended into the sand below. She disappeared in the unhurried way of creatures at home in the thing they move into.

Freddie walked home along the shore. The flat rock was behind him. The air was sharp and continuous with the cool of the coming evening. He walked slowly, his short legs carrying him home.

The cottage was lit when he arrived. The side lamp was on, his human’s jacket on the chair by the door. Freddie ate, and went to the bed, and was quieter than usual.

He circled once, twice, three times. Curled close, nose tucked to his own chest, small and complete. His breathing slowed almost before he had finished settling.

The End

Sleep well, Prince Freddie. On the flat rock, the rose-pink glass is still catching the last light.

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