Other stories
Once upon a time, there was a boy called Atilola. His parents loved him dearly because he was their only child and they made sure he lacked nothing. They treated him like a delicate egg and would not allow anyone to reprimand him, even when he behaved very badly. Because of this, Atilola grew to be a selfish, spoilt child who found it difficult to obey instructions.
One day, during the rainy season, Atilola, who was about ten years old at the time, told his mother that he was going outside to play with his friends.
‘Stay in the neighbourhood and do not wonder off into the valley; the sky is heralding rain,’ warned his mother. But, as usual, Atilola ignored his mother’s advice and ran off to find his friends.
‘Let’s go and look for honey in the beehive in Oyin valley,’ Atilola said to his friends once they had gathered together on the edge of the village.
The boys agreed, and so they all set off on the four mile journey in search of honey. But as the boys approached Oyin they noticed that the sky was beginning to turn grey. The first thunderclap made Atilola’s friends panic. One boy stepped forward and said, ‘We should get back to our homes before the rain comes.’
This was sensible advice and all of the other boys agreed to return home immediately.
‘Not me!’ yelled Atilola. ‘I have come here to find honey and I will not leave until I find some.’
‘But how can you find honey in the rain?’ asked another of the boys.
‘If I cannot find honey in the rain,’ said Atilola, ‘then I will stay right here until it stops raining!’ And just as the words left his lips, tiny drops of rain began to fall from the sky and tickle his bare back.
Upon seeing the rain the other boys all scampered off in the direction of the village leaving Atilola to hunt for the honey alone.
Before long, the little drops of rain formed a puddle and Atilola decided to jump around in it, splashing and dancing and waving his arms. Some of the farmers returning from the fields saw Atilola dancing in the puddle and told him to go home. But the spoilt boy would not listen; instead, he wrinkled up his nose and stuck out his tongue and continued to dance in the puddle as the rain grew heavier and heavier.
Before long, the sky began to empty its contents in sheets and buckets and the heavy downpour flooded the entire valley in no time at all.
Atilola could not find a place to hide anywhere. He looked all around until, eventually, he saw an Odan tree and hurried towards it.
But just as he was about to climb up into the tree, he slipped and fell into the water and the floods quickly engulfed him. As the waters carried Atilola down through the valley towards the big river, he began to scream and howl in fear for his life.
But there was nobody around to hear the frightened boy.
He tried to reach out and grab a hold of anything that might keep him afloat – twigs, logs, poles – but it was no use, he could not get a proper grip as he was moving too fast.
Then he saw a house in the distance and decided to scream at the top of his voice in the hopes that he would gain the attention of those inside.
‘Help!’ cried out Atilola. ‘Please help me!’
Ijapa, the tortoise, heard the noise and opened his window to see what was happening. He was shocked to see a boy struggling to swim against the flood, so he hurried out of his house to help. The tortoise took a long pole from the shed in his front yard and stretched it out across the water towards the boy.
‘Quick, grab a hold!’ yelled ljapa.
Atilola reached out for the pole and grabbed it with both hands and held on tightly as Ijapa pulled him to safety.
As soon as the boy was out of the water, Ijapa brought him into the house and built a fire and served soup so as to stave off the cold.
But Ijapa was not generous by nature and he was all the time busy deciding what he might gain from the unsuspecting boy.
This question was quickly answered after Atilola had drained his bowl of soup and curled up on a mat in a corner of the room. Before the boy drifted off to sle
