Gizzo the spider had one weakness: greed. He could eat what was set before him and wonder what someone else might be enjoying. He could be given his share and immediately wonder how he might make it more. If someone else found something nice, Gizzo's first reaction was, how could I have some of it?
One morning, as he emerged from his house, Gizzo saw a big mango seed lying near his doorstep. He went over to look at it, then he looked around. There was no one. He picked it up and turned it over in his hands.
"A magnificent mango that must have been", he thought, "how sweet it must have been, how huge, how much meat there must be around such a big seed!"
Tthe more Gizzo thought about it the more he wanted one himself, but the problem was he had no idea where to find them.
So he waited, and a few mornings later another big mango seed appeared near his house.
Gizzo's curiosity grew.
"What kind of place produces mangoes like these?" he wondered and he set out to watch the mornings more diligently, rising earlier than he normally would in search of clues, looking out the road, the trees and the sky.
Then, one morning, Gizzo saw them.
A group of birds flying overhead.
They were hankaki (pied crow), the birds famous in the old tale for carrying the remains of the mangoes they ate as they travelled. As they flew over Gizzo's house, one of the birds dropped a mango seed to the ground and Gizzo followed it down until he understood the birds were eating the mangoes somewhere. Wherever those mangoes came from, Gizzo wanted to go there.
He waited until he could talk to the birds and then went to find them.
"My friends," he greeted, "Where do you get these wonderful mangoes from?"
"They grow on an island far away," the birds replied.
Gizzo pretended to be impressed with the news, and then he asked the question he had been waiting to ask.
"When you go there again, will you take me with you?"
With no hesitation, the birds agreed. Gizzo went home happy.
He had found his opportunity, he did not think of sharing the journey, he was already thinking of the mangoes.
A few days later, the birds were ready to fly to the island. Gizzo was ready.
The birds had a way of carrying him through the air, two of them held him as they flew, another bird travelled with them, and the journey was long.
Far below them the landscape gradually changed, paths narrowed, trees seemed to move and familiar places slipped away, but Gizzo's only concern was the mangoes.
Eventually, they reached the island. The mangoes were big, ripe and plentiful. They began to feed.
Every time he saw a ripe mango he claimed it as his own.
"One of those is mine," he said, then "and that one's mine too!" and another, and another, and the birds allowed him to take what he claimed. They believed there was enough for everyone.
Gizzo continued to take, one fruit after another disappearing into his possession, while the birds searched for their own food but, whenever they found a good mango, Gizzo was already there.
"It's mine," he would say and, because he had been brought to the island as their guest, the birds did not challenge him straight away. They watched him eat, and before long there was little left for the birds. He had eaten almost everything.
Soon Gizzo was deeply asleep. The birds looked at one other. They had brought him to the island and carried him through the air, they had shown him where the food was and Gizzo had repaid them by taking almost all of it.
Now they had a choice: they could wake him or leave him behind.
They chose the latter.
❑❑❑
When he finally woke ,the sun had moved across the sky. For a moment he did not understand what had happened and then he looked around.
The birds were gone.
"Where are they?" he climbed down from the tree and searched the island but there was no sign of them.
He called out; there no answer. He waited; nothing.
Then he understood that the birds had flown home without him. For the first time, the clever spider found himself in a situation where clever words could not solve his problem. He could not fly, and home was somewhere beyond the island.
He walked towards the shore and stared across the water. Perhaps, he thought, the distance was not that great. Perhaps he could cross, but he did not know how deep the water was.
Gizzo, being Gizzo, looked around and found a small piece of stick. He threw it into the water.
"If the water is deep here," he said to himself, "the stick will sink".
The stick touched the water, then it rose again and floated on the surface.
Gizzo nodded.
"Aha," he said, "the water is shallow."
He jumped in.
The water closed over him.
Only then did he know that the stick floated; the water was deep.
He tried to keep himself above the surface, fighting the water. It didn't help much. He drowned.
