This morning Tut woke up earlier than usual. He stretched out and yawned in his warm cozy bed, which, if you look closely, was nothing else than an eyeglass case, furnished by cotton and soft pieces of cloth. In fact, after Tut got the new bed, dad Gustav was looking for his case that whole week. Not finding it, he went to the store and bought a new one… That’s how Tam got a warm and cozy bed too, leaving dad Gustav only shrug with a perplexed look.

But back to our story. This morning Tut woke up earlier than usual. He stretched out and yawned in his warm cozy bed, after which he immediately thought of eating something tasty. I must say that Tut and Tam lived in the living room, right behind the fireplace, but sometimes Tut wished they lived closer to the kitchen – he would not need to go that far for breakfast every morning.

Tut lay in his bed for a little longer, because it was too early to go to the kitchen – the Oluffsen family was still at home. As soon as Tut heard the front door closing, he came up to Tam’s bed and quietly started to wake Tam up. At that exact moment, Tam was dreaming about the Swedish Queen, whose picture he saw in the paper the night before. He dreamed that the Queen was smiling at him and thanking him for all the wonderful discoveries that he, pioneer and voyager Tam, had made. All of the sudden the Queen somehow spoke in Tut’s voice: “Tam, wake up! Wake up! Morning is here and it’s time for breakfast”.

Tam loved Tut very much, but this morning he wished Tut wasn’t so partial to delicious breakfasts. Tam would never know now what wonderful discoveries he, pioneer and voyager Tam, had made and he could only guess.

Grumbling a little bit on this exact matter, Tam followed Tut into the kitchen. Mom Erika was surely in a hurry this morning as the table was showing the signs of a hasty breakfast – pieces of thinly sliced rye bread huddled on a plate next to bright sunny round of Swiss cheese with holes and a small mountain of freshly picked cloudberries shadowed over a mug with milk… A mug with milk!! Milk!! Only Tut’s favorite thing in the whole wide world!! Faster than you could say “Tut and Tam”, Tut jumped on the round of cheese, hopped from the cheese to the cloudberry mound, and from there straight into the milk!

Whoosh!!

Poor Tut did not realize that the mug with milk was full to the brim! “Ta-a-a-a-a-m!” was all Tam could hear, but it was enough for him to know that Tut was in trouble – he could not swim.

Mustering all his gumption and wit, Tam searched the kitchen table for something – anything – that could help poor Tut. A breakfast bun? No, a bun wouldn’t work – it would only soak the milk in and get soft. A slice of lime? No, lime wouldn’t work – it would only drown to the bottom of the mug. Desperate, Tam was trying to remember his physics teacher Kin Kin and his lessons, during which Tam would dream of far away adventures and wonderful discoveries instead of learning the properties of milk.

At last, Tam saw a long silver spoon buried into the mountain of cloudberries. Faster than the cat Marquis chasing after the naughty mice, Tam ran to the mountain, pranced up, dug out the spoon and submerged it into the milk.

Whew!!

Just in time, as Tut’s green velvet caftan was starting to weigh poor Tut down to the bottom of the treacherous mug. Tut grabbed onto the spoon, climbed up, and sat down on the curled mug handle. He was smiling.

“That was a whole lot of milk” Tut said. He clumsily came down the handle, walked up to Tam, and gave him a milky hug. At that exact moment, Tam felt happier than the most wonderful discoverer, pioneer and voyager in the whole wide world.