“The Reservoir” takes place in a mid-20th-century village in New Zealand, where a Reservoir has recently been installed. The Reservoir is at the edge of the wilderness surrounding the village, and the local children, including an unnamed narrator, are not allowed near it. The narrator’s mother, along with neighbors and the other children’s parents, forbid them from walking to the Reservoir because children have drowned there.
Obeying their parents, the children explore and play in the rest of the wilderness along the local gully. They especially love the creek, and they consider themselves in tune with its moods and tides. When the creek is on high-flow, it means the Reservoir is being purged of waste that flows into the creek.
The school year comes to an end, and the heat makes the children’s summer vacation long and tedious. They play games, go swimming, and spread gossip, but soon all the children are looking forward to the start of the school year, the shade of school hallways, and the new experiences the year will bring.
However, school does not reopen––the village is struck by an epidemic of Infantile Paralysis, which kills children across the area. The children are forced to complete their lessons by post, still suffering from the heat and their boredom. To escape the monotony, the children play along the gully. They steal apples, and watch courting couples and joke about kissing and sex.
One day, the children can’t find any apples or courting couples, so one of the children suggests they visit the Reservoir. The narrator acknowledges that all of the children knew they would, someday, explore the Reservoir, but she still voices her concern. When her friends dismiss her as a coward, the narrator changes her mind and goes along with them.
The walk to the Reservoir is long and lined with pine trees. The children believe that pine trees cry and whisper, but the speech is at a level beyond understanding. This sort of speech, in which the meaning is felt but not articulated, is what the narrator believes is speech’s loneliest level.
As they walk, the children bicker and gossip. The narrator tries to imagine what the Reservoir will be like, picturing it as a place of darkness and danger. The children encounter a bull in its paddock. Although the bull has a ring in its nose, indicating it has been tamed, the bull looks like it might charge at them, so the children run away.
When they finally reach the Reservoir, the narrator is momentarily intimidated by the pine trees’ whispering, but she and her friends quickly push away the fear, ignoring a noticeboard that warns of danger, and play around the Reservoir. They play until they notice it seems to be getting dark out. Frightened of the dark, they rush home, only to realize the sun has barely moved in the sky at all.
When they arrive home, the children aren’t sure if they should tell their parents about their adventure. The question is answered for them when their parents remind them, as always, not to approach the Reservoir. The narrator laughs internally at her parents for being afraid.
