Pu n Books

Unbelievable?
Maybe.
But I’m telling you it’s true.

The crusher had pushed all the air out of my lungs. It was
squeezing me tighter and tighter. I knew I had only seconds
to live.

Believe it or not …

A kid can grow younger.

Birds can bury you.
Ghosts have exams.
There are eyes in the milk.

FROM THE ONE AND ONLY PAUL JENNINGS

 also by paul Jennings

Unreal!
Unbelievable!
Quirky Tails
Unbearable!
Unmentionable!
Undone!
Uncovered!
Unseen!
Tongue-Tied!
The Cabbage Patch series
(illustrated by Craig Smith)
The Gizmo series
(illustrated by Keith McEwan)

The Singenpoo series

(illustrated by Keith McEwan)
Wicked! (series) and Deadly! (series)
(with Morris Gleitzman)
Duck for Cover
Freeze a Crowd
Spooner or Later
Spit It Out
(with Terry Denton and Ted Greenwood)
Round the Twist

Sucked In …
 (illustrated by Terry Denton)
How Hedley Hopkins Did a Dare …

Paul Jennings’ Funniest Stories

Paul Jennings’ Weirdest Stories
Paul Jennings’ Spookiest Stories
Paul Jennings’ Trickiest Stories

FOR ADULTS
The Reading Bug… and how you can help your child to catch it

FOR BEGINNERS
The Rascal series

More information about Paul and his books can be found at

www.pauljennings.com.au and pu n.com.au
PUFFIN BOOKS
PUFFIN BOOKS

Published by the Penguin Group

Penguin Group (Australia)
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(a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty Ltd)
Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
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Penguin Books Ltd, Registered O ces: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

First published by Penguin Books Australia, 1987

First published as Unbelievable! More surprising stories
This edition published 2003

Text copyright © Lockley Lodge Pty Ltd, 1986

The moral right of the author and illustrator has been asserted.

All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of
this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or
transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording
or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the
above publisher of this book.

Text designed by George Dale, Penguin Design Studio

pu n.com.au
www.pauljennings.com.au

ISBN: 978-1-74-228687-7
To Fiona, Kirsten and Sharon Lacy
 Contents

Pink Bow-tie

One-shot Toothpaste

There’s No Such Thing

Inside Out

The Busker

Souperman

The Gumleaf War

Birdscrap

Snookle
 Pink Bow-tie

Well, here I am again, sitting outside the Principal’s o ce. And I’ve
only been at the school for two days. Two lots of trouble in two
days! Yesterday I got the strap for nothing. Nothing at all.
I see this bloke walking along the street wearing a pink bow-tie. It
looks like a great pink butter y attacking his neck. It is the silliest
bow-tie I have ever seen. ‘What are you staring at, lad?’ says the
bloke. He is in a bad mood.
‘Your bow-tie,’ I tell him. ‘It is ridiculous. It looks like a pink
vampire.’ It is so funny that I start to laugh my head o .
Nobody tells me that this bloke is Old Splodge, the Principal of
the school. He doesn’t see the joke and he gives me the strap. Life is
very unfair.
Now I am in trouble again. I am sitting here outside Old Splodge’s
o ce waiting for him to call me in.
Well, at least I’ve got something good to look at. Old Splodge’s
secretary is sitting there typing some letters.
She is called Miss Newham and she is a real knockout. Every boy
in the school is in love with her. I wish she was my girlfriend, but as
she is seventeen and I am only fourteen there is not much hope.
Still, she doesn’t have a boyfriend so there is always a chance.
She is looking at me and smiling. I can feel my face going red.
‘Why have you dyed your hair blond?’ she asks sweetly. ‘Didn’t you
know it is against the school rules for boys to dye their hair?’
I try to think of a very impressive answer but before I can say
anything Old Splodge sticks his head around the o ce door. ‘Come
in, boy,’ he says.
I go in and sit down. ‘Well, lad,’ says Old Splodge. ‘Why have you
dyed your hair? Trying to be a sur e, eh?’ He is a grumpy old coot.
He is due to retire next year and he does not want to go.
I notice that he is still wearing the pink bow-tie. He always wears
this bow-tie. He cannot seem to live without it. I try not to look at it
as I answer him. ‘I did not dye my hair, sir,’ I say.
‘Yesterday,’ says Splodge, ‘when I gave you six of the best, I
noticed that you had black hair. Am I correct?’
‘Yes, sir,’ I answer.
‘Then tell me, lad,’ he says. ‘How is it that your hair is white
today?’ I notice that little purple veins are standing out on his bald
head. This is a bad sign.
‘It’s a long story,’ I tell him.
‘Tell me the long story,’ he says. ‘And it had better be good.’
I look him straight in the eye and this is what I tell him.

I am a very nervous person. Very sensitive. I get scared easily. I am

scared of the dark. I am scared of ghost stories. I am even scared of
the Cookie Monster on ‘Sesame Street’. Yesterday I am going home
on the train after getting the strap and I am in a carriage with some
very strange people. There is an old lady with a walking stick, grey
hair and gold wire-rim glasses. She is bent right over and can hardly
walk. There is also a mean, skinny-looking guy sitting next to me.
He looks like he would slit your throat for a dollar. Next to him is a
kid of about my age and he is smoking. You are not allowed to
smoke when you are fourteen. This is why I am not smoking at the
time.
After about ve minutes a ticket collector puts his head in the
door. He looks straight at the kid who is smoking. ‘Put that cigarette
out,’ he says. ‘You are too young to smoke.’
The kid does not stop smoking. He picks up this thing that looks
like a transistor and twiddles a knob. Then he starts to grow older in
front of our eyes. He just slowly changes until he looks about
twenty- ve. ‘How’s that?’ he says to the ticket collector. ‘Am I old
enough now?’
The ticket collector gives an almighty scream and runs down the
corridor as fast as his legs can take him. The rest of us just sit there
looking at the kid (who is now a man) with our mouths hanging
open.
‘How did you do that?’ trembles the old lady. She is very
interested indeed.
‘Easy,’ says the kid-man as he stands up. The train is stopping at a
station. ‘Here,’ he says, throwing the transistor thing onto her lap.
‘You can have it if you want.’ He goes out of the compartment,
down the corridor, and gets o the train.
We all stare at the box-looking thing. It has a sliding knob on it.
Along the right-hand side it says OLDER and at the left-hand end it
says YOUNGER. On the top is a label saying AGE RAGER.
The mean-looking bloke sitting next to me makes a sudden lunge
forward and tries to grab the Age Rager but the old lady is too quick
for him. ‘No you don’t,’ she says and shoves him o . Quick as a ash
she pushes the knob a couple of centimetres down towards the
YOUNGER end.
Straight away she starts to grow younger. In about one minute
she looks as if she is sixteen. She is sixteen. She looks kind of pretty
in the old lady’s glasses and old-fashioned clobber. It makes her look
like a hippy. ‘Whacko,’ she shouts, throwing o her shawl. She
throws the Age Rager over to me, runs down the corridor and jumps
o the train just as it is pulling out of the station.
As the train speeds past I hear her say, ‘John McEnroe, look out!’
‘Give that to me,’ says the mean-looking guy. Like I told you
before, I am no hero. I am scared of my own shadow. I do not like
violence or scary things so I hand over the Age Rager to Mean Face.
He grabs the Age Rager from me and pushes the knob nearly up
to the end where it says YOUNGER. Straight away he starts to grow
younger but he doesn’t stop at sixteen. In no time at all there is a
baby sitting next to me in a puddle of adult clothes. He is only about
one year old. He looks at me with a wicked smile. He sure is a
mean-looking baby. ‘Bad Dad Dad,’ he says.
‘I am not your Dad Dad,’ I say. ‘Give me that before you hurt
yourself.’ The baby shakes his head and puts the Age Rager behind
his back. I can see that he is not going to hand it over. He thinks it
is a toy.
Then, before I can move, he pushes the knob right up to the OLDER
end. A terrible sight meets my eyes. He starts to get older and older.
First he is about sixteen, then thirty, then sixty, then eighty, then
one hundred and then he is dead. But it doesn’t stop there. His body
starts to rot away until all that is left is a skeleton.
I give a terrible scream and run to the door but I cannot get out
because it is jammed. I kick and shout but I cannot get out. I open
the window but the train is going too fast for me to escape.
And that is how my hair gets white. I have to sit in that carriage
with a dead skeleton for fteen minutes. I am terri ed. I am shaking
with fear. It is the most horrible thing that has ever happened to me.
My hair goes white in just fteen minutes. I am frightened into
being a blond. When the train stops I get out of the window and
walk all the rest of the way home.
‘And that,’ I say to Splodge, ‘is the truth.’

Splodge is ddling with his pink bow-tie. His face is turning the
same colour. I can see that he is about to freak out. ‘What utter
rubbish,’ he yells. ‘Do you take me for a fool? Do you expect me to
believe that yarn?’
‘I can prove it,’ I say. I get the Age Rager out of my bag and put it
on his desk.
Splodge picks it up and looks at it carefully. ‘You can go now,
lad,’ he says in a funny voice. ‘I will send a letter home to your
parents telling them that you are suspended from school for telling
lies.’
I walk sadly back to class. My parents will kill me if I am
suspended from school.
For the next two weeks I worry about the letter showing up in the
letter box. But nothing happens. I am saved.
Well, it is not quite true that nothing happens. Two things
happen: one good and one bad. The good thing is that Splodge
disappears and is never seen again.
The bad thing is that Miss Newham gets a boyfriend. He is about
eighteen and is good-looking.
It’s funny, though. Why would she go out with a kid who wears
pink bow-ties?
 One-shot Toothpaste

‘I’m afraid this tooth will have to be lled,’ said Mr Bin. ‘It’s badly
decayed.’
Antonio’s knees started to knock as he looked at the dentist’s arm.
He knew that Mr Bin was hiding a needle behind his back. ‘Not an
injection. Not that,’ spluttered Antonio. But it was too late. Before
he could say another word the numbing needle was doing its work.
Antonio could feel tears springing into his eyes. He stared
helplessly out of the window at the huge white tooth that was
swinging in the breeze. On the side of it was written:
M. T. BIN
DENTIST

The needle seemed to be taking years to go in. Mr Bin held

Antonio’s mouth open with one hand and slowly pushed the plunger
with the other. ‘Try not to move,’ he said. ‘You’re shaking like a
leaf.’
At last it was over. The dreaded needle came out. ‘Rinse,’ ordered
Mr Bin. Antonio took a mouthful of water from the glass and tried
to spit it out but his mouth was numb and he dribbled most of it
down his T-shirt.
Antonio fought back the tears as Mr Bin started up the drill. He
mustn’t cry. It wouldn’t be right for a thirteen-year-old boy to cry at
the dentist’s. He stared out of the window again at the giant tooth
sign and opened up his mouth.
‘What are you going to do for a job when you leave school?’
asked Mr Bin.
‘A dustman,’ answered Antonio. ‘I’ve always wanted to be a
dustman.’
 Mr Bin put down the drill with an amazed look on his face. ‘A
dustman. Did you say a dustman? Now isn’t that funny? I always
wanted to be a dustman when I was a boy.’
‘Well, how come you ended up a dentist then?’ Antonio asked.
The dentist looked around the room and then went over and shut
the door. He spoke in a very soft voice. ‘If you promise not to tell
anyone, I’ll tell you the story, seeing that you want to be a dustman
too. But you must give me your solemn promise not to tell any other
person. Not a soul. Do you promise?’
Antonio nodded. He couldn’t say a word because Mr Bin had
started drilling away inside his mouth. He closed his eyes and
listened.
‘When I was a boy,’ said Mr Bin, ‘I loved looking in rubbish bins. I
just couldn’t walk past one without opening it. I mean there are
really some wonderful things to be found in the garbage.
‘I once found a dead pig’s head in our neighbour’s bin. I took it
home and put it on an ants’ nest. They ate all the esh o and I was
left with just the skull. Next I drilled a hole in the top of it and gave
it to my mother for a sugar container. She liked it so much that she
never used it. She hid it away in a special place and then forgot
where it was.
‘All the bins in our street had something interesting about them,
but Old Monty’s rubbish was the strangest. I used to look in his
garbage bin every Wednesday and Friday and it was always lled
with the same thing. Empty toothpaste tubes. Dozens and dozens of
them. They weren’t your everyday tubes either. They always had the
same label: ONE-SHOT TOOTHPASTE was written on every one.
‘I could never work out why one old man who lived all alone
would use so many tubes of toothpaste. He couldn’t have spent all
day cleaning his teeth. Or I should say tooth, for he only had one
fusty, old green tooth right in the middle of his mouth. In fact his
tooth was so scungy that I am sure he had never cleaned it since the
day it rst grew.
 ‘I couldn’t stop thinking about Old Monty and his empty
toothpaste tubes. I just had to nd out what was going on. I knew it
would be no good trying to talk to him because he hated children
(actually, I think he hated everyone). If you said “good morning” to
him he would just tell you to clear o . In the end I decided to sneak
up to his house at night and peek in the window.’

‘One night, after my parents had gone to bed, I crept up to the side
of Monty’s house. It was a ramshackle, tumble-down old joint with a
rusty tin roof and cobwebs all over the windows. It was a dark night
and a cold wind was blowing. I was covered in goose bumps, but
they weren’t from the cold. I was scared sti .
‘I stumbled around until I found a window which had a chink
between the curtains. Then I stood on tip-toe and peered inside. All
was black in the room and at rst I couldn’t see anything. After a
minute or two, however, I noticed something eerie, something
strange, something I had never seen before. Teeth. I saw teeth.
‘About twenty sets of teeth were glowing palely in the dark. They
were so white that they shone like tiny, dim light globes in the
blackness. They hovered in the air at various heights above the oor
like erce kites on strings.
‘They were opening and shutting and waving around as if they
belonged to invisible heads. That was when I realised the teeth did
have heads. And bodies. I just couldn’t see them because it was
dark. The teeth were so clean that they gave o their own light.
‘There were large pointed teeth and tiny sharp ones. There was
every type of cruncher and chomper that you could think of except
one. None of them belonged to people. There were no human teeth.
I could tell that at once.
‘Just then someone lit a candle and an amazing sight met my
eyes. I saw a room lled with animals. There were rabbits, dogs,
kangaroos, wallabies and cats. Each one was in its own cage and
each one possessed the whitest set of teeth I had ever seen. But the
poor things – they all looked so sad. I could tell they hated being
kept in those small cages. And even more, they hated what was
about to happen next.
‘Monty strode across the room with an evil grin on his face and a
candle in his hand. “Tooth time, boys,” he croaked. I could almost
feel the poor animals shiver as he said it. He put the candle on a
table and went over to a large cupboard and opened it. Inside were
thousands of tubes of toothpaste. He took down one of the tubes.
“Number 52A,” he said. “Let’s see if this is the mix that will make
my fortune.”
‘Monty went over to the cage of a small rabbit and pressed a
button. A red light ashed inside the cage and the rabbit poked its
head out of a hole in the wire. The rabbit screwed up its nose and
bared its teeth. Monty put some of the toothpaste on a brush and
scrubbed away at them. I could tell that the toothpaste tasted
terrible. When Monty had nished he threw a dirty old carrot to the
rabbit but the poor thing couldn’t eat. It was too busy trying to get
the nasty taste out of its mouth.
‘This was terrible. This was monstrous. How cruel. That mean old
man was cleaning the teeth of animals with some foul-tasting
toothpaste. He was trying it out on them to see if it was any good. I
didn’t think of my own safety. I didn’t think of anything except
those frightened creatures. I raced around to the front door and
banged on it as hard as I could. “Let me in,” I screamed. “Let me in
and let those animals go.” ’

‘The door swung open and there stood Monty, grinning at me with
his fusty green tooth. He seemed pleased to see me. “Just what I
need,” he said. “A cheeky brat of a kid. Come in, boy, and
welcome.”
 ‘I burst into the house and ran into the room where the animals
were kept. “What are you doing?” I yelled. “Why are you cleaning
these animals’ teeth?”
‘ “I am inventing One-shot Toothpaste,” grinned Monty. “And I
am nearly there.”
‘ “What’s One-shot Toothpaste?” I shouted.
‘ “It’s toothpaste that you only use once in your life. One go and
you never need to clean your teeth again. Everyone will buy it once
it’s invented. All those brats who won’t clean their teeth. Their
parents will all buy it and I will be rich. Every time I make a new
batch I have to try it out. That’s why I have the animals.”
‘ “Let the animals go,” I said. “It’s cruel. Try your rotten old
toothpaste out on yourself.”
‘ “I couldn’t do that,” said Monty. “It tastes horrible. But now I
don’t need the animals any more. I have you.” He looked at me with
a sneaky smile and pointed to an empty cage.
‘Before I had a chance to move he jumped on me and grabbed me
with his skinny hands. He was thin but very strong. We rolled over
and over on the oor and crashed into the cupboard. Hundreds of
tubes of toothpaste fell out of the cupboard and showered all over
us. As we struggled on the oor many of the tubes burst open and
squirted long worms of toothpaste into the air. Soon we were both
covered in every colour of toothpaste you could think of. They all
got mixed up and the di erent types smeared into horrible, smelly
puddles.
‘Monty grabbed the toothbrush and dipped it into the mixture.
“See how you like this, boy,” he hissed as he tried to shove the
brush into my mouth.
‘There was no way I was going to let him put mixed-up
toothpastes on my teeth. I pushed Monty backwards and he fell
against the wall with a grunt. He was winded and lay there gasping
for breath. “Have a bit of your own medicine,” I said. I plunged the
toothbrush into Monty’s mouth and brushed at his fusty old green
tooth.’
 4

‘He didn’t like it. Not one bit. He rolled around on the oor
screaming and yelling and holding his hands up to his neck. It must
have tasted foul.
‘Then something happened I will never forget. Monty’s tooth
started to grow. It swelled up and started to stick out of his mouth.
Soon it was as big as his head. A whopping big green fusty tooth.
And as it grew Monty started to shrink. It was just as if the tooth
was sucking his innards out. Monty shrivelled up like a slowly
collapsing balloon as the tooth grew bigger and bigger. Soon it was
bigger than he was. It wasn’t Monty and a tooth. It was a tooth and
Monty.
‘The tooth continued to feed on Monty until it was as big as a full-
grown man and he was only the size of a pea on the end of it. Then
there was a small “pop” and he was gone altogether. The super
tooth lay there alone on the oor.
‘I was in a daze. I didn’t know what to do. I staggered over to the
cages and let the animals out one at a time. Each one bounded out
of the door in a panic.
‘The last to go was a big kangaroo. The poor thing was in such a
fright that it knocked over the table with the candle on it. In a ash
the curtains caught on re and the room was alight. The animals
had all ed into the night, so I grabbed the huge tooth and lugged it
out onto the lawn. The house burned to the ground before the re
brigade could even get there.’

‘And that,’ said the dentist to Antonio, ‘is the end of the story. And
your lling is nished. It didn’t hurt much, now, did it?’
‘No,’ said Antonio, ‘I didn’t feel a thing. ‘But what happened to
the giant tooth?’
 Mr Bin looked up at the large tooth swinging in the breeze
outside with
M. T. BIN
DENTIST

written on it and said, ‘That is a secret which I can’t tell even you.’
Antonio walked outside and looked at the large tooth sign. It was
painted white but on one corner the paint was peeling o .
Underneath he could see that it was a fusty green colour. He turned
round and walked home, shaking his head as he went.
Mr Bin went back into his surgery. A small girl was sitting in the
chair crying. ‘No needles, please,’ she whimpered.
‘What are you going to do for a job when you grow up?’ asked Mr
Bin.
‘A ballet dancer,’ said the little girl.
Mr Bin put down the needle with an amazed look on his face. ‘A
ballet dancer. Did you say a ballet dancer? Now isn’t that funny? I
always wanted to be a ballet dancer when I was a boy.’
‘Well, how come you ended up a dentist?’ the girl asked.
Mr Bin looked around the room and then went over and shut the
door. He spoke in a very soft voice. ‘If you promise not to tell
anyone, I’ll tell you the story,’ he said as he picked up the needle.
 There’s No Such Thing

Poor Grandad. They had taken him away and locked him up in a
home. I knew he would hate it. He loved to be out in his garden
digging the vegies or arguing with old Mrs Jingle next door. He
wouldn’t like being locked away from the world.
‘I know it’s sad,’ said Mum. ‘But it’s the only thing to do. I’m
afraid that Grandad has a sort of sickness that’s in the head. He
doesn’t think right. He keeps seeing things that aren’t there. It
sometimes happens to people when they get very old like Grandad.’
I could feel tears springing into my eyes. ‘What sort of things?’ I
shouted. ‘I don’t believe it. Grandad’s all right. I want to see him.’
Mum had tears in her eyes too. She was just as upset as I was.
After all, Grandad was her father. ‘You can see him on Monday,
Chris,’ she said. ‘The nurse said you can visit Grandad after school.’
On Monday I went to the nursing home where they kept Grandad.
I had to wait for ages in this little room which had hard chairs and
smelt of stu you clean toilets with. The nurse in charge wore a
badge which said, SISTER GRIBBLE. She had mean eyes. They looked
like the slits on money boxes which take things in but never give
anything back. She had her hair done up in a tight bun and her
shoes were so clean you could see the re ection of her knobbly
knees in them.
‘Follow me, lad,’ said the nurse after ages and ages. She led me
down a corridor and into a small room. ‘Before you go in,’ she said,
‘I want you to know one thing. Whenever the old man talks about
things that are not really there, you must say, “There’s no such
thing.” You are not to pretend you believe him.’
I didn’t know what she was talking about, but I did know one
thing – she shouldn’t have called Grandad ‘the old man’. He had a
name just like everyone else.
We went into the room and there was Grandad, slumped in a bed
between sti white sheets. He was staring listlessly at a y on the
ceiling. He looked unhappy.
As she went out of the room Nurse Gribble looked at Grandad and
said, ‘None of your nonsense now. Remember, there’s no such
thing.’ She sat on a chair just outside the door.

Grandad brightened up when he saw me. A bit of the old twinkle

came back into his eyes. ‘Ah, Chris,’ he said. ‘I’ve been waiting for
you. You’ve got to help me get out of this terrible place. My
tomatoes will be dying. I’ve got to get out.’ He looked at the door
and whispered. ‘She watches me like a hawk. You are my only
chance.’
He pulled something out from under the sheets and pushed it into
my hands. It was a small camera with a built-in ash. ‘Get a photo,’
he said, ‘and then they will know it’s true. They will have to let me
out if you get a photo.’
His eyes were wild and ashing. I didn’t know what he was
talking about. ‘Get a photo of what?’ I asked.
‘The dragon, Chris. The dragon in the drain. I never told you
about it before because I didn’t want to scare you. But now you are
my only hope. Even your mother thinks I have gone potty. She
won’t believe me that there is a dragon. No one will.’
A voice like broken glass came from the corridor outside. It said,
‘There’s no such thing as a dragon.’ It was Nurse Gribble. She was
listening to our conversation.
I didn’t know what to think. It was true then. Poor old Grandad
was out of his mind. He thought there was such a thing as a dragon.
I decided to go along with it. ‘Where is the dragon, Grandad?’ I
whispered.
 ‘In Donovan’s Drain,’ he said softly, looking at the door as he
spoke. ‘Behind my back fence. It’s a great horrible brute with green
teeth and red eyes. It has scales and wings and a cruel, slashing tail.
Its breath is foul and stinks of the grave.’
‘And you’ve seen it?’ I croaked.
‘Seen it, seen it. I’ve not only seen it, I’ve fought it. Man and
beast, battling it out in the mouth of Donovan’s Drain. It tried to get
Doo Dah. It eats dogs. And cats. It loves them. Crunches their bones.
But I stopped it, I taught it a thing or two.’ Grandad jumped out of
bed and grabbed a broom out of a cupboard. He started to battle an
imaginary dragon, stabbing at it with the broom and then jumping
backwards.
He leapt up onto the bed. He was as t as a lion. ‘Try to get Doo
Dah, will you? Try to eat my dog? Take that, and that, you smelly
end.’ He lunged at the dragon that wasn’t there, brandishing the
broom like a spear. He looked like a small, wild pirate trying to stop
the enemy from boarding his ship.
Suddenly a cold, crisp voice cut across the room. ‘Get back in
bed,’ it ordered. It was Nurse Gribble. Her mean eyes ashed. ‘Stop
this nonsense at once,’ she snapped at Grandad. ‘There is no such
thing as a dragon. It’s all in your head. You are a silly old man.’
‘He’s not,’ I shouted. ‘He’s not silly. He’s my grandad and he
shouldn’t be in here. He wants to get out.’
The nurse narrowed her eyes until they were as thin as needles.
‘You are upsetting him,’ she said to me. ‘I want you out of here in
ve minutes.’ Then she spun around and left the room.
‘I’ve got to escape,’ said Grandad as he climbed slowly back into
his bed. ‘I’ve got to see the sun and the stars and feel the breeze on
my face. I’ve got to touch trees and smell the salt air at the beach.
And my tomato plants – they will die without me. This place is a
jail. I would sooner be dead than live here.’ His bottom lip started to
tremble. ‘Get a photo, Chris. Get a photo of the dragon. Then they
will know it’s true. Then they will have to let me out. I’m not crazy
– there really is a dragon.’
 He grabbed my arm and stared urgently into my eyes. ‘Please,
Chris, please get a photo.’
‘Okay, Grandad,’ I told him. ‘I’ll get a photo of a dragon, even if I
have to go to the end of the earth for it.’
His eyes grew wilder. ‘Don’t go into the drain. Don’t go into the
dragon’s lair. It’s too dangerous. He will munch your bones. Hide.
Hide at the opening and when he comes out take his photo. Then
run. Run like crazy.’
‘When does it come out?’
‘At midnight. Always at midnight. That’s why you need the ash
on the camera.’
‘How long since you last saw the dragon, Grandad?’ I asked.
‘Two years,’ he said.
‘Two years,’ I echoed. ‘It might be dead by now.’
‘If it is dead,’ said Grandad, ‘Then I am as good as dead too.’ He
looked gloomily around the sterile room.
I heard an impatient sigh from outside. ‘Visiting time is over,’ said
Nurse Gribble, in icy tones.
I gave Grandad a kiss on his prickly cheek. ‘Don’t worry,’ I
whispered in his ear. ‘If there is a dragon I will get his photo.’ The
nurse was just about busting her ear-drums trying to hear what I
said but it was too soft for her to make out the words.
As she showed me out, Nurse Gribble spoke to me in her sucked-
lemon voice. ‘Remember, boy, there’s no such thing as a dragon. If
you humour the old man you will not be allowed back.’
I shook my head as I walked home. Poor Grandad. He thought
there was a dragon in Donovan’s Drain. I didn’t know what to do
now. I didn’t believe in dragons but a promise is a promise. I would
have to go to Donovan’s Drain at midnight at least once. I tried to
think of some other way to get Grandad out of that terrible place
but nothing came to my mind.
 3

And that is how I came to nd myself sitting outside the drain in the
middle of the night. It was more like a tunnel than a drain. It
disappeared into the black earth, from which came all manner of
smells and noises. I shivered and waited but nothing happened. No
dragon. After a while I walked down to the opening and peered in. I
could hear the echo of pinging drips of water and strange gurglings.
It was as black as the insides of a rat’s gizzards.
In the end I went there ve nights in a row. I didn’t see Grandad
in that time because the nurse would only let me visit once a week.
Each night I sat and sat outside the drain but not the slightest trace
of a dragon appeared. It gave me time to think and I started to
wonder if perhaps Grandad’s story could be true. What if he had
seen a dragon? It could be asleep for the winter – hibernating.
Perhaps dragons slept for years. It might not come out again for ten
years. In the end I decided there was only one way to nd out.
I had to go in.
The next night I crept out of the back door when Mum was
asleep. I carried a torch and Grandad’s camera and I wore a parka
and two jumpers. It was freezing.
I walked carefully along the drain with one foot on either side of
the small, smelly stream that ran down the middle. It was big
enough for me to stand upright. I was scared, I will tell you that
now. It was absolutely black in front of me. Behind me the dull
night glow of the entrance grew smaller and smaller. I didn’t want
to go but I forced myself to keep walking into the blackness. Finally
I looked back and could no longer see the entrance.
I was alone in the bowels of the earth in the middle of the night. I
remembered Grandad’s words. ‘Don’t go into the dragon’s lair. It’s
too dangerous. He will munch your bones.’
I also remembered Nurse Gribble’s words. ‘There’s no such thing
as a dragon.’ I almost wished she was right.
 The strong beam of the torch was my only consolation. I shone it
in every crack and nook. Suddenly the idea of a dragon did not
seem silly. In my mind I could see the horrible beast with red eyes
and dribbling saliva, waiting there to clasp me in its cruel claws.
I don’t know how I did it but I managed to walk on for a couple
of hours. I had to try. I had to check out Grandad’s tale. I owed him
that much.
Finally the tunnel opened into a huge cavern. It was big enough
to t ten houses inside. Five tunnels opened into the cavern. Four of
them were made out of concrete but the fth was more like a cave
that had been dug out by a giant rabbit. The earth sides were
covered in a putrid green slime and deep scratch marks.
I carefully made my way into the mouth of this cave. I wanted to
turn and run. I wanted to scream. I half wished that a dragon would
grab me and nish me o just to get it over and done with.
Anything would be better than the terror that shook my jellied esh.
I stumbled and fell many times, as the oor was covered in the
same slime as the walls. The tunnel twisted around and upwards
like a corkscrew. As I progressed a terrible smell became stronger
and stronger. It was so bad that I had to tie my handkerchief over
my mouth.
Just as I was about to give up I stood on something that
scrunched under my feet. It was a bone. I shone the torch on the
oor and saw that small bones were scattered everywhere. There
were bones of every shape and size – many of them were small
skulls. On one I noticed a circle of leather with a brass tag attached.
It said ‘Timmy’. I knew it was a dog’s collar.
As I pushed on, the bones became deeper and deeper until at last
they were like a current sweeping around my knees. My whole body
was shaking with fear but still I pressed on. I had to get that photo.
The only way to get Grandad out of that nursing home was to prove
he wasn’t mad.
Finally the tunnel opened up into another cavern that was so
large my torch beam could not reach the roof. And in the middle,
spread out across a mountain of treasure, was the dragon.

His cruel white jaws gaped at me and his empty eyes were pools of
blackness. He made no movement and neither did I. I stood there
with my knees banging together like jackhammers.
The horrible creature did not jump up and crunch my bones. He
couldn’t. He was dead.
He was just a pile of bones with his wings stretched out in one
last e ort to protect his treasure. He had been huge and ugly. The
dried-out bones of his wings were petri ed in earthbound ight. His
skull dripped with slime and leered at me as if he still sought to
snap my tiny body in two.
And the treasure that he sought to hoard? It was poor indeed.
Piles of junk. Broken television sets, discarded transistor radios,
dustbin lids, old car wheels, bottles, a broken pram, cracked mirrors
and twisted picture frames. There was not a diamond or a gold
sword to be seen. The dragon had been king of a junk heap. He had
saved every piece of rubbish that had oated down the drain.
Now I could get what I came for. I could take a photo. I stood on
a smooth rock and snapped away with my camera. This was the
evidence that would save Grandad. I took about ten photos before
my foot slipped and the torch and camera spun into the air. I heard
them clatter onto the dragon’s pile of junk. The torch blinked as it
landed and then icked out. I was in pitch blackness. Alone with a
dead dragon.
I felt my way carefully forward trying to nd the camera. The
rock on which I had stood was not a rock at all. It was a smooth
type of box with rounded corners. I felt it carefully with my ngers,
then I started to grope my way forward. I had to nd the camera
and the torch but in my heart I knew that it was impossible. They
were somewhere among the dragon’s junk. Somewhere under his
rotting bones. I knew I would never nd either of them in the dark.
As I started to grope around in the rubbish I bumped into an old
oil drum. It clattered down the heap making a terrible clacking as it
went.
Suddenly I felt the damp ground tremble. The noise had loosened
the roof of the cave. Pieces of rock and stone started to fall from
above. The cave was collapsing. The earth shook as huge boulders
fell from the roof above. I had to get out before I was buried alive. I
stumbled back through the rubbish to the tunnel and fought my way
through the piles of bones. I often hit my head on a rock or slipped
on the slimy oor. I could hear an enormous crashing and
squelching coming from behind. Suddenly a roaring lled the air
and a blast of air sent me skidding down the corkscrew passage. The
whole roof of the cavern must have fallen in.
I skidded down the slippery tube on my backside. The oor was
rough and the seat was ripped out of my pants as I tumbled down
and down.
At last I landed upside down at the bottom. I was aching all over
and although I couldn’t see anything I knew I must be bleeding.
A bouncing noise was coming from above. Something was
tumbling down after me. Before I could move, a hard, rubbery
object crashed into me and knocked me down. It was the smooth
box-thing that I had stood on.
I just sat there in the gurgling water and cried. It had all been in
vain. I had seen the remains of the dragon and taken the photo. But
the camera and the dragon and his rubbishy treasure were all buried
under tonnes of rock. The dragon was gone for ever and so was
Grandad’s hope of getting out of the nursing home. There was no
proof that the dragon had ever lived.

5
I could feel the box-thing move o down the drain. It was oating. I
decided to follow it downstream and I think that it probably saved
my life. By following the oating cube I was able to nd my way
back without a torch.
At last – wet, cold and miserable – I emerged into the early
morning daylight. The whole adventure had been for nothing.
Everyone would still think that Grandad was crazy and I was the
only one who knew he wasn’t. All I had to show for my e orts was
the rubbery cube. I had no proof that a dragon had once lived in the
drain.
I looked at the cube carefully. It looked like a huge dice out of a
game of Trivial Pursuit except it had no spots on it. It was heavy
and coloured red. I could see it had no lid. It was solid, not hollow. I
decided to show it to Grandad.
I carried the cube back home and had a shower. Mum had gone
to work. I got into some clean clothes and went round to the nursing
home. The mean-eyed nurse sat in her glass prison warder ’s box at
the end of the corridor.
‘Well,’ she said sarcastically, ‘where is your dragon photo?’
‘I haven’t got one,’ I said sadly, ‘but I have got this.’ I held up the
cube.
‘What is it?’ she snapped.
‘It’s from the dragon’s cave,’ I said weakly.
‘You nasty little boy,’ she replied. ‘Don’t think your lies are going
to get the old man out. You make sure that when you leave that
smelly box leaves too.’
I went down to Grandad’s room. His face lit up when he saw me
but it soon grew sad as he listened to my story.
‘I’m nished, Chris,’ he said. ‘Now I will never be able to prove
my story. I’m stuck here for life.’
We both sat and stared miserably at the cube. Suddenly Grandad
sat up in bed. ‘Wait a minute,’ he said. ‘I’ve read about something
like that in a book.’ He pointed at the cube. ‘I think I know what it
is.’ He was smiling.
 As he spoke, I noticed a crack appearing up one side. With a
sudden snap the whole thing broke in half and a little dragon
jumped out.
‘It’s a dragon’s egg,’ shouted Grandad. ‘Dragon’s eggs are cube-
shaped.’
The little monster ran straight at my leg, snapping its teeth. It was
hungry. I jumped up on the bed with Grandad and we both laughed.
Its teeth were sharp.
The dragon was purple with green teeth. Smoke was coming out
of its ears.
‘I’m getting out of here,’ said Grandad. ‘They can’t keep me now.
We can prove I saw a dragon in the drain. This little fellow didn’t
come from nowhere. I’m free at last.’
‘Hooray,’ I shouted at the top of my voice. ‘It really is a dragon.’
Just then I heard the clip, clop sound of Nurse Gribble’s shoes.
The little dragon stood still and sni ed. He was looking at the door.
He could smell food.
Nurse Gribble stepped into the room and started to speak. ‘There’s
no such thing …’ Her voice turned into a shriek as the tiny new-
born dragon galloped across the room and clamped its teeth onto
her leg. ‘Help,’ she screamed. ‘Help, help. Get it o . Get it o . A
horrible little dragon. It’s biting me.’ She hopped from one side of
the room to the other with the dragon clinging on to her leg tightly
with its teeth. She yelled and screamed and jumped but the dragon
would not let go.
Grandad headed for the door carrying his suitcase.
Nurse Gribble started to shriek. ‘Don’t go, don’t go. Don’t leave
me alone with this dragon.’
Grandad looked at her. ‘Don’t be silly,’ he said. ‘There’s no such
thing as a dragon.’
 Inside Out

‘What did you get?’ asked my sister Mary, looking at the video
cassette in my hand.
‘Chainsaw Murder,’ I answered.
‘You ratbag,’ she screamed. ‘You promised you would get
something nice. You know I can’t stand those horrible shows. I’m
not watching some terrible movie about people getting cut up with
chainsaws. And it was my turn. It was my turn to choose. You said
you would get a love story if I let you choose.’
‘It is a love story,’ I told her. ‘It’s about a bloke who cuts up the
girl he loves with a ch …’
‘Don’t give me that,’ she butted in. ‘It’s another of those
bloodthirsty, spooky, scary horror shows. You know I can’t watch
them. You know I can’t sleep for weeks after I see one of them.’ Her
voice was getting louder and louder and fake tears started rolling
down her face. She was hoping that Mum would hear her and come
and tell me o .
‘It’s no use yelling,’ I said. ‘Mum and Dad are out. They won’t be
back until two o’clock in the morning. They’ve gone out to the
movies.’
‘I’ll get you for this,’ she said in a real mean voice. ‘You just wait.’
She went out of the room and slammed the door behind her. What a
sister. Mary was the biggest sook I had ever met. If the slightest
scary thing came on the screen she would close her eyes and cover
up her ears. She just couldn’t take it. Not like me. I wasn’t scared of
anything. The creepier the show, the better I liked it. I wouldn’t
even have been scared if I met a real ghost. Things like that just
made me laugh.
 I put the cassette into the video player and sat down to enjoy the
show. It was even better than I expected. It started o looking
through a window at a bloke starting up a chainsaw. Suddenly the
window was spattered in blood and you couldn’t see through it. The
whole movie was lled with dead bodies, skeletons coming up out
of graves, ghosts with no heads and people getting cut up with
chainsaws. It was great. I had never had such a good laugh in all my
life.
After about an hour I started to feel hungry. I went over to the
pantry and made myself a peanut butter, Vegemite, banana and
pickle sandwich. I wanted to put on a bit of mustard but I couldn’t
nd any. While I was searching around for it I heard Mary come
into the room. ‘Changed your mind?’ I asked without looking up.
‘What’s the matter? Are you scared up there all on your own in the
bedroom?’
Then I heard a terrible sound. Mary had pushed the EJECT button
on the video player. As quick as a ash she whipped out the cassette
and ran out of the room with it. The little monster had nicked it.
The terrible deed was done in a second. She was quicker than the
villain in Graveyard Robber (a really good video about a freak who
stole corpses). I ran up the stairs after her but I was too late. Mary
slammed her bedroom door and locked it.
I banged on the door with my sts. ‘Give that tape back, you
creep. It’s just up to the good bit where the maggots come out of the
grave.’
‘No way,’ she said through the locked door. ‘I’m not giving it
back. I can hear all the screaming and groaning and creepy music
from up here and I’m scared. I’ll give you the video back if you go
and change it for Love Story.’
‘Love Story!’ I shouted. ‘Never. I’m not watching that mush.’
‘I’m scared, Gordon,’ she said. ‘Please take it back.’ How pathetic.
She sounded just like the helpless woman in I Married A Cannibal
Chief, a ripper movie with lots of gory bits about a bloke with a big
appetite.
 Mary was scared because Mum and Dad were out. That give me
an idea.
‘Give that tape back,’ I said. ‘Or I’m going out and leaving you
here on your own.’ There was no reply. She was being really
stubborn so I turned round and walked down the stairs. I was mad
at her because I really wanted to see the rest of that movie.
Just as I reached the front door she appeared at the top of the
stairs. ‘Come back, Gordon. Please come back. I’ll be frightened here
all on my own.’ I kept going. She had left it too late and it was time
for her to be taught a lesson.

As I walked down the dark street I laughed to myself. Mary was

really wet. She was scared of her own shadow. She would really be
freaking out alone in the house. I had a good laugh and then I
started to wonder why she got so scared. I mean, I wasn’t scared of
anything. I had even watched The Eyes Of The Creeping Dead without
one shiver. And yet Mary, my own esh and blood, was exactly the
opposite.
I started to think about all the horror movies I had ever seen.
There wasn’t one that had spooked me. Why, even if one of them
had come true I wouldn’t have worried. I was so used to seeing
creepy things that a real ghost wouldn’t have scared me. I would
just tell it to buzz o without a second thought.
I walked past the ‘All Night Video Shop’ and down a dark lane.
The moon was in and it was hard to see where I was going. Mary
would have been terri ed but not me. I almost hoped that
something creepy would happen. I walked on and on through the
night into a new neighbourhood. The houses started to thin out until
at last I was on a country track which wound its way amongst the
trees.
 After a short while I came to something I had not expected to nd
out there in the bush. A letter box. It was old and battered and stood
at the edge of the narrow track leading o into the dark trees. I
decided to follow the track and see where it went.
The track led to an old tumble-down house. I could see it quite
clearly because the moon had come out. Its tin roof was rusty and
falling in. Blackberry bushes grew on the verandah and all of the
windows were broken. The front door was hanging o its hinges so
there was nothing to stop me entering. I made my way into the front
room. There in one corner was an old wooden bed. It had no
mattress but it was a bed all the same. I was feeling tired so I
staggered over to it and lay down. I wasn’t scared. Not a bit. I
decided that I would stay in this old shack and not go home until
just before Mum and Dad got back. That would teach Mary a lesson.
I closed my eyes and lay there pretending I was the hero out of
Dark House Of Death. I was a ghost hunter. I was invincible. Nothing
could hurt me. At least that was how I was feeling at the time.
That’s why I hardly batted an eyelid when the candle came oating
over.

Yes, a candle. A lighted candle. It just oated across the room and
hovered next to the bed. I did nothing. I simply gazed at it with
detachment. It came closer until it was only a few centimetres from
my face. I took a deep breath and blew it out. I thought I heard a
gasp. Then the whole thing disappeared.
I turned over on my side and pretended to be asleep (a trick I had
seen in a movie called Blood In The Attic). After a short while I heard
a soft clinking sound coming from the next room. I ignored it. It
grew into a rattling and then a clanking but still I took no notice.
Then it became so loud it shook the oor and hurt my ears. ‘Quiet,’ I
yelled. ‘Can’t a boy get a bit of sleep in here.’ The terrible din
stopped at once.
 I knew something else was going to happen and I wasn’t wrong. A
moment later a green mist oated through the window and formed
itself into a dim, ghostly haze that wafted to and fro across the
room. ‘You shouldn’t smoke in here,’ I said. ‘You might set the place
on re.’ The mist twirled itself around into a spiral and left the room
through a knothole. This was great. This was good. It was just like
what happened in Spectre Of The Lost Lagoon.
What happened next was a bit more creepy. I’m not denying that,
but I decided I was handling the situation the right way. Whatever
or whoever it was wanted me to go screaming o into the night. I
decided to keep playing it cool. A huge pair of lips appeared and
started to open and shut, showing nasty yellow teeth. Next, a pair of
bloodshot eyes appeared, oating just above the lips. From out of
the mouth came an enormous, forked tongue, dripping with saliva.
The tongue licked its lips and then wormed its way over to me.
‘Halitosis,’ I managed to say. It obviously didn’t know what
halitosis was because it remained there, hovering in front of my face
like a snake about to strike. ‘Bad breath,’ I translated. ‘You’ve got
bad breath. Just like the giant pig in Razorback.’ I thought I heard
another small sob just before the whole lot vanished. I wondered if I
had hurt its feelings.
The next apparition consisted of a human skull with staring,
empty eye sockets. ‘Old hat,’ I said. ‘You’ll have to do better than
that.’ Blood started to drip out of one eye. ‘Still not good enough,’ I
told it. ‘I saw that one in a movie called Rotting Skull.’
The other bones appeared and the whole skeleton began to dance
up and down the room, twisting and turning as if to a wild beat.
‘Not very cool,’ I remarked a little unkindly. ‘That went out years
ago. Can’t you do rap dancing?’
That last remark was too cutting. The spook just couldn’t take it.
The skeleton sat down on a rickety chair and changed into a small
ghost. It was the gure of a punk rocker. He was completely
transparent and dressed in a leather jacket which was covered in
studs. He also wore tight jeans and had a safety pin through his
nose. He had a closely shaved head with a pink, mohawk hairdo.
 4

He looked at me and then hung his head in his hands and shed a
few tears. ‘It ain’t no use,’ he wailed. ‘I can’t even put the frighteners
onto a school boy. I’m doomed. I’m a failure.’
‘If you will kindly go away and be quiet, I’ll leave at one o’clock,’
I told him. ‘All I want is a bit of peace.’
He shook his head. ‘You can’t go. I need you for me exam. If I
pass you can clear out – if yer still alive that is. But if I fail me
exam, you’ll have to go into suspended animation until the next
one.’
‘When is that?’ I asked.
‘Same time next year.’
‘No thanks,’ I replied. ‘I have to get back to look after my little
sister. She’s at home alone and she gets scared. As a matter of fact I
think I’ll leave now.’ I tried to stand up but I couldn’t. It was just as
if unseen hands were holding me down.
‘See,’ he said. ‘I aren’t lettin’ you go anywhere. You stay here wiv
me. If I pass me exam you can go. If not – cold storage for you until
next year.’ The safety pin in his nose waggled around furiously as he
spoke.
I could move my mouth but nothing else. ‘I have to go,’ I told
him. ‘I can’t stay here for a year. I’ve made a booking for a video
called Jack The Ripper for tomorrow night.’
‘Yer better help me pass then,’ he said.
‘What do you have to do?’
‘The Senior Spook is comin’. I have to scare a victim, namely you.
If it’s scary enough, he passes me. If it’s not, he fails me. But it don’t
look good. You don’t scare easy. You just sit there givin’ mouthfuls
o’ cheek no matter what I do. I must say it looks bad fer bof ov us. If
I don’t give you a good fright I won’t pass me exam and if I don’t
pass me exam we’ll bof have to stay here until the same time next
year.’
 ‘I’ll fake it,’ I yelled. ‘I’ll pretend I’m scared. Then you’ll pass your
exam and I can go.’
He shook his head sadly. ‘No good. The Senior Spook is very
experienced. That’s how he got to the top. He can pick up vibes.
He’ll know if you’re not really scared.’
‘Let me loose,’ I said. ‘I’ll help you think of something. You could
try something out of Terror At Midnight.’
‘Yer won’t nick orf, will ya?’ he said, looking at me suspiciously.
‘I promise.’
The unseen hands released me and I started to pace around the
room. I thought of Mary. She would be frightened for sure but there
was no way that this little punk ghost would be able to scare me.
‘Have you seen the movie Night Freak?’ I said. ‘That had some
good ideas in it.’
‘No, I missed that one,’ he said. ‘Now quick, sit on the bed. Here
comes the Boss. Our exam is about to begin.’

I sat down where I was told and the Senior Spook oated through
the wall. He was dressed in a pinstriped suit, white shirt and black
tie. He carried a black leather briefcase in his left hand and wore a
pair of gold-rimmed glasses. I could see right through him. He took
no notice of me at all and not much more of the punk spook. He sat
down on a chair, opened his case and took out a biro and a
notebook. Then he looked at his watch and said to the punk, ‘You
have ten minutes. Proceed.’
I could tell that the punk was nervous. He really wanted to pass
this exam and to do that he had to give me a good fright. But I
wasn’t scared. Not a bit. All those years of watching horror videos
made this seem like child’s play. I was worried though because I
didn’t want to be put into cold storage until the same time next year
when the punk could have his next exam in spooking. I tried to feel
scared but I just couldn’t.
The punk produced a tennis ball from nowhere and placed it on
the table. Then he sprinkled some pink powder on it and said,
‘Inside out, ker-pro e.’ The tennis ball started to squirm on the
table. A small split appeared and it turned inside out. Very
impressive but not very spooky. My pulse didn’t increase a jot. I
could just see myself frozen for a year waiting for the punk to have
his next chance. I groaned inside. My punk friend was going to have
to do better than this. He had no imagination at all.
Next he produced a small sausage. He sprinkled some of the pink
powder on it and again said, ‘Inside out, ker-pro e.’ The sausage
split along its side as if it was on a hot barbecue. Then it turned
inside out with all the meat hanging out and the skin on the inside.
The Senior Spook wrote something in his notebook.
This wasn’t good enough. It just wasn’t good enough. It was more
like conjuring tricks than horror. I wasn’t the least bit scared. My
heart sank.
The punk then produced a watermelon from nowhere. Once again
he sprinkled on the pink powder. ‘Inside, out, ker-pro e,’ he said.
The watermelon turned inside out with all of the fruit and the pips
hanging o it. Once again the big shot wrote something in his
notebook.
The punk looked at me. Then, without warning he threw some
pink powder all over me and said, ‘Inside, out, ker–.’
‘Stop,’ screamed the Senior Spook. Then he fainted dead away. He
must have hit the oor a fraction before I did. Being a ghost he
didn’t hurt himself when he went down. I must have hit my head on
the table just after I fainted. I didn’t wake up for about half an hour.
When I woke up I looked around but the house was deserted. I
couldn’t nd a sign of either of them except for something written
in the dust on a mirror. It said, ‘I got an A plus.’
I don’t know how I managed to nd my way back. I was so scared
that my knees knocked. I jumped at every sound.
 When I reached home I went to bed because Mary was watching a
really creepy movie.
It was called The Great Muppet Caper.
 The Busker

‘Can you lend me ten dollars, Dad?’ I asked.

‘No,’ he answered without even looking up.
‘Aw, go on. Just till pocket money day. I’ll pay you back.’
He still didn’t look at me but started spreading butter onto a
bread roll. He was acting just as if I wasn’t there. He ate the whole
roll without saying one word. It was very annoying but I had to play
it cool. If I made him mad I would never get the money.
‘I’ll do some jobs,’ I pleaded. ‘I’ll cut the whole lawn. That’s worth
ten dollars.’
This time he looked up. ‘You must be crazy,’ he said, ‘if you think
I’ll ever let you near that lawn mower again. The last time you cut
the lawn you went straight over about fteen plants I had just put
in. They cost me twenty- ve dollars to buy and ve hours to plant.
You cut every one of them o at the base and now you want me to
give you ten dollars.’
I knew straight away I had made a mistake by mentioning the
lawn. I had to change the subject. ‘It’s important,’ I told him. ‘I need
it to take Tania to the movies on Saturday.’
‘That’s important? Taking Tania to the pictures is important?’
‘It is to me,’ I said. ‘She is the biggest spunk in the whole school.
And she’s agreed to go with me on Saturday night if …’ Another
mistake. I hadn’t meant to tell him that bit.
‘If what?’ he growled.
‘If I take her in a taxi. If I can’t a ord a taxi she’s going to go with
Brad Bellamy. He’s got pots of money. He gets fteen dollars a week
from his dad.’
 ‘Good grief, lad. You’re only fteen years old and you want to
take a girl out in a taxi. What’s the world coming to? When I was
your age …’
‘Never mind,’ I said. ‘Forget it.’ I walked out of the room before
he could get started on telling me how he had to walk ve miles to
school when he was a boy. In bare feet. In the middle of winter. And
then walk home again and chop up a tonne of wood with a blunt
axe. Every time he told the story it got worse and worse. The rst
time he told it he had to walk two miles to school. The way it was
going it would soon be fty miles and ten tonnes of wood chopped
up with a razor blade.
I walked sadly out into the warm night air. Dad just didn’t
understand. This wasn’t just any old date. This was a date with
Tania. She was the best-looking girl I had ever seen. She had long
blonde hair, pearly teeth and a great gure. And she had class. Real
class. There was no way that Tania was going to walk to the movies
or go on a bus. She had already told me it was a taxi or nothing. I
had to give her my answer by tomorrow morning or she would go
with Brad Bellamy. He could a ord ten taxis because his dad was
rich.
‘I’m going for a walk down the beach,’ I yelled over my shoulder.
There was no answer. I might as well be dead for all Dad cared.
I walked along the beach in bare feet, dragging my toes through
the water. I tried to think of some way of getting money. I could
buy a Tattslotto ticket. You never knew what could happen.
Someone had to win. Why not me? Or maybe I could nd the
mahogany ship. It was buried along the beach there under the sand
but it hadn’t been seen for over a hundred years. What if the sea had
swept the sand away and left it uncovered that very night? And I
found it? I could claim the reward of one thousand dollars. Boy,
would I be popular then. I could hire a gold-plated taxi to take
Tania out.
The beach was deserted and the moon was out. I could see quite
clearly. I walked on and on, well away from the town and the
houses. It was lonely and late at night but I wasn’t scared. I was too
busy looking out for the mahogany ship and thinking of how I
would spend the reward money. Every now and then I could see
something sticking out of the sand and I would run up to it as fast as
I could. But each time I was disappointed. All I found were old
forty-four gallon drums and bits of driftwood that had been washed
up by the heavy surf. It’s funny, I didn’t really expect to nd the
mahogany ship. Things like that just don’t happen, but in the back
of my mind I kept thinking I might stumble over it and be lucky.
After a while I decided to climb up to the top of the sand dunes
that ran along the beach. I knew I could see for miles from up there.
I struggled to the top and sat down under a bent and twisted tree.
Just at that moment the moon went in and everything was covered
in darkness.
‘What are you looking for, boy?’ said a deep voice from the
shadows.
I must have jumped at least a metre o the sand. I was terri ed.
There I was, miles away from any help, on an isolated beach in the
middle of the night. And an unseen man was talking to me from the
depths of the shadows. I wanted to run but my legs wouldn’t move.
‘What are you looking for, boy?’ the voice asked again. I stared
into the darkness under the tree and could just make out a shadowy
gure sitting on the sand. I couldn’t see his face but I could tell from
the voice that he was very old.
I nally managed to say something. ‘The mahogany ship,’ I
answered. ‘I’m looking for the mahogany ship. Who are you?’
He didn’t answer me but asked me another question. ‘Why do you
want to nd the mahogany ship, boy?’
‘The reward,’ I stammered. ‘There’s a reward of one thousand
dollars.’
‘And what would you do with one thousand dollars if you had it?’
the voice asked sadly.
I don’t know why I didn’t turn and run. I was still scared but I felt
a little better and thought I could probably run faster than an old
man if he tried anything. Also, there was something about him that
made me want to stay. He sounded both sad and wise at the same
time.
‘A girl,’ I said. ‘There’s this girl called Tania. I need the money to
take her out. Not a thousand dollars, only ten. But a thousand
dollars would be good.’
The old man didn’t say anything for a long time. I still couldn’t
see him properly but I could hear him breathing. Finally he sighed
and said, ‘You think that money would make this girl like you? You
think that a thousand dollars would make you popular?’
He made it sound silly. I didn’t know what to say.
‘Sit down, boy,’ he commanded. ‘Sit down and listen.’
I nearly ran o and left him. It was all very spooky and strange
but I decided to do what he said. He sounded as if he expected to be
obeyed, so I sat down on the sand and peered into the darkness,
trying to see who he was.
‘I am going to tell you a story, boy. And you are going to listen.
When I am nished you can get up and go. But not until I have
nished. Understand?’
I nodded at the dark shadow and sat there without moving. This
is what he told me.

Many years ago there was a busker who worked in Melbourne. He

stood by the railway station and played music to the people who
went by. He dressed completely in ags. His trousers, coat and vest
were made from ags and his bowler hat was covered with a ag.
When he pushed a button a small door would open on his hat and
ags would pop out.
He played a number of di erent musical instruments. With his
feet he pushed pedals which banged three drums. He had a mouth
organ on a wire near his face and he played a guitar with his hands.
His music was terrible but people always stopped to watch and
listen because of his small dog. The dog, whose name was Tiny,
walked around with a hat in her mouth and took up the money
people threw into it. Tiny had a coat made out of the Australian
ag. Whenever the hat was empty Tiny would stand up on her hind
legs and walk around like a person. Everyone would laugh and then
throw money into the hat.
The Busker, for that is what everyone called him, was jealous of
the dog. He could see that the people really stopped and gave
money because of Tiny and not because of the music. But there was
nothing he could do about it because he needed the money.
As the months went by The Busker became more and more
miserable. He wanted people to like him and not the dog. He started
to treat Tiny badly when nobody was looking. Sometimes he would
blame her if the takings were poor. Often he would forget to feed
Tiny for days at a time. The little dog grew thinner and thinner until
at last she was so weak that she couldn’t hold the hat up for the
money. She had to drag it along the ground with her teeth.
Finally a man from the RSPCA came to see The Busker when he
was working outside the station. ‘That dog is a disgrace,’ he said.
‘You are not looking after it properly. It is so hungry its bones are
sticking out. It is not to work again until it is healthy. I will give you
three weeks to fatten it up. If it isn’t healthy by then I will take it
away and you will be ned.’
A crowd was standing around listening. ‘Yes, it’s a shame,’ said a
man who had been watching. ‘Look at the poor little thing.’ Other
people started to call out and boo at The Busker. He went red in the
face. Then he packed up his drums and guitar and put them in his
car and drove o with Tiny.
It was a long way to The Busker’s house for he lived well out of
town. All the way home he thought about what had happened.
‘It’s all the fault of the rotten dog,’ he said to himself. ‘If it wasn’t
for her none of this would have happened.’ The further he went, the
more angry he became. When he reached home he grabbed Tiny by
the scru of the neck and took her round to the back yard. In the
middle of the yard was an empty well. There was no water in the
bottom but it was very deep. It was so deep you couldn’t see the
bottom.
‘I’ll x you, Tiny,’ said The Busker. ‘You’re not allowed to work
for three weeks. Very well then, you can have a holiday. A very nice
holiday.’ He went and fetched a bucket and tied a rope to it. Then
he put Tiny into the bucket and lowered her into the well. The poor
little dog whimpered and barked but soon she was so far down she
could hardly be heard. When the bucket reached the bottom Tiny
jumped out of the bucket and sni ed around the bottom of the well.
It was damp from water that trickled down the wall but there was
nothing to eat. The Busker pulled up the bucket and went inside.
Tiny looked up but all she could see was a small circle of light far
above. She walked round and round the bottom of the well always
gazing up at the patch of light at the top.
The next day The Busker went to work without Tiny. He had no
dog to carry the hat around so he just put it on the ground for
people to put their money in. But hardly anyone did. The Busker
tried his best. He played every tune he could think of and he
cracked jokes. But it was no good. In one day he took only fty
cents. Now he knew for sure that it was Tiny that the people liked
and not him.
He went home and threw some meat down the well. He could
hear the faint sound of Tiny barking far below. ‘It’s no good, Tiny,’
shouted The Busker. ‘I’m not letting you out for three weeks. That
will teach you a lesson.’
Every day The Busker went to work and the same thing
happened. He played his music but hardly anyone put money in the
hat. ‘No one likes me or my music without Tiny,’ said The Busker to
himself. He was angry. He wanted people to like him. It wasn’t the
money so much. He just wanted people to like him. Each night
when he reached home The Busker threw meat down the well for
poor Tiny. ‘Hurry up and get fat, Tiny,’ he said, ‘because you’re not
coming out until you do.’
Tiny walked round and round at the bottom of the well. All day
and night she looked up, hoping to be taken out. But no one ever
came except The Busker and all he did was throw down meat once a
day.
The three weeks went very slowly for The Busker. Each day he
stood at the station playing his music to the people who walked by
without listening. But the three weeks went much more slowly for
the little dog who lay at the bottom of the well, always looking up
at the sky for the help that didn’t come.
At last the three weeks was up. The Busker decided to get Tiny
out. He lowered the bucket down into the well but the little dog
didn’t know what to do. She walked around the bucket but didn’t
get into it. The Busker hadn’t counted on this. ‘Get in, you stupid
dog,’ he shouted. But it was so far down that Tiny could hardly hear
him. In the end he had to go and have a rope ladder made. It cost
him a lot of money because it was so long. And it took a long time
to make. Tiny was down the well for another week before it was
nished.

Then something happened that changed everything. The Busker won

Tattslotto. A letter came telling him that he had won over a million
dollars. He couldn’t believe his luck. It was wonderful. The rst
thing he did was to take his drums, ags and guitar and throw them
down the tip. He went and bought himself a new car and a stereo.
Every day he went to the shops and bought himself anything he
wanted. Soon the house was lled with every luxury you could
think of.
All this time Tiny was still at the bottom of the well, barking and
walking around and around, looking up at the world that was out of
reach so far above. Each night The Busker came and threw down
meat. And each night he told himself that he would get Tiny out in
the morning. But when the morning came he forgot and did
something else.
 The truth is, The Busker was still unhappy. He had no more
friends than before. When he bought things, the salesmen were nice
to him. They patted him on the back and told him how wise he was
to buy this or that. But as soon as he had bought their goods they
lost interest and didn’t want to talk to him.
In the end he realised he had only one friend in the world. Tiny.
Tiny was the only one who really liked him. And he had put her
down a well. He felt bad about what he had done to his little friend
and he rushed to the well to get her out. The Busker climbed down
the well to get Tiny. He was frightened because it was so deep but
he knew that he had to go. There was a terrible smell in the well
which got worse as The Busker went deeper. When he reached the
bottom he put Tiny inside his jumper and started to climb back up
the rope. All the way up Tiny licked The Busker’s face, even though
he had put the poor little dog down a well for all that time.
When he reached the top of the well The Busker put Tiny on the
ground. What he saw made tears come into his eyes. Tiny’s head
was bent back and her eyes stared up at the sky. She couldn’t
straighten up her neck. It was so sti she could only walk around
looking upwards. ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry,’ cried The Busker. ‘What
have I done? Forgive me, Tiny, forgive me.’ Tiny licked The Busker
on the face.
From that time on Tiny always walked with her head bent back
staring at the sky. No vet and no doctor could do anything about it.
She had been down the well too long and her neck was xed in a
bent back position for the rest of her life.
The Busker looked after Tiny well from that time on. He fed her
the best food and took her with him everywhere he went. Tiny
trotted around after The Busker, wagging her tail, even though her
neck was bent back and her head stared up at the sky.
The Busker had all the love of the little dog even though he had
treated her so badly. But it still wasn’t enough. He wanted people to
like him. ‘What good am I,’ he said to Tiny, ‘when my only friend is
a dog?’ He became more and more miserable until one day he hit
upon an idea. A great idea. Or so he thought. He put an
advertisement in the newspaper which said:
TO GIVE AWAY
FREE MONEY
$1.00 PER PERSON
COME AND GET IT

2 ROSE ST, MELTON

EVERY DAY 9.00 AM

‘Tiny,’ said The Busker, ‘the crowds will like me now. This time I
will give them money instead of them giving it to me. I will give
away half of all I have. I don’t need a million dollars. Half of that
will do. Those who need money can come and get a dollar each
whenever they like.’
The next morning The Busker set up a tent in his front yard.
Inside he put a table and a chair and a bucket full of one-dollar
coins. He hung a notice outside which said:
FREE MONEY
$1.00 EACH

At nine o’clock two scru y-looking boys came in. ‘Where’s the
free money, Pop?’ said one of them. This wasn’t what The Busker
had expected. He didn’t really want children. Especially rude ones.
But he had to keep his word so he took a one-dollar coin from the
bucket under the table and gave it to the boy. The boy looked at it
carefully and said to his friend, ‘It’s real.’ Then he turned around
and ran out of the tent. The other boy held out his hand, snatched
his coin and disappeared out of the tent before The Busker changed
his mind.
Soon the tent was lled with more and more children. The word
had spread quickly and every child in the neighbourhood was there.
‘Form a line,’ yelled The Busker. ‘And no pushing.’ The children
were jostling and shoving and some were trying to push in.
The Busker was upset at the rudeness of the children. The rst
three simply grabbed the money and ran but the fourth child, a girl
with big, brown eyes, said, ‘Gee, thanks. Thanks a lot.’ She turned
round to walk out of the tent but The Busker called her back.
‘Here,’ he said, handing her another dollar. ‘You are a very polite
little girl. The only one who has said thanks.’
The next girl in the line heard what was said. After The Busker
handed her a one-dollar coin she said, ‘Thanks a lot, Mister,’ and
then stood there without moving.
‘What are you waiting for?’ asked The Busker.
‘My other dollar,’ said the girl. ‘I said thanks too. So I should get
two dollars as well.’
The Busker sighed and handed her another dollar. After that all of
the children discovered their manners and said, ‘Thanks.’ The
Busker had to give all of them two dollars. He smiled to himself. At
least they were grateful.
The line grew longer and longer. Soon it reached all the way
down the street. After about fty children had taken their two
dollars an old woman came to the front of the queue. The Busker
handed her a dollar. She looked at it and said, ‘Thank you, love. You
are a very kind man. Very kind indeed.’
The Busker smiled and gave her another ve dollars. He was
pleased that she liked him so much.
As the morning passed, more and more adults joined the queue.
The ones who were very polite received more money. The Busker
gave fty dollars to one young woman who said, ‘What a wonderful,
generous and good man you are.’
‘This is more like it,’ he thought to himself. ‘People really like me.
They can see I am really a good man.’ He gave Tiny a pat on the
head. He didn’t even mind when the people in the line paid
attention to Tiny. He wasn’t jealous of Tiny now that he had his
own admirers.
By lunch time the bucket of money was empty. The Busker put up
another sign which said:
CLOSED.
GONE TO THE BANK
 FOR MORE MONEY

The Busker took out two buckets of coins from the bank. ‘You had
better give me some notes as well,’ he said to the teller. He took out
ten thousand dollars’ worth of notes. When he reached home he
found the queue had grown to a couple of kilometres long. It went
down the street and round the corner. As he went by people waved
and a cheer went up. ‘Good old Mister Busker,’ someone yelled out.

Mister Busker. No one had ever called him that before. He felt
wonderful. He went into the tent and started handing out more
money. Most people received two dollars but the ones who said
especially nice things got more. One old man came in, knelt at The
Busker’s feet and kissed his shoes. ‘Oh Great One,’ he said. ‘I give
thanks to you for your great compassion and generosity.’
The Busker was moved. ‘There is no need for that,’ he said. Then
he gave the old man two hundred dollars. The news soon spread
along the line. The more good things you said about The Busker, the
more you got. A lot of people left the queue because they couldn’t
bring themselves to do it. But plenty more took their places. Soon
everyone was getting at least twenty dollars.
At ve o’clock The Busker put up a notice saying he had closed
for the night and would be back in the morning. He went inside and
sat down. He was very tired and soon fell asleep in the chair. At
midnight he was woken up by a noise outside on the street. He went
over to the window and looked out. He got a terrible shock. The
people were still there in a long queue. They were sitting on the
footpath in sleeping bags and blankets. Some had even put up small
tents. A man in a van was selling pies, hot dogs and ice creams. No
one wanted to lose their place in the queue and they were all
staying for the night. It was like a crowd waiting to buy tickets to
see a pop star. The Busker grinned. He felt like a celebrity. All of
those people were there because of him.
In the morning a television crew came. They did interviews with
The Busker and he was on the evening news. People came from
everywhere to see the sight. The police arrived to control the tra c
and keep the crowds in order. The queue grew longer and longer.
And The Busker gave out larger and larger amounts of money. He
had to. The people expected it when they said nice things to him.
They went to lots of trouble. Some held up signs with his name on.
Others had done drawings of him. One group had formed a band
and sang a song saying what a great person The Busker was. Two
students had made up a poem. He gave them two hundred dollars
each.
On the third day the queue was four miles long. On the fth day
it was six miles long. People had to wait for three days to reach the
front and The Busker had given away over half a million dollars.
The money was brought every morning from the bank in an
armoured car. Tiny ran up and down the line licking everyone with
her little turned-up head.
At the end of the week the armoured car brought a large box of
money. ‘I will need one hundred thousand dollars to see me over the
weekend,’ said The Busker.
‘I’m sorry,’ said the bank manager, ‘but there are only ninety
thousand dollars left. If I were you I would stop now and keep some
for myself.’ The Busker knew that this was good advice. But he
couldn’t keep it. The crowd all expected money. Some of them had
been waiting in line for three days and three nights. He tried to cut
back and give each person less but he couldn’t. They all knew what
each compliment was worth. Two hundred dollars for a good song
about the busker and fty dollars for a drawing of him. He tried to
give less but they started complaining and yelling that it wasn’t fair.
They said they were being cheated.
The Busker was sick of it. He realised that they didn’t really like
him. He was tired of hearing people tell him how good he was. But
he had to keep going.
 Finally the terrible moment came. He ran out of money. There
wasn’t one cent left. He wrote a sign which said:
OUT OF MONEY

He hung the sign on the tent door and ran into the house with
Tiny. The news spread down the line like wild re. ‘There is no more
money,’ they yelled. The line broke up and the mob charged up to
the house. They started yelling and banging on the door. The Busker
was scared out of his brain. Someone threw a rock through the
window and glass scattered all over the oor.
‘Cheat,’ he heard someone yell.
‘Robber.’
‘I’ve been waiting in the freezing cold for two nights.’
‘Get him. Teach him a lesson.’
Another rock smashed through the window. The door was rattling
and shaking. The Busker knew it would soon collapse. He ran out of
the back door, followed by Tiny. The yard was empty and there was
nowhere to hide. He could hear the mob smashing and crashing
around inside the house. He had to hurry. Then he saw the well
with the rope ladder still hanging down inside. He ran over to it and
climbed down, leaving Tiny at the top. He was only just in time. The
angry crowd burst into the back yard yelling and shouting.
When they saw that he had escaped they went crazy. They
smashed up the house and stole all The Busker’s new purchases.
They broke everything they could get their hands on. One group
even destroyed the back fence and the top of the well. Someone
untied the rope ladder and let it go. They had no idea that, far
below, the terri ed Busker was hiding at the bottom.
After a while the police managed to control the mob and send
them home. But it was too late to save the house. When darkness
came it was a complete ruin. The Busker looked up and saw the
moon. He thought it would be safe to call out for help. He yelled
and yelled at the top of his voice but no one answered. Nobody
could hear him, for the well was too deep. No one knew he was
there. Except Tiny.

Days passed and no help came. It was cold and dark and smelly at
the bottom of the well. The Busker would have starved to death if it
hadn’t been for Tiny. The little dog ran o in search of food. It was
very di cult, for with her head bent back she had trouble picking
anything up in her mouth. She had to lie down on her side, grasp a
piece of food in her teeth and then stand up. After this she would
trot to the well with an old bone or piece of stale bread and drop it
down the well.
The days turned into weeks and still no help came. The Busker
stayed alive by eating whatever Tiny dropped down the well.
Sometimes it was a piece of rotten meat from a dustbin or a gnarled
old bone left by another dog. Once Tiny dropped down a dead cat.
Whatever it was, The Busker had to eat it or starve.
In all this time, Tiny gave everything she found to the Busker. She
ate practically nothing herself. After a month she was skin and bone
and so weak she could hardly drag herself to the well.
The Busker shouted and shouted every day but no one came. He
yelled up at the sun, at the clouds, at the moon so far above. But no
one answered. Then, one day, a terrible thing happened. Nothing
was dropped down the well. No bone, no scraps, nothing. The next
day was the same. And the day after that. The Busker licked the
water o the wet wall but he had nothing to eat. He knew that his
time had come. He couldn’t last much longer. He grew weaker and
weaker. And he wondered what had happened to Tiny.
At the end of the fth week The Busker decided to give one more
loud shout. His voice was almost gone. ‘Help,’ he screamed. ‘Help.’
He peered up at the small dot of light above. Was that a head
looking down? Was that a voice? He strained to listen.
 ‘Hang on,’ said a faint voice. ‘We will soon have you out.’ He was
saved.
A little later a steel cable came down the well. There was a small
seat on the end. The Busker sat on it and yelled up the well. ‘Take
me up. Take me up.’
When he reached the top he blinked. The bright light hurt his
eyes but he managed to see four or ve men with a tow truck and a
winch. They were staring at this wild, smelly, dirty man that had
come out of the well. ‘We had better get you to hospital,’ said one of
the men. ‘You don’t look too good.’
‘You’re lucky to be alive,’ said another. ‘I never would have heard
you if it wasn’t for that poor little dog lying over there. I came over
to see if it was still alive and heard you calling out.’
The Busker ran over to where the little dog lay on the ground.
She was dead. She had starved to death because she had dropped
every piece of food she could nd down to The Busker. Tears fell
down his tangled beard. He picked Tiny up in his arms. ‘You can
leave me,’ he said to the men. ‘I will be all right.’
He buried Tiny in a small grave, there in the back yard. On a
piece of wood he wrote:
MY FRIEND TINY
R.I.P.

Then The Busker shu ed o . He was never seen again.

‘And that is the end of the story,’ said the old man.
I had forgotten where I was. Sitting there on a sand dune at the
beach in the middle of the night. The story had completely taken me
in. I looked at the old man but I still couldn’t see this face. I wanted
to ask him questions. I wanted to know if the story was true. I
wanted to know what happened to The Busker. But I never got the
chance.
‘Go now, boy,’ said the old man. ‘That is the end of the story. Go
and leave me alone. I am tired.’
I didn’t want to go but he sounded as if he meant it. I stood up
and walked away along the top of the sand dune. After I had gone a
little way the moon came out. I turned around and looked back at
the tree where the old man had told the story. I could see him
clearly. He had a white beard and was standing there in the
moonlight looking up into the tree. Then he walked away, now
looking up at the stars and the moon. With a shock I realised his
neck was xed back. He couldn’t move it. He was destined to spend
all his days looking up, as he had looked up that well so many years
ago.
The story was true. And the old man was The Busker. I watched
him shu e away with his bent neck. Then the moon went in and he
was gone.
I ran home as fast as I could and jumped into bed. But I couldn’t
sleep. I lay there thinking about the sad, strange tale of Tiny and
The Busker who had tried to use money to make people like him.
The next morning I met Dad on the stairs. He pushed ten dollars
into my hand. ‘Here you are, Tony,’ he said. ‘If Tania won’t go out
with you unless you take her in a taxi, you might as well have the
money.’
‘Thanks, Dad,’ I said.
I stu ed the ten dollars into my pocket. Then I went round to
Tania’s house and told her to go jump in the lake.
 Souperman

‘Look at this school report,’ said Dad. ‘It’s a disgrace. Four D’s and
two E’s. It’s the worst report I have ever seen.’
He was starting to go red in the face. I knew I was in big trouble.
I had to do something. And fast.
‘I did my best,’ I said feebly.
‘Nonsense,’ he yelled. ‘Look what it says down the bottom here.
Listen to this.’
Robert could do much better. He has not done enough work this term. He spends all his time at
school reading Superman comics under the desk.

‘That’s it,’ he raved on. ‘That’s the end of all this Superman
silliness. You can get all those Superman comics, all those posters
and all the rest of your Superman junk and take it down to the
Council rubbish bin.’
‘But Dad,’ I gasped.
‘No buts, I said now and I mean now.’ His voice was getting louder
and louder. I decided to do what he wanted before he freaked out
altogether. I walked slowly into the bedroom and picked up every
one of my sixty Superman comics. Then I trudged out of the front
door and into the corridor. We lived on the rst oor of the high-
rise ats so I took the lift down to the Council rubbish bin. It was
one of those big steel bins that can only be lifted up by a special
garbage truck. I could only just reach the top of it by standing on
tip-toes. I shoved the comics over the edge and then caught the lift
back to the rst oor.
That was when I rst met Superman.
He was making a tremendous racket in at 132b. It sounded as if
someone was rattling the window. It can be very dangerous banging
on the windows when you live upstairs. At rst I thought it was
probably some little kid trying to get outside while his mother was
away shopping. I decided to do the right thing and go and save him.
I pushed open the door, which wasn’t locked, and found myself in
the strangest room I had ever seen.
The walls of the at were completely lined with cans of soup.
Thousands and thousands of cans were stacked on bookshelves
going right up to the ceiling. It was a bit like a supermarket.
Then I noticed something even stranger. I looked over at the
window and saw someone trying to get in. I couldn’t believe my
eyes. It was him. It was really him. My hero – Superman. In person.
He was clinging to the outside ledge and trying to open the
window. He was pu ng and blowing and couldn’t seem to lift it up.
Every now and then he looked down as if he was frightened of
falling. I ran over to the window and undid the catch. I pulled up
the window and Superman jumped in.

He looked just as he did in the comics. He was wearing a red cape

and a blue-and-red out t with a large ‘S’ on his chest. He had black,
curly hair and a handsome face. His body rippled with muscles.
‘Thanks,’ he said. ‘You came just in time. I couldn’t hang on much
longer.’
My mouth fell open. ‘But what about your power?’ I asked him.
‘Why didn’t you just smash the window open?’
He smiled at me. Then he held one nger over his mouth and
went over and closed the door I had left open. ‘My power only lasts
for half an hour,’ he said. ‘I had to go all the way to Tasmania to
rescue a woman lost in the snow. I only just made it back to the
window when my power ran out. That’s why I couldn’t get the
window open.’
 ‘Half an hour?’ I said. ‘Superman’s power doesn’t last for half an
hour. It lasts for ever.’
‘You’ve been reading too many comics,’ he responded. ‘It’s S-o-u-
p-e-r-m-a-n, not S-u-p-e-r-m-a-n. I get half an hour of power from
each can of soup.’
I started to get nervous. This bloke was a nut. He was dressed up
in a Superman out t and he had the story all wrong. He thought
Superman’s power came from drinking cans of soup. I started to
walk towards the door. I had to get out of there.
‘Come back, and I’ll show you,’ he said. He went over to the
fridge and tried to lift it up. He couldn’t. He strained until drops of
sweat appeared on his forehead but the fridge didn’t budge. Next he
picked up one of the cans of soup and tried to squeeze it. Nothing
happened. He couldn’t get it open.
‘See,’ he went on. ‘I’m as weak as a kitten. That proves that I have
no power.’
‘But it doesn’t prove that you’re Superman,’ I said.
He walked over to a drawer and took out a bright blue can
opener. Then he took out a book and ipped over the pages. ‘Here it
is,’ he exclaimed. ‘Lifting up refrigerators. Pea and ham soup.’
He took down a can of pea and ham soup from the shelf and
opened it up with the bright blue can opener. Then he drank the lot.
Raw. Straight out of the can.
‘Urgh,’ I yelled. ‘Don’t drink it raw.’
‘I have to,’ he said. ‘I don’t have time to heat it up. Just imagine if
I got a call to save someone who had fallen from a building. They
would be smashed to bits on the ground before the soup was warm.’
He walked over to the fridge and lifted it up with one hand. He
actually did it. He lifted the fridge high above his head with one
hand. I couldn’t believe it. The soup seemed to give him
superhuman strength.
‘Fantastic,’ I shouted. ‘No one except Superman could lift a fridge.
Do you really get your power from cans of soup?’
 He didn’t answer. Instead he did a long, loud burp. Then he held
his hand up over his mouth and went red in the face. ‘Sorry,’ he
said. ‘I’ve got a stomach ache. It always happens after I drink the
soup too
quickly. I’ll just nick into the bathroom and get myself an Alka
Seltzer for this indigestion.’
Indigestion? Superman doesn’t get indigestion. He is like the
Queen or the Pope. He just doesn’t have those sort of problems and
he doesn’t burp either. It wouldn’t be right. That’s when I knew he
was a fake. I decided to try the soup out myself while he was in the
bathroom and prove that it was all nonsense.
I looked at the book which had the list of soups. There was a
di erent soup named for every emergency. For burst dams it was
beef broth. For stopping trains it was cream of tomato. Celery soup
was for rescuing people from oods.
I decided to try the chicken soup. It was for smashing down
doors. I picked up the bright blue can opener and used it on a can of
chicken soup I found on the top shelf. I drank the whole lot. Cold
and raw. It tasted terrible but I managed to get it down. Then I went
over to the door and punched it with my st.
Nothing happened to the door but my poor ngers were skinned
to the bone. The pain was awful. My eyes started to water. ‘You
fake,’ I yelled through the bathroom door. ‘You rotten fake.’ I rushed
out of the at as fast as I could go. I was really mad at that phoney
Souperman. He was a big disappointment. I wished I could meet the
real Superman. The one in the comics.

My comics! I needed them badly. I wanted to read about the proper

Superman who didn’t eat cans of raw soup and get indigestion. I
wondered if the garbage truck had taken the comics yet. There
might still be time to get them back. It had taken me three years to
save them all. I didn’t care what Dad said, I was going to keep those
comics. I rushed down to the Council bin as fast as I could.
I couldn’t see inside the bin because it was too high but I knew by
the smell that it hadn’t been emptied. I jumped up, grabbed the
edge, and pulled myself over the top. What a stink. It was putrid.
The bin contained broken eggshells, old bones, hundreds of empty
soup cans, a dead cat and other foul muck. I couldn’t see my comics
anywhere so I started to dig around looking for them. I was so busy
looking for the comics that I didn’t hear the garbage truck coming
until it was too late.
With a sudden lurch the bin was lifted into the air and tipped
upside down. I was dumped into the back of the garbage truck with
all the lthy rubbish. I was buried under piles of plastic bags, bottles
and kitchen scraps. I couldn’t see a thing and I found it di cult to
breathe. I knew that if I didn’t get to the top I would su ocate.
After what seemed like hours I managed to dig my way up to the
surface. I looked up with relief at the ats towering above and at
the clouds racing across the sky. Then something happened that
made my heart stop. The rubbish started to move. The driver had
started up the crusher on the truck and it was pushing all the
rubbish up to one end and squashing it. A great steel blade was
moving towards me. I was about to be attened inside a pile of
garbage. What a way to die.
‘Help,’ I screamed. ‘Help.’ It was no use. The driver couldn’t see
me. No one could see me. Except Souperman. He was sitting on the
window ledge of his room and banging a can of soup on the wall.
He was trying to open it.
The great steel blade came closer and closer. My ribs were
hurting. A great pile of rubbish was rising around me like a swelling
tide and pushing me upwards and squeezing me at the same time.
By now I could just see over the edge of the truck. There was no one
in sight. I looked up again at Souperman. ‘Forget the stupid soup,’ I
yelled. ‘Get me out of here or I will be killed.’
Souperman looked down at me from the rst- oor window and
shook his head. He looked scared. Then, without warning, and with
the unopened can of soup still in his hand, he jumped out of the
window.
Did he y through the air in the manner of a bird? No way. He
fell to the ground like a human brick and thudded onto the footpath
not far from the truck. He lay there in a crumpled heap.
I tried to scream but I couldn’t. The crusher had pushed all the air
out of my lungs. It was squeezing me tighter and tighter. I knew I
had only seconds to live.
I looked over at Souperman. He was alive. He was groaning and
still trying to open the can of soup. From somewhere deep in my
lungs I managed to nd one more breath. ‘Leave the soup,’ I gasped,
‘and turn o the engine.’
He nodded and started crawling slowly and painfully towards the
truck. His face was bleeding and he had a black eye but he kept
going. With a soft moan he pulled himself up to the truck door and
opened it. ‘Switch o the engine,’ I heard him tell the driver. Then
everything turned black and I heard no more.
The next thing I remember was lying on the footpath with
Souperman and the driver bending over me.
‘Don’t worry,’ said Souperman with a grin. ‘You’ll be all right.’
‘Thanks for saving me,’ I replied. ‘But you’re still a phoney. The
real Superman can y.’
‘I can y,’ he told me, ‘but I couldn’t get the can of soup open.
When you rushed out of my at you took something of mine with
you. Look in your pocket.’
I felt in my pocket and pulled out a hard object. It was a bright
blue can opener.
 The Gumleaf War

The park ranger looked out of the train window and said, ‘It’s a hot
summer. We’ll have bush res this year for sure.’
No one in the carriage answered him. They were all too busy
looking at me and my nose. They weren’t looking straight at me.
They were straining their eyeballs by trying to look out of the
corner of their eyes. I didn’t pay any attention to them. If they
wanted to be sticky-beaks, that was their business and there was
nothing I could do about it. I was used to people staring at me but it
still made me embarrassed. After all, I couldn’t help it. I didn’t ask
to have the longest nose in the world. It happened by accident and
it wasn’t my fault.
Actually, I had only had the nose for three months. But three
months is a long time when your nose has been stretched to seven
centimetres long. Every day is lled with humiliation and pain
because of people staring and smiling to themselves.
It all started one night when I went down to the kitchen to get
myself a snack from the pantry. Dad and Mum were asleep so I crept
down the stairs as quietly as I could. The pantry had two swinging
doors which closed in the middle. I opened them a few centimetres
and poked my nose through, looking at all the goodies within.
Suddenly, someone pushed me from behind and I fell onto the
doors, slamming them shut. The only problem was, my nose was
stuck between them. The pain was terrible and there was blood
everywhere. My screaming just about brought the house down and
Dad and Mum rushed into the kitchen. Dad shoved me in the car
and raced me o to hospital while Mum stayed home and told my
little brother o for pushing me in the back and causing all the
trouble.
 The damage to my nose was monstrous. It was stretched from its
normal three centimetres to seven. It stuck out on the front of my
face like the bonnet of a car in front of the windscreen. I could see
my own nose quite clearly without even using a mirror or going
cross-eyed. And to make matters worse, the doctors said nothing
could be done for another three years when I had stopped growing.
They weren’t willing to operate on it for three whole years. Three
years of walking around with my own personal agpole. I felt ill at
the thought of it.
I only lasted one day back at school. Most kids were pretty good
about it. They tried not to stare at me and only peered at my nose
when they thought I couldn’t see them. But people have to look at
you when you talk and I could see some of them were having a hard
time not to crack up laughing. And then there were those who were
downright mean. One girl made a smart remark about the only boy
in the world who had to blow his nose with a bedsheet.
When I got home from school I gave it to Mum straight. ‘I’m not
going back to school,’ I said. ‘No way. I’ve nished with school for
three years. I’m not going to be the laughing stock of Terang High.’
Mum and Dad tried everything to get me back at school. They
tried bribes, but I wouldn’t take them. Dad lifted me into the car
and dumped me at the school gate but I just walked home again.
They brought in a psychologist, a nice bloke who spent hours and
hours talking to me. But nothing worked. In the end they decided to
send me for a holiday with Grandfather McFuddy, who lived all
alone in a shack high in the mountains. They thought a spell in the
country might bring me back to my senses.
So there I was, sitting in the train on the way to Grandfather
McFuddy’s with a carriage load of people staring at me out of the
corner of their eyes. Besides the ranger there was a clergyman with
a white dog-collar around his neck, an old woman of about thirty-
ve and a girl about my age. The girl was biting her tongue trying
to stop herself from laughing at my nose. In fact the only passenger
who wasn’t interested in my nose was the park ranger. He just kept
mumbling to himself about how dry it was and how there were
going to be bad bush res this year.

Grandfather McFuddy was waiting for me at the station with a horse

and trap. A horse and trap. That gave me a surprise for a start. I
didn’t think anyone drove around in a horse and trap any more. But
that was nothing compared with what was to come. Grandfather
McFuddy turned out to be the strangest old boy I had ever met. He
was dressed in dirty trousers held up with a scungy pair of braces.
He had a blue singlet and a battered old hat which was pulled down
over his whiskery face. His false teeth were broken and covered in
brown tobacco stains. He cleared his throat and spat on the ground.
‘Git up here, boy,’ he said. ‘We have to git back before dark.’
I don’t know how Grandfather McFuddy recognised me because I
had never met him before. I guess he recognised my nose from
Mum’s letters. We rattled along the dusty road which wound its way
through the still gum forest. ‘Thanks for having me for a holiday,
Grandfather,’ I said.
Grandfather grunted and said, ‘Call me McFuddy.’ He wasn’t a
great one for talking. I told him all about my nose and what had
happened at school but he made no comment. Every now and then
he would cough terribly and spit on the ground. He was a fantastic
spitter. He could send a gorbie at least four metres. A couple of
times he stopped the horse and rolled himself a cigarette.
After a while the trees turned into paddocks and the road started
to wind its way upwards. There was only one house, if you could
call it a house, on the whole road. It was really a tumble-down old
shack with a rusty iron roof and a rickety porch. McFuddy stopped
the cart before we reached the shack. ‘Cover your ears, boy,’ he said
to me.
‘What?’ I asked.
 ‘Block your ears. Put your hands over your ears while we go past
Foxy’s place,’ he yelled.
‘Why?’ I wanted to know.
‘Because I say so,’ said McFuddy. He put his hand in his pocket
and shed out a dirty wad of cotton wool. He tore o two pieces
and stu ed them in his ears. Then we went slowly past the old
shack, me with my hands over my ears and McFuddy with cotton
wool sticking out of his. The horse was the only one of us who could
hear. An old man ran out onto the porch of the shack and started
shaking his st at us. He was mad about something but I didn’t
know what. I was shocked to see that the old man had cotton wool
in his ears as well. There was one thing for sure, I told myself: this
was going to be a very strange holiday.
McFuddy stood up in the cart and started shaking his st back at
the other old man. Then he sat down and drove on, grumbling and
mumbling under his breath.
I looked round at the shack to see what the angry old man was
doing. All I could see was the top of his bald head. He was bending
over, peering through a telescope set up on the porch. It was
pointed at another old shack higher up the mountain.
‘He’s looking at my place,’ said McFuddy. ‘That’s my place up
there.’ My heart sank. Even though McFuddy’s shack was about a
kilometre away I could see it was a ramshackle, neglected heap.
There were rusty cars, old fridges and rubbish all around it. The
weatherboards were falling o and the last ake of paint must have
peeled o about a hundred years ago.
We went inside the shack and McFuddy showed me my room. It
was the washroom. It had a broken mangle and an empty trough.
On the oor was a dusty striped mattress and an old grey blanket.
The whole place was covered in cobwebs and the windows were
lthy dirty. In the kitchen I noticed a telescope pointing out of a
window. A little patch had been cleaned on the window pane to
allow the telescope to be aimed down the hill at Foxy’s shack.
 ‘I’m going to put in some fenceposts in the top paddock,’ said
McFuddy. ‘You can have a look around if you want, boy, but don’t
go down near Foxy’s place. And don’t git lost.’ He went out into the
hot afternoon sun, banging the door behind him.
I wandered around McFuddy’s farm, which didn’t take long, and
then decided to go and explore a small forest further up the hill. I
saw a brown snake and a couple of lizards but not much else. In the
distance I could hear McFuddy banging away at his fenceposts. Then
I heard something else quite strange. It was music. Someone was
playing a tune but I couldn’t work out what sort of instrument it
was. Then it came to me. It was a gumleaf. Someone was playing
‘Click Go The Shears’ on a gumleaf.
I sat down on a log and listened. It was wonderful listening to
such a good player. The tune wafted through the silent gum trees
like a lazy bee. I strained my eyes to see who it was but I couldn’t
see anyone. Then, suddenly, I felt a pain in my left hand. I looked
down and saw a deep scratch. It was bleeding badly. I wondered
how I had done it. I thought I must have scratched it on a branch. I
forgot all about the music and ran back to the shack as fast as I
could.
McFuddy was sitting in the kitchen having a cup of tea. He was as
angry as a snake when he saw the cut. ‘How did you do it?’ he
yelled.
‘I don’t know,’ I answered. ‘I just noticed it when I was sitting on
a log.’
‘Was there music?’ he shouted. ‘Did you hear music?’
‘Yes, someone was playing a gumleaf. A good player too.’
McFuddy went red in the face. ‘They were playing “Click Go The
Shears” weren’t they?’ he said. I nodded. He jumped out of his chair
and ran over to the wall and took down a shotgun. ‘That rat Foxy,’
he spluttered. ‘I’ll get him for this. I’ll x him good.’ He ran over to
the door and red both barrels of the shotgun somewhere in the
direction of Foxy’s shack. It went o with a terri c bang that rattled
the windows.
 I ran outside and looked down the mountainside. Far below I
could see Foxy’s shack. A tiny gure was standing on the porch and
pointing something up at us. There was a small ash and then the
dull sound of another shotgun blast echoed through the hills.
‘Missed,’ said McFuddy. ‘Missed by a mile.’ He went back in the
kitchen chuckling to himself. I wasn’t surprised that Foxy had
missed. I wasn’t surprised that either of them had missed. Shotguns
aren’t meant to be used over long distances. There was no way they
could have hit each other.
‘What’s going on?’ I asked. ‘Foxy didn’t give me the scratch. There
was no one near me at all. I didn’t see one person the whole time I
was away. It wasn’t his fault. It was an accident.’
McFuddy didn’t answer for a while. He was eating a great slab of
bread covered in blackberry jam. He pushed his false teeth between
his lips and shed around under them with his tongue, cleaning out
the blackberry seeds. When he had nished he said, ‘Don’t git
yerself into something yer don’t understand. Foxy is lower than a
snake’s armpit. He caused that cut and that’s that.’
‘But,’ I began.
‘No buts. And don’t go wandering o again without my
permission.’
That was the end of the discussion. He just wouldn’t say any more
about it. That night I went to bed on the old mattress. I tossed and
turned for a while but at last I went o to sleep.

In the morning McFuddy had a terrible cold. He was coughing and

sneezing and spitting all the time. His nose was as red as a tomato.
He was in a bad temper. ‘Foxy’s been here,’ he yelled. ‘He’s given
me the u. He came when I was in bed and I couldn’t git out quick
enough.
‘Didn’t yer hear it boy? Didn’t yer hear the gumleaf playing?’
 ‘No,’ I said. ‘And I don’t believe Foxy gave you the u. You can’t
catch colds through closed windows.’ I walked out of the front door
to get away from his coughing. That’s when I saw the note. A
crumpled dirty envelope was lying on the porch. It said:
To the boy, with the long nose.
I tore it open. Inside was a message for me.
Sorry about the scratch, boy. I thought you was McFuddy.
McFuddy tore the note out of my hand. ‘I knew it. I just knew it,’
he spluttered. ‘That low-down ratbag was up here last night and he
gave me the rotten u.’ He ran inside and came out with the
shotgun again. Once again he red o both barrels down at Foxy’s
shack. The shot was answered straight away by another dull bang
from Foxy in the valley below.
I tried to get McFuddy to explain what was going on but he was
in a bad mood and wouldn’t say anything about it. ‘I’m straining a
fence today,’ he said. ‘And I need your help. Grab one end of that
corner post and we’ll take it down to the bottom paddock.’
We staggered down the hillside with the heavy post. I was
surprised at how strong McFuddy was. He didn’t stop once but he
coughed and spat the whole way. Then, just as we neared the fence
line McFuddy stepped in a pat of fresh cow dung and slipped over.
‘Ouch,’ he screamed. ‘My ankle. My ankle.’ I rushed over to him and
looked at his ankle. It was already starting to swell and turn blue.
‘I’ll help you back to the house,’ said. ‘This looks serious.’ I looked
at his face. It was all screwed up with pain. Then, suddenly, a
change swept over him and he grinned.
‘Good,’ he said. ‘It hurts like the dickens. Just what I wanted.’ He
started to cackle like a chook that had just laid an egg. ‘Go git me a
stick boy. This is the best thing that’s happened for a long while.’ I
found him a stick and he used it to help him hobble o to the road.
He limped badly and I could see his ankle was hurting.
‘Where are you going?’ I asked him. ‘You can’t go o down the
road with that ankle.’
 ‘I’m going to the old twisted gum,’ he called back over his
shoulder. ‘And then I have some other business. You can go back to
the house, boy, and don’t you try to follow me.’ He limped slowly
down the road and nally disappeared round a bend in the road.
The whole thing was crazy. These two old men shooting at each
other. And blaming each other for things they couldn’t have done.
And sneaking around playing tunes on a gumleaf in the middle of
the night. I had to nd out what was going on. So I followed
McFuddy down the road, making sure I kept behind bushes where
he couldn’t see me.

I found it easy to keep up with him because he went so slowly on

account of his twisted ankle. After about an hour he reached the old
twisted gum he had pointed out to me the day before. I noticed all
of the lower branches were stripped bare of leaves as if stock had
been grazing on them. McFuddy hit at a branch with his stick and a
leaf fell o . He put it up to his lips and blew. A strong musical note
oated up the road. McFuddy laughed to himself and put the leaf in
his pocket. Then he headed o down the road. I knew where he was
going.
Sure enough, after about another hour of hobbling, McFuddy
reached Foxy’s shack. Foxy was peering into his telescope, which
was pointed at our place. McFuddy crept on all fours along a row of
bushes so he couldn’t be seen. When he was quite close to the shack,
but still out of sight, he grabbed the gumleaf and started to play a
tune. I couldn’t hear what it was because a strong wind was blowing
but I found out later that it was ‘Click Go The Shears’.
As soon as the rst few notes sounded, Foxy jumped up in the air
as if he had been bitten. Then he clapped his hands over his ears
and ran inside screaming out at the top of his voice. McFuddy
turned and ran for it. He bolted out to the road like a rabbit. I had
never seen him move so fast. It took me a few seconds to realise he
wasn’t limping. His sprained ankle was cured. It wasn’t swollen and
it didn’t hurt.
Foxy came out onto the porch carrying a shotgun, which he red
into the air over McFuddy’s head. ‘You’re gone, McFuddy,’ he
shouted. ‘I’ll have you for goanna oil.’ He tried to chase McFuddy up
the road but he couldn’t. He had a sprained ankle.

My head started to spin. This was the weirdest thing I had ever
come across. These two old men seemed to be able to give each
other their illnesses and cure themselves at the same time. By
blowing a gumleaf where the other person could hear it. I decided
to nd out what was going on and I followed McFuddy up the dusty,
winding road.
I caught up to him under the old twisted gum tree where he was
sitting down for a rest. He was laughing to himself in his raspy
voice. I could see he thought he had won a great victory. ‘That’s
xed him,’ he said. ‘That’ll slow him down for a bit.’ McFuddy
didn’t seem to care about me following him. In fact he seemed
pleased to have someone to show o to.
‘What’s happened to your sprained ankle?’ I demanded. ‘And how
come Foxy’s got one now and he didn’t have before?’
McFuddy looked at me for a bit and then he said, ‘You might as
well know the truth, boy. After all, you are family. It’s this tree. This
old twisted gum tree. When you play “Click Go The Shears” on one
of its leaves, it passes your illness on to whoever hears it. But it only
works for leaves on this tree. And the only tune that makes it work
is “Click Go The Shears”.’
It seemed too fantastic to believe but I had seen it work with my
own eyes. ‘Why does it only work with leaves from this old twisted
gum tree?’ I asked.
 ‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘I’ve tried it with hundreds of other trees
but it never works. It only works with this tree.’ He gave an
enormous sneeze and spat on the road. His nose was still red and his
eyes were watering.
‘Well, how come you’ve still got your cold?’ I asked. ‘Why didn’t
Foxy get that back just now when you passed on the sprained
ankle?’
‘You can’t get it back again. The same thing can only be passed
on once. After that you are stuck with it. I will just have to wait for
the cold to go away on its own. And Foxy can’t give me the sprained
ankle back. He will have to wait for it to get better in the normal
way. That’s the way it works.’ McFuddy took the gumleaf out of his
pocket and threw it on the ground. I picked it up and tried to make
a noise. Nothing came out. Not a peep.
‘Save your breath, boy,’ said McFuddy. ‘Each leaf only plays once.
After that it don’t work any more.’
‘Well, I think it’s the meanest thing I’ve ever heard of,’ I said.
‘Fancy making another person sick on purpose. How long has this
been going on?’
‘Over sixty years, boy. And it’s not my fault. Foxy rst gave me
the measles when we were at school. But I found out and I gave him
a toothache back. That’s how it all got started and it’s been going on
ever …’ McFuddy stopped in mid-sentence. He was twisting up his
nose and sni ng the hot, north wind. ‘Smoke,’ he yelled. ‘I can
smell smoke.’
He jumped up and started running up the road. ‘Quick, boy,’ he
called out over his shoulder. ‘There’s a bush re coming. Back to the
house.’ We both sped up the road as fast as we could go. We were
only just in time. A savage re swept over the top of the hill and
raced through the dry grass towards the shack. Smoke swirled
overhead and blocked out the sun.
‘Git up on the roof, boy,’ McFuddy yelled. ‘Block up the
downpipes and ll up the spouting with water. I’ll close up the
house.’ I put a ladder up against the wall and lled up the spouting
with buckets of water. McFuddy went around closing all the
windows and doors. Then he started up a portable generator and
started spraying the house with a hosepipe connected to his water
tank. Soon the house was almost surrounded by re. Sparks and
smoke swirled everywhere. Spot res broke out in the front yard
and at the back of the house. Then the back door caught on re. I
beat at it with a hessian bag that I had soaked in water but it was
getting away from me. McFuddy couldn’t help. He was ghting a
re that had broken out under the front porch.
It looked hopeless. I couldn’t hold the re at the back door and I
knew that at any moment the whole house would explode into a
mass of ames. Then, without any warning, an old Holden utility
sped through the front gate and stopped in a swirl of dust. It was
Foxy. He jumped out of the car, put on a back-pack spray and
rushed over to the back door. He soon had the ames out. Then he
ran around to the front and started helping McFuddy on the porch.
The three of us fought the ames side by side for two hours until
the worst of it had passed. Then we just stood there looking at the
shack, which had been saved with Foxy’s help, and the burnt grass
and trees which surrounded us. The shack was saved but it was now
an oasis in a desert of smouldering blackness.

McFuddy looked at his old enemy, who was still limping when he
walked. He held out his hand. ‘Thanks, mate,’ he said. ‘Thanks a
lot.’
Foxy paused for a second, then he shook the outstretched hand.
‘It’s okay, McFuddy,’ he answered. ‘I would have done the same for
a wombat.’
McFuddy grinned. ‘Come over and have a beer. You’ve earned it.’
They both went into the kitchen and McFuddy opened two stubbies
of beer and a can of Fanta for me. They were soon joking and
laughing and talking about what a close shave it had been.
‘I’m glad to see you’re friends at last,’ I said after a while. ‘Now
neither of you will have to visit the old twisted gum again.’
They both sprang to their feet as if someone had stuck a pin in
them. ‘The old twisted gum,’ they shouted together. Both of them
ran outside and jumped into the utility. I only just had time to climb
into the back before it lurched o down the hill. I hung on for grim
death and stared at the blackened, lea ess trees that sped by us on
either side. The car screeched to a halt and we all climbed out.
I was pleased to see the old twisted gum had been burnt in the
re. It was a black and twisted corpse. The leaves had all gone up in
smoke. Except one. High up on the top, well out of reach, one lonely
green leaf pointed at the sky. We all stood there looking at it and
saying nothing. Then, without a word, Foxy ran over to the utility
and drove o down the hill as fast as he could go. ‘Quick,’ shouted
McFuddy. ‘He’s gone to git a ladder. Come and help me, boy. We
must git that leaf before he does. It’s the last one. Come and help me
carry the ladder.’
‘No way,’ I said. ‘I wish every leaf had been burnt. Passing on
your sickness to someone else is a terrible thing to do. Carry your
own ladder.’
‘Traitor,’ he yelled as he hurried o .
I sat there beside the blackened countryside looking up at the
leaf. It was too high up for me to climb up and get it and anyway,
the tree was still hot and smouldering. So I just sat there and
waited.
I had been sitting there for quite some time when something
happened. The leaf fell o its lonely perch and slowly uttered to
the ground. It landed right at my feet. I picked it up and put it in my
pocket.

7
I was only just in time. At that very moment McFuddy and Foxy
arrived carrying a ladder each. Foxy’s car had conked out from
overheating and both men were staggering under their heavy
burdens. They dumped their ladders down and stared at the tree
with their mouths open. Then they fell onto their hands and knees
and started scrabbling around in the burnt debris at the bottom of
the tree. ‘The last leaf,’ moaned Foxy. ‘The very last leaf.’
‘Gone, gone,’ cried McFuddy. They scratched and searched
everywhere but to no avail. They both became covered in black soot
and dust. They looked like two black ghosts hunting around in a
black forest.
After a while they slowed down in their search. McFuddy looked
at me. ‘The boy,’ he said suddenly. ‘The boy’s got it. Give it here,
boy.’ They both started walking towards me slowly with
outstretched hands. Their eyes were wild circles of white set in their
black faces. They looked mean. Real mean. I felt like a rabbit
trapped by two starving dingoes. I could see they would tear me to
pieces to get their leaf. I pushed it deeper into my pocket and
backed away.
I had to get rid of it. I wasn’t going to give either of them the
chance to get one last shot at the other. But I didn’t know what to
do. I was cornered. One of them was coming from each direction on
the road and the paddocks were still hot and smouldering. Then I
remembered what McFuddy had told me. Each leaf would only play
one tune and then it wouldn’t work any more. I decided to use up its
power by playing it. I put it to my lips and blew. But nothing
happened. Not a squeak. I tried again and a loud blurp came out. It
was working. I tried to think of a tune to play but my mind was a
blank. I was so nervous I couldn’t think of one single tune. Except
‘Click Go The Shears’. So that is what I played. It wasn’t very good –
there were a lot of blurps and wrong notes but it was ‘Click Go The
Shears’, no worries.
McFuddy and Foxy fell to the ground screaming with their hands
up over their ears. Then they put their hands over their noses. And
so did I. My nose was normal. It had gone back to three centimetres
long. And McFuddy and Foxy both had long, long noses. They had
both copped my poor broken, stretched nose and mine was normal
again.
McFuddy looked at Foxy’s nose and started to laugh. He rolled
around in the dirt laughing until tears made little tracks through the
soot on his face. Then Foxy saw McFuddy’s nose and he started to
laugh too. Soon all of us were rolling around in the dirt shaking
with laughter.

McFuddy and Foxy didn’t seem to mind their long noses and they
made friends again once they realised there were no leaves left. I
explained that both of them could have operations to shorten their
noses but neither of them seemed very interested. ‘I’m not trying to
impress the girls at my age,’ was all McFuddy said.
The next day I got on the train to go home. I wanted to get back
to school again now I had a normal nose. It was a short holiday but
it had turned out to be a good cure.
So there I was sitting in the train with the same people that I had
arrived with. They were all staring at me out of the corners of their
eyes trying to work out if I was that funny-looking kid they had
travelled with before.
The ranger was the only one not taking any notice of me. He was
staring out of the window at the blackened forest. No one was
listening to him except me. And I didn’t like what he was saying.
‘Never mind,’ he rambled on. ‘It will be green again this time next
year. Gum trees usually spring back to life after a bush re.’
 Birdscrap

The twins sat on the beach throwing bits of their lunch to the
seagulls.
‘I don’t like telling a lie to Grandma,’ said Tracy. ‘It wouldn’t be
fair. She has looked after us since Mum and Dad died. We would be
in a children’s home if it wasn’t for her.’
Gemma sighed, ‘We won’t be hurting Grandma. We will be doing
her a favour. If we nd Dad’s rubies we can sell them for a lot of
money. Then we can x up Seagull Shack and give Grandma a bit of
cash as well.’
‘Why don’t you wait until we are eighteen? Dad’s will says that
we will own Seagull Shack then. We can even go and live there if
you want to,’ replied Tracy.
Gemma started to get cross. ‘I’ve told you a million times. We
won’t be eighteen for another three years. The last person who
hiked in to Seagull Shack said that it was falling to pieces. If we
wait that long the place will be blown o the cli or wrecked by
vandals. Then we’ll never nd the rubies. They are inside that
shack. I’m sure Dad hid them inside before he died.’
Tracy threw another crust to the seagulls. ‘Well, what are you
going to tell Grandma, then?’
‘We tell her that we are staying at Surfside One camping ground
for the night. Then we set out for Seagull Shack by hiking along the
cli s. If we leave in the morning we can get there in the afternoon.
We spend the night searching the house for the rubies. If we nd
them, Grandma will have a bit of money in the bank and we can
send in some builders by boat to x up Seagull Shack.’
‘Listen,’ said Tracy to her sister. ‘What makes you think we are
going to nd the rubies? The place was searched and searched after
Dad died and neither of them was found.’
‘Yes, but it wasn’t searched by us. We know every corner of that
shack. And we knew Dad. We know how his mind worked. We can
search in places no one else would think of. I think I know where
they are anyway. I have an idea. I think Dad hid them in the stu ed
seagull. I had a dream about it.’
‘Hey, did you see that?’ yelled Tracy without warning. ‘Where did
that crust go?’
‘What crust?’
‘I threw a crust to the seagulls and it vanished.’
‘Rubbish,’ said Gemma. ‘One of the birds got it. Bread doesn’t just
vanish.’
Tracy threw another scrap of bread into the air. It started to fall
to the ground and then stopped as if caught by an invisible hand. It
rose high above their heads, turned and headed o into the
distance. All the other gulls apped after it, squawking and
quarrelling as they went.
‘Wow,’ shrieked Gemma. ‘How did you do that?’
‘I didn’t,’ said Tracy slowly. ‘Something ew o with it.
Something we couldn’t see. Something invisible. Perhaps a bird.’
Gemma started to laugh. ‘A ghost gull maybe?’
‘That’s not as funny as you think,’ said Tracy. ‘It’s a sign. Some
thing or some one wants us to go to Seagull Shack.’
‘Maybe you’ve got it wrong,’ replied Gemma. ‘Maybe something
doesn’t want us to go to Seagull Shack.’
The wind suddenly changed to the south west and both girls
shivered.

Two days later Tracy and Gemma struggled along the deserted and
desolate cli tops. They were weighed down with hiking packs and
water bottles. Far below them the Southern Ocean swelled and
sucked at the rocky cli . Overhead the blue sky was broken only by
a tiny white seagull which circled slowly in the salt air.
‘How far to go?’ moaned Gemma. ‘My feet are killing me. We’ve
been walking for hours.’
‘It’s not far now,’ said Tracy. ‘Just around the next headland. We
should be able to see the old brown roof any moment … Hey. What
was that?’ She felt her hair and pulled out some sticky white goo.
Then she looked up at the seagull circling above. ‘You rotten nk,’
she yelled at it. ‘Look at this. That seagull has hit me with bird
droppings.’
Gemma lay down on the grassy slope and started to laugh.
‘Imagine that,’ she gasped. ‘There are miles and miles of cli top
with no one around and that bird has to drop its dung right on your
head.’ Her laughter stopped abruptly as something splotted into her
eye. ‘Aaaaagh, it’s hit me in the eye. The stupid bird is bombing us.’
They looked up and saw that there were now four or ve birds
circling above. One of them swooped down and released its load.
Another white splodge hit Tracy’s head. The other birds followed
one after the other, each dropping its foul load onto one of the girls’
hair. They put their hands on top of their heads and started to run.
More and more birds gathered, circling, wheeling and diving above
the eeing gures. Bird droppings rained down like weighted snow.
The girls stumbled on. There was no shelter on the exposed,
wind-swept cli s – there was no escape from the guano blizzard
which engulfed them.
Tracy stumbled and fell. Tears cut a trail through the white mess
on her face. ‘Come on,’ cried Gemma. ‘Keep going – we must nd
cover.’ She dragged her sister to her feet and both girls groped their
way through the white storm being released from above by the
squealing, swirling gulls.
Finally, exhausted and blinded, the twins collapsed into each
other’s arms. They huddled together and tried to protect themselves
from the pelting muck by holding their packs over their heads.
Gemma began to cough. The white excrement lled her ears, eyes
and nostrils. She had to ght for every breath.
And then, as quickly as it had begun, the attack ended. The whole
ock sped out to sea and disappeared over the horizon.
The girls sat there panting and sobbing. Each was covered in a
dripping white layer of bird dung. Finally Gemma gasped. ‘I can’t
believe this. Look at us. Covered in bird droppings. Did that really
happen? Where have they gone?’ She looked anxiously out to sea.
‘They’ve probably run out of ammo,’ said Tracy. ‘We had better
get to the shack as quick as we can before they come back.’

An hour later the two girls struggled up to the shack. It sat high
above the sea, perched dangerously on the edge of a cli which fell
straight to the surging ocean beneath. Its battered tin roof and
peeling wooden walls stood de antly against the might of the ocean
winds.
Both girls felt tears springing to their eyes. ‘It reminds me of Dad
and all those shing holidays we had here with him,’ said Tracy.
They stood there on the old porch for a moment, looking and
remembering.
‘This won’t do,’ said Gemma as she unlocked the door and pushed
it open. ‘Let’s get cleaned up and start looking for those two rubies.’
Inside was much as they remembered it. There were only two
rooms: a kitchen with an old table and three chairs and shing rods
and nets littered around; and a bedroom with three mattresses on
the oor. The kitchen also contained a sink and an old sideboard
with a huge, stu ed seagull standing on it. It had only one leg and a
black patch on each wing. It stared out of one of the mist-covered
windows at the sky and the waves beyond.
‘It almost looks alive,’ shivered Tracy. ‘Why did Dad shoot it
anyway? He didn’t believe in killing birds.’
 ‘It was wounded,’ answered Gemma. ‘So he put it out of its
misery. Then he stu ed it and mounted it because it was so big. He
said it was the biggest gull he had ever seen.’
‘Well,’ said Tracy. ‘I’m glad you’re the one who is going to look
inside it for the rubies, because I’m not going to touch it. I don’t like
it.’
‘First,’ said Gemma, ‘we clean o all this muck. Then we start
searching for the rubies.’ The two girls cleaned themselves with tank
water from the tap in the sink. Then they sat down at the table and
looked at the stu ed seagull. Gemma cut a small slit in its belly and
carefully pulled out the stu ng. A silence fell over the hut and the
cli top. Not even the waves could be heard.
The air seemed to be lled with silent sobbing.
‘The rubies aren’t there,’ said Gemma at last. She put the stu ng
back in the dead bird and placed it on its stand. ‘I’m glad that’s
over,’ she went on. ‘I didn’t like the feel of it. It gave me bad vibes.’
As the lonely darkness settled on the shack, the girls continued
their hunt for the rubies. They lit a candle and searched on into the
night without success. At last, too tired to go on, Tracy unrolled her
sleeping bag and prepared for bed. She walked over to the window
to pull across the curtain but froze before reaching it. A piercing
scream lled the shack. ‘Look,’ she shrieked. ‘Look.’
Both girls stared in terror at the huge seagull sitting outside on
the window sill. It gazed in at them, blinking every now and then
with ery red eyes. ‘I can see into it,’ whispered Gemma. ‘I can see
its gizzards. It’s transparent.’
The lonely bird stared, pleaded with them silently and then
crouched on its single leg and apped o into the moonlight.
Before either girl could speak, a soft pitter-patter began on the tin
roof. Soon it grew louder until the shack was lled with a
tremendous drumming. ‘What a storm,’ yelled Gemma.
‘It’s not a storm,’ Tracy shouted back. ‘It’s the birds. The seagulls
have returned. They are bombing the house.’ She stared in horror at
the ghostly ock that lled the darkness with ghastly white rain.
 All through the night the drumming on the roof continued.
Towards the dawn it grew softer but never for a moment did it stop.
Finally the girls fell asleep, unable to keep their weary eyes open
any longer.

At 10 a.m. Tracy awoke in the darkness and pressed on the light in

her digital watch. ‘Wake up,’ she yelled. ‘It’s getting late.’
‘It can’t be,’ replied Gemma. ‘It’s still dark.’
The shack was as silent as a tomb. Gemma lit a candle and went
over to the window. ‘Can’t see a thing,’ she said.
Tracy pulled open the front door and shrieked as a wave of bird
droppings gushed into the room. It oozed into the kitchen in a foul
stream. ‘Quick,’ she yelled. ‘Help me shut the door or we’ll be
drowned in the stu .’
Staggering, grunting and groaning, they managed to shut the door
and stop the stinking ow. ‘The whole house is buried,’ said
Gemma. ‘And so are we. Buried alive in bird droppings.’
‘And no one knows we are here,’ added Tracy.
They sat and stared miserably at the ickering candle. All the
windows were blacked out by the pile of dung that covered the
house.
‘There is no way out,’ moaned Gemma.
‘Unless …’ murmured Tracy, ‘they haven’t covered the chimney.’
She ran over to the replace and looked up. ‘I can see the sky,’ she
exclaimed. ‘We can get up the chimney.’
It took a lot of scrambling and shoving but at last the two girls sat
perched on the top of the stone chimney. They stared in disbelief at
the house, which was covered in a mountain of white bird
droppings. The chimney was the only evidence that underneath the
oozing pile was a building.
 ‘Look,’ said Gemma with outstretched hand. ‘The transparent
gull.’ It sat, alone on the bleak cli , staring, staring at the shaking
twins. ‘It wants something,’ she said quietly.
‘And I know what it is,’ said Tracy. ‘Wait here.’ She eased herself
back down the chimney and much later emerged carrying the
stu ed seagull.
‘Look closely at that ghost gull,’ panted Tracy. ‘It’s only got one
leg. And it has black patches on its wings. And look how big it is.
It’s this bird.’ She held up the stu ed seagull. ‘It’s the ghost of this
stu ed seagull. It wants its body back. It doesn’t like it being stu ed
and left in a house. It wants it returned to nature.’
‘Okay,’ Gemma yelled at the staring gull. ‘You can have it. We
don’t want it. But rst we have to get down from here.’ The two
girls slid, swam, and skidded their way to the bottom of the sticky
mess. Then, like smelly white spirits, the sisters walked to the edge
of the cli with the stu ed bird. The ghost seagull sat watching and
waiting.
Tracy pulled the stu ed seagull from the stand and threw it over
the cli into the air that it had once loved and lived in. Its wings
opened in the breeze and it circled slowly, like a glider, and after
many turns crashed on a rock in the surging swell beneath.
The ghost gull lifted slowly into the air and followed it down
until it came to rest on top of the still, stu ed corpse.
‘Look,’ whispered Tracy in horror. ‘The ghost gull is pecking at
the stu ed one. It’s pecking its head.’
A wave washed across the rock and the stu ed seagull vanished
into the foam. The ghost gull apped into the breeze and then ew
above the girls’ heads. ‘It’s bombing us,’ shouted Gemma as she put
her hands over her head.
Two small shapes plopped onto the ground beside them.
‘It’s the eyes of the stu ed seagull,’ said Tracy in a hoarse voice.
‘No it’s not,’ replied Gemma. ‘It’s Dad’s rubies.’
They sat there, stunned, saying nothing and staring at the red
gems that lay at their feet.
 Tracy looked up. ‘Thank you, ghost gull,’ she shouted.
But the bird had gone and her words fell into the empty sea
below.
 Snookle

Snookle was delivered one morning with the milk. There were four
half-litre bottles; three of them contained milk and the other held
Snookle.
He stared sadly at me from his glass prison. I could see he was
alive even though he made no sign or movement. He reminded me
of a dog on a chain that manages to make its owner feel guilty
simply by looking unhappy. Snookle wanted to get out of that milk
bottle but he didn’t really expect it to happen. He didn’t say
anything, he just gazed silently into my eyes.
I placed the three full bottles in the fridge and put Snookle and
his small home on the table. Then I sat down and looked at him
carefully. All I could see was a large pair of gloomy eyes. He must
have had a body but it was nowhere to be seen. The eyes simply
oated in the air about fteen centimetres above the bottom of the
bottle.
Mum and Dad had already left for work so I wouldn’t get any
help from them. I gave the bottle a gentle shake and the eyes
bounced around like a couple of small rubber balls. The gloomy
expression was replaced by one of alarm and the eyes blinked a
number of times before settling back to their original position.
‘Sorry,’ I said. ‘I didn’t mean to hurt you.’ There was no reply, just
a long reproachful look.
‘Where did you come from?’ I asked. ‘And how did you get here?
What sort of creature are you? What is your name?’ I received no
reply to my question. In fact, the eyes began to close. He was falling
asleep.
A nasty thought entered my mind. What if he was dying? There is
not much air in a milk bottle. He might be su ocating if he was an
air-breathing creature. I thought about opening the bottle and
letting him out. But if I did I could be in for big trouble. He might
not go back into the bottle and he could be dangerous. He might
bite me or give me some terrible disease that would kill o the
whole human race. He might nick o , spreading death and disease
wherever he went.
I went over to the window and looked outside. Maybe one of the
kids from school would be passing. Two heads would be better than
one, especially if the thing in the bottle attacked me. Then I
remembered. It was Curriculum Day and there was no school. The
only person in the street was poor old Mrs McKee, who was
hobbling down her steps to get the milk. She wouldn’t be any help.
She had arthritis and it was all she could do to pick up one milk
bottle at a time. It took her half an hour to shu e back to the front
door from the gate.
Some weekends I used to go and do jobs for Mrs McKee because
her hands were so weak that she couldn’t do anything by herself.
Her garden was overgrown with weeds and her windows were dirty.
All the paint was peeling o the house. I once heard Mum say that
Mrs McKee would have to go into an old folks’ home soon because
her ngers wouldn’t move properly. No, Mrs McKee wouldn’t be any
use if the eyes in the bottle turned nasty.

I looked at my visitor again. His eyelids were beginning to droop. At

any moment he might be dead. I decided to take the risk. With one
swift movement I took the metal cap o the bottle.
The expression in the eyes changed. They looked happy. Then
they started to move slowly up to the neck of the bottle. I could tell
that the little creature was climbing up the glass even though I
couldn’t see his body. The eyes emerged from the bottle and oated
in the air just above the rim. He sat on the top of the bottle staring
at me happily. I couldn’t see his mouth or any part of his face but I
knew he was smiling.
‘What’s your name?’ I asked. It might seem silly to talk to an
unknown creature as if it could answer but I had a feeling that he
would understand me. Even so, I got a shock when he did answer.
He didn’t use words or speech. I could hear him inside my brain.
The word ‘Snookle’ just sort of drifted into my mind.
‘Who are you, Snookle?’ I said. ‘And what do you want?’
Again he answered without talking. His reply melted into my
thoughts. ‘I am your servant. Your every thought is my command.’
They weren’t his exact words because he didn’t use words but it is
more or less what he meant. Especially the bit about my every
thought being his command. That was the next thing I found out –
he could read my thoughts. He knew what I wanted without me
saying anything.

My stomach suddenly rumbled. I was hungry. The eyes oated

across the table and over to the pantry. Snookle could y. The next
thing I knew a packet of corn akes and a bowl ew slowly back
with the eyes following close behind. Then the fridge opened and
the milk arrived the same way. The corn akes and milk were tipped
into the bowl and sugar added. Just the right amount and just the
way I liked it. This was great. He knew I wanted breakfast and he
got it for me without even being told. I didn’t eat it straight away
because I like my corn akes soggy.
I decided to try Snookle out on something else. I thought about
bringing in the papers from the letter box. Snookle oated over to
the front door and opened it. Then he stayed there hovering in the
air. ‘Go on,’ I said. ‘Out you go.’ The eyes moved from side to side.
He was shaking his head. I looked out the door and saw a man
riding by on a bike. As soon as the cyclist had passed Snookle ew
out and fetched the papers. I knew what had happened. Snookle
didn’t want anyone to see him except his master. I was his master
because I had let him out of the bottle. He would only show himself
to me.
I went back to my bedroom followed by Snookle. His preferred
altitude was about two metres o the ground. I decided to wear my
stretch jeans as there was no school that day. The moment the
thought entered my mind Snookle set o for the wardrobe. My
jeans, T-shirt and underwear were delivered by air mail and laid out
neatly on the bed. The next bit, however, gave me a bit of a
surprise. Snookle pulled o my pyjamas and started to dress me. I
felt a bit silly. It was just like a little kid being dressed by his
mother. I could feel long, thin, cold ngers touching me.
‘Cut it out, Snookle,’ I said. ‘You don’t have to dress me.’ He
didn’t take any notice. That was when I found out that Snookle
helped you whether you wanted it or not.
My nose was itchy. I could feel a sneeze coming on. As quick as a
ash Snookle whipped my handkerchief out of my pocket and held
it up to my nose. I sneezed into the handkerchief and said, ‘Thanks,
but that wasn’t necessary.’
I went back to the kitchen for my breakfast. Snookle beat me to
the spoon. I tried to grab it o him but he was too quick for me. He
dipped the spoon into the corn akes and pushed it into my mouth. I
tried to stop him by keeping my lips closed but he prised them open
with his chilly little invisible ngers and shoved the next spoonful
in. He fed me the whole bowl of corn akes just as if I was a baby.
Now I hope you will understand about the next bit. I am not
really a nose picker but I have thought about it now and then. My
nose was still a bit itchy and the thought just came into my mind to
pick it. I wouldn’t have done it any more than you would. Anyway,
before I could blink, this cold, invisible nger went up my nose and
picked it for me.
Snookle was picking my nose! I nearly freaked out. I screamed
and tried to push him o but he was too strong.
 After that things just got worse and worse. Snookle wouldn’t let
me do a thing for myself. Not a single thing.

I went back to the kitchen and sat down. This wasn’t working out at
all well. I could see my future looming in front of me with Snookle
doing everything for me. Everything. He had to go. And quick.
I dropped a corn ake into the empty milk bottle and thought
hard about getting it out. Snookle oated over and went into the
bottle to get it. I moved like greased lightning and put the top back
on that bottle before Snookle knew what had hit him. He was
trapped. He didn’t even try to get out but just looked at me with
sad, mournful eyes as if he had expected nothing better.
Now I was in a x. I didn’t want to leave Snookle in the bottle for
the rest of his life but I didn’t want him hanging around picking my
nose for me either. I looked out of the window. Poor old Mrs McKee
had managed to get back to the house with one of her bottles of
milk. Soon she would make the slow trip back to the letter box for
the next one.
I picked up Snookle and slowly crossed the road. Then I put his
bottle down outside Mrs McKee’s house. I grabbed her full bottle of
milk with one hand and waved goodbye to Snookle with the other.
His eyes stared silently and sadly back at me.
That was the last I ever saw of Snookle.
Over the next few days a remarkable change came over Mrs
McKee’s house. The grass was cut and the ower beds were weeded.
The windows were cleaned and someone repainted the house. The
people in the street thought it was strange because they never saw
anyone doing the work.
I went over to see Mrs McKee about a week later. She seemed
very happy. Very happy indeed.
 About the Author

Paul Jennings is Australia’s multi-award-winning master of madness.

The Paul Jennings phenomenon began with the publication of
Unreal! in 1985. Since then, his stories have been devoured all
around the world. The top-rating TV series Round the Twist and
Driven Crazy are based on his stories.
Paul Jennings has been voted ‘favourite author’ by children in
Australia over forty times and has won every children’s choice
award in Australia. In 1995 he was made a Member of the Order of
Australia for services to children’s literature, and in 2001 was
awarded the Dromkeen Medal for services to children’s literature.