Authors: A. F. Harrold

The Boy Who Cried Fish (16 page)

BOOK: The Boy Who Cried Fish

10.47Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub

ads

Fizz didn’t know what to say to that, so he just looked at Wystan and then at the Captain and then at the Admiral and said, ‘Okay.’

The next morning the sun rose and the birds sang and it didn’t rain and all was good and right and proper in the world. All around the circus riggers were deconstructing things and trucks were being loaded up with tents and cages. The Big Top had been taken down in the early hours of the morning.

The circus was getting ready to move on.

Fizz made his way over to Captain Fox-Dingle’s place to see how Charles was.

The Captain had polished the buttons on his uniform extra hard. They gleamed in the sunlight, dazzling Fizz as he came near.

‘Captain Fox-Dingle,’ he said. ‘How’s Charles?’

The Captain pointed to a truck Fizz didn’t recognise. On the side of it were painted the words: TWILIGHT TOPS, and underneath in smaller writing it said: A RED NOSE RETIREMENT HOME.

‘Alright mate,’ said a burly chap who was about to climb into the lorry’s cab. ‘You the lad wiv the head?’

Fizz thought for a moment, before understanding what the man meant and nodding.

‘Round the back, mate.’

Fizzlebert Stump went to the back of the truck and found that the doors were open. Inside was a cage and inside the cage was Charles. He looked tired. When he saw Fizz he yawned and grumbled a small greeting-ish roar. Fizz reached through the bars and patted his nose.

‘Goodbye,’ he said, a lump in his throat almost blocking the way up for the word.

He felt a hand on his shoulder.

‘He’ll be alright, won’t he? They’ll take care of him, won’t they?’

Captain Fox-Dingle said nothing, but he squeezed tightly. Fizz felt that was a good enough answer from the Captain. In fact, because he knew how much the Captain cared about Charles, he hadn’t really needed to ask.

‘Alright, chums?’ the driver said. ‘I’ve got a schedule to keep. Sign here and we’ll have old Chaz here up at Twilight Tops in time for lunch.’

Captain Fox-Dingle signed the clipboard and helped the driver to shut the doors.

They watched the truck drive off, slowly out the park and then it turned away onto the main road and was gone.

Then the Captain turned to Fizz and said, ‘New act.’

‘What?’

The Captain didn’t say anything more, but led Fizz away to the large cage in which Charles had spent his days. In it was the crocodile. She watched them with beady amber eyes and slowly waved her tail. Fizz felt a butterfly bloom in his stomach, because he understood what the Captain meant.

‘Kate.’

The tail stopped waving.

‘Open.’

The crocodile’s jaws slowly parted, wider and wider. The yellowed teeth glistened moistly and the fat pink tongue pulsed like a heart. Fizz looked into the long space between those jaws with a bravery mingled with terror. There was room in there for a boy’s head.

Well, he thought, a circus can’t stand still, even the best act must move on. This would be a challenge. No false teeth here. As soon as the circus unloaded itself in the next town they could begin practising.

Wow
, he thought, coming round to the idea.
This is going to be a brilliant act. Just wait until I tell Wystan!

And with that thought he remembered what he’d forgotten in all the excitement and sadness.

Fish!

‘Sorry Captain,’ he said, ‘I’ve got to go see Wystan.’

And Fizz ran across to Miss Tremble’s caravan (which was just over the way from the Captain’s, so he wasn’t even out of breath when he got there).

‘Wystan, Wystan!’ he shouted.

He banged on the door, and after a moment a startled Miss Tremble answered, clutching her dressing gown tight and holding a large hairbrush in her hand.

‘Yes?’ she said.

‘Excuse me, Miss Tremble,’ Fizz said, ‘where’s Wystan?’

‘I think he’s round the back, isn’t he? Playing with Fish.’

‘What?’

‘In his paddling pool.’

‘What?’

‘I just saw them out the window.’

‘What?’

Fizz jumped off the steps and ran round her caravan, past the portable horse paddock, right round to where Fish’s paddling pool usually sat, and there in the middle of it was Wystan, in a pair of bathing trunks, and Fish, in his spangly waistcoat and a Moroccan fez (which is the sort of hat Fish is wearing in the accompanying picture).

‘Fish!’ Fizz shouted.

Fish turned to face him, thinking that a person who shouted ‘Fish!’ might have a fish on them, and let out a haddock-flavoured burp which wafted right into Fizz’s face.

‘How . . . ?’

‘I think,’ Wystan said, since Fish wasn’t going to answer, ‘he’s been out in the sea. There was seaweed in his waistcoat and a crab hanging onto a flipper, which makes sense, but where he got the tattoo, poker chip and the cool new hat, I don’t know and he ain’t telling. But he must’ve seen the circus getting packed up and I reckon he didn’t want to be left behind. So he came home.’

Fish honked as if to say, ‘That’s right.’ But because animals can’t talk he was never able to tell anyone exactly where he’d been those last few days, or why he’d decided to come back when he did. Fizz and Wystan just chose to believe what they believed, because it seemed sensible, even if it meant all the grownups kept saying, ‘
See
, we said he’d come back,’ which was astonishingly annoying.

So there it was. The end of their stay by the seaside.

Wystan and Fish had their act back together.

The Captain and Fizz had a new act to rehearse, even scarier than his old one.

Admiral Spratt-Haddock had offloaded an overly friendly crocodile.

And Dr Surprise had reprogrammed Cook’s brain so he was a happy and talented chef.

The End

Except, there’s just one last thing I need to tell you, something Fizz didn’t see, but which I think may be important to the story. Or it may not be. You decide. Anyway, here it is.

Chapter Fourteen-and-a-half

In which Flopples makes another appearance

It was the night before. All the excitement in the kitchen was over. The all-new improved Cook had finished tidying up and was beginning to plan some new recipes for breakfast. Captain Fox-Dingle had wandered off with the crocodile. The boys had gone to bed. All was quiet in the circus.

There was a knock on a caravan door, metal on wood.

There was a creak as the door opened.

In the doorway stood Dr Surprise. Even though it was late, he didn’t have a hair out of place, his monocle was bright and clear and his plastic moustache was elegantly placed. His white rabbit, Flopples, was cradled in his arms like a baby. Her nose twitched.

‘Yes?’ Dr Surprise quavered in his high voice.

‘Now, I looked in his freezers,’ Admiral Spratt-Haddock said, starting his conversation in the middle rather than at the beginning. ‘And I found in there the last fish he stole. Me green-gilled mudsharks. Nothing I can do for them now. But I think he took something else, Doctor.’

As he spoke the Admiral cleaned under his fingernails with the tip of his hook. His large navy blue coat fluttered in the gentle breeze that blew between the caravans and his eyes had a slightly unnerving gleam about them.

‘Oh yes?’

‘Me prize mollusc, me extremely rare and extremely talented lesser green-footed coral octopus were gone this evening. The tank were empty.
But
, it ain’t in the freezer. And that’s when I thought of you, Doc.’

‘Me?’

‘I couldn’t help but remember the visit you made last week. You looked at me octopus and you asked how much it would cost to buy and I said—’

‘Oh, much more money than a simple circus employee could find.’

‘It be a very rare octopus, Doctor.’

‘And beautiful, Admiral.’

The two men looked at each other. The Doctor stroked Flopples with one hand and the Admiral picked between his teeth with his hook. There was a tense silence.

‘I thought,’ the Admiral said eventually, ‘you might have heard something. Maybe this villainous chef of yours might’ve offered you an octopus at a knock-down price? Maybe . . . he was even working for—’

‘Oh no, no,’ said the Doctor, his monocle glinting. ‘You shouldn’t think such suspicious thoughts, Admiral. They stick in the brain and drive a man mad. That’s what happened with Cook, remember, all that jealousy and suspicion? You heard him. His brain needed a good wash. Me, on the other hand, I’m just a simple showman, happy and honest.’

He stroked Flopples under the chin and she twitched her nose and shook her lovely white ears.

‘Never liked rabbits myself,’ the Admiral muttered, watching with a shudder.

‘Goodnight, now,’ Dr Surprise said, in a manner that meant, ‘This conversation is over, please go away.’

‘No,’ Admiral Spratt-Haddock snapped, angry at being dismissed. ‘I ain’t finished, Doc, I still got questions. Before I go, I want to get this cleared up.’

‘Of course,’ said Doctor Surprise amiably, ‘I think I’ve got time before bed.’

With his free hand he looped his pocket-watch out of his pocket, just to check.

‘Goodnight, Admiral,’ Dr Surprise said a minute later. ‘Say goodnight, Flopples.’

And as the perfectly satisfied Admiral walked off into the night, humming a happy nautical tune into the dark air, heading back to his slightly diminished but now safe and secure Aquarium, the white rabbit unfurled a long greenish-white tentacle and waved him goodbye.

Bloomsbury Publishing, London, New Delhi, New York and Sydney

First published in Great Britain in January 2014 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

This electronic edition published in January 2014 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

50 Bedford Square, London WC1B 3DP

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

You may not copy, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise

make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means

(including without limitation electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying,

printing, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the

publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication

may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library