by Duncan Ball
THE AWFUL TRUTH
“I wish people would be more helpful,” Mrs Trifle said with a sigh. “I asked the people of Bogusville for ideas on how to keep the town’s expenses down and no one gave any. No one cares. What’s worse, there’s been a rash of stealing.”
“What’s gone missing?” Dr Trifle asked, as he poured some liquid into a bottle.
“Light globes,” Mrs Trifle said. “They’re being taken from streetlights and even from the council chambers.”
“This could be the answer,” Dr Trifle said, swirling the funny-smelling chemical around. “It’s a new invention of mine called Blabbo.“
“If Blabbo is the answer,” Mrs Trifle said. “What is the question?”
“You don’t understand. My Blabbo is really the not-very-well-known chemical, di-ethyl-tri-beryl-poly-wanna-kraka.”
“All that in a little jar?”
“It’s a new kind of truth serum.”
“Truth serum?” thought Selby, who was nibbling a Dry-Mouth Dog Biscuit. “Dr Trifle’s gone bonkers this time.”
“You mean people drink that and they have to tell the truth?”
“Exactly. When the police catch a suspect, all they have to do is give him — or her,” the doctor added to be polite, “one sip and he — or she — won’t be able to lie to save their lives. It lasts for about an hour and then wears off.”
“Have you taken some yourself?”
“I would have taken some myself but I only ever tell the truth anyway. So it wouldn’t be much good, would it?” Dr Trifle said, blushing from ear to ear. “I’m sure it’ll work. I’ve given some to the police to use on their next suspect.”
Suddenly the telephone rang.
Mrs Trifle picked it up. “Yes? Yes? Yes? No. Yes. No!” she said, the way people do when they talk on the phone. “I’ll be there in a jiffy,” she added, putting down the receiver.
“What is it, dear?” Dr Trifle asked. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“That was Sergeant Short. It seems that my sister, Jetty, has just been caught sneaking into the council chambers with a ladder under one arm.”
“You mean —?”
“Yes. He thinks she’s the globe grabber. Hurry! We’ve got to go to the town hall straight away. I can’t believe it! My own sister, a criminal! The family honour will be in tatters! I’ll never be able to show my face again.”
“Don’t jump to conclusions. She could be completely innocent,” said Dr Trifle, also jumping to the conclusion that Aunt Jetty was guilty and jumping into the car with Mrs Trifle and Selby. “The police will try out my Blabbo. We should know if she’s guilty soon.”
“Are you sure your Blabbo is safe?” Mrs Trifle asked as they tore through the darkened town.
“When scientists think a new medicine is safe,” Dr Trifle said, “they try it out on animals just to be sure. So that’s what I did and so far it’s okay.”
“You mean you gave some to a poor unsuspecting animal?”
“Yes, so your poor unsuspecting sister should be quite okay.”
“Hmmmmmmmm,” Selby thought as he munched on a bit of dog biscuit that had been stuck in his teeth. “I wonder what sort of poor unsuspecting animal Dr Trifle tried it out on.”
“What sort of poor unsuspecting animal did you try it out on?” Mrs Trifle asked.
“I put some on Selby’s dog biscuits,” Dr Trifle said, “and he seems to be okay — well at least so far.”
“Oh, no!” Selby thought, suddenly noticing the warm feeling of the truth serum in his stomach. “Dr Trifle’s tricked me into testing his Blabbo! It’s not fair! He’s turned me into his guinea pig!”
The car skidded to a stop in front of the town hall and the Trifles dashed inside. There, lying on the floor of the council chambers, was the whole of Bogusville’s police force, Sergeant Short and Constable Long. Standing over them with her arms folded was Aunt Jetty.
“Jetty! What have you done to these poor men?” Mrs Trifle shrieked at her sister.
“I didn’t lay a hand on them!” Aunt Jetty protested. “They wanted me to take some truth serum and I said no way, not till they took some first. So they did, and that’s when the fighting began.”
Sergeant Short staggered to his feet and pulled Constable Long up by his shirt.
“What did you say about my haircut, you big-nosed beanpole?” he demanded.
“I said you looked like you lost a fight with a lawn-mower,” Constable Long answered. “You asked for the truth and you got it!”
“That’s the last time you’ll make a nasty crack about my hair!” Sergeant Short said, giving the constable a good shake. “I’ll have you fired for insulting a superior officer.”
“Hah! Talk about insults! What did you say about my nose?”
“I only said it was big. Big is big, there’s no getting around it. You asked a question and I gave a truthful answer.”
“Gentlemen! Stop it!” Mrs Trifle said. “Stop telling the truth about each other this instant. It’s only causing problems.”
“But we can’t help it,” Constable Long said. “That beryl-meryl-whatsis won’t let us tell even the most innocent lies.”
“All right, sister,” Mrs Trifle said, turning to Jetty, “did you or did you not steal those light globes?”
“Me? Steal?” Aunt Jetty said innocently. “I’m as honest as the day is long.”
“If you’re so honest,” Dr Trifle said, thinking of what a short day it had been, “why were you caught skulking about in the town hall with a ladder?”
“I was removing light globes,” Aunt Jetty said flatly.
“So it is true!” Mrs Trifle exclaimed. “You were stealing light globes.”
“Not so fast, sis. Removing is not stealing. You wanted to save some of the rate-payers’ money in this stupid little town and I simply helped. It obviously took a clever person like me from out of town to come up with the idea.”
“Will you tell us how, exactly, you expected to save Bogusville money?” Mrs Trifle asked. “It’ll cost us a fortune to replace all those light globes.”
“You won’t have to replace them. They’re right here,” Aunt Jetty said, opening a closet door and letting out a flood of globes. “Think of what you’ve been saving on your electricity bill.”
“Electricity bill?” Dr Trifle asked.
“Sure. With the globes out it’ll save electricity,” Aunt Jetty said. “You see, I’m no more a crook than that silly dog of yours. You’re not a crook are you?” she added, poking Selby with her walking-stick.
“Oh, no!” Selby thought, and panic spread through his body. “She just asked me a question and now I have to answer it! The truth serum won’t let me not answer! Help! I have to tell the truth and the truth will ruin me because everyone will know I’m a talking, feeling dog — the only one in Australia and perhaps the world! At first they’ll be delighted. I’ll have long conversations with the Trifles in front of a roaring fire. We’ll talk about things so interesting that I’ll go to sleep happy every night. Sure, that’s what’ll happen at first — but then what? Then it’ll be, ‘Selby, dear, would you mind answering the telephone while we’re out?’ and ‘Would you please pop down to the shops to get a few things for dinner?’ and ‘How about mowing the lawn?’ How about mowing the lawn! How soon they forget to say ‘please'! I can’t answer. I can’t. But I have to …”
Selby stepped forward and was about to say, “You know perfectly well I’m not a crook,” when Mrs Trifle spoke for him.
“You know perfectly well he’s not a crook. He’s only a wonderful little dog,” she said, picking up the relieved Selby and giving him a big hug. “Now let’s go home before I tell the truth about what I think of you, Jetty.”
“Phew! That was close,” Selby thought. “Now I’ll just have to keep my toes crossed that nobody asks me any more questions till the truth serum wears off.”
BEATING AROUND THE BUSH
“This is hopeless,” Dr Trifle said
to Mrs Trifle as he cut another branch off a tall bush and sent it tumbling down next to Selby who was trying to find some shade. “It just doesn’t look like what it’s supposed to be.”
“It looks like a bush, dear,” said Mrs Trifle, who was too busy worrying about what to do with Dudley Dewmop, Bogusville’s shortsighted part-time dog catcher, to notice what her husband was doing.
“It’s not supposed to be a bush,” Dr Trifle said, snipping another branch. “See if you can guess what it is.”
“Dudley’s meant to be catching stray dogs but his eyesight’s terrible,” Mrs Trifle said. “Last week he brought in three cats, two possums and a rabbit.”
“That’s it!” Dr Trifle cried. “It’s a rabbit! It does look quite like a rabbit, doesn’t it?”
“I’m sorry, dear, but it looks more like a pig eating an ice-cream cone,” Mrs Trifle said. “Why are you doing all this?”
“It’s called topiary,” Dr Trifle said to Mrs Trifle. “It’s the art of making bushes and shrubs look like something else. I was getting bored with bushes that looked like bushes and shrubs that looked like shrubs.”
“Why can’t people just let things look like what they are?” Selby thought as he moved out of the sun and under his favourite bush only to have Dr Trifle lop off the shadiest branch.
“Just out of curiosity,” Mrs Trifle said, suddenly forgetting about the near-sighted part-time dog catcher and noticing the bush behind her,"is that a hippo doing a handstand?”
“Ummm, er,” Dr Trifle said, reaching around and cutting off a big limb. “It’s supposed to be a kangaroo juggling three koalas.”
“And that one? It looks like a giraffe climbing a ladder.”
“Two snakes kissing,” Dr Trifle corrected her.
“Surely that one’s a cow tying her shoelaces.”
“Wrong again. It’s the prime minister giving a speech,” Dr Trifle said with a sigh. “I’m not very good at this, am I?”
“I’ll invite him over tonight and give him a good talking to,” Mrs Trifle said.
“Who? The prime minister?”
“Goodness no. Dudley Dewmop. He refuses to wear his new glasses because he says they make his nose itch. I’ll just have to insist that he does. As it is, he can’t tell a dog from a rabbit.”
That night when the near-sighted part-time dog catcher was about to arrive, Selby crept out to the backyard to avoid him.
“Dudley Dewmop, sheeesh!” Selby groaned as he looked around in the moonlight at the eerie animal shapes in the garden, and remembered all the times he’d been chased by the dog catcher."The man hates dogs!”
Selby lay down under a bush that looked very like a lizard doing a somersault when Dudley Dewmop came driving down the driveway. Which would have been okay if the near-sighted Dudley hadn’t missed the driveway entirely and shot straight past the house and into the backyard.
“Gads!” Dudley exclaimed in a loud whisper as he grabbed his dog-catching net and leaped from the car."I’m surrounded by stray dogs!”
Dudley swung hard at the nearest bush, breaking off four branches at a single hit.
“Gotcha!” he said, plucking sticks and leaves out of his net."Ooops! Where’d you go?”
Selby watched as Dudley raised his net again and again, smashing away at Dr Trifle’s topiary. “I see you,” the short-sighted dog catcher said, not seeing Selby at all but whacking off the trunk of an elephant and two humps off a camel. “You can’t fool me.”
Selby watched as Dudley’s swishing net left a litter of leaves on the lawn.
“If I don’t stop him,” Selby muttered, scooting under another bush only to have it demolished by Dudley, “there won’t be a patch of shade left in the whole yard! Help! What can I do?”
Just then a cloud covered the moon and cast the yard into total darkness. Selby stepped towards Dudley and put his paws on his hips knowing that the dog catcher couldn’t possibly see him.
“Okay, Dudley,” Selby said aloud, “stop it this instant! Enough is enough. You’re destroying the Trifles’ backyard and they’re not going to be very pleased. These aren’t stray dogs, they’re bushes, you nit!”
“Who said that?” Dudley said, raising his net over his head.
“I did,” Selby said calmly and then, just as Selby was about to leap over the fence and escape, the moon came out again and, when it did, Dudley’s net came crashing down around him.
“You talked! An animal talked!” Dudley screamed. “And I caught you! People are going to have to pay squillions just to see you! I’m going to be famous!”
“What is going on here?” Dr Trifle yelled as he and Mrs Trifle ran out into the backyard and looked around at all the mess. “Dudley, what have you done?”
“Look! He talked!” Dudley cried, pointing at Selby. “He really did! He’s a real, live, talking monkey!”
Dr and Mrs Trifle looked at one another and then at the dog catcher.
“Congratulations, Dudley. You’ve finally caught a dog,” Mrs Trifle said, letting Selby out of the net. “Even if he isn’t a stray dog. Now could you do me a big favour and put on your new glasses?”
“Maybe you’d better talk to him about his hearing,” Dr Trifle whispered to Mrs Trifle. “He seems to be hearing talking monkeys.”
“I’ll put them on if you wish, Mrs Mayor,” Dudley said, putting on the glasses and looking around for a talking monkey but seeing only topiary. “My goodness! Look at all those bushes! They look just like animals.”
“Well at least they did before you came along,” Dr Trifle muttered.
“That looks just like a bear on a bicycle,” Dudley said.
“Does it really?” Dr Trifle asked, taking a closer look.
“It certainly does. And there’s a frog in a spacesuit and two dingoes dancing and an emu on a tightrope. They’re wonderful, Dr Trifle.”
“Are they really?” Dr Trifle asked with a blush.
“Absolutely. I’ve never seen anything like them before,” Dudley said. “Hmmmmmm, I wonder where that talking monkey went.”
“Talking monkey indeed!” Selby muttered, as he ran off down Bunya-Bunya Crescent. “That’s the last time I let that dim-witted dog catcher make a monkey out of me.”
BOGUSVILLE’S BOXING BALLET
It was the annual Bogusville Charity Night and once again the two bush boxers, Nigel “Knuckles” and Sigmund “Slugfest” were in the dressing-room getting ready for the big fight.
“I’m pleased that you’ve come once again to help us raise money for our needy,” Mrs Trifle said to the huge men and their tiny manager, Wilma “Willy” Wynn. “Many people have paid to see this boxing match tonight and of course the profits will go to charity. Though I have to admit I don’t care for fighting myself.”
“Mrs Mayor!” Wilma exclaimed, letting her cigar fall from her lips. “Bite your tongue! Boxing is a wonderful sport. It’s good exercise and it gives boxers a lot of pleasure.”
“Mostly the winners, I should think,” Mrs Trifle said, looking around the room for Selby and wondering where he’d gone. “Now I’d better get back to my seat for the big match. Happy boxing.”
In a minute, the dressing-room was empty except for Knuckles, Slugfest, Wilma and Selby — who had hidden in a box in the corner for a close-up view of Knuckles, his favourite boxer.
“All right, boys,” Wilma said, spitting into a bucket. “I want you to get out there and beat each other to a pulp. The crowd wants to see lots of blood so give it to them and have a great time! May the best man win.”
“Oh, Ma, do we have to?” Knuckles whined. “Do we have to hurt each other?”
“Goodness!” Selby thought. “Knuckles called her Ma. Willy Wynn, the manager, must be his mother! This is a surprise.”
“Of course you do. Don’t be silly.”
“But why?”
“Because they’ve already paid us for the fight, that’s why.”
“Well I don’t care,” Knuckles answered. “Slugfest is my brot
her and I don’t want to fight him any more.”
“Double goodness,” Selby said, stretching his neck for a better look. “Knuckles and Slugfest are brothers and Willy’s their mother.”
“You just don’t want to fight because you know I’ll beat you this time, you big sook,” Slugfest said in a deep growl. “I’ll knock you out right now if you’re not careful!”
“Save it for the ring, boys,” Wilma said, stepping between her sons. “There aren’t any paying customers in here. Now let’s get out there.”
“Right you are, Mum.” Slugfest turned to Knuckles. “I’m going out there and you’d better come too.”
With this he stormed out of the dressing-room nearly knocking over Selby’s box as he passed.
“I’m tired of fighting, Mum,” Knuckles said. “I never wanted to be a boxer. You made me do it. I only ever wanted to be a ballet dancer.”
“Ballet dancer. Don’t be silly. That’s not fun like punching people. Besides, it’s bad for you. It gives people square toes.”
“No it doesn’t, Ma. It’s fun. You should have let me do it. I could have been somebody. I could have been a choreographer.”
“A corry-what? They kicked you out of ballet class because you were no good. You couldn’t stand on your toes, remember?”
“I know, Ma,” Knuckles whimpered. “But I don’t like beating people up any more — not even my own brother. I want to stop. I’ve been hit so much already that my head’s going wonky. One more punch and I’ll start hearing voices, for sure. Oh, please, please, please,” he added, getting down on his knees.
“Poor Knuckles,” Selby thought as a tear trickled down Knuckles’ face. “My favourite boxer hates to box.”
“I’m sorry,” Wilma said, giving Knuckles a pat on the back that could have knocked over an elephant."I don’t mind if you retire from the ring but not tonight. Now I’m going out there right now and I’ll count to ten. If you’re not there, you know what you’ll get.”