Big Bad Goat
‘He can’t stay there on his own,’ said Mrs Melly. She glanced through the classroom window, where Ulrik was sitting all by himself.
‘I told him he was to stay behind,’ said Mr Wiseman. ‘I made it quite clear.’
‘I know,’ said Mrs Melly, ‘but nobody will have him. I’ve asked every teacher in the school and none of them wants a troll sitting at the back of their class all day. They say he upsets the other children.’
‘Then what are we going to do?’ asked the head.
‘Can’t he stay with you?’ asked Mrs Melly.
‘Be serious! I can’t have him in my office – I’ve got parents coming to see me. What if he bites somebody?’
Mrs Melly sighed. ‘Then he’ll just have to come on the trip after all. Goodness knows I must be out of my mind. Ulrik on a farm – who knows what he’ll get up to!’
Ulrik wasn’t sure why he was allowed on the trip after all, but he was pleased to be going. On the coach he sat by himself next to the window, while everyone else sat with their friends. Warren was on the back seat with Danny and Rashid. Ulrik could hear them swapping crisps and chocolate bars from their lunch boxes. He wished he was sitting with them and had his own lunch box. He began to hum a tromping song to cheer himself up, but he must have hummed too loudly because across the aisle Nisha and Katy Sims were staring at him and sniggering.
The farmer peeples who showed them round was called Mrs Douglas. Ulrik liked her from the start. She showed them the young lambs in their white, woolly coats and the cows being milked in the barn. She let them feed the pigs and climb over the big red tractor in the corner of the yard. Ulrik asked if he could take a cow-patty home but Mrs Douglas just laughed, as if he had told a very good joke. All the same he was starting to enjoy himself. Beside the yard he spotted an animal with a black, shaggy coat and two long, curly horns. It was all by itself in a pen.
‘A goat!’ he said.
‘Yes, Ulrik,’ said Mrs Douglas. ‘That’s Victor. He’s a mountain goat.’
‘Can we go in and see him?’ asked Mrs Melly.
‘No, I’m afraid we keep Victor away from visitors,’ replied Mrs Douglas. ‘He’s got a nasty temper. Get too close and he might butt you.’
Ulrik took a good long look at Victor. He didn’t look friendly. Ulrik remembered the giant goat which had tossed his father off the bridge: hooves like iron and horns sharp as knives. Victor looked like that kind of goat.
Later, Mrs Douglas left them in the farmyard to eat their lunch, seated on some bales of hay. On the far side of the yard, Warren leaned over the fence, watching Victor chew the grass. Suddenly there was a scream of alarm from Katy Sims. The gate of the pen had swung open and Victor had trotted out into the farmyard. Warren was standing by the gate with a mischievous smirk on his face. Victor eyed the children in the yard and gave a low, menacing bleat. ‘Bahhhh!’
He lowered his horned head and ran at them. Class 4 scattered in all directions, leaving their half-eaten sandwiches behind them. Some ran into the gift shop, while others dived into the barn and bolted the door behind them. Ulrik climbed on top of the red tractor, where he found Mrs Melly looking pale and shaken.
‘Mrs Douglas! The goat’s got out!’ she called. But there was no answer – Mrs Douglas was too far away to hear them. Victor trotted around the yard in search of a target. Turning his head, he caught sight of the boy who had opened the gate to set him free. The smirk vanished from Warren’s face and the colour drained away.
‘Warren! Get away from there!’ warned Mrs Melly.
But Warren couldn’t move. He was rooted to the spot with fear. The goat was staring at him with its small, mean eyes. It snorted.
‘Help!’ croaked Warren in a small, frightened voice.
There was no time to think. Ulrik jumped down from the tractor. He tromped towards the goat, stamping his feet hard to get Victor’s attention. When that didn’t work, he took a deep breath and bellowed his best roar: ‘GRARRR!’
It was enough to scatter the sparrows from the trees, but it didn’t scare Victor. The goat simply turned its head to see who was making all the noise. It had a black beard wagging from its chin and it looked in an evil mood.
Ulrik tried a second roar but this time it came out as a squeak, like air escaping from a balloon. Faced with a choice of two victims, Victor chose the smaller one and turned his attention back to Warren.
‘Stay there, Warren,’ called Ulrik. ‘I’m coming.’
Ulrik began to inch his way round the yard, keeping close to the fence, until he reached the place where Warren was cornered by the gate.
‘Get behind me,’ Ulrik whispered.
‘What are you going to do?’ asked Warren.
Ulrik didn’t answer. The truth was he didn’t know. His plan had been to distract Victor long enough for Warren to escape from the yard, but now the two of them were trapped together. He bravely stepped in front of Warren, blocking Victor’s path. The goat tossed its head impatiently, tired of playing games. It kicked up a cloud of dust and lowered its wicked-looking horns. Ulrik knew it was preparing to charge.
‘Run, Ulrik!’ called Mrs Melly, peering down from the top of the tractor.
‘Run, Ulrik, run!’ echoed the voices of Class 4. But Ulrik refused to run. He was a troll and trolls didn’t run from goats. His dad hadn’t run when he’d faced the giant goat on the bridge. As Victor gathered speed, pounding across the yard towards him, Ulrik did the only thing he could think of. He closed his eyes, opened his mouth and began to sing.
He sang a song of his homeland, of the blue mountains and the shining lakes.
A few paces short of his target, Victor skidded to an abrupt halt. He put his head on one side to listen. He was a mountain goat and this song brought back a long-forgotten memory of the craggy mountains where he grew up. It filled him with such sadness and longing that a tear ran down his long nose and plopped into the dust.
Ulrik opened his eyes, surprised to find he wasn’t flying through the air. When he went closer and stroked Victor’s shaggy head, the goat licked his hand and meekly allowed himself to be led back into his pen.
As soon as the gate clicked shut, a great cheer erupted from all around the yard. Ulrik found himself surrounded by his class mates, all talking at once and gazing at him with wide-eyed admiration.
‘Ulrik!’ said Mrs Melly, giving him a hug. ‘That was so brave!’
‘You were, like, cool!’ said Danny.
‘You were a hero!’ said Nisha dramatically.
Ulrik was glad that no one could see him blushing beneath his hair.
‘Now,’ said Mrs Melly. ‘Where is Warren Priddle?’
Warren came forward, looking very small and shame-faced.
‘Warren. Did you open that gate? The truth, please.’
‘Yes, Mrs Melly,’ mumbled Warren.
‘That was a very, very stupid thing to do. If it wasn’t for Ulrik here, someone might have got badly hurt. What do you say to him?’
‘Thanks, Ulrik,’ said Warren sheepishly. He held out his hand. Ulrik opened his mouth to bite it – but just in time, remembered what had happened last time. Instead he did what trolls do to show they are friends. He lifted Warren right off the ground in a mighty troll huggle.
All Together Now
Nine weeks later, at the end of summer term, there was a concert. The parents sat in rows and listened dewy-eyed to their children singing. Sitting in the front row, taking up four seats between them, were Mr and Mrs Troll. They had dressed in their smartest clothes for the occasion. Mr Troll sported a red bow tie to match his Bermuda shorts while Mrs Troll glittered in a yellow ball gown that she was unfortunately wearing back to front. When Ulrik came forward to sing his solo, Mr Troll couldn’t help cheering and stamping his large, hairy feet.
Everyone agreed that Ulrik’s singing was the highlight of the concert. In fact, Mr and Mrs Troll wept so loudly that they had to be shushed several times. When Ulrik sang, de
clared Mr Troll afterwards, he could almost smell the pine forests back home.
Afterwards Mr Troll caught sight of the Priddles and invited them back for supper, in a burst of generosity. Since the incident with ‘the mad goat’ the Priddles had softened a little towards their neighbours. Mrs Priddle no longer screamed when she met one of the trolls on the street. Mr Priddle no longer spied constantly on his neighbours through his telescope. Even Warren admitted that Ulrik wasn’t so bad really – for a troll.
Yet, despite their change of heart, none of them had ever actually set foot inside the trolls’ house and they were a little nervous about what they would find.
‘Phwar! It pongs!’ said Warren as soon they came through the front door.
‘Warren!’ scolded his mum, but Mrs Troll seemed flattered.
‘I do my best,’ she said. ‘I’m afraid the cow-patties aren’t as fresh as they were.’
The Priddles picked their way carefully through the mud and leaves on the floor, worried what they might step in. Luckily, since it was a warm day, Mr Troll announced they would all sit outside.
An hour later, things seemed to be going fairly well. They had all politely refused second helpings of Mrs Troll’s baked bean and banana pie and were wondering what to talk about next.
Ulrik, who had been waiting for the right moment, appeared from the house with a muddy pair of trousers and dropped them in Warren’s lap.
Warren recognised them at once and turned pink. ‘Wh … whose are these?’ he stammered. ‘They’re not mine!’
‘You haven’t even looked at them,’ said Ulrik.
‘Give them to me,’ said Mrs Priddle, snatching the trousers impatiently. ‘Of course they’re yours, Warren! I recognise them. I’d been wondering where these had got to.’
‘Mum!’ Warren shook his head. ‘I’ve never seen them before!’
‘Don’t be so silly. Here are your initials on the label – WP. I wrote it myself. Wherever did you find them, Ulrik?’
‘Well …’ began Ulrik, but Mr Troll interrupted him.
‘By the bogles!’ he said. ‘It wasn’t goblins in our garden that night, it was you. You were creeping around trying to rob us!’
The Priddles couldn’t deny they had been creeping around – the evidence of Warren’s trousers proved it. They looked at the ground, ashamed and embarrassed. Mr Priddle took a gulp of Mr Troll’s home-made slug-and-nettle wine, forgetting what was in it. When he’d finished choking he tried to explain.
‘We didn’t want to rob you, Egbert,’ he said. ‘We were just …’
‘… just looking,’ supplied Mrs Priddle.
‘In the muddle of the night?’ asked Mr Troll. ‘Looking for what exactly?’
Mr Priddle gulped. ‘Well, for bones actually,’ he said. ‘You see, Jackie somehow got the idea … well, that … that trolls eat …’
‘Eat what?’ said Mrs Troll.
‘I heard you in the supermarket that day,’ said Mrs Priddle. ‘You asked for a nice young kid!’
‘What’s wrong with that?’ replied Mrs Troll. ‘Goat is Egbert’s favourite and a young kid is nice and tendersome.’
The Priddles looked at each other, as their mistake finally dawned on them.
‘You mean you were talking about a goat?’ said Mrs Priddle. ‘We thought …’
‘What?’ said Mr Troll. ‘That we eat porky little peeples like your Warren?’
The Priddles nodded sheepishly and waited for their neighbours to fly into a rage.
Mr Troll looked at Mrs Troll, then at Ulrik. He puffed out his cheeks and exploded with laughter. All three trolls laughed and held their bellies and kicked their legs in the air.
When they had at last recovered, Mr Priddle said, ‘I still don’t understand. Why dig up all that earth if it wasn’t to bury something?’ He pointed at Mr Troll’s gigantic earth-hill, now almost as tall as the house.
Mr Troll smiled. ‘What’s the name of this road?’ he asked.
‘Mountain View,’ replied Mr Priddle.
‘Makes no sense,’ said Mr Troll. ‘There’s no mountainses. And no view. Not till now. Come and take a look.’
A minute later the Trolls and the Priddles were all standing on top of Mr Troll’s earth-hill. Ulrik often climbed up here when he was feeling a little homesick. He could see right across the houses and gardens to a wood in the distance. It was only a molehill compared to Troll Mountain, but it was their own.
‘And now,’ announced Mr Troll, ‘we are all going to roar.’
‘Oh no, please!’ protested Mrs Priddle.
‘Go on, try it,’ urged Mr Troll.
‘It makes you feel good!’ said Ulrik.
‘Deep breath,’ instructed Mr Troll. ‘Puff out your chests and roar.’
‘GRARRRRR!’
An ear-splitting roar echoed along Mountain View and over the neatly cut lawns, so that neighbours looked up and wondered if a jet plane was passing over.
Ulrik smiled to himself. Peeples weren’t so bad once you got to know them, he decided. With a bit more hair you would hardly notice how ugly they were.
Footnotes
1 In ‘Pongo’ the catcher is blindfolded and has to find the other trolls purely by using his sense of smell. If he catches one he sits on them and shouts ‘Pongo, Pongo, you are ongo!’ If he walks into a tree and knocks himself out, he loses.
2 Trolls call this ‘a gruffler’. It is a troll custom to let loose a gruffler after a meal to show your appreciation.
Also by the Author
Other titles in the
Troll Trouble series
Trolls United!
Look out for
Goat Pie
Trolls on Hols
PRIDDLES: Roger, Jackie and Warren
Description: ‘Pasty-faced peeples’
Likes: Peace and quiet
Dislikes: Trolls
MR TROLL: Egbert / Eggy
Description: Tall, dark and scaresome
Likes: Roaring, tromping, hiding under bridges
ULRIK TROLL
Description: Big for his age
Likes: Smells, singing, Rockball
MRS TROLL: Nora
Description: Gorgeous (ask Mr Troll)
Likes: Huggles and kisses, caves, the dark
GOAT
Description: Strong-smelling, beardy beast
Likes: Mountains, grass
Dislikes: Being eaten
First published in Great Britain in 2006 by Bloomsbury Publishing plc
36 Soho Square, London, WID 3QY
This electronic edition published in 2006 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Text copyright © Alan MacDonald 2007
Illustrations copyright © Mark Beech 2007
The moral rights of the author and illustrator have been asserted
All rights reserved 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 of this book is available from the British Library
eISBN 978 1 4088 1904 3
www.bloomsbury.com
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