The Indoor Pirates

by Jeremy Strong

  Captain Blackpatch started to climb the rope rigging up to his Captain's quarters. ‘I can't think any more today,’ he grunted. ‘I've already had two clever ideas in one day and now I'm worn out. I expect I shall have another clever idea when I wake up tomorrow morning. Obviously nobody else is going to think of anything useful.’ He scowled down at his crew. ‘I'm going to bed. Batten down the hatches. Good-night!’

  ‘Good-night,’ said Molly.

  ‘Good-morning!’ said Polly.

  2 The Treasure Ship

  There was a great deal of clattering on Dolphin Street. The refuse truck was slowly making its way down the road. The dustmen were collecting rubbish from every house and throwing it into the back of the truck. The Indoor Pirates had two sacks of rubbish and Polly carried them to the back of the truck. ‘There's a lot of stuff in there!’ she said. ‘I never knew there was so much rubbish.’

  Fred mopped his florid face with a big spotty handkerchief. ‘It's amazing what some people throw out,’ he said, shaking his head in disbelief. ‘This truck is like a treasure chest some weeks.’ Polly's eyes almost fell out of their sockets. She tried to appear as calm as possible.

  ‘Oh?’ she squeaked. ‘Treasure, you say?’

  ‘Every week,’ nodded Fred, stuffing his handkerchief inside his baseball cap before shoving it back on his head. ‘We get old tellys, foodmixers – all sorts of things that can still be used. We always get lots of tools.’

  Just as Fred said ‘tools’, his mate Tony gave a huge sneeze and drowned his words, but Polly was quite certain that Fred had said ‘we always get lots of jewels’. She didn't bother to stop and listen to any more. Polly was already half-way up the garden path before Fred had finished counting on his stubby fingers all the treasures: ‘old spades, saws, hammers, screwdrivers…’

  Polly almost smashed the front door off its hinges, she was so excited. She clawed her way up the rigging and barged into the Captain's quarters, where Captain Blackpatch was having breakfast in bed. (Blackpatch had breakfast in bed every Thursday. And also every Tuesday. And also Sundays, Fridays, Mondays, Wednesdays and Saturdays.)

  Polly blurted out everything about the refuse truck full of treasure. Blackpatch was rather puzzled at first. He wondered why a rubbish truck should be used for carrying jewels.

  ‘Don't you see?’ cried Polly. ‘It's a trick! Nobody would ever think of looking in the back of a dustcart for jewels!’ Of course, it had to be a trick! Blackpatch grinned from one big ear to the other. Those dustmen were fiendishly clever – fancy hiding jewels in the rubbish!

  At this, even Captain Blackpatch got so excited that he spread honey on the back of his teddy. He yelled for the rest of the crew and they came hurrying in. ‘Good work, Polly,’ said the Captain. ‘Prancing prawns, we're going to be rich, lads! We shall be able to pay our electricity bill for the next thousand years!’

  ‘But how are we going to get the treasure?’ asked Bald Ben, hoping very much that it would not involve hitting anybody.

  Captain Blackpatch leaped out of bed, even though he wasn't wearing any pyjamas. (He'd gone to sleep in his clothes as usual.) He fixed his crew with a fierce grin. ‘We shall wait until the treasure ship sails down our street and then we'll have a boarding party.’

  ‘Hurrah –'a boarding party!’ shouted Lumpy. ‘It's ages since we had a party. I'll make the cakes. I'll do some of those nice chocolatey ones with white icing on the top, and some butterfly-sponges with hundreds and thousands to make them look pretty. I'll bake lots of mini sausage-rolls and put little cubes of cheese on sticks and…’

  ‘It's not that kind of party, you dopey doughnut,’ roared Captain Blackpatch. ‘A boarding party is when we get our swords and we all hang on ropes and go swinging across to the enemy ship and jump on her and take her over and get all the treasure. That's what a boarding party is.’

  Lumpy Lawson was crestfallen. ‘No cakes or sausage-rolls?’ he asked. The other pirates sadly shook their heads. They quite fancied the kind of party Lumpy had just described. However, at least they would get the treasure.

  ‘I'm going to be rich!’ said Polly, rubbing her hands.

  ‘No, you're not,’ snapped Molly. ‘I'm going to be rich!’

  ‘That's what I said, I'm going to be rich,’ Polly repeated.

  ‘No, that's what I said. I'm going to be rich,’ insisted Molly.

  ‘SHUT UP!’ bellowed Captain Blackpatch. ‘Everybody get your sword. We've got a week before the treasure-ship dustcart-thingummy comes back and we need all the practice we can get so that we are perfect on the day.’

  The Indoor Pirates fetched their swords and they practised swinging on ropes and getting into very noisy and dangerous sword fights. They always used wooden swords.

  Some while back, they'd had proper metal ones which they tucked into their belts, but every time they pulled out their swords they sliced through their belts and their trousers fell down. Captain Blackpatch decided that wooden swords were a lot better.

  They practised day after day. The only time they stopped was when Bald Ben discovered his teddy was missing. There was a dreadful fuss and he just would not be comforted. Captain Blackpatch offered Ben his own teddy, although it still had a rather sticky bottom.

  ‘I don't want your teddy, I want mine,’ wailed Ben. ‘I've had him for years and years and he is my very best friend.’

  ‘Do stop blubbing,’ pleaded Molly. ‘You can have my toothbrush that's like a dinosaur.’

  ‘No, you can have my dinosaur toothbrush,’ Polly promised. ‘It's bigger and better than hers.’

  It was no use. Bald Ben wanted his teddy and that was the one thing that could not be found. They searched the house from top to bottom, from side to side, and then front to back. Ben did not stop wailing until it was bin-day once more and the Indoor Pirates were getting ready to steal all the jewels from the refuse truck.

  Molly put out two sacks of rubbish next to the trees on either side of the road. The pirates grabbed their swords and clambered up into the leafy branches. ‘Wait for my signal,’ whispered Blackpatch, his eyes glinting from between the leaves. The pirates grasped their ropes.

  ‘Can we have chocolate sponge after this?’ mumbled Lumpy Lawson.

  ‘If we get the treasure,’ hissed the Captain, ‘you can have a chocolate sponge as big as a ship. Listen – they're coming!’

  With a great clanking and grinding, the refuse truck clattered to a halt between the two trees. Down jumped Fred and Tony to collect the sacks. They were startled by a loud yell from the middle of a tree.

  ‘Boarding party – let's get 'em!’ And with swords firmly gripped between their teeth, the Indoor Pirates swung into action.

  Lumpy Lawson forgot to hold his rope and crashed to the ground. ‘Oh, fuzzyfigs!’

  Bald Ben went zooming straight into the side of the truck, which made his eyes spin round and round as if they were on a spin-cycle.

  Molly and Polly landed on the roof of the truck and started to fight each other before they remembered they were on the same side.

  Captain Blackpatch swung down beside the driver's cab and dangled at the open window. He glared savagely at Dave the driver. ‘Hurfisheruk! Giffusherezzer!’

  Dave looked back at the fierce bearded face. ‘Beg your pardon?’

  ‘Hurfisheruk! Giffusherezzer!’ bellowed Blackpatch.

  Dave rested his hairy arms on the steering-wheel. ‘If you take that sword out of your mouth I might be able to hear what you are saying,’ he suggested calmly. The Captain, who was still holding the rope with both hands, struggled to spit out the sword.

  ‘Splurrrgh! This is our truck!’ he snarled. ‘Give us the treasure!’

  ‘What treasure?’ asked Dave. ‘We haven't got any treasure. All we've got is rubbish.’

  ‘Ha!’ cried Blackpatch. ‘I knew you'd say that! You think I'm stupid, don't you?’

  ‘Yes,’ nodded Dave. ‘And you are, too.’ Fred and Tony nudged each other and grinned.
>
  ‘You can't fool me,’ growled the Captain. ‘If you don't give us the treasure, I'll cut off your arms and you'll be swimming in pools of your own blood.’

  ‘No, we won't,’ said Dave. ‘If you cut off our arms, we won't be able to swim at all.’

  ‘DON'T ARGUE!’ thundered Captain Blackpatch. ‘We have boarded your ship and taken it over. Now, we want the jewels, and you are going to unload them into our front garden. GET ON WITH IT!’

  The dustmen looked at each other and shrugged. Tony tugged his cap further down his weaselly face. ‘I always did think these pirates were a bit daft,’ he muttered.

  ‘Better do as they say,’ said Fred. ‘The customer is always right.’

  Dave frowned at the Captain's sword. The tip was almost sticking into his nose. ‘Stop poking me and I'll back up to your garden,’ he said. The engine hummed and hurred. The rear of the truck lifted higher and higher until with a sudden whoosh! out spilled all the rubbish. Within a few minutes the garden was piled high with a stinking, messy mountain of muck.

  ‘Help yourselves!’ shouted Dave, as Tony

  and Fred climbed into the cab alongside him and they all went off for an early tea-break.

  ‘Wonderful!’ cried Polly.

  ‘It's more than one-derful,’ argued Molly. ‘It's two-derful.’

  ‘Two-derful?’ said Polly. ‘What's two-derful?’

  ‘One more than one-derful, of course,’ Molly answered. ‘Two-derful. If it was even more wonderful it might be three-derful, or even six-derful.’

  ‘You're the most stupid human being in the whole world,’ muttered Polly, and she turned back to the stink-pile. The excited pirates pulled out sacks and emptied them. They plunged their arms deep among old fish bones, smelly socks, mouldy cheese wrappers, squidgy tomatoes, soggy pizzas, and hunted for jewels.

  ‘Anyone found anything?’ rasped Captain Blackpatch, trying to brush away several thousand flies that seemed to find him very attractive.

  ‘I've got an old hammer,’ said Lumpy Lawson.

  ‘I've found a saw,’ said Molly.

  ‘I saw the saw first,’ Polly began.

  ‘No! I saw the saw you saw first. You saw my saw.’

  ‘QUIET!’ boomed the captain. He

  straightened his aching back. ‘It's no good. Those dustmen must have suspected us right from the start. They've hidden the jewels somewhere else. This is just a filthy pile of rubbish. There's nothing here at all.’

  ‘Oh yes there is!’ cried Bald Ben triumphantly. ‘Look what I've found – my teddy! He was right at the bottom of the pile!’ Ben wiped a big smear of baked beans from his chin and his face split into a huge grin. He was happy at last.

  Next door, a window was flung open and Mrs Bishop leaned out. ‘Captain Blackpatch,’ she said accusingly, ‘I do hope you are not going to leave that horrible smelly mess there all week?’ And she glared at the pirates with stern eyes. Blackpatch gritted his teeth.

  ‘We wouldn't dream of it, Mrs Bishop. The crew are just about to bag it all up again.’ And while the crew bagged all the rubbish once more, Blackpatch went inside and bagged the bathroom.

  He ran a deep bath and got in with all his clothes on. After all, they were just as dirty as he was. He lay there for an hour, grumbling and growling to himself, and wondering how they would ever manage to pay that electricity bill. The little plastic boat he had been bombarding with small bits of soap finally sank and Captain Blackpatch closed his eyes. Outside the bathroom, four very smelly pirates patiently waited their turn for a bath.

  ‘You stink,’ said Molly.

  ‘You stink!’ said Polly.

  Bald Ben sniffed a couple of times. ‘I think we all stink,’ he observed ruefully, and they stood and listened to the loud snores coming from the other side of the bathroom door.

  3 The Hunt Goes On

  Lumpy Lawson was the first to see the notice. He had gone to the shops and was busily using up what little money they had left to buy important supplies – eggs, bacon, chocolate, cereals, chocolate, crisps, fruit, biscuits (chocolate ones), milk and chocolate. And there, in the supermarket window, was the notice.

  Lumpy almost dropped the shopping in his haste to get back to 25 Dolphin Street. He ran all the way there, so by the time he arrived he could barely speak for panting.

  ‘We're going-a-huff-a-huff-a-huff…’

  Captain Blackpatch, who was busily supervising the housework by lying in an armchair with both eyes closed, opened one fierce eye and glowered at the ship's cook. ‘What? What did you say?’

  ‘We're going to be-a-huff-a-huff-a-huff…’

  ‘Shivering sharks!’ shouted the captain. ‘Get a grip on yourself!’

  ‘I'll grip him, Captain,’ offered Bald Ben, wrapping his massively muscled arms around Lumpy's body and lifting him completely clear of the ground. Lumpy's arms and legs thrashed about wildly as he tried to breathe. The Captain was beside himself.

  ‘I didn't mean that kind of grip, you big, bald barnacle! Look – he's turning purple.

  Let him go at once.’

  ‘Oh –'sorry, Captain.’ Ben obediently let go.

  Lumpy fell to the floor and so did the shopping. There was a loud crash and a large milky puddle appeared beside Lumpy, quickly joined by some ready-scrambled eggs. Lumpy struggled to his feet. ‘We're going to be rich! Everything is going to be all right. There's a Treasure Hunt in the park on Saturday!’ And he told the pirates about the poster in the supermarket window.

  ‘Saturday,’ said Molly. ‘That's tomorrow.’

  ‘No, it isn't,’ argued Polly. ‘It's the day after today.’

  ‘The day after today is tomorrow!’

  ‘It isn't,’ insisted Polly. ‘The day after today is the day before the day after the day after tomorrow.’

  Molly was still trying to puzzle that one out when Captain Blackpatch interrupted. ‘We've only got four days left, lads, and then the electricity company are going to cut us off. We've got to get our hands on that treasure in the park tomorrow.’

  ‘What kind of treasure do you think it might be?’ asked Molly. The Captain tugged at his stormy beard.

  ‘Gold, I expect, and silver too. Maybe some pearl necklaces and diamond rings. But we could have a fight on our hands. Suppose there are other pirates there? The notice says everyone is welcome. What we need is a plan, and who makes the best plans around here?’

  The four other pirates looked at each other, perplexed. Who did make the best plans? They hadn't got a clue. Captain Blackpatch tore at his hair.

  ‘I do, you huge hairy half-wits! Now, let me sit in this nice comfy armchair so that I can have a proper think.’ And he drove the pirates from the front room with a kick of one slippered foot.

  Lumpy Lawson went stomping back to the shops to buy some more milk and eggs. (He got some chocolate too.) Bald Ben knitted a little cardigan for his teddy bear. Molly and Polly went upstairs to their bunk-beds and had a flaming row that ended with each sister throwing the other's entire bedding out of the window. This came as a bit of a surprise to old Mrs Bishop, who later discovered Polly's pillow and Molly's night-dress draped over one of her beautiful rose-bushes.

  The following morning, Lumpy made everyone a lumpy picnic to take with them. (He made sardine sandwiches with whole sardines.) The pirates grabbed their swords and set off for the park.

  ‘Here we are, lads,’ hissed Captain Blackpatch. ‘Keep an eye out for pirates.’

  The park was certainly full of people, although there didn't seem to be any other pirates. There were a great number of children and a few parents too, but the Indoor Pirates hardly noticed the crowds. They had spotted something so wonderful

  that all they could do was fix their eyes on it and sigh deeply.

  It was a climbing-frame. It was big, and it was painted bright red and bright green. As if that wasn't enough, the climbing-frame had been built in the shape of a pirate galleon.

  ‘Now, that's the kind of ship I like,’ said
Captain Blackpatch. ‘One that's anchored in concrete. Come on, let's seize her!’

  The pirates drew their swords and rushed across the play area, yelling and snarling and driving the children from the climbing-frame. The children hurried off to find the park-keeper so that they could complain, while the Indoor Pirates swarmed over their captured prize.

  ‘This is the best ship we've ever had,’ grinned Polly.

  ‘It isn't,’ said Molly. ‘I went on a ship twice as big as this.’

  ‘Well, I went on a ship three times bigger,’ Polly butted in.

  ‘My ship had a thousand cannons!’ cried Molly.

  ‘My ship had a million cannons,’ shouted Polly, ‘and its masts reached the sky and its sails were as big as clouds and it could go as fast as a hurricane…’ she panted. Molly stared back at her sister.

  ‘Well, my ship was even bigger,’ she said simply. ‘So there.’

  Polly drew her sword and was threatening a fight to the death, but Captain Blackpatch had had enough and he ordered her up to the top of the mast to act as look-out, and a good thing too. Hardly had Polly taken up position when she gave a cry of alarm. ‘Pirate on the starboard bow, Captain!’ she cried.

  Sure enough, a large, red-faced park-keeper with big boots and bristling moustache was marching straight towards them, surrounded by an excited gaggle of children. ‘Look here,’ he complained. ‘You big pirates can't play here. This is for children.’

  ‘I like your hat,’ said Lumpy Lawson admiringly. ‘Can I have it?’

  ‘Of course not. This hat is the property of the Parks and Gardens Department.’ The park-keeper wagged a large and menacing finger at the pirates. ‘Now, get off at once!’

  There was no way that the Indoor Pirates were going to have their newly won ship taken away from them. Captain Blackpatch whispered something in Bald Ben's ear.