Paul Jenning's Weirdest Stories

by Paul Jennings

  I stand up and stagger to my feet. As I breathe, the mouth organ screeches in time. In. Out. In. Out. Horrible bellows. I gasp and the mouth organ gasps with me. A terrible tune. The kids clap their hands over their ears. They try to block out the screeching music. Wheezing discords fill the air.

  Looks of pain and fear are thrown at me as I stagger towards the door. I am angry. It’s not my fault. I am only trying to make up for killing the tree. I am only trying to get money for a new one. Why does everyone hate me now? I hate them back.

  The tune is a tune of pain. My music calls up sights from the bottom of dark places. It is the sound of broken hearts, of wars and disease. Of murder and theft. Of revenge and unforgiven accidents. I see all this in the eyes of Mr Ralph and the class. I have stirred up demons from deep within myself.

  They come for me. The class close around me with outstretched fingers. Their nails are like claws. I break through and run. I burst out of the door, clutching my guitar in my hands.

  6

  The sun has gone. A chill wind tears at my streaming eyes. Cold rain begins to fall. The mouth organ screams with each panting breath. I stumble out of the schoolyard. Mr Ralph and the class follow despite the bellowing shrieks from my mouth. They are after my blood. I have turned them into wild animals. My heart thumps against my ribs. My lungs are screaming for rest. The mouth organ plays the tune of my flight for all to hear.

  I stagger through the town. The mouth organ is still lodged inside my mouth. I can’t get it out. Shopkeepers and farmers join the chase. My tune of tears irritates everyone. They will do anything to stop it. I stumble and fall at the foot of the magnolia tree. I am exhausted. My breath comes in shrieking howls. The crowd surrounds me.

  I hate them. Why have they done this to me? Why won’t they leave me in peace? I look at the dead tree. I wish they were like it. Made of wood. With wooden hearts.

  The mouth organ pumps out my terrible tune of hate with each breath. The crowd suddenly freezes – the kids, the shopkeepers, the farmers, Mr Ralph. Every one of them makes my wish come true. They turn to wood in front of my eyes. Wooden faces. Wooden clothes. Wooden hair. Eyes that do not see. I am standing alone. In a street of statues. They no longer thirst for my blood. They stand there like tombstones in the rain. Still. Silent. With raging faces.

  For a moment I am numb. I try to pull the mouth organ from my trembling lips but it won’t budge. It won’t leave its chosen home.

  A door bangs open in the street. It is Dr Jenson. He stands for a moment – stunned. Staring at the stiff figures in the street. He is up-wind. He has not heard my tune of terror. He can save me. He is a doctor. He can get this wretched instrument out of my mouth. He runs towards me and then, mid-step, stops. And turns to wood as the first notes reach his ears.

  In the silence of the street I suddenly realise what has happened. I can’t go home. Mum and Dad will turn to wood too. I can’t go anywhere near anyone. There is not a soul who can help me.

  Or is there?

  7

  I wonder if the young man is still down by the river. He is my only hope. It is his mouth organ. If only I can give it back.

  I stumble out of town. Past the school. Past Mr Hardbristle’s empty porch. Out into the bush. Towards the river. There is no sign of the young man. The cold water of the river flows by uncaring. I follow the bank. Hoping desperately to see the owner of the mouth organ.

  In my cheeks I have a mouth organ. And in my hand a guitar.

  My feet take me up. And up. The river is far below. I am on a rocky outcrop looking at the chill water lying like dead rope in the valley.

  I see him. There he is. His back is towards me. He is heading into the forest. I scream but no scream comes. Just terrible discords bellowing with every breath.

  Fear grabs my heart. What if my music turns the young man to wood? Who will help me then? I try not to breathe. I wave my guitar but his back is towards me. Oh, oh, oh. Who will help me? I wave again. But it is no use signalling to the back of a head.

  I search around for a stone. A rock. A branch. Anything to throw down and attract his attention. But there is nothing. The rocky cliff face has been swept clean by the wind. A few leaves wedged in crevices are all I can find. I desperately throw them over the edge but the cruel wind steals every one.

  The guitar. It’s all I have. I throw it high into the air.

  My eighty-four dollars fall out and spin towards the water. The money is gone. And the guitar is tumbling down. The wind seems to take it in soft hands. I think I can hear quiet chords plucked by unseen fingers. The guitar spins and twists and plunges onto an outcrop of rocks near the young man. It splinters into a thousand fragments.

  The young man looks up. He sees me and smiles. He waits.

  8

  It takes me an hour to reach him. An hour. And bloody knees and scratched fingers. An hour of painful tunes, gasped out through the false smile of my stretched lips.

  At last I reach him. The sounds of my breath have no effect. He does not turn to wood. He puts his hands to my cheeks and then gently plucks the mouth organ from my mouth.

  ‘It does good for those who do good. And bad for those who do bad,’ he says.

  Tears run down my cheeks. ‘I only wanted to get money for a tree,’ I cry. ‘But everything went wrong.’ I remember the silent statues in the town.

  The young man hands me the mouth organ. We both know what has to be done. Without speaking we walk back together.

  The people are all standing there. Everyone. Still silent. Still made of wood.

  I lift the mouth organ to my lips and start to play. It is the sweetest tune. It is the sound of the birth of the world. It is a flower opening. It is a mother’s tear plopping on her baby’s cheek. It is a foal’s first steps. It is the promise of new life.

  My wish comes true. Stiff limbs soften. Wooden lips smile. The people are people again. They are caught up by the tune. They are happy. They remember nothing of my hateful melodies. They sway in time to my new tune. All is forgotten.

  I look at Mr Hardbristle’s window. I can see his face looking out. It disappears. He comes out and stares up at the magnolia tree. The withered leaves are not withered any more. They are green and fresh. My music has brought the magnolia tree back to life.

  The young man turns to me and smiles. ‘You have one more tune to play,’ he says.

  I close my eyes and hold the mouth organ to my lips. I just play a tune of love. Nothing more.

  When I open my eyes Mr Hardbristle is smiling. Everyone is smiling.

  And the magnolia tree is in full bloom.

  My nickname was Greensleeves and I didn’t like it. Not one bit. It wasn’t what you think though. It had nothing to do with the way I wipe my nose. Nothing at all.

  It was because of the watch.

  Anyway, let me start at the beginning. You might as well know the whole story.

  Dad and I lived in the caravan park in Port Niranda. We were very poor. Always short of cash. Dad used to get paid for digging out tree stumps on people’s farms. He would dig a hole under a stump and then shove in a couple of sticks of gelignite. Then he would rush for cover as the whole thing went up with a mighty bang. After that he used to load up the scraps of stump that were left and sell them for firewood.

  It didn’t pay much. That’s why I was so surprised when he gave me the watch. ‘Gee thanks Dad,’ I yelled. ‘What a ripper. A digital watch with an alarm.’

  ‘Try out the alarm,’ said Dad with a grin. ‘It plays a tune.’

  I pressed a couple of buttons and set the alarm. Five minutes later, at exactly four o’clock, off it went. It played a little tinkling tune called ‘Greensleeves’.

  I gave Dad a hug. He really was the tops. He could easily have spent the money on himself. He was saving up for the deposit on a house so we didn’t have to live in the caravan park any more. Poor old Dad. He only owned work clothes. Old boots, a woollen beanie, grubby jeans and an old battle jacket. He wasn’t exa
ctly the best-dressed man in town. But as far as I was concerned he was the best man in town.

  ‘Where did you get the money?’ I asked. ‘You shouldn’t have spent it on me, Dad. You should have bought yourself a new outfit.’

  ‘I’ve just landed a big job,’ he said with a crooked smile. ‘A real big job. We’ll soon be in the money.’

  2

  I didn’t like the way he said ‘real big job.’ A nasty thought was trying to find its way into my mind. ‘What job?’ I asked.

  ‘The whale. I’m going to get rid of the whale.’

  ‘Oh no,’ I groaned. ‘Not the whale. Not that.’ I looked at him in horror. To tell the truth I felt like giving the watch back. Even if it did play ‘Greensleeves’.

  A whale had stranded itself on the main beach about three weeks ago. It was the biggest sperm whale ever seen. It was longer than three big houses joined together.

  And just as high. Before anyone could do anything to save the poor thing it had died.

  People came from everywhere to look at this whale. All the motels were full up with rubbernecks. They swarmed down on the beach taking photos. Special buses came up from Melbourne filled with tourists. No one had ever seen such a large whale before.

  Then, suddenly, the tourists stopped coming. No one would even go onto the beach or anywhere near it. The whale started to go bad.

  What a stink. It was terrible. When the wind blew from the south (which was just about all the time), the whole town was covered in the smell. It was unbearable. People locked themselves in their houses and shut the windows. But it was no good. The terrible fumes snuck under the doors and down the chimneys. They seeped and creeped into every crevice. There was no escape. It was revolting. It was just like living with a bucket of sick under the bed.

  Sailors tried to tow the whale out to sea with a tug boat but the cable broke. The whale was too heavy.

  Men from the council, dressed in gas masks, tried to move it with bulldozers. It still wouldn’t budge. In the end they gave up and refused to go anywhere near it.

  And now Dad had offered to take on the job. ‘Five thousand dollars,’ he said. ‘That’s what I’m getting for removing the whale. Everyone else has failed. The Mayor is desperate.’

  ‘Five thousand dollars,’ I echoed. ‘That’s enough for – ’

  ‘Yes,’ interrupted Dad. ‘Enough for a deposit on a house.’

  I looked around our little caravan. I sure would be glad to move into a house. ‘But how are you going to move it?’ I asked.

  ‘Not me,’ said Dad. ‘We. You are going to help.’ He was grinning from ear to ear.

  ‘Me,’ I gasped. ‘What can I do? Tie a rope onto one of its teeth and drag it off? There’s nothing I can do.’

  ‘You can scramble into its mouth,’ said Dad, ‘and get right down deep inside it. Like Jonah. Then you can shove the sticks of gelignite into its guts.’

  ‘What?’ I screamed. ‘You’re going to blow it up? Blow up the whale?’

  ‘Yes,’ hooted Dad. ‘It’ll be a cinch. No one’s thought of blowing it up. The gelignite will break it up into small bits and the tide will wash them out to sea. And we will be five thousand dollars richer.’

  For a minute I just stood there thinking about the whole thing. I thought about crawling into a whale’s gizzards. I thought about the terrible stink. Then I thought about poor old Dad trying to save up for a house. I looked at his worn-out clothes and his faded beanie.

  ‘Okay,’ I said with a shiver. ‘I’ll do it.’

  ‘Shake, Troy,’ said Dad, holding out his big brown hand.

  I shook his hand. The deal was done. A boy’s word is his word. I couldn’t get out of it now.

  3

  The next day Dad and I headed off towards the beach in our old truck. On the back were boxes of gelignite, fuses, ropes, axes and other tackle. As we got closer to the shore the smell became stronger and stronger. What a pong. It was revolting. Dad pulled over to the side of the road and we put on our gas masks. It was a little better with the gas masks on, but it was very hard to talk. We had to shout at each other.

  When we reached the beach there were only two people to be seen. I couldn’t tell who they were because they had gas masks on too.

  ‘It’s Mr Steal, the Mayor,’ said Dad. ‘And that boy of his.’

  I smothered a groan. The Mayor’s son Nick was a pain in the bum. And Nick was a good name for him too. He was always nicking things. The only trouble was you could never catch him. He was too quick. If you put your best pen on the desk at school when he was around you could kiss it goodbye. The pen would just vanish. It was no good telling the teachers. If you couldn’t prove that Nick stole the pen then you couldn’t complain. The teachers would just tell you off instead of him.

  ‘We don’t want anyone here while we work,’ Dad said to Mr Steal. ‘It’s too dangerous with all this gelignite around.’

  ‘I’m here to make sure you do a good job,’ said Mr Steal. ‘I’ll take care of Nick. He won’t get in your way.’

  ‘Well,’ said Dad, ‘you both stay here with the truck. I don’t want either of you getting any closer to the whale.’

  I looked at the rotting whale. Its eyes were like dead white saucers. Seagulls sat on its mountainous back pecking away at the tough hide. Even with the gas mask on I could smell it. The fumes were so thick that you could almost see them.

  ‘Now,’ said Dad, peering at me through his gas mask. ‘You take two sticks of gelignite at a time into the mouth. Sixteen altogether. I’ll drop sixteen sticks down the blow hole. For every stick you take into the whale put a match in this box.’ He put a small wooden box down on the back of the truck next to Nick.

  We called this the tally box. It helped us to know how many sticks of gelignite had been planted.

  ‘If we don’t put in enough,’ said Dad, ‘it won’t blow the whale into small enough pieces. Make sure you put one match in the box for every stick of gelignite. Then we will know we have the right number.’

  I nodded at Dad. His voice sounded funny inside the gas mask.

  I looked up at Nick. He was staring at the tally box. I could swear that he was sneering at us. Nick was a nasty bit of work. That was for sure.

  Dad put a long ladder up against the whale and climbed up onto its back. ‘It’s slippery,’ he yelled, ‘but it will be okay.’ I watched him drop the first two sticks of gelignite down the whale’s blow hole. Then I walked around to the whale’s mouth.

  My heart sank as I peered into the gaping jaws. It was like a big, wet cave. Every now and then a piece of rotting flesh would break off the roof of its mouth and fall onto its tongue with a wet thunk. I shivered. Then I walked back to the truck to get my first two sticks of gelignite.

  I put two matches into the tally box and walked slowly back to the stinking carcass.

  4

  Dad gave me my instructions. ‘Get right down inside her guts. She won’t blow properly if you don’t. I’d go myself but I’m too big to get right inside. You don’t mind do you?’

  To be honest I did mind. What if I got stuck? What if I got lost? What if the gizzards collapsed on me and I got buried alive? I stared at Dad’s eyes through the gas mask and remembered our handshake. A deal is a deal. With pounding heart I walked into the soggy, wet mouth of the dead whale.

  Dad went back to his ladder to finish putting the rest of the sticks down the blow hole. I was alone.

  I walked carefully over the sagging, stinking tongue. With every step I sank up to my ankles. My heart was pounding with terror. I shone my torch into the blackness and saw that the roof sloped downwards. On either side were white, glistening shelves of gristle. I forced my legs to take me forward. Soon the roof was so low that I had to go forward on my knees. My jeans were soaked with slime.

  Suddenly the whole thing narrowed into a spongy tube like a sausage. I knew that I would have to lie on my stomach and wriggle in. I could hear my breath sucking and squeezing through the gas mask. Th
e goggles were starting to mist up in the damp air. I couldn’t do it. I just couldn’t do it. I couldn’t bury myself inside that giant sausage-shaped bit of guts.

  Then I thought of poor Dad and the battered old caravan. I pushed myself forward with a great shove and slithered into the tube. I had the gelignite in one hand and the torch in the other. But I couldn’t see anything. I was surrounded by gurgling blackness. I wriggled in further and further. Down, down, down into the darkest depths and all around me the dead whale’s decaying dinner.

  Suddenly my hand touched something solid. It was like a slimy wall. It seemed to be crawling. It was crawling. It was covered in maggots. I dropped the gelignite and shrieking and screaming pushed myself backwards. Wriggling, choking, scrambling like a fat caterpillar inside the finger of a rubber glove.

  I squirted out into the mouth and slithered over the tongue and into the glaring sunshine. Then, before my heart failed me, I staggered over to the truck and grabbed four sticks of gelignite – as much as I could carry. I threw four matches into the tally box and once again entered the unspeakable jaws.

  Down I went – into the grizzly gizzards. Then out. Then back down. Then out. How many times I slid down into that filthy throat I couldn’t say. Each time I threw matches into the tally box but the pile never seemed to grow. I staggered in and out and in and out. My head swam. My brain pounded. At last I could do no more. I fell onto the ground next to the truck. Nothing would make me go in there again.

  Dad counted the matches. ‘Fourteen,’ he said. ‘Two more to go.’

  I couldn’t believe it. It seemed as if I had taken a million sticks of gelignite in there.

  Dad could see that I was beat. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘You’ve done a great job. I’ll just throw the last two sticks of gelignite into the mouth. That should be okay.’ He walked over to the whale and threw the last sticks in gently. ‘Right,’ he yelled at Mr Steal and Nick. ‘Get out of the way. We’re ready to blow her up.’