The Beak Speaks

by Jeremy Strong

  I don’t know why Dad had to blow his top about the advert. I was only trying to get him organized. It’s not my fault he can’t see that he needs a girlfriend. Sometimes I think he’s more of a child than I am, and I’m more grown-up than he is. He might at least have given those ladies half a chance. He could have interviewed them or something. But no, Dad had to send them all packing, so I don’t suppose they’ll ever come back.

  Dad was cross about it all weekend. Almost every time we met he hissed at me, ‘No girlfriends!’ Then there’d be a seething pause. ‘And tell Sanjeev to keep his ideas to himself.’ Another simmering pause. ‘And tell him to leave your hair alone!’

  It was quite a relief to get back to the peace and quiet of school on Monday. I told Sanjeev what had happened and all about the Madwoman from Romania. I’ve got a funny feeling about her. She’s weird.

  Sanjeev reckoned it was all too much for him. ‘It’s because there were so many of them. He was probably scared.’

  ‘Don’t be stupid! My dad’s poured cough medicine down a lion’s throat. He’s not scared of anything.’

  Sanjeev suddenly grinned from ear to ear. ‘I know! Why don’t we raffle him?’

  ‘Raffle Dad? How do you mean?’

  ‘We make him top prize in a raffle, we sell tickets and the winning ticket gets your dad.’

  ‘Suppose the winning ticket goes to a man? Or suppose it goes to some really horrible old lady with no teeth and a hairy chin and wobbly legs?’

  Sanjeev went all moody. ‘You’re always picking holes in my ideas,’ he said, and then brightened up again. ‘Do you fancy being a vulture?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I could shave off your hair, so you’re all bald. Vultures are bald. It’s so they can fly faster. If I shave your hair off, you’ll be able to run faster. You’ll be able to run a million miles an hour.’

  ‘Sanjeev, you are talking complete rubbish. Vultures have a bald head and neck, so they don’t get blood all over their feathers when they’re feeding.’

  Sanjeev kicked a stone. ‘Think you know everything about animals, don’t you?’

  ‘I know that,’ I told him, because I did. I remembered reading about it.

  We were saved from further quarrelling by Nathan. He had brought me a patient and we went into the empty classroom to examine it.

  ‘It’s a mouse with a bent tail,’ he said, holding out a small box.

  Before I could stop him he took off the lid and it leaped out. The mouse went zooming away with the three of us in hot pursuit.

  ‘Catch it before Miss Pettigrew gets here!’ yelled Sanjeev.

  ‘Catch what before Miss Pettigrew gets here?’ asked Miss Pettigrew. How come teachers always walk in when you really don’t want them to?

  ‘Stand still, boys. No rushing about in the classroom. What’s all this about?’

  Nathan has got as much nerve as a rabbit being questioned by a shark. He blurted out the whole story.

  ‘There’s a mouse loose in the classroom? Then we’d better catch it before everyone else gets here. Oh dear, I’m so glad you’re my last class.’

  We began hunting around and when I moved the paint trolley, the mouse whizzed away.

  ‘Watch out, Miss Pettigrew, it’s coming your way!’

  ‘Oh! Oh!’

  Talk about Irish dancing! Miss Pettigrew was THE champion! Her feet were a blur. Her legs were snipping and snapping like chopsticks. The amazing thing was that it didn’t scare the mouse at all. In fact, it seemed positively attracted by all that movement. It made a beeline – or should I say, a mouseline – straight for Miss Pettigrew, dashed on to her foot and vanished up her trousers!

  ‘OH! OH! OH!’

  Miss Pettigrew began leaping even higher. She made a grab at her shin. Tve got it, I’ve got – oh! It’s gone again. Quick, somebody help!’

  How on earth were we supposed to help her? What could we do? We just stood there, goggling at our dancing teacher.

  ‘I have it!’ Miss Pettigrew was clutching her thigh. The mouse wriggled and it was off again, climbing even higher. It disappeared round behind her and Miss Pettigrew suddenly grabbed at her bottom.

  ‘Oh, oh! I can’t bear it! I shall have to take off these trousers!’

  Still clutching her bottom, Miss Pettigrew shuffled down the corridor and into the girls’ toilet. She pulled the door shut. There was an awful lot of banging, the door opened a tiny crack and her hand appeared, dangling the trousers.

  ‘Mark, make absolutely sure there is NO mouse in those trousers. Then hand them back to me, and for goodness’ sake be quick!’

  I shook the trousers as hard as I could.

  That was when the head teacher appeared. Miss Pettigrew was yelling from inside, ‘Give those trousers back quickly!’ Her hand waved from behind the door. I was brandishing Miss Pettigrew’s trousers and, strange to say, he wondered what was going on.

  It took fifteen minutes of explaining by four different people. Even then I am not too sure whether Mr Raza believed us. However, he did find it very funny. (I didn’t.) He told the entire staff at lunchtime. Poor Miss Pettigrew had to put up with no end of jokes, and so did I. We never found the mouse with the bent tail. I hope it’s all right.

  At the end of the day Miss Pettigrew asked if she could have a quick word with Dad. She must have seen my face. ‘It’s all right, Mark, I would just like to tell him the story before he hears it from somewhere else. I want to make sure that you don’t get into any more trouble.’

  I thought that was really nice of her, so I got Dad and we sat in the classroom while Miss Pettigrew told her tale. I told my side too, just to make things clear.

  ‘I’m very sorry it happened at all,’ sighed Dad, giving me a long-suffering look.

  ‘Oh, I have to admit I felt cross at the time, standing there in the toilet with nothing…’ Both Dad and Miss Pettigrew grew rather red and Miss Pettigrew hurried on.

  ‘I mean, the mouse; I’ve never liked mice. I’m quite happy with spiders, but I don’t like scampery things.’ Miss Pettigrew smiled again. ‘How about you, Mr Draper?’ she asked. ‘Are you managing? Did you see anyone you liked on Saturday?’

  How did Miss Pettigrew know about Saturday? Dad was looking puzzled too and as for my teacher, I had never seen her so flustered.

  ‘What about Saturday?’ asked Dad.

  ‘I was… I mean… I think someone told me some ladies came to see you.’

  ‘Yes. They’d made a mistake,’ frowned Dad.

  ‘I sometimes think an older woman can bring the right touch,’ Miss Pettigrew offered. ‘To the children, I mean. Naturally. But don’t you miss the company?’

  ‘What sort of company?’

  ‘I thought, maybe, sometimes, perhaps you felt, you know, um… lonely? I know I get lonely sometimes, being on my own,’ said Miss Pettigrew, rushing on. ‘I mean, sometimes I’m lonely and sometimes I’m not; happy as a lamb sometimes, most of the time, and then other times…’ Her voice trailed away.

  I was beginning to think that my ancient teacher was flirting with my own dad, but that would have been totally crazy!

  ‘I don’t have time to get lonely I have two children to look after – two interfering children, I might add, especially one of them.’ Dad looked at me again. This long-suffering look of his was getting a bit worn out, if you ask me.

  Miss Pettigrew reached out and gently laid a hand on Dad’s arm. ‘Even so, the company of children does become a bit wearing after a while. I should know! I do think adults need the company of other adults, don’t you?’

  Dad rose to his feet, looking a little flustered. ‘Come on, Mark, time to go home. We have to collect Tammy.’

  Just as we were leaving, I caught a flicker of movement out of the corner of my eye. It was up on the window sill and then in a flash it was gone. It all happened so quickly that I wasn’t even sure I had seen it at all. It was the mouse. I was about to tell Dad and Miss Pettigrew, but I was getting really hun
gry for tea and we’d already stayed on after school. Dad was tugging me on the arm – he seemed to be in a hurry to escape too. So I kept quiet, and, in fact, things more or less stayed quiet for the rest of the week. Thank goodness for that.

  5 Dinah: Introducing Arnold

  Quiet? What about Saturday morning? I mean, you really don’t expect a chimpanzee to come crashing down the chimney at three o’clock on a Saturday morning, do you? That’s not exactly quiet, is it?

  There I was, snoozing the night away in the front room, when all of a sudden there’s this whooshing, scraping noise, a cloud of soot comes flying out of the fireplace (putting black spots all over my yellow wattles, I might add) and a moment later a chimpanzee is sitting there.

  The soot got up my beak. I sneezed so hard I did a reverse spin on my perch and fell off. I felt so undignified, lying there with my legs waving in the air. I struggled back on to my perch and tried to look nonchalant, but interesting.

  The chimpanzee just sat in the fireplace, holding out his left arm and gazing at it intently. Tve broken my arm,’ he said mournfully. ‘Look.’

  He lifted it a little and the front half hung down. He pushed it with his other hand and it swung from one side to the other. ‘You see? It’s broken there, right in the middle.’

  ‘That’s your elbow,’ I said.

  His head jerked up and he looked at me with such joy. ‘Really? Do you really think so? It’s not broken?’

  ‘It’s definitely your elbow,’ I said, and I was thinking, This chimp’s an idiot.

  Almost as if he wanted to prove my point, the chimp now lifted his right arm and made that one swing backwards and forwards too. He was delighted.

  ‘Look! Look! The other one does the same thing! I’ve got two elbows!’

  ‘Congratulations,’ I muttered, while the chimp sat in the fireplace making both arms swing at once and blissfully beaming at them.

  I shall let you into a secret. I have often sat in my cage, all alone, and wondered, Wouldn’t it be nice if I had a companion? Someone I could talk with. We could muse upon the state of the world. We could chat about fashion and how to get the glossiest feathers and how to strut with style. What fun that would be! It was a lovely, comforting kind of thought.

  And who do I get to talk to? A chimpanzee with a brain problem – the problem being that he didn’t seem to have one. Not only that, but great chunks of his hairy coat appeared to be missing, which made him a brainless, semi-bald chimpanzee. Even so, I didn’t forget my manners and decided I should introduce myself.

  ‘I’m Dinah the Mynah,’ I said, through gritted beak. How I hated that name!

  The chimpanzee, who was still playing with his elbows, lowered his arms and looked across at me. I straightened on my perch, drawing myself up to my full height and trying to look Calm and Elegant. Unfortunately, another bit of soot got up my beak and I sneezed. At least I managed to stay on my bit of twig.

  ‘Excusez-moi,’ I said, smoothing down my feathers.

  ‘Ex-coo-what?’

  ‘Excusez-moi,’ I repeated. ‘It’s French. It means “excuse me”.’

  ‘Ah. French. I’m Arnold. Arnold Teabag.’

  I began to tell him that I was not actually French myself, but he wasn’t listening. He was holding his head on one side and pulling strange faces, pushing out his lips, puffing up his cheeks and then sucking them in.

  ‘I’ve got this big lump in my mouth,’ Arnold told me.

  I sighed. I was beginning to feel like a nurse on Casualty Ward. ‘Really?’

  ‘Yes. I’ll show you, look.’ He opened his mouth and an enormous pink thing flopped out of his mouth.

  ‘Is that it?’ I asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘That’s your tongue.’

  ‘Really? Is it dangerous?’

  ‘Only if you don’t think before you talk,’ I hissed.

  Arnold sat there, sticking his tongue in and out of his mouth. He pinched the end with his fingers and pulled it out as far as possible, before letting go so that it snapped back into his mouth.

  ‘Ow!’

  Then, just as I was beginning to think he couldn’t possibly do anything more stupid, he slowly lifted one leg, leaned slightly to one side and made a long, rumbling noise from somewhere beneath that I shouldn’t mention. He gazed across at me with enormous sadness.

  ‘I have an air leak,’ he explained. ‘It keeps happening. I’m losing air all the time.’

  Arnold shifted his body the other way and let off another little rumble. Then he started leaping upwards, jerking his head into the air and taking great gulps, as if he were trying to catch it.

  ‘Got to get more air,’ he cried, ‘before it all leaks out.’

  Well, I ask you: what would you have done? What would you have said? I reckoned the best thing to do would be to shoot him and put him out of his misery. Did I say this chimp was an idiot? I’ve changed my mind. Arnold was not just any idiot. He was THE World Record-Breaking Idiot of All Time.

  And he’d come down my chimney. Lucky me.

  I didn’t bother to tell him that all that was wrong with him was a bit of wind. I thought it best to change the subject.

  ‘So,’ I began brightly. ‘Where have you come from?’ Arnold began to raise his arm, but before he could speak I hastily interrupted. ‘Yes, I know you came down the chimney. And before that? Do you have a home somewhere?’

  It was a simple question, but it had the most extraordinary result. Arnold dashed out of the fireplace, hurled himself beneath the coffee table and lay there, curled up in a tight ball of manky black hair, and he whimpered. His teeth chattered uncontrollably. His arms and hands were clasped tightly over his head.

  I had never seen anything so desperately frightened in all my life. I moved to the end of my twig and stared down at this scared and shivering body beneath the coffee table.

  ‘What’s the matter? What’s scaring you? It’s OK. You’re amongst friends here.’

  I know, that last bit was stretching the truth a little, but only a very little. I mean, I didn’t wish him any harm; I just thought he was an idiot, but his terror was beginning to scare me!

  Slowly, Arnold began to unfold. He remained beneath the table, but he wouldn’t look at me. He started to talk and the story he told sent shivers up my spine. It stirred up all kinds of memories of my own – memories I wanted to forget.

  He was an escaped prisoner. He’d been held in a place he called The Dark House. There were hundreds of animals there – birds, beasts, reptiles – all prisoners. They were cramped so close together and fed so rarely that the house was full of disease and death. The place was run by a man and a woman. Food was often taken away as a punishment. The animals were beaten if they misbehaved. The man did the beating, but it was the woman who gave the orders.

  I froze. It was as if an entire field of icebergs had floated on to my spine. This nightmare was so familiar. Was my past coming back to haunt me?

  Arnold slowly lifted his face towards my cage and looked straight at me. ‘You must see The Dark House for yourself. I want you to come with me – now.’

  This was all incredibly dramatic, but Arnold did rather spoil it at this stage by deciding to sit up straight. Since he was still under the coffee table, he ended up sitting there wearing the table on top of his head like some bizarre hat.

  At that moment the door opened and Mark walked in and switched on the light.

  6 Mark: The Midnight Visitor

  I couldn’t sleep. I opened my leopard eyes and gazed into the darkness. Leopards have brilliant night vision. They could spot a mouse at a hundred metres, in the pitch black. I narrowed my eyes, slipped out of bed and almost tripped over my own clothes on the floor. At least leopards don’t have to bother about clothes. I pulled on my dressing gown and crept out to the landing. I sniffed the air, like a real leopard would. Everything was still, so I padded down to the kitchen.

  I was going to make myself a drink and snaffle something to eat, b
ut I heard strange noises coming from the front room. Dinah was muttering away like mad. At first I thought she was having a dream or something, but then I realized that something else was making a noise too, another animal. I know it sounds weird, but it almost sounded like they were talking to each other.

  I pushed the door open and switched on the light. Dinah looked at me as if she’d just been caught red-handed doing something extremely naughty. And then I saw the chimpanzee!

  There was a chimp sitting on the floor with our coffee table on his head. He was covered in soot and a big sooty trail led all the way from the fireplace to where he was sitting.

  ‘Hello,’ I said, like you do when you meet a chimp with a table on his head. Dinah and the chimp stared at me. He lifted one leg and… well, piffed, noisily. Dinah gave a small choking noise and slowly toppled backwards off her perch.

  ‘Arrrk – dead,’ she croaked, then promptly got up and began gabbling away, while the chimp looked at me with his immensely sad eyes.

  I quietly moved across to the chimp, lifted the table from his head and sat down in front of him. ‘I’m Mark,’ I said, and I tapped my chest with one finger. ‘Me Mark,’ I repeated.

  Dinah was fussing about in her cage, making a right nuisance of herself. I could see the chimp

  was scared, so I patted my head and pointed to my spotted hair.

  ‘It’s OK,’ I said softly. ‘I’m not a real leopard. This is just for fun.’ Then I thought that a chimp probably wouldn’t think it was much fun to be a leopard anyway. Things were getting complicated. I just wanted him to understand that I wasn’t going to harm him.

  The chimp began tapping his own chest and then there was this really magic moment – he reached out and gently touched my chest! He did! It was like he was shaking hands or something. It was his way of saying ‘hello’.

  I tapped his chest and he tapped mine. I felt like I was almost talking to him. It was brilliant! Then he lifted one arm and made the bottom half swing from side to side. He chattered quietly, all the time he was doing this. He lifted his other arm and he made that swing from side to side too. I did the same. We sat there facing each other, making our arms swing back and forth. It was terrific!