Spooky Stories and Twisted Tales

by Roger Hurn

  Peter closed his eyes and groaned. It felt as if sour milk was curdling in his stomach. “Big Jack” as he was known to friends and foes alike was a man with a foul temper and whose natural instinct was to lash out first and ask questions afterwards. He was not the kind of man to forgive and forget.

  As Peter stood there contemplating Big Jack’s rage, Rex trotted into the kitchen and nudged Peter’s hand with his nose. He still wanted that sweet.

  Peter scratched his dog behind the ears. ‘Jack is going to go ballistic when he finds out what you’ve done,’ he said miserably. ‘What the heck am I going to do, Rex? Jack’s a nasty piece of work and even if he doesn’t hit me, he’s bound to demand I have you put to sleep.’

  Rex heard the word sleep and took himself off to lie down on his blanket leaving Peter to fret. Peter didn’t know what he could do to save his dog but he knew he had to do something and quickly. Suddenly he had a flash of inspiration.

  He filled the sink with hot water and washed the rabbit with soapy liquid. Then he plugged in his hair drier and dried Flopsy’s fur and combed it and brushed it until her coat shone. When Flopsy was quite dry, Peter hid her under his jacket and crept out into the garden.

  He was pretty sure Emma and her brute of a father were out but peered over the fence to see if he could see any sign of them. When he was sure the coast was clear, he scrambled over the fence and ran to Flopsy’s hutch. He opened the door and put the rabbit back inside. In a desperate attempt to make her look as life-like as he could, Peter even put a carrot in her paws.

  He was standing back to examine his handiwork when he heard a car door slam out in the street. Emma and Jack had returned. For a second, Peter was too paralysed by fear to move. But then the sound of their voices galvanised him into action. The adrenaline pumped through his body and, with an agility he didn’t know he possessed, he jumped over the fence and dashed back into his own house.

  As he stood panting and shaking with his back to the door, Rex came bounding up to greet him.

  ‘Down, Rex,’ snapped Peter. ‘I’ve got nothing for you.’

  Rex slunk away and hid under the table. He knew his master was angry with him, but he didn’t know why.

  Peter knew it would only be a matter of time before Emma discovered that her rabbit was dead and he waited in trepidation for Jack to come knocking at the door. But Jack didn’t come that day or the next or the day after. Peter began to dare to hope that his ruse had succeeded. Then, when he saw Jack out in his garden one morning, Peter decided he couldn’t avoid his neighbour any longer so he ventured outside.

  Forcing himself to act normally he called out a greeting. Jack turned and eyed him with a sullen belligerence.

  ‘So there you are. I haven’t seen you or that mutt of yours for a few days. What you been up to?’

  Peter gulped. ‘Nothing,’ he said. ‘I’ve been a bit under the weather that’s all but I’m fine now.’ He smiled a feeble smile. ‘Er … how about you? Is everything OK?’

  Jack stared at Peter. Peter suddenly understood how a mouse must feel when confronted by a particularly malevolent stoat.

  Oh god, he knows, thought Peter.

  Jack slowly shook his head. ‘No, everything is definitely not OK.’

  ‘Really,’ said Peter struggling to keep his voice as normal as possible. ‘What’s up?’

  ‘Well,’ said Jack. ‘A strange thing happened a few days ago. I’d taken Emma to visit her gran and when we came home we found Emma’s pet rabbit dead in its hutch.’

  ‘That’s awful,’ gasped Peter. ‘Poor Emma must have been devastated.’

  ‘No, that’s not the strange bit, you muppet,’ growled Jack. ‘The weird thing is the rabbit had died that morning and I’d already buried it in the garden before we went out!’

  If you enjoyed Spooky Stories and Twisted Tales, why not try:

  Once There Were Lions

  By

  Roger Hurn

  Chapter One

  The Lions

  I can still see it in my mind as plain as day. I turned the corner of Rolt Street and headed up Cold Harbour Lane. I hurried on past the warehouses to the wasteland where we had our secret hideout. Only the wasteland wasn’t there anymore. There was just a great big hole in the ground where a German plane had dropped a tonne of high explosives. The pilot had been aiming for the warehouses but he’d missed. They’d survived, but our den hadn’t. I wasn’t really surprised. The Nazis had flattened large parts of London so I wasn’t expecting our little patch would get away scot-free. Even so, it brought me up short.

  But, wait a minute, I’m getting a bit ahead of myself here. I should tell you who we were and why we had a den. Well, there was me of course. My name’s William Shapley but everyone calls me Billy - except my mum who calls me William. Then there was Thomas and Rosie. Thomas was my best friend and he was brilliant at football. His Dad went around telling anyone who’d listen that Thomas was going to play for Millwall when he grew up. But Thomas had a big secret. He wanted to play for Arsenal. He told me but he wouldn’t tell anyone else because Thomas didn’t want to upset his Dad. I didn’t blame him. Thomas’s Dad was a big bloke with a shouty voice. I was glad he wasn’t my father.

  Rosie was Thomas’ sister. She was only a year younger than Thomas and she was a bit of a bossy boots but she didn’t tell tales and, like her big brother, she was good at sport. Mind you, Thomas’s Dad never boasted about her.

  And then there was Eddie Johnson. He was an only child and his mother spoiled him rotten, which meant he really got the hump if he didn’t get his own way. But as he always had plenty of pocket money for sweets and trips to the pictures, we put up with his sulky nature and let him think he was our leader. But he wasn’t really. Simon was. Simon’s nickname was ‘Brainbox’. He was the cleverest kid in our school but he wasn’t a swot. Simon was born with an extra helping of brains – he couldn’t help it, it’s just the way it was. Anyway, for better or worse, that’s who was in our little gang. We called ourselves ‘The Lions’ after Millwall, our local football team, and so our hideout was ‘The Lions’ Den’.

  Actually, our Den wasn’t much to look at. It was only an old shed; a left over part of a factory that had once stood on the site. The factory had been knocked down years ago but the demolition men must have forgotten about the shed so it waited there empty and abandoned until we came along and claimed it for ourselves.

  We patched up the roof with some tarpaulin we thieved from Mr Entwhistle’s rag and bone yard. We stuck newspapers across the windows to keep out the rain and the wind and we used upturned wooden crates from the market as a table and chairs. Rosie put one of her mum’s glass jam jars on the table and stuck a paper flower in it to make it seem more cosy. Then Eddie painted the words: ‘LIONS’ DEN. KEEP OUT OR YOU WILL BE EATEN!’ on the front door in red paint (though Simon had to tell him where the apostrophe went). We were pretty pleased with what we’d done and we used to meet up there every day after school - and on Sundays if we could.

  But now it was gone. Blown to smithereens by some nasty Nazi. I was standing there gawping at the hole when I heard a voice behind me say: ‘We thought you were never going to show up.’

  I turned round and there were Thomas and Rosie. They didn’t look how I remembered them. Like me they were five years older. Thomas was really tall and gangly while Rosie was, and I hated myself for thinking it, quite pretty. She’d always been a tomboy but now she looked more like a young woman. ‘Mum only just gave me your message,’ I said. ‘Anyway, it looks like I’m not the only one who’s late. Where’re Eddie and Simon?’

  Thomas shrugged. ‘Eddie’s still in Canada. He’s living with his relatives. We don’t think he’s coming back.’

  ‘Oh,’ I said. ‘His Mum won’t like that.’ I grinned at them but they didn’t grin back. ‘So where’s Simon then?’

  There was a long silence. Thomas and Rosie glanced at each other like they were sharing some sort of guilty secret. Thomas looked do
wn at his feet. Rosie stared at me. ‘Simon’s dead,’ she said.

  Rosie’s words didn’t make any sense to me. I shook my head. This wasn’t right. Loads of children had been killed in the war but I didn’t know any of them. Simon was ‘Brainbox’. He was clever. He knew the answers to all the questions the teachers asked in school. If you sat next to him in class and gave him a gobstopper or a sticky toffee he’d let you copy his work. Though, thinking about it, humbugs were his favourite. Simon would do your homework for you in return for a bag of mint humbugs. He was too brainy to be killed in a stupid war. So I knew he couldn’t be dead.

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