Demon Dentist

by David Walliams

  Alfie stood open-mouthed in shock.

  he thought.

  Miss Root might not wear black, or a pointy hat, or have a broomstick exactly, but she was a witch all right.

  Gabz was right after all – witches were alive and well. Miss Root was walking proof. Well, flying proof. And now they were practising dentistry. That’s what the MDW must have stood for, a Master’s degree in Dentistry and Witchistry.*

  * * *

  *Made-up word ALERT

  * * *

  As soon as the door to the surgery had closed behind Miss Root, the streets began to hum with people and traffic. Then from behind the tree Alfie spotted a little girl with a mass of dreadlocks approaching the surgery door. It was Gabz. True to what she had told Alfie in the playground yesterday, she was going to confront Miss Root herself. However, Gabz didn’t know the full extent of the evil that lurked behind that door. She didn’t know Miss Root had taken out every single one of his teeth. What’s more, she hadn’t witnessed the horror that Alfie had last night. Before he could shout out, Gabz had pressed the dentist’s bell. In an instant the door buzzed open. Alfie had to warn his little friend. And fast.

  He leaped out from behind the tree. But just as he was about to shout the girl’s name, someone grabbed him by the back of his coat and lifted him high into the air…

  29

  Asleep on the Toilet

  “I’ve been looking all over town for you, Alfred!” said Winnie. The social worker was holding the boy by the back of his coat. The toes of Alfie’s shoes just scraped the ground.

  “Put me down!” said Alfie angrily.

  “Your poor father is worried sick about you!” The big lady placed him back down on the ground, but kept a firm hand on his shoulder. “I’m taking you straight home!”

  “No, no, no, I can’t go home…” Alfie felt guilty that he had run out without telling Dad where he was going. But it was an emergency.

  Winnie sighed wearily. “Listen, young man,” she began. “I am not in the best of moods this morning. After your little trick with the coffee Revels I had to sleep on the toilet!”

  Alfie attempted to dismiss the image of that as soon as it took shape in his head. However, the more he tried not to visualise his social worker asleep on the lavatory, the more vivid the image became.

  “Look! I have to get into the dentist’s surgery!” pleaded Alfie.

  “No, no, no!” scoffed Winnie. “First I am going to take you home. Then we have a little appointment with your headmaster. I am going to try and persuade him not to expel you…”

  “I don’t care if he expels me or not! I have to get in there now!” shouted Alfie, pointing at the dentist’s door.

  Winnie’s eyes narrowed. Try as she might, she couldn’t understand this boy at all. “Yesterday the whole town had to chase you all the way there, now you can’t wait to get in…?”

  “I have to warn this girl friend of mine, well she’s not my girlfriend, she’s a girl who’s a friend…”

  “It’s OK if she is your girlfriend…” mused Winnie.

  “She’s not.”

  “Sounds like she is,” replied the lady, with a big grin on her face.

  “She’s not,” repeated the boy firmly.

  “No,” said Winnie. “But just to say, it really doesn’t matter if she is your girlfriend.”

  Alfie was becoming mightily frustrated now.

  “Well, she’s definitely one hundred per cent not my girlfriend! And no returns!”

  The social worker fell silent for a moment, before continuing, “So this girl, who’s a friend of yours, but definitely not your girlfriend, where is she?”

  “Gabz. She’s just gone into the dentist’s surgery! She called me a scaredy cat for not wanting to go, but I have to warn her about the dentist…”

  Winnie shook her head wearily. “That Miss Root seems like such a nice lady. What on earth do you have to warn Gabz about?”

  “That the dentist is really…”

  “Yes?”

  Alfie knew it to be true, but still felt silly saying it. Finally he plucked up the courage to finish his sentence: “…a witch!”

  The social worker looked at Alfie for a long while. Then a smile crept across her face before she burst into hysterical laughter.

  “Ha ha! A witch, you say! Ha ha ha ha ha!”

  “Yes,” replied Alfie firmly.

  “Ha ha ha!” Winnie was still laughing. “A witch? That’s the nuttiest thing I have ever heard!”

  “Well, it’s true!” he exclaimed. “She flies around on this cylinder of laughing gas, that’s her broomstick…”

  “Ha ha ha!” laughed Winnie. “Next you’ll be telling me she has a black cat!”

  “White, actually. But it’s really evil,” replied Alfie.

  “Ha ha ha!” The lady was wiping away a happy tear from her eye now. “Miss Root has become a respected member of the local community. And from what I have heard is an excellent dentist…”

  Alfie looked right into Winnie’s eyes.

  “Really? Then why on earth would she do this to me…”

  With that he took out his false teeth and showed the social worker exactly what Miss Root had done to him. Winnie gasped and brought a hand up to her mouth in shock.

  “Oh no!” she whispered. “Miss Root did that to you?”

  Alfie put his teeth back in before answering. “Yes. And right now my friend is up there in her surgery…”

  Winnie looked up at the blacked-out windows. At that moment they heard the whine of a drill and then a blood-curdling scream from inside the surgery.

  “Nooooo!” cried Winnie. “Come on, Alfred, there’s no time to lose!”

  30

  Kneel Down Before Me

  Winnie grabbed Alfie’s hand, and together they raced up the street towards the surgery. The social worker was a big lady. Being a big lady, when she charged towards the door and slammed her shoulder into it, it started to buckle. After two attempts she beckoned to Alfie to jump on to her back to add a little more ballast.

  This worked rather well, and on the fourth attempt the door smashed out of its frame and crashed to the floor. Together they flew up the stairs and burst into the surgery.

  Gabz’s wrists and ankles were fastened to the dentist’s chair just as Alfie’s had been. Miss Root loomed over the little girl, wielding a huge drill. Like all her dental tools, the drill looked more like an instrument of medieval torture. It wasn’t electric. Instead, her hand circled wildly to make the thick drill bit on the end rotate. It was going so fast, it let out a high-pitched scream as it spun. It was so gigantic it looked like it was more suited to digging a hole in the road than in someone’s tooth.

  “Get away from her!” shouted Winnie.

  Despite the drama, Alfie couldn’t help but smile. Finally he and his social worker were a team.

  “What is the meaning of this?” proclaimed Miss Root.

  “I said get away from her,” repeated the social worker.

  The dentist pointed the drill towards Winnie and Alfie.

  “Step back…” she growled.

  “Let Gabz go!” said Alfie.

  “Or what…?”

  “Or I will write a very strongly worded letter to the British Dental Association…” replied Winnie.

  “Help!” screamed Gabz, her entire body trembling with fear. “Root said she’s going to take out every single one of my teeth!”

  “Yes, I am…” sneered Miss Root.

  With that she smiled, baring those too-white-to-be-real teeth of hers. She slowly raised her hand, and pulled those teeth out of her mouth. They were false all along. Lifting the veneers away, she revealed the true horror underneath.

  A set of hideous fangs.

  Each one sharper, more jagged, bloodier than the next. They were so gruesome, they would not have looked out of place on a Tyrannosaurus rex.

  “And none of you can stop me,” the dentist continued. “You must kneel down before me.
For I am the

  31

  Swinging a Cat

  Stepping out from behind Winnie, Alfie circled round the back of the Tooth Witch. Now the demonic one was wielding the drill this way and that to keep them both from coming close.

  From the cabinet behind him, he grabbed a tube of Mummy’s toothpaste. Fang leaped up on to the counter and launched herself at him, landing on his head. But the cat couldn’t stop him squirting the paste straight at the witch’s face. Most of it missed and just singed her hair, but as a few flecks of the toxic goo dropped into her black, black eyes, she fell to her knees in pain.

  The drill fell out of her hand, and swirled around on the floor like a snake in the throes of death.

  Winnie hurried over to the chair, and started trying to force open the metal clasps that bound Gabz to it. As she did so, Fang leaped from Alfie’s head to Winnie’s, the cat’s thick white fur now obscuring the woman’s face completely. One by one Fang’s razor sharp claws came out, and the evil beast started digging them deep into Winnie’s neck until they drew blood.

  “Aaah!” screamed the social worker. “And I am allergic to cats!”

  Thinking fast, Alfie grabbed hold of the beast’s hard and bony tail, and with all his strength yanked the cat off his social worker.

  Alfie had often wondered where the phrase ‘the room wasn’t big enough to swing a cat in’ originated. Now as he found himself swinging a cat by her tail in a small room, her head skimming the chair, the cupboards, even the walls, Alfie’s understanding of the phrase grew.

  After swinging Fang round and round, the most natural next step seemed to be to let her go.

  Which is exactly what Alfie did.

  Fang flew through the air, hissing wildly. The beast shot across the room, and landed with a on the witch’s trolley.

  All the deadly dental instruments scattered across the room to the floor.

  “Nice one!” said Gabz.

  “Thanks,” said Alfie.

  With Winnie nursing her wounds, and the witch still rubbing her eyes clear of the last of the toothpaste, Alfie frantically started trying to find the lever to open the metal clasps.

  “You were right,” he said breathlessly. “She is a witch!”

  “DUH!”replied Gabz. “You don’t say!”

  The sarcastic tone took Alfie by surprise. “All right! Do you want me to rescue you or not?” he asked.

  “Erm, yes, please…” said Gabz, adding a hopeful little smile. “That one there!”

  “Oh yes, of course,” said Alfie. Hastily he reached for the lever behind the headrest, and yanked on it hard. In an instant, the restraints retracted, and Gabz’s wrists and ankles were freed. Like a knight in shining armour, Alfie tried to scoop Gabz into his arms but she was having none of it.

  “I can manage, thank you!” said Gabz dismissively. She was a tomboy at heart, and hated this new role she was being cast in as the damsel in distress. She swung her legs round and jumped down on to the floor.

  “Let’s go!” said Winnie.

  Behind them, rubbing her eyes clear of the last of the toothpaste, the Tooth Witch slowly rose to her feet. Groping behind her with one hand she grabbed one of the ancient tools still left on the trolley. This one had a long sharp spiked hook at the end of it. With her other hand, the witch reached out and grabbed Gabz, pulling her violently towards her, and held the weapon up to the little girl’s throat as she whispered…

  “One step forward and your girlfriend dies.”

  Winnie and Alfie stood as still and quiet as statues. But the boy couldn’t help himself and broke the silence.

  “Just for the record, she is not my girlfriend…”

  “Yeah!” scoffed Gabz, the hook almost piercing her skin. “As if I would go out with him!”

  “Well, I would never ever in a million years go out with her…” agreed Alfie, a little hurt by quite how sure the girl sounded.

  “I wouldn’t go out with you if you were the last boy on earth!” replied Gabz.

  “This is not the time!” shouted the witch. With that, she pulled the girl by her hair and backed over to the silver gas cylinder in the corner of the room. The witch climbed astride it, and placed the kicking and screaming Gabz in front of her. Then the witch leaned back, and turned the nozzle on the end of the cylinder. Just in time, Fang hopped up behind her and it shot off like a rocket. The three of them crashed through the blacked-out window. Alfie ran over to see them zoom off up into the sunless sky. A trail of smoke spilled out behind them.

  “Quick, Winnie!” shouted Alfie. “We have to save Gabz!”

  The pair raced downstairs, and leaped on to the social worker’s moped. Alfie kept his eyes focused upwards, directing Winnie after the trail of smoke. They sped through the town, travelling cross-country when necessary, taking shortcuts through back gardens, down alleyways, even through a supermarket. Poor Mrs Morrissey had only popped in for a tin of spaghetti hoops. But as the moped roared past, she leaped out of the way, and fell headfirst into the ice-cream section. Within moments, an absent-minded shelf-stacker had stickered her as being on ‘Special Offer’.

  “Sorry, Mrs M!” shouted Winnie, before exiting through the five items or less queue to save time. “I’ll be round tomorrow afternoon as usual with the Meals on Wheels!”

  As they sped out into the car park, the social worker pulled back on the throttle hard.

  “Hold on tight…” she yelled, as the pair picked up the trail of black smoke once more. But now it looked like it had come to a stop somewhere just over the brow of the next hill. As they reached the top, Winnie brought the moped to a halt for a moment.

  “Look,” shouted Alfie over the hum of the engine, “the witch has taken Gabz into the old coal mine…”

  “Oh no,” said Winnie. “There’s no way down…”

  32

  The Lower Depths

  For many years coal mining in the town had been extinct. The mine itself had been boarded up. It stood there, ugly and unloved, in an ocean of its own slurry. To keep trespassers out, a huge metal fence encircled the mine. The fence was topped with a crown of barbed wire. Signs screaming…

  Alfie knew where there was a little hole in the fence. The older kids at school would often talk about it. Strange as it might seem, the old deserted mine held a fascination for many of the local youngsters. At the very least, it was somewhere for them to go of an evening to drink and smoke and snog, away from the prying eyes of grown-ups.

  The hole in the fence was child-sized, not biglady-sized, so Alfie thought it safest for Winnie to try and crawl through first. However, as soon as she tried to squeeze through, her clothes became caught on the metal edges of the wire.

  “Help me, boy! I’m stuck!” she shrieked.

  Alfie surveyed the scene. The social worker did not look at her most dignified.

  “What do you want me to do?” he asked.

  “Push!” she implored.

  Alfie took in her position. All he could now see of his social worker were her more than ample buttocks.

  “Where?” he asked innocently.

  “My booty!”

  Reluctantly he placed his hands on Winnie’s abundant bum.

  “PUSH!” she cried.

  Using all his weight, Alfie pushed the woman’s bottom, his feet slipping and sliding on the wet mud just outside the wire fence. Nothing. He took a deep breath and made another huge effort. It was a bit like pushing a car. But eventually Winnie passed through the hole.

  Unfortunately her clothes did not.

  The multicoloured jacket, top and leggings remained hanging on the ends of the cut wire. It took a few moments for Winnie to realise she was now only in her underwear. “It’s suddenly become rather chilly…” she muttered to herself at first, as she struggled to her feet. Finally, she looked down and saw that she was standing there in her bra and knickers. The bra was quite the biggest Alfie had ever seen. It looked like it could comfortably hold two footballs, and was bright orange. Th
e knickers, that might have doubled as a child’s play tent, were a shocking shade of pink. “Oh my!” Winnie cried. The poor lady looked dreadfully embarrassed.

  As fast as he could, Alfie untangled Winnie’s clothes from the fence. To respect her modesty, he turned his head away as he passed the now-torn garments through the hole.

  “Oh, thank you, young Alfred,” said Winnie, as she snatched it from him. Alfie didn’t turn his head back until all the grunting and groaning as she struggled to put the dress back on had stopped. The social worker gave a deep sigh of relief, before telling Alfie, “Not a word of that to anyone, please!”

  “Of course not, Winnie!” said Alfie, not sure he would quite be able to keep it secret forever.

  “I wasn’t wearing matching underwear today!” she exclaimed. “Oh, the shame of it!”

  From where they stood, the pair could just see how the now dispersing trail of smoke ended exactly at the entrance to the mine. At the opening rested a huge metal cage, which itself housed a giant lift. In its long-lost days as a working mine, the lift would have taken Alfie’s dad and all the other miners deep underground. Hundreds of metres down, in the dark tunnels, they would do their arduous work. Once upon a time, coal was the country’s main source of energy. So for hours upon hours the miners would work, dig and chisel and drill, to bring chunks of the mineral to the surface. That was how Dad developed the terrible problem with his breathing. Over the years, all that dust from drilling the coal had become embedded in his lungs.

  “The witch must have taken Gabz straight down there,” said Alfie, as they raced across the rubble to the mine entrance. “My dad told me there is only one way down – in the lift. We have to go after them…”