Casper Candlewacks in the Claws of Crime!

by Ivan Brett

  “I’m home,” called Casper as he slammed the sticky front door behind him.

  “Casper, that you? Come on through, supper’s looking delicious!” Casper’s mum’s shout from the kitchen was accompanied by the clattering of knives and a rubbery thud.

  On the doormat lay five red letters all with different shouty words on the front like Urgent: Final Payment Request and Fines overdue – we will release the hounds, along with one of those Wanted posters with that picture of Tiddles on it. Casper picked them all up and traipsed down the dark corridor to the back of the house. At the kitchen table sat Casper’s dad, Julius Candlewacks, surrounded by mountains of cookery books and furiously scribbling on a roll of toilet paper. Casper’s mum, Amanda Candlewacks, stood proudly in the middle of the cluttered kitchen floor, her blouse inside out, little pink rollers littering her straggled blonde hair, with a whole raw chicken clutched to her chest like a slippery hot water bottle.

  “I’m making chicken!” she announced.

  “Oh,” said Casper, worried. “It looks very dirty. What have you been doing with it?”

  “I might have dropped it once or twice, but it’s fine. We always clean the floor, right?”

  “I’ve never cleaned the floor.”

  “It doesn’t matter, Casper. Floor bits are tasty.” Amanda flung open the oven door, threw in the chicken, slammed it shut and grinned. “Simple as that. I’m a natural!”

  The door swung back open and broke right off its hinges, tipping the oven forward so that the grubby chicken tumbled out on to the floor and rolled under a cupboard.

  “Oh…” muttered Amanda. “Is that meant to happen?”

  Casper sighed. “Forget the chicken, Mum. Let’s try beans on toast.”

  “Beans on toast! That’s easy.” She perked up at once and bounded back over to the stove, grabbing the nearest saucepan and thumping it down on a ring. Into the pan she threw two slices of stale bread and a tin of baked beans (unopened), then she stepped back with hands on hips, chest puffed up proudly. “There. I’m not completely useless.”

  “Um…”

  You see, being a mum is a difficult job. It’s much easier, on balance, to sit in front of the telly and munch biscuits. Amanda Candlewacks made this discovery eleven and a half years ago, shortly after the birth of her bubbly blonde-haired son called Casper. She’d only get up from the sofa during advert breaks or weather reports, and that would only be to fetch biscuits, use the toilet or have another baby (which only happened once, and Amanda was furious about it because she missed the latest episode of Granny’s Skin Complaints).

  But two months ago the telly broke and, left alone in the house with Cuddles, her screaming baby, Amanda was faced with a problem. You see, televisions have ‘mute’ buttons and you can change the channel when you get bored, but even the most up-to-date babies can’t boast those features. So she was forced to be a mother for the very first time in eleven and a half years. Strangely, she quite liked it. Not so strangely (for someone who’d been sitting in front of a telly for over a decade), she wasn’t very good at it.

  “Dad, can’t you help?” pleaded Casper. “You’re a chef, for goodness’ sake.”

  Julius didn’t look up from his toilet paper. “Was a chef, Casp. Was.”

  “Whatever. Couldn’t you cook our dinner?”

  “I’m busy, can’t you see?”

  Casper sighed. Two months ago Julius Candlewacks’s restaurant had closed down due to bad press and a small explosion, and suddenly he’d found himself without a job. Never one to give up, he jumped on the next bus to High Kobb, took out every single book from the food section of Kobb Central Library, staggered home and announced to his family, “I’m writing a celebrity cookbook!”

  “Which celebrity?” Casper had asked.

  “Me, of course. I’ve been a chef for twenty years; now it’s time to pass on my knowledge.”

  “What knowledge?” Casper had asked.

  But Julius wouldn’t hear a word of it. From that moment on he spent every waking second poring over exotic ingredient lists, copying down useful pages and growing steadily more angry about younger chefs’ successes.

  Today was no different. “Look at this potato gratin, Casp, just look at it.” He waggled a loose page from Vinnie’s Veg across the room. “It isn’t even properly seasoned! That’s it. I’m taking this one. He doesn’t deserve it.”

  “Dad, you can’t just steal other people’s recipes.”

  “I’m not! Mine’ll have more seasoning.”

  Casper rubbed his eyes. “Never mind. Where’s Cuddles?” Normally he would’ve heard screaming by now, or at least felt that characteristic stabbing pain as his feral baby sister bit him on the ankle.

  “She’s hanging on the line,” said Amanda. “I gave her a wash today.”

  “Hanging on the…?”

  “I couldn’t very well put her in the tumble dryer, could I?” Amanda burst into trills of uproarious laughter.

  Eleven and a half straight years of telly would do funny things to anyone, but Casper hoped his mother might have learnt how to be a bit less bonkers by now. This morning he’d caught Amanda drying her hair with a Hoover. Last night she’d plugged a dummy up each of Cuddles’ nostrils. “These things take time,” he told himself.

  Casper shoved open the back door and dashed into the garden, where the ten-month-old bundle of teeth and snot called Cuddles Candlewacks bounced up and down inside a pair of Julius’s boxer shorts that were hanging on the washing line. At the sight of Casper she screeched like a wounded eagle and swung her arms about, gnashing at the air with her tiny razor-sharp fangs.

  “Come on, let’s get you inside.” Casper unhooked Cuddles and carried her at arm’s length back to the kitchen.

  “There she is!” Amanda grabbed the baby from Casper’s arms and gave her a loving squeeze. “Ooh, ‘WANTED’. What’s this about?” She reached for the poster.

  Instantly forgotten, Cuddles slithered gently down her mother’s legs. She landed on all fours and scuttled off under the cupboard to hunt the raw chicken.

  “Haven’t you heard?” said Casper. “Someone’s stolen Sir Gossamer D’Glaze’s sword. A jewel thief going by the name of Le Chat.”

  “Is this him?” asked Amanda. “Poor feller. He does look so much like a cat.”

  Cuddles’ head popped out from under the cupboard. She stared at Amanda with wild eyes.

  “What’s she doing?” Casper frowned at his sister, her ears pricked up attentively.

  “Oh, it’s her new thing. She saw a cat in the garden and went berserk. Started bonking her head against the windows.”

  “TAT!” screeched Cuddles. “TAT!”

  “Ooh!” Amanda frowned. “She’s not done that before.”

  “She’s saying ‘cat’!” Casper couldn’t believe his ears.

  “Don’t be silly,” giggled Amanda. “Babies can’t talk.”

  “TATATA! TATATA!”

  “No, she is, she definitely is!”

  Cuddles scrabbled out from under the cupboard and set off on a circuit of the kitchen, her nose frantically sniffing the air.

  “Is it the cat?” Casper waved the poster at Cuddles. “Do you want the cat?”

  Cuddles’ whole body tensed. Then she launched at Casper, scaling his trousers, yapping with all her lungs, drool dangling off her sticky chin. She leapt vertically, snatching the poster from Casper’s hands and then dropping to the floor.

  Casper had never seen Cuddles chase a cat, but he was pretty sure he knew what would happen next. “Cuddles, don’t—”

  But he was wrong. Cuddles wasn’t tearing it to pieces. She wasn’t even gnawing at the cat’s face. Actually, she’d wrapped both of her arms round the poster and was rolling around with it on the floor, gurgling strings of happy nonsense and licking its ear.

  “TATATA!” Cuddles squealed, before returning to her cat cuddle.

  Casper grinned. “She knew the word, Mum. She said ‘Cat’!”


  “Her first word!” Amanda skipped over to Cuddles and swung her around in the air (covering herself in sticky splats of toddler slobber as she spun). “Julius, darling, our baby’s said her first word!”

  “Shh,” Julius retorted. “I’m working.”

  Amanda swung Cuddles even faster round her head. “Casper, get the camera.”

  “We don’t have a camera.”

  “Oh, she’s a genius! She’s a genius, Casper. Bring her the dictionary.”

  “We don’t have a dictionary.”

  “My beautiful little Cuddles!” Mother and wailing baby spun round and round, quicker and quicker. But the spinning got too fast, Cuddles coughed up a chicken bone and with a shriek she slipped from her mother’s hands. Time slowed as Casper watched his sister soar through the air, leaving a slimy dribble vapour trail in her wake. She lost altitude, dropped like a stone and landed with a Schmulck face-first in the mouldy fruit bowl.

  Amanda and Casper held their breath.

  There was a gurgle, then a squeak, then Cuddles climbed out of the bowl grinning from ear to ear and covered in rotten banana.

  “She’s alive!” Amanda raced over to greet her aeronautic baby. “Aren’t I a clever little mummy, putting that fruit bowl just where you’d land?”

  “Come on, give her here,” said Casper. “Your beans smell burnt.”

  “Ooh, forgot about them!”

  Casper plonked Cuddles down on top of a pile of cookbooks on the kitchen table, found the least sticky seat and sat down next to Julius.

  “Good, Casp, I need your help. I was going to call my book The Candlewacks Cookbook. Now I know what you’re thinking – snore, snore. Well, exactly. But then I had a brainwave. Call it a stroke of genius. I’m calling the book… wait for it…Juicy Julius.” He spelt out the words in the air with a grand flash of his wrists.

  There was a long pause. Casper chewed his tongue.

  “What d’you think?”

  Luckily there was no need to answer because a heavy saucepan thumped down on to the table in front of them, held by the grinning Amanda. “Dinner is served,” she announced proudly.

  Black plumes of smoke poured from the pan (due to the burnt toast and the half-melted tin of beans), stinging Casper’s eyes worse than Lamp’s nettle sunglasses. Covering his mouth with his T-shirt, Casper blundered blindly across the kitchen and threw open the door. “Let’s have supper in the garden.”

  “Great idea!” Amanda sang, “I do so love picnics.” She disappeared down the garden with the saucepan in a puff of smoke (literally).

  “Right. Time for some proper dinner.” Casper searched the kitchen cupboards, but all he found worth eating was a pile of rice (with the weevils picked out), a carton of orange juice and half a sausage. “Sausage a l’Orange,” he said determinedly and reached for the kettle. “Dad, why don’t you ever cook any more?”

  “Too busy. We’re on to chapter five, Casper. ‘Buns and Biscuits’. What are my good ones?”

  “Don’t know,” Casper replied. “Not those squashed fly biscuits you used to do, though.”

  “But they were great!”

  “They had actual flies, Dad. It’s meant to be raisins.”

  “I knew that.” Julius coughed and a large book mountain came tumbling down. “You’re no help at all, Casper.”

  “I just think your book idea is silly, that’s all. You do realise there’s no money in publishing?”

  “Course there is. Everyone’ll want a copy of my book. I’m a household name.”

  Casper chuckled. “Which household?”

  “This one.”

  “Any others?”

  “I’m working on that.” Julius puffed up his chest. “Anyway, don’t just stand around being useless. We’re looking for buns and biscuits.” He picked up the nearest book and flung it at Casper, who dropped his wooden spoon just in time to catch the book.

  He read the title – Just My Tripe: 1000 tasty uses for cow’s stomach. “Yuck. You sure I’ll find any biscuits in here?”

  “Or buns, Casper. The chapter’s called ‘Biscuits and Buns’, remember?”

  “How could I forget?” Casper groaned and flicked through Just My Tripe’s greasy pages. Tripe ’n’ Kidney Soup; Ripe Tripe Roulade; Edible Tripe Shoes with Rhubarb Laces…”

  “Pah!” Julius pointed at a recipe on the top of his pile. “Found a mistake, Casper. Juicy Julius won’t have any mistakes.”

  “What’s that then?” asked Casper. He soon wished he hadn’t.

  Julius pointed at the page. “These biscuits are called Langues de Chat. ”

  Cuddles suddenly turned to face Julius, eyes wide.

  “Now I know a bit of French from my gap year, but I’ve looked through the recipe and I don’t see a single cat tongue.”

  “TATATA?” squeaked Cuddles frantically.

  Casper dashed over to calm his sister down. “Shh, don’t listen to Daddy.” He pressed his finger to his mouth and glared at Julius.

  “I’m serious! Langues de Chat means ‘Cat Tongues’. That’s just a lie! I don’t see even a slice of cat.”

  “TAT!” squealed Cuddles. “TATATA!”

  She sprang into action and set upon Julius’s books, clawing and tearing through the flimsy pages trying to find the cat.

  “No!” Julius yelled, sweeping Cuddles from his mauled books. “Get off. That’s my hard work! You can’t!”

  She could. Cuddles jumped back on and ripped more furiously, flinging empty dust covers over her shoulders once she’d checked each one for cats. Casper dived for cover inside the oven and watched the rest of the action from there.

  After two minutes Cuddles’ claws hit hard wood and she sat back, puzzled. She sniffed once, twice, then flumped over the side of the table and scuttled on all fours down the corridor.

  Julius looked with horror at the scene.

  “Dad, I’m sorry,” said Casper, still in the oven.

  His dad watched the pile of torn paper for what seemed like ages. Then suddenly, his eyes lit up. “Don’t touch anything, Casper. Where’s the glue?”

  “I don’t think that’s going to—”

  “Rubbish. I’ll stick it all back together.” He tiptoed to the cutlery drawer and rummaged around before pulling out an old glue stick. “Don’t breathe. Don’t even think of breathing. Don’t even think of thinking of breathing.” Gingerly, he picked up the nearest two shreds. “No…” he said, and placed them back down. He picked up two more. “Ah!” he whispered, unscrewing the top of the glue. “This isn’t so hard. I’ve always been good at puzzles.”

  “Delish!” sang Amanda as she re-entered the kitchen and threw the blackened pan into the sink.

  A gust of wind followed her through the door, lifting a million scraps of paper high into the air. Half of them swirled out of the door and flew off into the sky; the other half-million wafted solemnly to the sticky kitchen floor and… well… stuck.

  When Casper looked back at Julius, his face was in his hands.

  “It’s OK, Dad. You can start again.”

  “Twenty-thousand pounds, Casp,” he said, a little teary.

  “What’s that?”

  “Course I don’t really want to write a book. I’m a chef. Cooking is my life. Olive oil runs in my veins; my heart beats a spicy rhythm with a chicken drumstick on the bongos of my soul.”

  Casper frowned. “And twenty thousand pounds…?”

  “I want my restaurant back, I really do. But I can’t open another one, not without lots of equipment. Lots of equipment costs lots of money, Casp, and lots of money costs twenty-thousand pounds. All I’ve got is…” Julius turned out the pockets of his stained chef’s trousers, finding twelve pence and a lollipop. He wiggled the lollipop in front of Casper’s eyes. “I’ll sell you this for twenty grand?”

  All of a sudden a bell rang in the back of Casper’s mind as he recalled Mayor Rattsbulge’s speech. “How much did you say you needed?”

  “Twenty thousand. It’s strawbe
rry flavour.”

  “Forget the lollipop, Dad.” His head was buzzing now. “I’ve got a better plan.”

  Julius shrugged and popped it in his mouth.

  “…And now it’s time for ‘How to Catch a Criminal’, with your host, Detective Cuffbert ‘Cuffs’ Parkhurst.”

  “Now this is more like it.” Casper sat forward on the sofa, his pencil and notepad held at the ready. The mayor had been perfectly clear: whoever brought home Le Chat and the sword would earn twenty thousand pounds; just what Julius needed to get his restaurant started.

  The television cut to a butch policeman with a crew cut and a nose ring, squeezing the breath out of two roughed-up youths, one under each arm. “’Allo. I’m Detective Cuffbert Parkhurst, but you better call me ‘Cuffs’ unless you want a fick ear. I’ve nicked over a million criminals in my life. In fact these two oiks are my million-and-twelf and million-and-firteenf.” He banged the youths’ heads together and bundled them into a patrol car. “So if you break the law, you’ll ’ave Cuffs at your door…”

  Casper didn’t know a thing about fighting crime, so he’d set himself in front of Cops ’n’ Robbers TV, one of those rubbish cable channels that you’d never watch unless Cuddles had eaten the remote again. For two hours he’d been watching grainy car-chase footage broken up by insurance adverts, but this show seemed more promising. Casper licked his pencil.

  “Now, the first fing you gotta remember if you wanna be like me,” Cuffs prodded a tattooed thumb at himself and snarled, “is that the criminal always returns to the scene of the crime. The night after ’e’s done it, once it’s dark, ’e’ll go back to check nuffin’s outta place. Get that into yer heads and you know where to start lookin’.”

  “Of course!” Casper sat bolt upright, a sudden flash of inspiration hitting him right between the temples. “Perfect! Thanks, Cuffs. Wait there.” Casper dashed out of the living room and up the stairs, narrowly missing Cuddles, who was gnawing on the carpet. By the time Casper reached his bedroom the plan was fully formed in his head.

  Some say that a boy’s room perfectly reflects his mind. Casper’s room was an intriguing mess. Clothes and books were strewn across the floor and piled up in corners, crushing model planes, plastic tanks and sheets of scrap paper scrawled with mythical beasts. On the far side was an ant farm, front pane smashed by a cricket ball and ants tumbling out through the cracks, down on to the grubby carpet below and off under the wardrobe. Back down the same path returned another line of victorious ants proudly carrying chunks of chocolate biscuit. A pair of muddy shoes stood on his bed next to a science experiment, which, by the looks of the blue foam drizzling on to the carpet, had been a failure.