Uncle Shawn and Bill and the Almost Entirely Unplanned Adventure

by A. L. Kennedy

  Maude came and unlocked the cage door and the dogs slowly approached it. Even Maude didn’t like to be too close to Cracker and made sure that she didn’t turn her back on him.

  The human beings either side of the wire mesh stared down at Bill and nudged each other, saying things like, “That badger won’t last long.” And, “Small, isn’t he?” And, “I think he’s going to cry.”

  Bill was trying to stand up with his eyes shut because that might make it easier. But it didn’t. He couldn’t get up. He couldn’t move any more, he was so frightened, and he thought that any moment now he wouldn’t be able to breathe…

  Only then something very strange took place, which shouldn’t have surprised Bill, because – as Uncle Shawn had said – you never know what might happen until it’s happened.

  First, there was a remarkable noise, as if thunder was thundering quite close and getting closer. Under poor Bill’s feet, the concrete was shaking and starting to crack and there were louder and louder rumbles and bangs and clatters on all sides.

  From the back of the crowd, a very tall, thin person, who Badger Bill now recognized, winked straight at him and then smiled. And then Uncle Shawn (because that’s who it was, of course) shouted, “Look! Look! The farmhouse is falling down! Everything is falling down!”

  Uncle Shawn had an incredibly loud voice when he wanted to and everyone could hear him, but for a little while no one believed him.

  Ethel laughed. “That house has been there for years, what are you talking about—” But then she noticed that everyone else was turning towards the McGloone house, where Uncle Shawn was pointing, and she saw – as everyone else did – that the farmhouse’s slimy, miserable bricks and nasty, bad-tempered stones were crumbling apart. The roof was sagging. One of the windows fell out, followed by two of the McGloone children. Slates began to fly through the air and shatter on the ground.

  “That’sss not sssupposssed to happen!” screamed Maude, making a couple who had travelled all the way from Poole to see the badger fight very wet indeed.

  As the bricks and beams and slates tumbled, the crowd started to rush about in panic, but it was hard for them to know where they should run to. The farmhouse was falling apart and so was the barn and so was Ethel and Maude’s house and so was every single wall that belonged to the McGloones. It was all crashing and clattering down, so that people were stubbing their toes on bricks and being covered in dust and thumped by bits of masonry and each other.

  “Oh, wonderful! Wonderful!” Bill was sure that the fight wouldn’t happen now and that he would be all right. And maybe this had something to do with Uncle Shawn, who was walking towards the cage as if he knew exactly what was going on and felt very safe about it. None of the bits and pieces of farmhouse and wall were falling anywhere near him. It was as if he was carrying a big invisible umbrella over his incredibly happy head.

  But then Ripper and Snapper and Cracker – who were cowards when anything happened that they didn’t understand – rushed into the cage because they thought it would keep them safe from falling lumps of McGloone Farm. Suddenly, Bill was faced by just the horrible faces his nice, quiet, peaceful face had never wanted to face.

  As Ethel teetered past on her snakeskin stilettoes and Maude tottered past on her cowboy boots, Bill found himself squashed into a corner of the cage with three snarly mouths very close to him and drool dripping off snarly teeth and onto his fur. It was the worst thing yet. And Cracker was peering at him with his deep, deep black eyes full of wicked thoughts.

  Only, just then a different kind of thunder that wasn’t to do with walls collapsing got louder and louder and louder, and then the yard was packed with a rushing crowd of squirrels and rabbits and weasels and shrews and siskins and blackbirds and robins and every kind of small animal that was fond of Uncle Shawn. (And pretty much all the small animals that had ever met Uncle Shawn liked him very much.) The creatures hopped and scampered and leaped and scrabbled and flew and pecked their way among anyone who was still left in the yard. The couple from Poole had their ankles nibbled by shrews, and a man from Cumbernauld had his wig stolen by a young squirrel, who also laughed at him, and rolled-up hedgehogs rattled about across the cobbles, prickling people for being so nasty and wanting to see a badger in shorts when everyone knows badgers don’t like them.

  And – thank goodness – while some of the creatures were clearing the yard, a big crowd of stoats and weasels and hedgehogs and the little cat and her mother all rushed right into the cage and swept Badger Bill out past the dogs.

  The dogs were very surprised and scared and covered in sparrows, who were pecking their ears and then jumping out of the way of the dogs’ teeth. And wasps were stinging them and giggling and stinging them again. As it happened, the dogs were horribly afraid of wasps and had always been nasty to them and squashed their nests while they were sleeping in the winter. So now the wasps were having their revenge. And Ripper and Snapper and Cracker were howling like puppies and big lumps were coming up on their noses and all over them under their fur.

  And in all this confusion, Badger Bill felt a big, warm, safe hand take hold of his paw and he looked up and saw Uncle Shawn smiling down at him and saying, “Everything is fine. But we have to run now.”

  And Bill did run, as fast as his lovely but slightly short legs would go. And the small animals and the little birds all ran and rushed and fluttered and buzzed away, too. And for a few moments Uncle Shawn turned round and ran backwards so that he could shout, “Thank you, wasps. Thank you, Jeremy Wasp. Thank you, Suzie Weasel. Thank you, Angus Rabbit and Mary Rabbit and Hughie Rabbit and Shane Rabbit… Thank you, Mother Mole. Thank you very much! Thank you all!” And the so many, many creatures scattered away into the countryside again, laughing and cheering and saying, “It was our pleasure! Don’t mention it, Uncle Shawn!” Because they had never liked the McGloones, not one bit.

  Behind Bill and Shawn, the last pieces of the farm and its buildings fell into a number of ugly heaps of rubble.

  SECTION FIFTEEN

  In which three dogs have a change of heart. Don’t worry, this is a very short section and the excitement is still going on all over McGloone Farm. We’ll be back there soon.

  And Ripper and Snapper and Cracker ran harder and faster than they had run in their lives until they were so far away they ended up at the seaside. Being at the seaside always cheers everyone up and makes them nicer to be around. After they reached the beach, the dogs didn’t stop for ice cream – they swam out to sea. This was because their ears hurt and they thought the water would help ease the pain. They kept on swimming until they came to a small island where there was nobody else.

  And they lived there for the rest of their lives. For a while, they were still fairly horrible dogs and shouted at each other and ran about a lot while snapping and growling. But slowly they calmed down and explored the island and built nice kennels for themselves from washed-up orange boxes, and made toys out of bits of driftwood. And without the McGloones to torment them, they turned into extremely peaceful and polite dogs. And when anyone came to call at the island, the dogs would help them get out of their boats and show them where the best places were to have picnics.

  And if the dogs saw a wasp, they would feed it jam that they made out of elderberries.

  SECTION SIXTEEN

  In which there are some pants and some lemonade and Uncle Shawn forgets something very important. But Bill is really happy.

  The McGloone Farm was, by now, mainly a number of heaps of rubble, and Bill was free. He was completely free. His heart was free in his chest and skipping in a way that made him feel sparkly. He was running next to Uncle Shawn.

  “Wasn’t that good?” Uncle Shawn chuckled as he loped across the grass, his long legs making it hard for Bill to keep up.

  “That was… Yes, that was… But how did…?”

  And Bill would have asked, “But how did you manage all of that?” Only then there was a lot of noise from where the cars were parked
in the lane as each car slowly sank into gaps that opened up in the ground and swallowed them whole like shiny metal sweets.

  “Good heavens!” said Bill.

  “It was Mother Mole,” explained Uncle Shawn. “I made a plan and she agreed with it, which was very nice of her. And I summoned her and all her mole relatives with my Summoning Dance and then they knew just where to dig, because I stamped to show them, and they made all the foundations of McGloone Farm turn into crumbles and dust. Clever moles. And clever me, actually.” Uncle Shawn felt very proud of himself for making such a fine adventure happen.

  By this time, Badger Bill was completely exhausted because he hadn’t really eaten or slept for so long and his head went all twirly and he was glad to be rescued, but he really did have to stop running. So he did. He sat down fast and felt funny, but happy, but also a bit sick.

  So Uncle Shawn stopped running, too. “Hello.” He grinned. “Hello, William J. Badger.”

  Bill took lots of deep breaths and felt Uncle Shawn sit down next to him. Then Bill stared at his own feet because he felt shy, but he said softly, “Hello.” And then he felt his face smiling, which it hadn’t done since he’d been put in that horrible sack and so many horrible things had happened.

  Then Uncle Shawn asked Bill, “What do you call a three-legged donkey?”

  And Bill giggled and said, “A wonky.” And then he asked Uncle Shawn, “What’s orange and sounds like a parrot?”

  And Uncle Shawn laughed and laughed and answered, “A carrot.”

  And Bill took off his painful, sad boxing boots and threw them away and wriggled his toes in the soft grass. He took off his tail-squeezing shorts that weren’t half as lovely as his thick, glossy badger coat that he wore all the time and was all he needed. His fur was feeling much happier in every hair now that he was free. He sniffed all the interesting and tasty smells that were in the countryside around him. By now, he was smiling from his ears to his paws and Uncle Shawn gave him some lemonade out of a little bottle he’d brought with him as part of the plan in case anybody got thirsty. Bill drank it and it was the best lemonade in the world.

  Bill was about to say, “Thank you for rescuing me. And for the lemonade,” because he was a polite badger, but then Uncle Shawn shouted, “Oh, I knew I’d forgotten something!” And Uncle Shawn picked up Badger Bill and put him on his shoulders and put the lemonade bottle back into one of his baggy jacket pockets and then he stood up and started sprinting very hard.

  “What? What have you forgotten?” asked Badger Bill, who could hear something worrying behind him and smell something familiar and very, very unpleasant getting closer… “What!?!?”

  “Oh, I just forgot that we would have to keep running because the McGloones would work out all this was my fault and want to make me into pies as well as you, and then there are the llamas to consider…”

  “What?!?!”

  And, sure enough, when Badger Bill turned a little to check, every one of the McGloones – Farmer McGloone, Mrs McGloone, Socket Wrench McGloone, Dusty McGloone, Small McGloone, Fred McGloone, Bettina McGloone, Ethel McGloone and Maude McGloone – were chasing along and waving jagged parts of window frames and knives and fists and stones. Ethel and Maude had taken off their shoes, and their yellowy, leathery feet were slapping on the ground with each step. Several young squirrels were skipping around the sisters’ ankles and laughing at them, because their skirts had been torn and their big, grey pants were showing.

  SECTION SEVENTEEN

  In which Badger Bill is mistaken for someone taller and there is a great deal of running. And some shouting. The McGloones don’t get what they expected and Uncle Shawn runs out of plan and then finds some more plan and many things happen all at once. And there is a great deal of mud.

  Meanwhile over in the llama field it had actually stopped raining, even though the llamas had definitely seemed to hear thunder coming near, which they thought was odd.

  “Well, this is a nicer day,” said Carlos Llama.

  “I don’t want to be killed and made into pies on a nice day,” said Guinevere Llama. “Then I’ll miss it.”

  “I don’t want to be killed at all,” said Brian Llama.

  “Especially not with my fur in this condition,” said Ginalolobrigida Llama.

  The llamas had been too downhearted to notice Uncle Shawn dancing very carefully round the whole of their field as the sun rose. They also hadn’t noticed the cloud of dust hanging above what had been McGloone Farm and the farm buildings and the sisters’ cottage.

  They were very able to notice, though, when each of the posts holding the electric fence that was keeping them prisoner did its own small dance and then toppled onto the ground.

  Brian and the others started to wonder if they could escape. “We can! We can!” shouted Guinevere Llama.

  But the fence had been very tall and now that it was lying down it was very wide. It was, in fact, a big, wide strip of wires, each one full of snaky, bitey electricity, hissing and buzzing in the grass. And if that wasn’t enough of a problem, they could hear feet running towards them…

  Up over the brow of the hill came a strange sight: the top and then the rest of Badger Bill. “What a very tall badger,” said Guinevere.

  But then, as Uncle Shawn appeared carrying Bill on his shoulders, the llamas started to be afraid. They weren’t sure who was going to make them into pies and shoes and maybe a very tall man and a very short badger would be the ones to do the slish-slashing.

  Bill was already afraid enough for several much taller badgers. He knew that the McGloones weren’t that far behind and that they were incredibly angry – even for McGloones. And he could hear something else – a noise that made his fur prickle. “What’s that sound, Uncle Shawn?”

  “Oh, that – that’s the electricity in the fence. It’s rushing back and forth and waiting to electrocute anyone who comes near it so that they’re turned all crispy like toast.” Uncle Shawn grinned, as if this wasn’t scary.

  Bill thought this was scary. Very. “What?!?!?!?!”

  Uncle Shawn didn’t stop running, but he did slow down a bit so that he didn’t scare the llamas by rushing towards them too much. “Oh, yes. This is the part of my plan that I didn’t quite have time to finish…”

  “What??!!!???!!!! I don’t want to be toast. I’ve only just escaped being eaten by three dogs.” Bill smoothed his ears and patted his whiskers and wrung his paws. “And who are these llamas?” Bill’s voice sounded all joggly because Uncle Shawn’s running was jiggling him.

  “We’re going to rescue them. I rescued you and now we rescue them.”

  “Without a plan?” joggled Bill.

  “Without much of a plan…”

  The llamas had trotted very nervously towards the fence. Bill saw the eight frightened llama eyes watching him and watching the electrical wires as they writhed and complained like annoyed spaghetti.

  “Who are you?” asked Brian Llama, sounding very suspicious and angry. “Because if you’ve come to slish-slash and make us into wallets and pies, I warn you – we will spit and bite and do terrible things to you.” But by the time he’d finished saying this his voice sounded all wobbly and sad and it looked as if he was crying. “Oh, dear,” he sighed. The other llamas shook their heads slowly and blinked as they and Bill and Uncle Shawn worked their way along what used to be the fence – lots of bitey electricity humming and fizzing between them.

  “We used to be the finest llamas in all Peru,” said Guinevere.

  “Don’t worry,” called Uncle Shawn.

  “Don’t worry?!” complained Bill. “We could be toast at any moment and the McGloones are coming and they want to make all of us into … into … just one big pie probably.”

  “Pie!” All the llamas squealed and ran to the other side of the field and then – “McGloones!” – they ran back, just as the McGloones did indeed appear, red-faced and angrier than a washing machine full of hornets. The fence sizzled, the llamas shuddered and – abov
e all the din – everyone could hear Maude screeching, “We’ll have their eyessss! We’ll have them sssstewed in butter!” And her hissing and spitting landed on the fence and made it crackle. The McGloones started to run round the field to reach Uncle Shawn and Bill who were, by now, the two people they hated most in the world – which is saying something.

  “Now, llamas! All is well,” called Uncle Shawn, his long legs starting to race again. “My friends the moles have burrowed away underneath the fence and made it fall, but now I need you to be brave and jump over it so that you can come away with me.”

  The llamas stared at him and stopped trying to keep up. They just stood, looking scared and little.

  “There’s no time to be scared now. You have to be brave very fast,” said Uncle Shawn, glancing at the pursuing horde of McGloones. “Within the next minute or so … maybe less.” He was now going clockwise round the remains of the fence and had reached about where six o’clock would be if the big, round, fallen fence had been a clock face. The McGloones were at midnight and were also running clockwise round the fence, trying to get closer. “Please, llamas!”

  But the llamas just looked at him. They were so used to being sad and defeated that they couldn’t think what they should do.

  “Come on!” Uncle Shawn yelled loudly, so that the chasing and scrambling McGloones could hear him. “The dreadful McGloones are here and you know how bad they smell and sound and how dreadful Myrtle is – the only woman horribler than Myrtle is Maude. I mean, they’re all TERRIBLE…”

  Bill looked over his shoulder at the red-faced McGloones, who had got as far as three o’clock. This was all right, because Uncle Shawn had now run as far as eight o’clock … but they were getting closer. Bill whispered to Uncle Shawn, “The McGloones are already so angry they look as if their ears will catch fire. Is it wise to make them even angrier by insulting them? Maybe if we said nice things about them…” And Bill tried to think of a compliment to shout at Maude or Ethel, but all he could think of was, “Your voice would scratch windows,” which wasn’t a compliment at all.