Best Mates

by Michael Morpurgo

  Michael didn’t have to ask, he could see the vet was not optimistic. He could see his whale was failing fast. His eyes were closed now, and he had settled into a deep sleep. He was breathing, but only barely. Michael thought he did hear him breathe just one more word.

  “Promise?” he said.

  “I promise,” Michael replied. He knew exactly what he was promising, that he would spend his whole life keeping it. And then the whale simply stopped breathing. Michael felt suddenly very alone.

  The vet was examining him. After a while he looked up, wiping the tears from his face. “Why?” he asked. “I don’t understand. Why did he come? That’s what I’d like to know.”

  Ahead of them, as they came back into the heart of London, flew a single white bird. It was the snowy egret that had never left the whole way out and the whole way back. All London seemed still with sadness as they passed by under Tower Bridge.

  On 20 January 2006, an eighteen-foot (five-metre) northern bottle-nosed whale was spotted swimming up the Thames past the Houses of Parliament. She swam up as far as Battersea Bridge where she became stranded. For two days rescuers battled to save the whale, as the world looked on, hoping for the best. But in spite of everyone’s efforts that whale died before the rescue pontoon on which she was being transported could reach the safety of the open sea.

  Meet another special animal in Sarah Lean’s story about a brave little dog called Jack Pepper.

  Turn the page to read an extract.

  1.

  I CAN FIT A WHOLE ROMAN AMPHITHEATRE in my imagination, and still have loads of room. It’s big in there. Much bigger than you think. I can build a dream, a brilliant dream of anything, and be any hero I want …

  For most awesome heroic imagined gladiator battles ever, once again the school is proud to present the daydreaming trophy to … Leo Biggs!

  That’s also imaginary. You have to pass your trumpet exam to get a certificate (like my big sister Kirsty), or be able to read really fast and remember tons of facts to get an A at school (like my best mate George), before anyone tells you that they’re proud of you. Your family don’t even get you a new bike for your birthday for being a daydreamer, even if you really wanted one.

  Daydreaming is the only thing I’m good at and, right here in Clarendon Road, I am a gladiator. The best kind of hero there is.

  “Don’t you need your helmet?” George called.

  “Oh, yeah, I forgot,” I said, cycling back on my old bike to collect it. “Now stand back so you’re in the audience. Stamp your feet a bit and do the thumbs-up thing at the end when I win.”

  George sat on Mrs Pardoe’s wall, kicking against the bricks, reading his book on space.

  “It says in here that meteors don’t normally hit the earth,” George said, “they break up in the atmosphere. So there aren’t going to be any explosions or anything when it comes. Shame.”

  “Concentrate, George. You have to pretend you’re in the amphitheatre; they didn’t have books in Roman times … did they?”

  “Uh, I don’t think so. They might have had meteors though. People think you can wish on meteors, but it’s not scientific or anything.”

  He didn’t close the book and I could tell he was still concentrating on finding out more about the meteor that was on the news. So I put on my gladiator helmet (made out of cardboard, by me) and bowed to my imaginary audience. They rumbled and cheered.

  “Jupiter’s coming now. Salute, George, salute!”

  The king of all the Roman gods with arms of steel and a chest like hills, rolled into the night stars over Clarendon Road like a tsunami. Jupiter was huge and impressive. He sat at the back of the amphitheatre on his own kind of platform and throne, draped his arm over the statue of his lion and nodded. It was me he’d come to watch.

  I held up my imaginary sword.

  “George!”

  George punched the sky without looking up from his book. He couldn’t see or hear what I could: the whole crowd cheering my name from the thick black dark above.

  Let the games begin! Jupiter boomed.

  The gate opened.

  “Here he comes, George!”

  “Get him, Leo, get him good.”

  The gladiator of Rome came charging up the slope. I twisted and turned on my bike, bumped down off the kerb and picked up speed. The crowd were on their feet already and I raised my sword …

  And then George’s mum came round the corner.

  “George! You’re to come in now for your tea,” she said.

  I took off my helmet and put it inside my coat.

  “In a minute!” George said. “I’m busy.”

  “It’s freezing out here,” she said.

  I skidded over on my bike. I whispered, “George! Please stay! It is my birthday. You have to be here, I have to win something today.”

  “I’m fine,” he called to his mum. “I’ve got a hat.”

  “Yes, but you’re not wearing it.” She came over, pressed her hand to George’s forehead. “You’ve got homework and you’re definitely running a temperature.”

  “Gladiators don’t have homework,” I said. George grinned.

  “But George does,” his mum said.

  “Mum!” His shoulders sagged.

  She shook her head. “I think you both ought to be inside. Come on, George, home now.”

  “Sorry, gotta go,” he sighed. He slipped off the wall, pulled at the damp from the frosty wall on the back of his trousers. “I’ll come and watch tomorrow.”

  “Do your coat up,” George’s mum said as they walked away.

  George turned back. “Did you know that Jupiter is just about the closest it ever gets to earth right now?”

  I looked up. Jupiter was here, in the night sky over Clarendon Road.

  “Yeah, I know, George.”

  “I’ll do some research for our Roman presentation.”

  “Yeah, good one, see you tomorrow.”

  “Leo!”

  “What?”

  He saluted.

  I didn’t want to go home yet though. I really wanted something to go right today.

  I bumped the kerb on my bike, cruised back into the arena.

  The gladiator of Rome was lurking in the shadows between the parked cars. I could smell his sweaty fighting smell, heard his raspy breath. Just in time I hoisted my sword over my head as he attacked. Steel clashed. I held his weight, heaved, turned, advanced, swung. We smashed our swords together again. I felt his strength and mine.

  The crowd were up: thousands of creatures and men stamped their feet in the amphitheatre of the sky. Their voices roared. Swords locked, I ducked, twisted, to spin his weapon from his hands. I didn’t see the fallen metal dustbin on the pavement. I braked but my front wheel thumped into the side of it. I catapulted over the bin and landed on the pavement.

  The crowd groaned. Jupiter held out his arm, his fist clenched. He punched his thumb to the ground.

  I’d never thought that I could lose in my own imagination. Maybe I wasn’t even that good at imagining. I lay there, closed my eyes, sighed. It warmed the inside of my cardboard helmet but nothing else. Everything was going wrong today.

  I opened my eyes but it wasn’t the gladiator of Rome looking down at me. It was a little white dog.

  2.

  I DIDN’T KNOW IF DOGS HAD IMAGINATIONS OR IF they thought like us at all, but this little dog looked me right in the eye and turned his head to the side as if he was asking the same question that I was: How can you lose when you’re the hero of your own story? Which was a bit strange seeing as nobody can see what’s in your imagination.

  I leaned up on my elbows and stared back. The dog had ginger fur over his ears and eyes, like his own kind of helmet hiding who he really was, and circles like ginger biscuits on his white back.

  “Did you see the size of that gladiator?” I said.

  The little dog looked kind of interested, so I said, “Do you want to be a gladiator too?”

  I think he would
have said yes, but just then a great shadow loomed over us.

  “Is that you dreaming again, Leo Biggs?” a voice growled.

  It was old Grizzly Allen. He had one of those deep voices like it came from underground. If you try and talk as deep as him it hurts your throat.

  Grizzly is our neighbour and the most loyal customer at my dad’s cafe just round the corner on Great Western Road – Ben’s Place. Grizzly was always in there. It was easier and a lot better than cooking for one, he said.

  You might tell a dog what you’re imagining, or your best mate, but you don’t tell everyone because it might make you sound stupid.

  “I didn’t see the bin. I couldn’t stop.”

  Grizzly held out his hand and pulled me up like I was a flea, or something that weighed nothing.

  “No bones broken, eh?” he beamed. “Perhaps just something bruised.”

  I checked over my bike. The chain had come off and the rusted back brake cable was frayed.

  “Aw, man!” I sighed.

  “Bit small for you now,” Grizzly said. “Can’t be easy to ride.”

  “Yeah, I know. I need a new one.” I shrugged, but I didn’t really want to talk about that. I’d had this bike for four years, got it on my seventh birthday; the handlebars had worn in my grip. They were smooth now, like the tyres and the brake pads and the saddle. I didn’t want to say anything about how I’d thought my parents were getting me a new one for my birthday, today. I guessed they didn’t think I deserved it yet. It wasn’t like I’d passed my Grade 6 trumpet exam, like Kirsty had.

  Grizzly picked up my bike as if it was as light as a can-opener, leaned it against his wall and lowered himself down, all six feet four of him folded into a crouch.

  “Can’t do anything with this here cable.” He sort of growled in his throat, but I didn’t know if that was because he couldn’t fix it or because he was uncomfortable hunkered down like that.

  The little dog watched Grizzly’s hairy hands feeding the chain back on the cogs. Grizzly didn’t have a dog and it looked odd, a great big man with that little white and ginger dog standing, all four legs square, by his side.

  “Did you get a new dog, Grizzly?”

  Actually there was nothing new about that dog, except he was new here in our road. I don’t mean he looked old, because he didn’t. He was almost buzzing with life. There was something ancient about him though. Like one of the gold Roman coins in our museum. Sort of shiny and fresh on the outside, but with years and years of history worn into them.

  “He’s not mine,” Grizzly said. “This here is Jack Pepper.” The little dog watched Grizzly’s broad face and his tail swayed at the sound of his own name.

  Click here to read more.

  Never has Aman needed a friend more than when a Springer Spaniel appears at the mouth of his Afghan cave. The dog becomes a constant companion, a shadow, and that’s what Aman decides to call her.

  But life becomes more dangerous by the moment. Eventually, Aman and Shadow find the courage to leave. But how far can Shadow lead them? And in this terrifying new world, is anywhere really safe …?

  Click here to read more.

  “The elephant lifted her trunk and began trumpeting at the sea. She swung around, and I held on for dear life as she stampeded into the shadows of the jungle …”

  For Will and his mother, going to Indonesia on holiday is a chance to put things behind them and have some fun.

  But then the elephant Will is riding on the beach starts acting strangely. That’s when the tsunami comes crashing in, and the elephant begins to run. Except that when the tsunami is gone, Will’s elephant just keeps on running …

  Click here to read more.

  “All my life I’ll think of you, I promise I will. I won’t ever forget you.”

  Bertie rescues an orphaned white lion cub from the African veld. They are inseparable until Bertie is sent to boarding school far away in England and the lion is sold to a circus. Bertie swears that one day they will see one another again, but the butterfly lion ensures that their friendship will never be forgotten.

  Click here to read more.

  The incredible tale of a deserted village, a lifelong friendship, and one very adventurous cat.

  It’s 1943, Lily Treganza lives on a farm in the seaside village of Slapton, and her life is scarcely touched by the war. Until one day when the villagers are all told to move out of their homes.

  Soon the whole area is out of bounds as the allied forces prepare to invade France. But Tips, Lily’s adored cat, has other ideas – and returns to the forbidden area. Frantic to find her, Lily decides to enter the danger zone to look for Tips herself …

  Click here to read more.

  May, 1915

  On an uninhabited island in the Scillies, Alfie and his father find an injured girl – thirsty, hungry and with no memory of who she is or how she came to be there.

  Is she a mermaid, a ghost? Or could she even be, as some islanders suggest, a German spy …?

  Click here to read more.

  Also by Michael Morpurgo:

  A Medal for Leroy

  Little Manfred

  An Elephant in the Garden

  Shadow

  Kaspar – Prince of Cats

  Running Wild

  The Amazing Story of Adolphus Tips

  Private Peaceful

  Alone on a Wide, Wide Sea

  Born to Run

  Sparrow

  Outlaw

  Pinocchio

  Listen to the Moon

  www.michaelmorpurgo.com

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