He fluttered up in the air with a pleased-sounding squawk. ‘Ha!’
‘Good one,’ laughed Patch, perching on a rock in order to stay off the hot sand. ‘Okay, guys,’ she said to Cutlass and Monty as the pirates crowded around the map, arguing and jabbing their fingers at it. ‘We can’t let our crew find the cursed treasure. So we need to stop them, or slow them down, any way we can.’
Monty pouted and began juggling shells. ‘But I want some treasure,’ he argued. ‘A nice gold crown … King of the ship. Yeah, that would be cool!’
‘Mmm, it would be cool, yes,’ Patch agreed. Then she narrowed her eyes. ‘Right until the curse kicks in and you’re faced with CERTAIN DEATH, that is! Monty, this is serious – we’ve got to stop them!’
Cutlass was pecking at a cuttle-fish bone on the sand, but flapped his wings excitedly as an idea came to him. ‘Hey, I know – I’ll peck a hole in the map!’ he cried. ‘I’ll peck it to pieces!’
‘YES, Cutlass!’ cheered Patch. ‘Great idea.
Impeckable, in fact!’
Without a map, the pirates wouldn’t know where to search for the treasure. There was no way they’d be able to find it before the Black Heart crew!
Cutlass flew up into the air immediately and swooped towards the pirates, beak at the ready for some serious paper pecking. Down he hurtled … just as Captain Halibut leaned over to point at on the map, his big pirate hat blocking the flight path.
‘Aarrrkk!’ squawked Cutlass in alarm, swerving away at the last second and getting his feathers in a tangle.
‘Get away, you poxy parrot!’ cried Captain Halibut, swinging a fist through the air.
Monty laughed so hard he dropped his shells, but Patch was more encouraging.
‘Try again,’ she called.
Second time lucky, thought Patch as Cutlass flew up above the pirates once more, all set to tear into the map. Down he plunged … but this time Butch leaned over, getting his big bald bonce was in the way!
‘Aarrrkk!’ squawked Cutlass again, changing direction in the nick of time once more and feeling flustered as he landed on a nearby rock. Pecking holes in the map was proving to be harder than he’d imagined! Maybe he needed a better idea …
‘Change of plan,’ he announced. ‘Watch this!’
Patch and Monty gazed on as, for a third time, their parrot pal flew across to where the pirates were standing in a huddle. This time, instead of pecking, Cutlass hovered right above the treasure map and then … SPLAT! A gooey parrot poo plopped all over the paper, covering every last detail.
‘Eww!’ cried Ginger, jumping back.
‘It splashed me! It splashed me!’ wailed Butch, diving into the sea to wash himself clean.
Patch was helpless with laughter. ‘Genius!’ she spluttered as Cutlass bowed in mid-air.
Cannonball peered at the parrot poo with interest. ‘Is that … cream-cheese?’ he asked, reaching a finger towards it.
‘Pesky parrot!’ yelled Captain Halibut, pushing Cannonball’s hand away before his stupid cook could poison himself. ‘Don’t touch that, you blithering idiot. It’s not cream-cheese!’ He wiped the map on Cannonball’s apron several times then squinted down at it. ‘Oh, yuck, it’s all smeary now,’ he complained.
‘Woo-hoo!’ cheered Patch with a grin.
‘But luckily I can still see exactly where we need to go,’ said the captain, and Patch’s whiskers wilted in disappointment. ‘Now see here, me hearties, this is the way to the treasure. First we have to take fifty paces east until we reach the Swamp of Doom.’
Butch, who was returning from the sea, stopped dead as he heard this. ‘Eek,’ he said nervously.
‘Then we make our way through the Jungle of Terror.’
‘Yikes,’ whimpered Butch.
‘We cross the Extremely Dangerous River.’
‘Wibble,’ wibbled Butch.
‘Walk twenty paces to Viper Rock.’
‘Wahh,’ wailed Butch.
‘And then we climb Skull Mountain.’
‘Noooooo,’ squeaked Butch.
‘Where X marks the spot! Well, that all sounds nice and easy for an old salt like me,’ said the captain, putting the map in his pocket.
Patch pulled a face at Cutlass. ‘Nice and easy? It sounds absolutely horrible!’ she hissed, glancing longingly back at the Golden Earring, where there were no swamps, no jungles and where the deadliest danger came from Cannonball’s dinners.
‘If they even get to the treasure in one piece it’ll be a miracle,’ Cutlass added, with a shake of his head.
‘Swamp of Doom coming right up, buckos!’ the captain cried, clapping his hands together. ‘So – fifty paces east. Who knows how to count?’
‘Um …’ said Ginger doubtfully. ‘I can do up to three. I think!’
‘I can count up to eleventy hundred,’ Butch boasted. ‘Let’s go!’
The pirates set off across the beach, with Patch, Cutlass and Monty racing after them, over the sand and on to a path that led into the trees. The undergrowth was thick and steamy, with strange colourful flowers blooming in the bushes and hairy coconuts dangling from palm trees above.
Patch almost collided with Butch’s legs as he came to a sudden standstill.
‘Nobody panic,’ Butch said, voice shaking, ‘but … HEEEELP! There’s a great huge scary s-s-s-spider!
Nobody told me there would be s-s-s-spiders in here!’ His knees knocked together as he pointed at an enormous cobweb that stretched its sticky strands across the path, with a gigantic black furry spider perched in one corner.
Patch pulled a face. She was quite fond of catching spiders, but did not like getting cobwebs in her whiskers. Yuck!
‘Allow me!’ said Cannonball, searching in his apron pocket. ‘Aha!’ he cried, pulling out a bread knife in triumph and setting about the web. SLASH! went the knife through the sticky strands. SLASH! SLASH!
Soon the cobweb dangled from the bushes in tatters. The spider was extremely cross about this and promptly scuttled up the leg of Butch’s shorts, causing him to scream and dance about in terror. ‘Ooh! Ahh! It’s got me!’ he screeched, right until Cannonball whopped him over the head with his ladle. CLANG!
‘Let’s get ahead of them,’ hissed Patch to her gang as the pirates started arguing. ‘We might be able to find something else to slow down the crew.’
Off they hurried … and of course Monty, the show-off, couldn’t help trying to go faster than the others. He charged ahead, swinging through the trees, until he stopped suddenly in front of a wooden sign stuck in the ground.
He turned in alarm, calling to the other two, ‘We’ve got to hurry! There’s sand!’
‘Sand?’ Patch repeated, wrinkling her nose as she approached. More sand? Had they somehow looped round to another beach? Oh, she hoped not!
‘Look – on the sign,’ Monty said importantly. ‘Quick! Sand!’
Patch burst out laughing. ‘It doesn’t mean we have to be quick, you silly banana,’ she chuckled. ‘It’s quicksand – you’ll sink if you try to walk across it. Arrrr, this must be the Swamp of Doom.’
Monty put his nose in the air and turned away. ‘Am NOT a silly banana,’ he huffed.
The swamp was boggy and marshy, with a salty, rotting smell. Mosquitoes buzzed lazily above the surface. Cutlass shivered and pointed a wing-tip to where a pirate hat was just visible in the middle of the quicksand. ‘Looks like someone was unlucky there,’ he said. ‘I wonder if the Black Heart crew came this way?’
Patch stepped back at once. ‘We don’t want that to happen to our pirates,’ she said, thinking hard, ‘but maybe if they got stuck just for a little while it would slow them up enough to miss out on the cursed treasure!’
‘Clever!’ cried Cutlass, fluttering a loop-the-loop. ‘Then we can rescue them and they’ll be so happy and grateful they might even get me some bird seed.’
‘And me some fish,’ Patch agreed, her eyes going all dreamy at the thought. ‘ Mmmm … fish …’
‘Eleventy-five … eleventy-nine … er … twelvety-six,’ came the voice of Butch in the distance. The pirates were catching up with them!
‘Hurry! Let’s block the sign so they walk right into the quicksand!’ Patch cried, leaping up on top of it and draping her paws over the letters. Cutlass hovered in mid-air in front of the sign, his wings stretched out wide.
But Monty was still in a big fat sulk about being called a silly banana and didn’t feel like helping one bit. In fact, as the pirates rounded the corner, he sneaked up and gave Patch an almighty PUSH instead, so that she lost her balance and toppled off the sign … right into the sloppy quicksand!
SQUELCH!
‘Help!’ yowled Patch.
Cutlass flapped around, trying to tow her out by tugging at her eye patch, but it slipped from his beak and twanged back against Patch’s head.
‘OW!’
‘Sorry!’
‘FIFTY!’ cried Butch in relief, reaching the sign.
‘Monty, you stinking scallywag,’ Patch spluttered, thrashing about hopelessly. Try as she might to escape, she could feel her paws slipping deeper and deeper into the quicksand. She scrabbled and scrambled, but soon she was up to her tummy in the swamp. Any minute now her head would sink beneath the surface and then …
‘Here – grab this,’ cried Cutlass, who’d managed to drop a branch down to her.
Patch clung on shakily and, claw by claw, she hauled herself out until she was safely back on firm ground.
‘That monkey. Just wait till I get my paws on him,’ she growled, trying to shake the smelly wet sand out of her fur. ‘He’s going to be sooo sorry!’
Of course, Monty was laughing so hard that he was rolling around on the ground and not looking sorry at all.
The other pirates had caught up with Butch by now. ‘A sign!’ cried Ginger, pointing at it with excitement.
‘Does it say TREASURE?’ asked the captain, peering to read the letters.
‘Nope,’ said Cannonball. ‘It says—’
‘Ooh, does it say CUSTARD?’ interrupted Ginger hopefully, jigging up and down.
Cutlass rolled his eyes. ‘I say, I say, I say: why don’t pirates know their alphabet, Cap’n?’ he asked Patch in a low voice.
‘Because they always get stuck at C. Get it, matey? Stuck at SEA!’
‘The sign says QUICKSAND!’ replied Cannonball, and he held out a rolling pin to block the way. ‘This must be the Swamp of Doom. Nobody take another step forward!’
‘Nobody take another step forward!’ repeated Captain Halibut, who hated anyone else giving orders.
‘Not even a single toe!’
Butch leaped backwards at once, teeth chattering nervously. ‘This place gives me the heebie-jeebies,’ he whimpered.
Ginger flicked a creepy-crawly off her ear. ‘Where next, Captain?’ she asked. ‘I hope it’s going to be nicer than the Swamp of Doom.’
Captain Halibut took out the map and checked the route. ‘Arrrr, next we need to head through the Jungle of Terror,’ he replied. ‘Sounds a doddle to me. Mark my words, we’ll have this treasure in the blink of a squid’s eye!’
‘Unless the Black Heart pirates have got there first, that is,’ Cannonball pointed out, rather unhelpfully. ‘Look – footprints! Do you think that was them?’
‘Gah!’ growled Captain Halibut, gnashing his teeth together at the sight of the footprints leading away into the jungle. Then he began stamp-clonking furiously after them. ‘What are you shower of shellfish waiting for?’ he yelled over his shoulder. ‘Move it!’
The pirates set off again, followed by Monty, who turned round to titter at Patch and Cutlass. ‘Patch, that is one special fur-do you’ve got going on,’ he smirked. ‘It really suits you!’
Patch glared after him. She was still damp and sticky from the quicksand and could feel her fur standing up in spikes.
‘Oh, ha ha,’ she hissed crossly, before turning back to her feathered friend. ‘We’ll have to keep trying, Cutlass,’ she said. ‘Anything to stop the pirates getting their mitts on the cursed treasure. Come on, there has to be another way to slow them down!’
As the crew ventured into the Jungle of Terror, the pirates quickly realized that it was a pretty terrible place.
TWANGGG! BOINGGG! Patch and Cutlass sent jungle vines snapping into the pirates’ faces.
BOOF! THUD! Patch and Cutlass dropped coconuts onto the pirates’ heads.
SLITHER! SLAP! Patch and Cutlass pushed tree snakes off the branches so that they fell squiggling and squirming onto the pirates’ shoulders.
‘Wah! I don’t like it here,’ Butch yelped as a large green snake hissed in his ear.
‘It’s as if the Jungle of Terror wants to, you know, terrify us,’ agreed Ginger, rubbing her head where a coconut had bounced off it.
‘Yeah, like someone’s trying to tell us something,’ Cannonball shuddered, using a spatula to fight through the springy vines.
‘Nobody panic, but the map did say that the treasure was cursed,’ Butch reminded them in a small, scared voice.
‘Do you think … do you think all these bad things are happening because of the curse?’ asked Cannonball fearfully.
Patch and Cutlass grinned at each other and did one of their secret high-fives, paw to claw. Their plan was working! Any minute now the pirates would admit defeat and return to the ship, and they’d all be safe from the cursed treasure!
But just then …
‘Codswallop! Balderdash! Nonsense!’ snorted Captain Halibut. ‘Someone’s trying to tell you something? Yes, it’s me, trying to tell you lot to stop being such a pack of ninnies. Now pull yourselves together and keep walking. The sun’s shining! We’re having an adventure, like proper pirates and we’re going to get that treasure if it’s the last thing we do!’
On went the pirates, hacking through the jungle. Birds made mournful calls to one another from the trees. Lizards scuttled away at the sound of the pirates’ heavy footsteps. Every now and then a huge, horrible skull could be seen at the side of the path. It didn’t exactly feel a friendly place to be.
After a few minutes, Patch spotted a red-bottomed baboon high up in a tree nearby and had another idea. ‘Arrrr,’ she hissed to Cutlass. ‘New plan. Let’s see if this slows the pirates down.’ She raced ahead and scrambled up the nearest palm tree. Still wet and bedraggled, she made her one green eye look wide and frightened, yowling her most pathetic meows. ‘Meow! Meow! MEOWWWW!’
The pirates stopped dead.
‘I thought I just heard a cow,’ said Butch, scratching his head and looking around nervously. ‘And don’t panic anyone, but cows are really massive and scary.’
‘It wasn’t a cow – it was a cat,’ argued Cannonball, gazing around too. Then he licked his lips. ‘If it’s a big cat, we could be in for a special treat for dinner tonight,’ he went on. ‘A few tiger chunks would go very nicely in my tentacle stew, I can tell you. Even better, a delicious juicy lion chop!’
‘Meoowwwww,’ wailed Patch miserably from above their heads. ‘Meooowww!’
‘It’s not a lion or a tiger – it’s our cat. It’s Patch!’ cried Ginger, pointing upwards. ‘Awww, look! She’s stuck, poor thing.’
They all stared up at Patch in the tree.
‘Oh well, never mind. That’s one less mouth to feed,’ said Captain Halibut heartlessly. ‘Back to the treasure hunt!’
‘We can’t just leave her here in the middle of nowhere!’ protested Butch. ‘With all those snakes and spiders and cows and that!’
Captain Halibut rolled his eyes. ‘All right, one of you climb up and rescue the silly creature then,’ he said. ‘But hurry up about it.’
‘Me!’ said Ginger, sticking her hand up at once. ‘Me! Pick me! I love climbing. I’ll do it!’
‘Butch, you can do it,’ said the captain, ignoring Ginger. ‘And get a move on. If the Black Heart pirates have somehow managed to get their hands on my treasure, there’ll be trouble.’ He drew a finger across his th
roat with a fierce scowl.
‘MEOOOOWWWWW,’ wailed Patch, huddling against the trunk of the tree.
‘Aye aye, Cap’n,’ said Butch, striding over. ‘All right, there kitty, don’t you fret. Big brave Butch will have you down in no time.’ He began hauling himself up the tree, his huge knees gripping the trunk.
Patch edged away, onto a long branch that stretched out over a clump of thorny bushes.
‘Here, kitty kitty,’ Butch crooned, clambering after her. But Butch was big and heavy … and the branch was thin and twiggy … As Butch teetered along it, there was a CREAK. And then a CRACK.
Patch leaped higher into the tree just as the branch went snap … and Butch went tumbling down into the thorny bushes below.
‘YOW! OW! EE! MUMMY!’ he yelled, springing out again, falling over and rolling into the undergrowth. The other pirates heard what sounded like a small avalanche followed by a distant SPLASH and then everything went quiet.
Still in the tree, Patch gave another pitiful wail. ‘MEOOOOWW!’ she cried, winking at Cutlass, who was sniggering nearby.
Ginger put her hand up again. ‘Shall I go? Can I do it this time? I’m proper good at climbing, Captain!’ she cried eagerly, hopping from foot to foot. ‘Pick me! Pick me!’
‘Arrrr, watch. This’ll get the daft moggy down,’ said Cannonball before the captain could reply. He pulled a saucepan from his apron pocket, closed one eye and took aim …
… just as Cutlass, sensing his pal was about to get panned, flew quickly over and pecked Cannonball on the end of his nose.
‘YOWCH!’ yelped Cannonball, losing his balance and sending the saucepan spinning off in the wrong direction. ‘My best pan!’ he cried in dismay as it disappeared into the bushes.
Sensing the chance to get in Cannonball’s good books – and earn himself some extra bananas – Monty went bounding helpfully after the pan, while Ginger turned her attention to the captain once more. ‘Now shall I try? Is it my turn? Oh, please let me try!’
Captain Cat and the Treasure Map Page 2