by Susan Gates
Mum yelled up the stairs, “What’s going on? You and Danny aren’t fighting, are you?”
Leon shouted down, “No, Mum!” He turned to the book again.
“When wolves howl,” he told Danny, “it’s like they’re talking to each other. You can hear a howl ten miles away!”
“Wow!” said Danny. “Ten miles!”
Danny opened his mouth and gave a howl so loud it seemed to shake the house.
“No more howling!” said Leon, putting his hands over his ears. “Mum will wonder what’s going on.”
He flipped over another page in the book.
“The guy that wrote this lived with wolves in Alaska,” he told Danny. “He made friends with them. Look at this!”
Leon showed Danny the book.
It was the scary grey wolf from the other photo. And the man who lived with wolves was sitting beside him, scratching his ears, as if he was a great big friendly pet dog.
Suddenly Danny said, his eyes shining, “I could be friends with that wolf in the cupboard!”
Leon slammed the book shut. “Oh no!” he thought. “My plan is going all wrong!”
“That wolf could be my best friend!” said Danny.
“I’ve played along with this stupid wolf in the cupboard story for far too long,” Leon thought. “Now it’s time to get tough!”
“Look, Danny,” said Leon. “I told you before. There isn’t any wolf in that cupboard. Only silly little kids would believe that. There isn’t a wolf who eats bad kids.”
“I know there isn’t,” said Danny.
“At last!” thought Leon. “He’s got it!”
But then Danny went on, “I know he doesn’t eat kids. Because wolves are really nice. That book says so. Poor wolf, I bet he’s lonely in that cupboard. I bet he’s just waiting for me to be friends with him.”
“Danny!” yelled Leon. “Will you listen to me?”
But Danny’s eyes were shut. He had a happy smile on his face.
And Leon knew just what he was thinking. Danny was thinking about walking down the street, with a big, wild wolf by his side. While the other kids stared and pointed and said, “Wow! How cool is that?”
Chapter Seven
Bad Boy
Next morning, it was a mad rush to get to school.
Danny didn’t talk about wolves while he was getting dressed. He didn’t talk about wolves at breakfast.
“Maybe he’s finally got bored with wolves,” thought Leon.
Today Mum was dropping them off. As she stood by the car, yelling “Hurry up!”, Leon rushed back upstairs to get All About Wolves.
“I don’t need this book any more,” he thought. “I’ll take it back to the library on the way home.”
At school, Leon was trying to do some tricky sums when the classroom door burst open. A kid from the baby class came running in.
“Miss says Leon’s got to come right away!” he yelled, as if they were all deaf. “It’s about Danny!”
“What’s wrong now?” thought Leon.
When Leon got to the baby class, Danny’s teacher looked puzzled.
“I don’t get it,” she told Leon. “For two days Danny has been as good as gold. But today he’s been really naughty. He’s been running around the classroom, yelling and throwing books on the floor.”
Leon looked around the room. He saw Danny sitting at the back with his lip stuck out like a big pink slug and a frown on his face.
“It’s almost like he wants to be punished,” said the teacher. “Do you know what’s going on?”
“I think I do,” said Leon. “Can I talk to Danny outside?”
“Of course,” said Danny’s teacher.
Leon marched to the back of the class.
“Come with me!” he hissed at Danny. “I know what you’re up to.”
He took Danny outside the classroom.
“I know your game!” said Leon. “You’re trying to get put in that wolf cupboard, aren’t you?”
“This silly school!” Danny frowned. “What do I have to do to get put in the wolf cupboard? I’ve been really bad!”
“This is stupid!” said Leon. “This wolf thing has gone far enough!”
“But I want to meet the wolf!” wailed Danny. “It’s cruel, locking him up in there. I want to take him home! I want him and me to be friends!”
“Look, Danny…!” snapped Leon.
But Danny wasn’t listening. He was gazing up the corridor, towards the wolf cupboard. “Hey!” he said, smiling. “The wolf cupboard is open!”
Danny ran to the cupboard. Leon raced after him. But Danny was already tugging the door wider.
Leon felt a tiny trembling deep in his stomach, as if a wolf with yellow eyes and teeth dripping blood might really leap out.
He skidded to a stop beside Danny. The cupboard door was wide open. It was full of PE stuff, like hoops and footballs and cricket bats. There was hardly room for a mouse in there. Let alone a wolf.
Chapter Eight
The Truth About Wolves
Danny stood, staring into the cupboard. He didn’t speak.
Leon said, “There’s no wolf, Danny. Just like I told you. That stick you saw your teacher with? I bet it was a cricket bat and she was just putting it away.”
Still Danny didn’t speak.
“Danny?” said Leon, more gently, putting a hand on his little brother’s shoulder. “You OK?”
Danny burst into tears. He pulled away from Leon and threw himself on the floor. He was crying as if his heart would break.
“I wanted there to be a wolf in the cupboard,” he wailed. “Where’s my wolf?”
Leon didn’t know what to do. All he could say was, “Shhh! Miss will hear you.”
“I’ve got nothing to take to Show and Tell!” roared Danny.
“What?” said Leon, puzzled.
Then he remembered. When he was in the baby class, kids would bring things in, show them to the other children and talk about them.
“It’s Show and Tell this morning,” Danny sobbed, “and I was going to take my wolf into my class and tell them all about him.”
Suddenly, Leon had another brilliant plan.
“I can’t believe it!” he said, pretending to be shocked. “You weren’t going to take a wild wolf into the baby class, were you?”
“Why not?” asked Danny. “The book says they hardly ever attack kids.”
“I know that,” said Leon. “And you know that. But other kids don’t know that, do they? They only know about the big, bad wolves in fairy tales. If you took a wolf in, they’d say, ‘It’s going to gobble me all up!’ They’d run all over the place, screaming!”
Danny nodded slowly. “I suppose they would be scared,” he said.
“Of course they would,” said Leon. “I mean, even you were scared at first. Until you learned what wolves are really like. So you’ve got to tell them the truth in Show and Tell.”
Danny wiped away his tears. There was a big smile on his face again.
“That’s a good idea!” he said. “I will! I’ll tell them the truth!”
Danny got as far as the classroom door. But then he turned round to look at Leon. He’d stopped smiling. His face was like a sad clown.
“But I’ve got nothing to show!” he wailed. “How can I do Show and Tell when I’ve got nothing to show!”
“Oh no!” thought Leon.
He’d thought everything was going so well. Now it was all going wrong again!
“Stay here!” he told Danny.
Leon raced back to his classroom and crashed through the door. He tugged All About Wolves out of his backpack.
“Back in a minute,” he gasped to his teacher then raced off again down the corridor.
He shoved the book into Danny’s hand. “Show them this book,” he panted. “Show them the photos.”
“It’s not as good as a real wolf…” Danny began to say.
“But you can’t take a real wolf into the classroom!” yelled Leon. �
��I just told you!”
“Oh yeah,” said Danny. “I forgot.” And, grasping his book, he trotted back into the baby class.
Leon stood, staring after him. Then he stumbled back to his own classroom.
He felt worn out. He’d worked so hard, sorting out Danny’s problems. He should get some kind of medal. But no-one but him would ever know about it.
He slumped back into his seat. At least now he might get some peace.
Minutes ticked by. Then someone in Leon’s class said, “What’s that noise?”
Everyone looked up. From the baby class down the corridor came a wild, spine-chilling howl. It made your blood run cold. You could hear it all around the school.
“What on earth was that?” asked Leon’s teacher.
Only Leon knew the answer.
It was Danny, doing Show and Tell, teaching his class the truth about wolves.
First published 2012 by A & C Black
This electronic edition published September 2012
Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
50 Bedford Square
London WC1B 3DP
Text copyright © 2012 Susan Gates
Illustrations copyright © 2012 Cherry Whytock
The rights of Susan Gates and Cherry Whytock to be identified as the author and illustrator of this work have been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyrights, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
ISBN 978-1-4081-8076-1 (e-book)
A CIP catalogue for this book is available from the British Library.
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