by Duncan Ball
Selby’s throat went dry. He could feel tears filling his eyes.
‘They might have loved me before, but now they’re going to hate me. Oh woe woe woe — another horrible, terrible shemozzle! How did I get myself into this?’
As he opened his mouth to speak, Selby’s thoughts came flooding back. He remembered that fateful moment only a week before when Mrs Trifle said to Dr Trifle, ‘What about a time capsule?’
‘What about a what?’
‘One of those things you bury in the ground and no one’s allowed to open it for a long, long time.’
‘But what would we put in it?’
‘A portrait of the town,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘Not a painted portrait, but something that says what life is like in Bogusville right now. Maybe everyone who wants to can keep a diary for a whole week. Then we’ll bury what they’ve written. A hundred years from now the people of Bogusville — Bogusville will be a city by then — can dig it up and see for themselves just what life was like.’
‘Great idea,’ Dr Trifle said.
‘But what if someone comes along and digs it up a couple of months from now?’ Mrs Trifle wondered.
‘Don’t worry about that,’ Dr Trifle said. ‘We’ll put everything in a steel box and screw the lid on. Then we’ll bury it in a ten-tonne block of Quick-Set Super-Hard Killer-Koncrete. Nobody — nobody except someone with a mega-mega-giga-horsepower giant jackhammer — could break into that.’
‘Good,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘I’ll put a notice in the Bogusville Banner to tell everyone to start writing about their week.’
* * *
One week later Postie Paterson delivered a big bag of mail.
‘The last of the diaries,’ he said. ‘Here’s mine, too. Have a read of it.’
‘Oh, no, I’m not reading them. That would be rude.’
‘It’s okay. I’ll read it to you: “Monday, I delivered the mail. Tuesday, I delivered the mail. Wednesday, I delivered the mail.” Do you like it?’
‘Yes, very nice.’
‘Thursday is more interesting,’ Postie said. ‘“Thursday, I delivered the mail and cleaned the wombat cage at the zoo.”’
‘Very good,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘We want people in the future to know what we did for the week. You delivered the mail.’
‘And I cleaned the wombat cage at the zoo,’ Postie added. ‘Then, on the weekend, I went skydiving but my parachute didn’t open and I fell through the roof of a house, which made the house catch fire, but I rescued everyone and … Sorry, I was just kidding. Actually I read a great book about delivering the mail. I thought I knew everything about it, but I didn’t. It was really good. I’d better be going. I’ve got something to do.’
‘Deliver the mail?’ Mrs Trifle said.
‘You guessed it.’
Later that day the trouble started. And of course it started with Aunt Jetty and Willy and Billy bursting into the Trifles’ house when Selby least expected it.
‘Hey!’ Willy squealed. ‘That’s that stupid, stinky dog! Let’s get him, Billy!’
‘You leave Selby alone!’ Mrs Trifle said, standing between Selby and the boys.
‘But he knows how to talk, ‘Willy said.
‘Yeah, he does,’ Billy said. ‘Only he’s not telling nobody.’
‘Now don’t be silly,’ Mrs Trifle said.
‘Here’s my diary,’ Aunt Jetty said, putting the pages onto the pile.
‘What’s all them?’ Billy asked.
‘Lots of people wrote what they did last week,’ Mrs Trifle explained. ‘We’re going to put them in a time capsule so that people a hundred years from now can find out about us.’
‘I wanna write somefing too! ‘Willy said.
‘Me too,’ Billy said. ‘I want to! I want to! It’s not fair if I don’t get to!’
‘All right, boys,’ Mrs Trifle sighed. ‘There are paper and pencils in the study.’
‘And don’t you dare write anything rude,’ said Aunt Jetty.
‘We won’t, Mummy,’ Willy and Billy said together.
That night when the Trifles were asleep, Selby unscrewed the lid of the time capsule. He tore open the envelope with Willy and Billy’s page in it.
‘Just as I thought,’ he said to himself as he started reading the page.
Selby stopped reading.
‘It just sounds unbelievably stupid,’ he said, throwing the page into the wastepaper basket. ‘No one would believe it. But, hang on a tick, those little monsters have given me an idea. What if I tell my own story in my own words? I can’t tell anyone my secret right now, but wouldn’t it be great if people in one hundred years’ time knew that there actually was a real, live talking dog?’
Selby dashed into the study and started writing. And this is what he wrote:
Selby finished writing the page and then put it in an envelope and wrote ‘Selby Trifle’ on it.
‘Now I feel so much better,’ he thought. ‘It’s an answer to all my worries. I can keep my secret, but in one hundred years’ time the whole world will know everything about me. It’s a pity my paw-writing isn’t neater. Oh well, that’ll show that it was really written by a dog.’
Selby put the envelope in the time capsule and screwed the lid back on.
The next day, Selby, the Trifles and most of the town watched as the capsule was placed in a hole in the Bogusville Memorial Rose Garden. Then a big truck poured in ten tonnes of Quick-Set Super-Hard Killer-Koncrete, which was as solid as stone in minutes.
‘I wonder if people in the future will be surprised about what life was like here in the old Bogusville?’ Mrs Trifle said.
‘I can certainly think of one thing that’s going to surprise them,’ Selby thought, trying not to snicker.
Selby tried to imagine what it would be like when the time capsule was opened. Once the people in the future knew there had been a real talking dog in the world, they’d study the Selby books in every tiny detail. People would write more books about him. There would be TV shows — and even movies.
‘I will be the most famous dog in the history of the world,’ Selby thought.
And that would have been that, except for one little thing. It happened a few days later when Mrs Trifle was putting out the rubbish. As she did, a breeze blew a bit of paper onto the ground. And as she stooped to pick it up she noticed Willy and Billy’s writing.
‘They wrote what?’ Aunt Jetty screamed down the telephone.
‘They wrote horrible things about Selby,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘I found a draft of what they wrote in the wastepaper basket. What they put in the time capsule is probably a hundred times worse.’
‘They will bring shame to my good name!’ Aunt Jetty said.
‘It’s too late now, Sister,’ Mrs Trifle sighed. ‘What’s done is done. It would take a mega-mega-giga-horsepower giant jackhammer to break into that time capsule now. Anyway, I guess it won’t matter that people in a hundred years’ time think that your boys were badly brought up.’
‘We’ll see about that!’ Aunt Jetty cried. ‘Willy! Billy! Come here!’
An hour later Mrs Trifle opened the door, and there stood Aunt Jetty with the time capsule under one arm and a mega-mega-giga-horsepower giant jackhammer under the other.
‘I couldn’t find the boys’ page, but have a look at this! ‘Aunt Jetty said, handing Mrs Trifle the envelope marked ‘Selby Trifle’.
‘Why? What is it? “Selby Trifle"?’
‘That mutt of yours wrote it,’ Aunt Jetty said, pointing to Selby. ‘Willy and Billy were right all along. That dog of yours can talk — and read and write. And he’s a little sneak, if you ask me. Imagine keeping it a secret all this time and eavesdropping on everyone.’
Dr and Mrs Trifle stood in stunned silence, staring at the page. They turned to Selby and said all the things they said at the beginning of the story. Then Mrs Trifle said, ‘Okay, Selby, now it’s time to talk. Come on, say something.’ (Just as she also did at the start of this story.)
Selby
’s mouth went dry and tears formed in his eyes and the rest of it, and then, just as he was about to speak, Aunt Jetty burst out laughing.
‘What’s so funny?’ Mrs Trifle asked.
‘Don’t you see?’ Aunt Jetty said. ‘Willy and Billy were the ones who really wrote this. See the terrible handwriting? It has to be theirs.’
‘Do you really think so?’ said Mrs Trifle.
‘Absolutely! And weren’t they grown-up,’ Aunt Jetty said. ‘They knew they shouldn’t write the rude draft you found, so they threw it away and wrote this very clever piece pretending they were that … that stupid mutt of yours.’
‘You could be right,’ Dr Trifle said. ‘Then the whole thing’s a joke. And a good one, too. So I guess you broke the time capsule open for nothing.’
‘That’s right,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘Okay, put the boys’ bit of comedy back in the capsule and I’ll ring Killer-Koncrete and get another load delivered.’
‘Phew!’ Selby thought. ‘That was a close one! But what a shemozzle! One second more and I’d have spilled the beans. Thank goodness my secret’s still a secret. And thank goodness everyone’s going to know the truth about me in one hundred years’ time after all, because they won’t think that Willy and Billy wrote it.’
‘Now wait a minute,’ Aunt Jetty said, snatching the envelope. ‘Let me just write a note on it.’
And with this, Aunt Jetty wrote:
This is just a bit of comedy writing by Jetty’s very clever sons, Willy and Billy.
And into the time capsule it went.
‘Oh, woe woe woe,’ Selby thought. ‘I guess my secret will have to stay a secret forever.’
Paw note: Of course I wrote my real name and the Trifles’ real name too.
S
See-Through Selby
‘The Kwangdangi Box!’ cried Ralpho the Magnificent, the Trifles’ old friend and (hopeless) magician. ‘It’s perfect! It looks just like the real one! It even looks old.’
Dr and Mrs Trifle and Selby had just arrived in the city. Selby followed as the Trifles grabbed the box from the back of their car and carried it into the back of the theatre. There, wearing his magician’s cape and tall hat, was Ralpho, ready to do his act.
‘I followed those plans you gave me exactly,’ Dr Trifle said.
‘Yes, I bought those old plans from Luigi Whodunni many years ago.’
‘Not the Great Whodunni?’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘He was the most famous magician ever!’
‘This is sooooooo exciting!’ Selby thought. ‘This trick is going to knock the socks off all those other magicians!’
Selby knew all about the Great Whodunni. He’d read a book about him over and over again.
‘That guy was the best!’ Selby thought. ‘He could do any trick there was. He went everywhere and worked out other magicians’ tricks and showed people that there was no such thing as real magic — it was all just tricks.’
‘There’s no time to waste,’ Ralpho said. ‘The MAGIC Show has already started and I’m on next.’
‘What exactly is this MAGIC Show?’ Mrs Trifle asked.
‘M.A. G. I. C.,’ Ralpho said, spelling it out. ‘It stands for the Mysterious and Ghostly International Conference. This is not an ordinary show. The audience is all magicians. Every year we get together and show off our strangest and spookiest tricks. Wait till they see the Kwangdangi Box trick. It’s the most famous magic trick ever.’
As Ralpho talked, Selby remembered the story of the Great Whodunni, travelling on a camel to the town of Kwangdangi in the middle of the desert, where he discovered the Kwangdangi Box trick. There he saw an old magician put a boy in a box, say some magic words — aka-baka-paka — and when he opened the box, the boy was gone. Then he said some more magic words and the boy reappeared.
‘So this is just like the box that the Great Whodunni saw?’ Mrs Trifle asked.
‘Not exactly,’ Ralpho said. ‘It looks the same, but I asked your husband to put a secret hiding place in it.’
‘I’ll show you how it works,’ Dr Trifle said, opening the front of the box. ‘The boy steps into the box. It’s just big enough for him to stand up. When Ralpho closes the box, the boy lies down and scrunches up as tight as he can. Closing the door brings a flat panel gently down on top of him. Ralpho says his magic words, opens the box, and the boy is gone. Only he’s really just hiding in the bottom of the box where you can’t see him.’
‘And how does he un-disappear?’ Mrs Trifle asked.
‘Simple — Ralpho closes the box again and the panel goes up against the top of the box. The boy stands up, Ralpho opens the box and ta-da! there he is. This should really fool the other magicians. They won’t have a clue how it’s done.’
‘So the real Kwangdangi Box didn’t have a hiding place in the bottom,’ Mrs Trifle said.
‘Oh, no,’ Ralpho said. ‘Luigi Whodunni had a very good look at it. He even took it apart. It was the one trick he could never work out.’
‘Maybe it was real magic.’
‘Goodness, no! Everyone knows that there’s no such thing as real magic,’ Ralpho said. ‘Ooops! I’m on! Will you two be my assistants?’
‘Yes, of course,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘But where’s the boy?’
‘What boy?’
‘The one you’re going to put in the box and make disappear?’
‘Oh, no!’ Selby thought. ‘He’s completely forgotten! Poor Ralpho, he’s got to be the most hopeless magician in the world!’
‘I — I think I forgot,’ Ralpho said. ‘But maybe one of you can be the boy in the box.’
‘Ralpho,’ Dr Trifle sighed, ‘we’re too big. We won’t fit. And we certainly can’t fit in the hiding place at the bottom.’
‘Then where are we going to find a boy — or a girl?’ Ralpho said, pacing around the room.
‘Let’s put our thinking caps on,’ Dr Trifle said, pacing around after Ralpho.
‘We need someone small,’ Mrs Trifle said, pacing around after the others.
‘Hey, hang on,’ Selby thought. ‘How about me? I’m small.’
‘Someone very small,’ Ralpho said.
‘Very, very small,’ Dr Trifle agreed.
Selby climbed into the open box and sat there waiting to be noticed.
‘Yes,’ Ralpho said, noticing Selby. ‘We need someone about Selby’s size.’
‘But where,’ Dr Trifle said, ‘are we going to find someone the size of Selby in the next few minutes?’
‘That’s right,’ Ralpho said. ‘Think think think. There must be an answer to this problem.’
‘I am the answer,’ Selby thought. ‘Wake up, guys!’
‘Look at Selby sitting in the box,’ Dr Trifle said. ‘Isn’t he cute?’
‘Cute schmoot,’ Selby thought. ‘Come on, how about me?’
‘Hang on!’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘How about Selby?’
‘Selby?’ Ralpho said.
‘Selby?’ Dr Trifle said.
‘Yes, Selby,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘It’s worth a try.’
Mrs Trifle closed the door to the box. Selby quickly lay down and scrunched up as tightly as he could. Then Mrs Trifle opened the door.
‘He’s gone!’ she cried. ‘He did it!’
Mrs Trifle closed the door again and Selby stood up when the board went up.
‘And here he is again!’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘That’s the answer! Your disappearing boy is about to be a disappearing dog.’
Ralpho waited with Selby behind the curtain as Dr and Mrs Trifle wheeled the box out onto the stage. Hundreds of magicians suddenly fell silent.
‘The Kwangdangi Box!’ someone cried. ‘The most famous and mysterious trick in the world!’
‘But who’s the magician?’ someone else cried out.
Ralpho pulled the curtain back and bowed. There was a moment of silence followed by a roar of laughter.
‘It’s Ralpho the Hopeless!’ someone yelled.
‘Hey, that’s not nice,’ Selby thought. ‘It may be true, but
it’s not nice to say.’
‘Ladies and gentlemen, conjurers and tricksters,’ Ralpho said. ‘Throw away your trick card decks and your fake handcuffs, because today you will see the most mysterious and ghostly magic ever performed.’
‘Yeah, right!’ someone yelled, and everyone laughed.
Dr and Mrs Trifle opened the door to the box and turned it round and round on the stage. They stopped when the open door was again facing the audience.
‘As you can see,’ Ralpho said, tapping the box with his magic wand, ‘there is nothing in the box. But before your very eyes you are about to see a real, live dog disappear. Come here, Selby.’
‘We’ll show them, Ralpho,’ Selby thought.
Selby hopped into the box and stood looking out at a sea of tall hats and laughing faces.
‘Now you see him …’ Ralpho said, closing the door.
Selby quickly lay down and scrunched up as the panel came down and covered him.
‘Now does everyone remember the magic words that the Great Whodunni heard when he saw this feat of magic?’
All together the audience called out, ‘Aka-baka-paka!’
Bllllliiiiinnnng!
‘That’s a strange noise,’ thought Selby.
‘That’s right, aka-baka-paka!’ Ralpho said, tapping the box again with his wand and then opening the door. ‘As you can see the dog is gone.’
‘You mean the doggone dog is hiding in the bottom of the box!’ someone called out. ‘It’s the old secret-hiding-place-under-the-floor trick!’
Once again all the magicians screamed with laughter.
‘That’s cruel,’ Selby thought. ‘Poor Ralpho. And poor Dr Trifle. He spent all that time making the box and everyone already knows the trick.’
‘And now I’m going to bring him back from the beyond,’ Ralpho said.
Inside the box, the board lifted and Selby stood up, feeling hugely proud of himself — and Ralpho.
‘They may have seen the trick before,’ he thought, ‘but I’ll bet they’ve never seen it done with a dog.’
