by Duncan Ball
‘And you’re lucky,’ Selby thought, as he raced for home to hide the suit under the house again, ‘that I didn’t bite yourhead off!’
SUPERSTITIOUS SELBY
‘Did you know that it’s supposed to be good luck to carry around a rabbit’s foot?’ Dr Trifle said, looking up from the book he was reading.
‘I don’t believe it,’ said Mrs Trifle.
‘I don’t either,’ thought Selby. ‘It wasn’t good luck for the rabbit — he had four of them and look what happened to him.‘
‘Did you know that if you spill pepper you’ll have an argument with your best friend?’ Dr Trifle said, turning the page. ‘And if you dream about a lizard you have a secret enemy.’
‘I dreamt about a lizard once,’ Selby thought, ‘so I must have a secret enemy. It could be Willy or Billy but there’s no secret about them.’
‘If your nose itches it means that you’ll be kissed by a fool,’ Dr Trifle said.
‘Come to think of it,’ Mrs Trifle said, ‘my nose itched just before you kissed me yesterday.’
‘Is that true?’
‘No, just kidding, dear. Right now all I care about is collecting the money for the Bush Hospitals’ Benefit Raffle. We’ve asked everyone who wants tickets to leave the money in their mailbox by ten o’clock tonight. You and I have to collect it and give it to Camilla. She’ll be drawing the winner tomorrow morning at the Hospitals’ Benefit Breakfast. And, thanks to that nice man on the radio, lots of people are buying lots of tickets. The winner will get a new car and there should be heaps of money left over for Bogusville Hospital.’
‘Did you say that you and I have to collect the money? Aren’t Melanie Mildew and Postie Paterson going to help?’
‘Melanie is sick,’ Mrs Trifle said, filling out a raffle ticket for herself and putting it with some money in an envelope. ‘She caught a cold in the rain. She blames herself. She thinks that she made it rain.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You know the saying that if you kill a spider it will rain? Well, she killed one in her garage last week.’
‘If that saying was true,’ Selby thought, ‘there wouldn’t be one spider left in Bogusville. The farmers would have killed them all to make it rain.’
‘What’s wrong with Postie?’ Dr Trifle asked.
‘He fell down and hurt his back just after a black cat crossed his path.’
‘Yes, they say that’s bad luck,’ Dr Trifle said, opening his book again. ‘There are so many superstitions. Did you know that if your cheeks feel like they’re on fire it means someone is talking about you?’
‘The last time I felt like my cheeks were on fire,’ Selby thought, ‘they were. I was standing too close to the heater.’
‘What is that book you’re reading?’ Mrs Trifle asked.
‘It’s called Half Your Luck. It’s by our friend Madame Mascara,’ Dr Trifle said. ‘She’s a very superstitious woman.’
‘And a very rich one,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘She’s had an incredible run of good luck.’
‘Here’s another one,’ Dr Trifle said.‘Step on a crack and break your mother’s back’
‘If that was true,’ Selby thought, ‘every mother in the world would be walking around with a broken back.’
‘That actually did happen to a girl at my primary school,’ Mrs Trifle said.
‘You mean she stepped on a crack and broke her mother’s back?’
‘Not exactly. She tripped on a crack and fell on her mother and hurt her mother’s back.’
‘Not quite the same,’ Dr Trifle said, ‘but it was certainly bad luck for her mother. Did you know it was also bad luck if you let milk boil over?’
‘I knew that,’ Selby said. ‘Last year Mrs Trifle let some milk boil over and it splashed on me. It nearly killed me!’
‘I knew that,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘I boiled some milk over and a drop or two hit Selby. But he didn’t seem to notice.’
‘Madame Mascara’s book says that you should never have the head of your bed pointing north,’ Dr Trifle said.
‘Oh, give me a break,’ Selby thought.
‘We moved the bedroom furniture last week,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘Hmmm. Let’s just have a look at it.’
Selby followed the Trifles into the bedroom.
‘Just as I thought,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘It’s pointing north. And, look, you left your hat lying on the bed. That’s very bad luck — or so they say.’
‘And so are shoes lying upside down on the floor,’ Dr Trifle added. ‘Both of yours are upside down.’
‘I think we both got out of the wrong side of the bed this morning,’ Mrs Trifle said, with a laugh. ‘What is the wrong side of a bed, anyway?’
‘Madame Mascara explains this,’ Dr Trifle said. ‘The wrong side is the side you didn’t get in on.’
‘Then it’s true,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘I did get out of bed on the wrong side this morning.’
‘Do you really believe this nonsense?’ Dr Trifle asked. ‘I don’t.’
‘Neither do I,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘Besides, what is bad luck? What could possibly happen?’
‘A plane could crash into our house,’ Dr Trifle said. ‘But what would be the chance of that?’
Suddenly in the distance there was the sound of an approaching aeroplane. Dr and Mrs Trifle listened for a moment.
‘Highly unlikely,’ Mrs Trifle said, as she turned over her shoes. ‘But I do think my shoes look better right-side up.’
‘And my hat shouldn’t be on the bed,’ Dr Trifle said, snatching it up.
‘And I think I did like the bed better round the other way,’ Mrs Trifle said, as the plane passed overhead. ‘Didn’t you?’
‘Absolutely,’ Dr Trifle said. ‘Let’s move everything back the way it was.’
‘Hang on. You don’t suppose we’re superstitious, do you?’ Mrs Trifle asked.
‘Of course not. But there are lots of mysterious things we don’t know about. We’re just not taking any chances. That’s different.’
‘Oh, please,’ Selby thought, as he headed for the lounge room. ‘This is getting totally out of hand. I’ve got to do something to stop this nonsense before they drive themselves crazy — and me, too! Hey, I know …’
Selby raced around the house while the Trifles were rearranging the bedroom.
‘Phew!’ Dr Trifle sighed, as he and Mrs Trifle came back to the lounge room. ‘Now to collect that raffle money. Oops, someone’s spilt salt on the table. That’s bad luck.’
‘I wonder who did that?’ Mrs Trifle said, taking a pinch of it and throwing it over her left shoulder. ‘This should make it good luck again.’
Mrs Trifle grabbed her handbag but, just as she did, her hand mirror fell to the floor and broke.
‘Oh, no! A broken mirror! Seven years’ bad luck,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘How did that happen? I thought I’d closed my handbag.’
‘Hang on,’ Dr Trifle said, thumbing through the book. ‘There’s something you can do. Here it is: Turn around three times, scream, “Shoot me! Shoot me! I’m a rooster!” and then spit.’
‘But that’s too silly,’ Mrs Trifle said.
‘I agree. Don’t do it. Better to risk a bit of bad luck.’
‘Shoot me! Shoot me! I’m a rooster!’ Mrs Trifle said.
Then she spat, narrowly missing Selby.
‘Maybe that wasn’t such a good idea,’ Dr Trifle said. ‘It says in the book that it’s very bad luck to spit on the floor.’
‘Is there anything I can do about it?’ Mrs Trifle asked, wiping the floor with a tissue.
‘It says here that you have to stand on your head and stay there for a minute.’
‘This is getting really really stupid!’ Selby thought, as Mrs Trifle got down on all fours.
‘I can’t get my feet up in the air,’ she said.
Dr Trifle lifted Mrs Trifle’s legs up in the air, waited for a minute and then let her down again.
‘Phew! I’m glad that’s over,’ S
elby thought.
‘Phew! I’m glad that’s over,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘Now let’s go.’
Dr Trifle opened the front door and then stopped.
‘We can’t go out,’ he said, looking at the ladder that was propped up outside the door. ‘We can’t go out or we’ll walk under the ladder. That’s very bad luck. I wonder how it got there?’
‘Oh, for pity’s sake!’ Selby thought. ‘Just go under it and you’ll see that it isn’t bad luck after all!’
‘You must have been cleaning leaves out of the gutter,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘And you left the ladder there. Let’s go out the back door.’
They started for the back door.
‘Wait,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘It’s bad luck if you don’t leave a house through the same door that you came in.’
‘Yes, that’s in this book, too,’ Dr Trifle said. ‘But it’s okay because you were in the backyard when I came home so you came in through the back door and you can go out through the back door. I didn’t, I came in through the front door.’
‘So what do we do?’
‘Simple: You go out the back and then jump the fence into the laneway, run around the house and move the ladder. Then I can go out the front door and everything will be okay.’
‘This is amazing!’ Selby thought. ‘What’s the problem? Just go out and collect that money!’
‘Everything would be okay,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘But there’s no way I can jump that back fence. Unless … you could go out the front and bring the ladder in and then I’ll take it out the back and put it up to the fence for me to climb over. Then you can go out the front again and run around and help me down the other side.’
‘But to do that, I’ll have to go under the ladder first,’ Dr Trifle reminded her. ‘So it won’t work. Besides, you and I should never go out different doors when we’re leaving the house.Leave together, stay together. Leave apart, stay apart.
‘I couldn’t stand it if we ever stayed apart,’ Mrs Trifle sighed.
‘I couldn’t either,’ Dr Trifle said. ‘But I don’t know what to do because we have to collect that money. I say we just forget all this superstition stuff.’
‘I agree,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘Let’s go.’
‘Finally!’ Selby thought. ‘They’re coming to their senses. It’s about time!’
Mrs Trifle suddenly noticed the calendar on the wall.
‘Oh, no! Do you know what day it is? It’s Friday the thirteenth! The unluckiest day of the year! That’s the last straw. I’m not going anywhere. I’m going straight to bed and staying there till tomorrow.’
‘I guess I’d better do the same,’ Dr Trifle sighed. ‘At least we’ll be safe now that our bed’s pointing in the right direction.’
‘Now I’ve really done it!’ Selby squealed in his brain. ‘I was only trying to cure them and now I’ve made it worse! They’re never going to collect the raffle money! What am I going to do? I guess I’ll have to collect the money!’
That night was the busiest night of Selby’s life. He ran from mailbox to mailbox, quietly opening them and taking out the envelopes with the money. He filled bag after bag with tickets and money and left them in a pile on Camilla Bonzer’s doorstep.
‘I never thought money could be so heavy!’ Selby thought as he dragged the last bag of money and tickets to the pile. ‘I’m exhausted! And I’ve finished just in time, the sun is coming up. But what am I going to do about the Trifles?’
Selby limped back to the house, curled up and fell asleep. He woke to the sound of the telephone ringing. Mrs Trifle stumbled out of the bedroom to answer it.
‘Camilla, I’m terribly sorry …’ she started. ‘What? … What do you mean? … Really? … No! … No!! … No!!! That’s wonderful! I can’t wait to tell my husband!’
‘What is it?’ Dr Trifle asked. ‘What’s happened?’
‘That was Camilla phoning from the Hospitals’ Benefit Breakfast. Apparently someone collected all the raffle money.’
‘I guess Postie and Melanie must have felt well enough after all,’ Dr Trifle said. ‘Hey, if Postie was okay then do you know what that means?’
‘No, what?’
‘Maybe black cats aren’t such bad luck after
all.’
‘And the very best news of all,’ Mrs Trifle said, ‘is that I won!’
‘You what?’
‘My ticket won the raffle! I won a new car! Can you believe it?’
‘No, because you didn’t even send your raffle ticket in,’ Dr Trifle said, looking to where the envelope had been on the table and not seeing it. ‘That was more than luck — that was a miracle! The ticket got to the raffle all by itself! You see, didn’t I say that there are lots of mysterious things that we don’t know about?’
‘You can say that again,’ Selby thought.
‘Of course I won’t keep the car,’ Mrs Trifle said.
‘You won’t?’
‘No, it wouldn’t look right for the mayor to win the prize. I’ll tell them to sell it and give the money to the hospital.’
‘It seems that all of those things that were supposed to be bad luck, weren’t bad luck after all,’ Dr Trifle said.
‘Good!’ Selby thought. ‘Finally all that silly superstition business is over.’
‘In fact, they were good luck,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘Quick, let’s move the bed back and walk under that ladder and — hey, it wasn’t Friday the thirteenth after all! Someone must have flipped the calendar over to next month. Oh, goody, there’s a Friday the thirteenth at the end of next week!’
‘Great,’ Dr Trifle said, spilling a pile of salt and looking around for another mirror to break. ‘Now how are we going to get a black cat to cross our path?’
‘Oh, woe woe woe,’ Selby thought. ‘This is going to be just as bad as before. Just my luck … what am I saying?!’
DOG TALK
by Selby Trifle
I wish that I could learn to speak In German, Portuguese and Greek And Arabic and Japanese And Hindi, Thai and Cantonese. I wish my tongue could wrap around Every sort of foreign sound From Timbuktu to Samarkand And even EuroDisneyland. Yes, I would stop and say, ‘G’day!’ To all the folks who came my way. They’d say, with faces all agog, ‘He talks like us! — and he’s a dog!’
SELBY SCRAMBLED
Selby’s brain was scrambled.
He wasn’t sure who he was or even what he was.
‘I don’t know where I am,’ he thought. ‘Or who I am.’
Selby looked down at his paws.
‘What are these things on the ends of my arms? Am I a cat? No, I don’t have any whiskers. A mouse? No, I’m too big to be a mouse. A bear? No, too small. And what’s that funny thing poking out of my bottom? Oh, yes, it’s a tail. Hey, it’s a dog’s tail! I’m a dog. But I don’t feel like a dog.’
Selby was lying beside the swimming pool in the backyard. He glanced towards the house.
Suddenly the back door opened. Walking towards him was something strange — a machine, maybe.
‘It’s shaped kind of like a person,’ Selby thought, ‘but it’s all shiny. People aren’t shiny. No, it can’t be a person. Besides, people don’t have flashing lights all over their chests.’
The creature came closer. It was humming.
‘He’s humming that song. I know that song but I can’t remember where I’ve heard it before. Oh, I’m so confused.’
Selby’s problems had all begun a week before. Mrs Trifle was at work and Dr Trifle was in his workroom. Selby was secretly reading the fantasy series,Valley of Dead Souls. He’d just started the last book,Dogboy’s Final Challenge.
‘I can’t wait to see if Dogboy kills the Gork king,’ Selby thought. ‘It’s sooooooo exciting!’
Selby was so caught up in his book that he barely heard Mrs Trifle’s footsteps and the sound of the front door opening. Selby quickly slipped the book under the lounge just as Dr Trifle came out of his workroom.
‘How was your day, dear?’ Dr Trifle a
sked his wife.
‘Terrible,’ she sighed. ‘Problems, problems, problems. After a while I was so confused and exhausted that, before I knew it, I’d eaten a whole bag of leftover chocolate Easter eggs. And everyone was giggling at me because I kept humming that song from the Dry-Mouth Dog Biscuits ad without even thinking.’
‘What song is that?’
‘You remember, it goes like this:
Oh Dry-Mouth, oh Dry-Mouth oh wiggley woo
Dry and delicious so crunchy to chew
Fill up my bowl with my fave-ourite food
And if you do so – then I’ll love you too.
‘I hate that song but it’s stuck in my head. It’s embarrassing when I hum it!’
‘I hate it, too,’ Selby thought, ‘and it’s stuck in my head, too. But if I start humming it, it’s going to be more than embarrassing.’
‘I don’t understand the human brain,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘We think we’re logical and sensible and then we gobble up whole bags of chocolate Easter eggs and sing dog food ads without even thinking. And we make so many mistakes.’
‘What we need are helpers that don’t make mistakes,’ Dr Trifle said.
‘Yes, that would be perfect — but impossible.’
‘Impossible? Never say impossible to an inventor,’ Dr Trifle said. ‘Frank! Come here!’
There was a rattle and a clunk in the workroom and then a clomp clomp clomp. The door opened and there stood a strange shiny machine the size and shape of a man.
‘What’s that?’ Mrs Trifle screamed.
‘It’s Frank, my newly invented robot.’
‘Your robot? What a strange-looking thing. He looks a bit … well, scary. I’ll bet you named him after Frankenstein’s monster.’
‘Frankenstein’s monster? Goodness, no. Frank stands for Fully Responsive Animated Neutronic Kinematoid. F-R-A-N-K. Listen to this. Hello Frank.’
‘Hello … mister … man,’ Frank said slowly.
‘Call me Dr Trifle. And this is Mrs Trifle.’
‘Hello … Dr Trifle … and … Mrs Trifle.’
