Elephants Don't Sit on Cars

by David Henry Wilson

  And just at the moment when the arms and legs were about to refuse to do any more digging for ever and ever, Jeremy James’s seaside spade struck something very hard indeed.

  ‘Gosh!’ said Jeremy James, and brought his spade down on it again. It felt even harder the second time than the first. Jeremy James got down on his hands and knees, which had stopped sending complaints now, and scraped the earth off the treasure chest. It was certainly metal, and it was so hard the pirates must have put all their best jewels in it.

  ‘Gosh!’ said Jeremy James again, and started to dig all around the treasure chest, because he knew that even the biggest treasure in the world won’t buy you many ice creams unless you can get it out of the ground. And so he dug, and then he pulled, and then he pushed, and he growled and he howled, and he hugged and he tugged, and he clasped and he gasped, and he sneezed and he wheezed . . . but the treasure chest stayed exactly where it was, and never moved an inch.

  Jeremy James sat down beside the treasure chest to have a good think. That was what Daddy always said – if you have a problem you should sit down and think about it. Mummy always said if you had a problem you should get up and do something about it, but Daddy said Mummy didn’t understand these things, and so he carried on with his thinking and left Mummy to carry on with her doing. The funny thing was that by the time Daddy had finished his thinking, Mummy had usually finished her doing, and there wasn’t much of a problem left for Daddy to deal with, but that never seemed to worry Daddy, because he said that only proved how much simpler life was if you sat down and had a good think while someone else was doing the doing.

  Anyway, Jeremy James was a man like his Daddy, and so he sat next to his problem and thought about it. There was no way he could get that treasure chest out of the ground. So what could he do? He could, of course, tell Mummy and Daddy and ask them to help him, but this was his land and his treasure chest, and he wanted to show them, not them to show him. He didn’t want to ask anyone for help. Treasure’s treasure, and finding’s keeping. But how do you get a treasure out of the ground if it refuses to come? Sometimes Jeremy James refused to come, and Mummy had ways of persuading him, but the treasure chest hadn’t got ears to listen to a telling-off, and it hadn’t got a bottom to feel a smack, so Mummy’s methods certainly wouldn’t work.

  And then Jeremy James remembered something that had happened a long time ago. Picnic-time out in the green fields, with Daddy talking about the beauty of Nature and Mummy flapping a cloth at the flies and Jeremy James wishing they’d hurry up and bring out the ice cream. A tin of mandarin oranges, that’s what Jeremy James was remembering now. A large tin for once, with a black label and a mouth-watering picture of mandarin oranges right in the middle. And Daddy saying, ‘Just what I feel like – some nice juicy mandarin oranges – perfect end to a perfect meal. Eh, Jeremy James? How about some nice juicy mandarin oranges?’ and Mummy saying, ‘I forgot the tin-opener.’ What happened then? Daddy said a few words, and Mummy said she was sorry, and then Daddy sat down to think, and what did Mummy do? She got a knife out of the bag, held the tin very firmly on the ground, and pushed the point of the knife right through the top of the tin. Then she waggled it around until there was a hole big enough for all that sweet, cool, juicy treasure to come pouring out. That was the way to do it. Get something with a sharp point, waggle it around, and out would come all the sparkling gold and silver.

  Jeremy James looked down the garden towards the living-room window, the kitchen window, the bedroom window, the bathroom window. Not a Mummy or a Daddy in sight. A quick dash across the lawn, and he was safe inside Daddy’s tool shed. And inside Daddy’s tool shed he soon found just what he was looking for. It was a lot bigger than a knife, and it had a great big handle and a big round pointed head, and Jeremy James could hardly lift it, it was so heavy. But one thump with that, and the treasure would be his for sure. Another quick look down the garden, and then Jeremy James wrestled the pickaxe back across the lawn to the earthy cradle of his golden future.

  The pickaxe really was very heavy, but Jeremy James was very determined, and a determined boy and a heavy pickaxe can do quite a lot of damage to a stubborn stick-in-the-mud treasure chest. There was a loud clang as pickaxe and treasure chest were introduced to each other, and Jeremy James bent down to have a look. He hadn’t managed to break through yet, but there was a nice deep dent in the metal – and after all, pirates don’t bury their gold and silver in mandarin orange tins. One more thump on the same place should do it. The pickaxe wobbled up into the air again, and crashed down into the earth beside the treasure chest, giving one wriggling pink worm a terrible shock that sent it squirming in all directions at once. ‘Missed!’ said Jeremy James, and gathered strength for another attack. Three times the pickaxe rose and fell, and by the third stroke there wasn’t a worm in sight, but Jeremy James was not to be put off. He took very very careful aim, drew in enough air to float half a dozen Christmas balloons, and heaved the pickaxe up to the sky once more. When it came down, there was a glorious crunch as the point pierced the metal, and then a very strange thing happened. There was a great whoosh, and something shot high into the air, and when it came down again it was very wet, and Jeremy James found himself being drenched with the coldest, heaviest shower he’d ever been showered with.

  ‘Mummy!’ he shouted, and dripped hastily across the lawn to the French doors, which opened even before he could shout ‘Mummy!’ again.

  Ever such a lot of things happened during the next hour or so. There were phone calls and running backwards and forwards, and The Men came, and Jeremy James was sent to his room, and Daddy had a talk with a big man who had a red face and a bristly moustache, and some of the neighbours knocked on the front door, and The Men kept tramping in and out, and when Jeremy James went to the lavatory it wouldn’t flush, and when he told Mummy the lavatory wouldn’t flush she told him to go back to his room, and in the end, when everyone had gone, the garden looked like a paddling pool and the house was full of muddy boot-marks which Mummy said were Jeremy James’s fault, though the feet were obviously a hundred times bigger than his. And Daddy came upstairs, and sat with Jeremy James on the bed, and put on a very serious, very Daddy-like voice, and told him that he must never, never take the pickaxe again, or go digging again, or go ‘messing up the whole caboodle again’ – which was very unfair since Jeremy James didn’t even know what a caboodle was. And Mummy said he should go to bed without any supper, but Daddy brought him a sandwich and said he’d jolly well better not make any crumbs. And goodnight and God bless.

  Jeremy James sat up in bed and munched his sandwich (which was strawberry jam – his favourite) and reflected on the injustices of the world he lived in. Of course, all that water must have caused a lot of trouble, but he’d got as wet as anybody, and it shouldn’t have needed much common sense for them to realize that it wasn’t his fault. After all, they’d have been pleased enough if he’d come in with his pockets full of gold and silver. Why on earth should they blame him if those stupid pirates had gone and buried a box of water instead?

  CHAPTER SIX

  The Doctor

  Jeremy James wasn’t very well. In the night he’d had to call for Mummy, and he’d been very sick – horribly smelly sick, all over the bedclothes. And Mummy had had to stroke his hair, and sit by him for a while, which was rather nice. And the crispy clean sheets were rather nice, too. But being ill wasn’t so nice, especially the being sick part, which was very un-nice. Even Daddy had come in for a few minutes while Jeremy James was being sick – and it took a lot to get Daddy out of bed for anything – but Mummy said he looked even worse than Jeremy James felt, so he should go back to bed. And Daddy said something like, ‘Worple doctor semantics’, and Mummy said, ‘In the morning’, and Daddy said, ‘Semantics doctor worple’, and Jeremy James said, ‘Gloop!’ and Daddy went away very quickly and Mummy stayed with Jeremy James.

  Now that it was morning, Jeremy James felt a bit better. He didn’t feel all bett
er, but just sort of better better. He felt better enough to get up and play, but not better enough to eat his cornflakes and drink his milk. Anyway, Mummy said he wasn’t better enough to get up and play either, so he stayed in bed and Mummy phoned for the doctor. When Mummy came back from phoning, she was holding a little packet in her hand. It was a cardboard packet, with lots of bright colours on it, and Jeremy James knew even before Mummy said anything just which packet it was and where Mummy had found it.

  ‘Now then,’ said Mummy . . . and this wasn’t Mummy’s are-you-feeling-better-darling voice at all . . . ‘last night, Jeremy James, when I changed your pillow, I found this. And it’s empty.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Jeremy James.

  ‘A big box of liquorice allsorts,’ said Mummy.

  ‘Er . . . hmmph!’ said Jeremy James.

  ‘I suppose you ate them all,’ said Mummy.

  ‘Oh yes,’ said Jeremy James. ‘Nobody helped me.’

  ‘After you’d cleaned your teeth,’ said Mummy.

  ‘Hmmph,’ said Jeremy James.

  ‘And then,’ said Mummy, ‘you were sick.’

  ‘Well no,’ said Jeremy James, ‘I wasn’t sick then. I wasn’t, Mummy, not then.’

  ‘Oh?’ said Mummy.

  ‘I didn’t feel at all sick then. I went to sleep, that’s what I did then.’

  ‘Jeremy James,’ said Mummy, ‘you must never, never eat sweets before you go to sleep. You must never eat anything after you’ve cleaned your teeth. And you must never, never, never eat a whole box of liquorice allsorts at one go. Do you hear?’

  ‘Yes, Mummy,’ said Jeremy James.

  ‘One liquorice allsort, or maybe two,’ said Mummy, ‘and that’s enough.’

  ‘Yes, Mummy,’ said Jeremy James, though inside he said to himself that one liquorice allsort, or maybe two, wasn’t enough and never could be enough, and only a grown-up would ever imagine that it was enough, because only grown-ups liked little helpings of nice things and big helpings of nasty things. Mummy would never say for instance, ‘One potato, or maybe two, and that’s enough’, or one cornflake, or one carrot, or one cabbage leaf. Oh no, you could have as many of those things as you liked (or didn’t like). But ask for more mandarin oranges, more chocolate, more liquorice allsorts, and all you’d get was the no-more-they’re-not-good-for-you speech.

  Dr Bassett was the tallest man in the world. He was taller than the house, because when he came into Jeremy James’s room, he had to bend down so that his head wouldn’t go through the roof. He was taller than the apple tree, because the apple tree wasn’t as tall as the house, and so he must have been taller than Daddy, because Daddy couldn’t reach the top of the apple tree, except when he borrowed Mr Robertson’s ladder, and even then he usually couldn’t get to the top of the apple tree because either he or the ladder kept falling down. Dr Bassett was a very tall man.

  ‘Well now, old chap,’ said Dr Bassett, ‘how are we feeling?’

  ‘Who?’ asked Jeremy James.

  ‘You,’ said Dr Bassett.

  ‘Oh,’ said Jeremy James. ‘I’m very well, thank you, and I’ve been sick.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Dr Bassett.

  ‘He ate a whole box of liquorice allsorts before he went to bed,’ said Mummy.

  ‘It wasn’t before I went to bed,’ said Jeremy James, ‘it was after I went to bed.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Dr Bassett, ‘that does make a difference.’

  Dr Bassett had a very interesting-looking black bag, which was full of chocolate, tins of fruit, toy soldiers and railway engines, until he opened it, and then it was full of very boring things like youknowwhats and whatdoyoucallits. Jeremy James was poked with a youknowwhat, and pulled a face, then he was tickled with a whatdoyoucallit, and giggled. Then Dr Bassett looked into his mouth, felt his head, tapped his chest and ruffled his hair.

  ‘He’ll be all right,’ said Dr Bassett.

  ‘No I won’t,’ said Jeremy James. ‘Because I’m not ill where you were looking and you were looking in the wrong place.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Dr Bassett.

  ‘Jeremy James!’ said Mummy.

  ‘And where should I have looked?’ asked Dr Bassett.

  ‘In my tummy,’ said Jeremy James. ‘That’s where I’m ill, ’cos that’s where the pain was.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Dr Bassett. ‘Aren’t I a silly old doctor, not looking in your tummy? Let’s have a look at it then.’

  And Dr Bassett had a very close look at Jeremy James’s tummy. He bent right over like the beanstalk must have done when Jack chopped it, and Jeremy James could see through his grey hair and on to his shiny head, and Dr Bassett pointed his little torch on to Jeremy James’s tummy, and studied the tummy for a very long time.

  ‘Well,’ said Dr Bassett, ‘you were quite right, Jeremy James. There’s a pink liquorice allsort in there, and it’s been having a fight with a blue liquorice allsort, and that’s what all the trouble was about. If you’d just eaten a blue liquorice allsort, or you’d just eaten a pink one, they couldn’t have had a fight, and you wouldn’t have been ill. It’s a good thing you told me to look, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Jeremy James.

  ‘Anyway,’ said Dr Bassett, turning to Mummy, ‘he’s got a little bit of a temperature. It’s probably a touch of flu, as a matter of fact. I should keep him in bed for a day or two, and just give him plenty of liquids. He’ll soon let you know himself when he’s better. I’ll write you out a prescription . . .’

  Now this was all very strange. Because Dr Bassett had been to the house before. And the last time Dr Bassett had come to the house, it hadn’t been to see Jeremy James, but to see Daddy because Daddy had been dying, and dying very loudly, with a lot of ‘foofs’ and ‘phaws’ and ‘hmmphs’ and ‘aaahs’. And Dr Bassett had Jack-in-the-beanstalked over Daddy, too, and poked him and tickled him, and Daddy had said something about it being the end, and Dr Bassett had said it wasn’t quite the end, but it was . . . it definitely was . . . it most certainly was . . . a touch of flu. And if Daddy had a touch of flu then, and Jeremy James had a touch of flu now . . . It was all very complicated, but Jeremy James managed to work it out just before Dr Bassett folded himself in two to get through the door.

  ‘Excuse me,’ said Jeremy James, because that was what you always said to grown-ups when you wanted them to turn and look at you.

  ‘Yes, old chap?’ asked Dr Bassett, turning to look at Jeremy James.

  ‘Can you,’ asked Jeremy James, ‘get a touch of flu through eating too many liquorice allsorts?’

  ‘Ah,’ said Dr Bassett. ‘I’ll have to ask the Royal Society to look into that one. But as far as I know, most people find a different way of getting it.’

  ‘Well, did my Daddy get it through eating too many liquorice allsorts?’ asked Jeremy James.

  Dr Bassett seven-league-booted back to the bed, and whispered very, very secretly: ‘That’s highly problematical. You see, it’s only very clever people that get a touch of flu through eating too many liquorice allsorts. Now, do you think that’s how you got yours?’

  Jeremy James had a quick think, because you have to have a quick think before you answer a question like that.

  ‘Well,’ said Jeremy James, ‘I think that maybe I possibly might have done.’

  ‘I think you possibly might have done as well,’ said Dr Bassett.

  And Jeremy James sat back in his bed and tried to work out whether it was better to be clever and eat liquorice allsorts and get a touch of flu, or not to be clever and not to eat liquorice allsorts and not to get a touch of flu. The best thing might be to be clever and to eat liquorice allsorts and not to get a touch of flu, but Dr Bassett had already gone, and it was too late to ask him whether anyone possibly might have been clever enough to do that.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Timothy

  Timothy lived next door, and he was Jeremy James’s best friend, and Jeremy James didn’t like him very much. The trouble with Timothy was that he was spoi
lt, and anything Jeremy James had, Timothy had too but even more so. If Jeremy James had a train set to go round the living room, Timothy had a train set to go round the living room and the dining room and the hall. If Jeremy James had a tricycle with a bell, Timothy had a tricycle with a bell and a hooter and a saddlebag. And if Jeremy James went to the zoo on a Saturday, Timothy had already been there on Friday, which was the only day when the elephants were allowed to escape and little boys were allowed to ride on them.

  Timothy was one year older than Jeremy James, and he was taller, stronger, richer. Timothy had red hair, and told Jeremy James over and over again that red hair was the best thing anyone could have on top of his head. Timothy had freckles on his face, and as everyone knows, a face without freckles can hardly be called a face. But worst of all, Timothy went to school, and anyone who hasn’t been to school simply doesn’t know what life is all about. Timothy did all kinds of marvellous things at school, like eating all day long, teaching the teachers how to do reading and writing, making pictures which were the best pictures anyone had ever made because his Daddy said so, and fighting ten boys at a time and knocking them all out with a single punch. Timothy knew everything, could do everything, had done everything.

  Timothy had a great big tent in which he and Jeremy James could play Cowboys and Indians. Jeremy James had a tent, too, but there was only room for one Indian in his tent. Timothy’s tent could hold a tribe. And so they always played Cowboys and Indians in Timothy’s tent in Timothy’s garden, which was bigger than Jeremy James’s garden. Timothy was always the chief – after all, it was his tent and his garden – and Jeremy James was either a miserable Indian tied to a stake, or he was a miserable cowboy tied to a stake. The only time he was allowed to tie anyone else to a stake was if little Billy from over the road came and played with them, or his baby sister Gillian, but they were so small that you couldn’t really enjoy capturing them because it was too easy.