One Big Wacky Family

by Jackie French

  ‘Why?’ asked Jason.

  ‘Because it’s the slaves’ ship now,’ said Mum soberly. ‘And they deserve better than mucky decks. Good Queen Bess wants her treasure—and we take a bit of that ourselves—but the real business here is freeing the slaves. With a ship to sail home in and a share of the treasure, they’ll be safe and free.’

  CHAPTER 16

  Freedom

  One by one the slaves ventured out on deck, blinking in the sunlight: kids with big eyes, women with scared, silent faces, men who had been whipped and chained.

  ‘Snail-gutted slavers,’ muttered Mum watching the slaves from the deck of the good ship Mermaid and wiping away a few tears with the big hanky with the skull and crossbones embroidered on the corner that Cecil had given her for a Mother’s Day present. ‘Well, at least they’re free now.’

  ‘Ahoy, Captain!’ Filthy Frederick hailed her from the Black Ship. ‘A couple of the men here are shanghaied sailors. One says he’s a master navigator. Reckon this lot will be safe on their own.’

  ‘Good speed to them!’ called Mum. ‘Now bring over our share of the treasure!’

  She turned to the kids. ‘Half the treasure for the slaves, a quarter for Good Queen Bess and a quarter for us.’

  ‘Only a quarter!’ protested Jason. ‘That’s not very much.’

  ‘You wait till you see the treasure,’ said Mum.

  One by one the pirates carried the treasure on board.

  ‘Eight chests of jewels,’ said Cecil, making a note on his list, ‘two hundred and forty gold bars—no, Snap, you can’t eat gold bars, you’ll break a tooth—one hundred and sixty bolts of chinese silk, sixteen chests of pepper—pepper is worth more than gold in London,’ he told Jason and Shaun who were standing nearby. ‘Eighty-eight barrels

  of cinnamon bark—that’s worth even more than pepper. Snap, I told you pepper makes you sneeze if you sniff too closely.’

  ‘Atchoo!’ sneezed Snap again.

  Mr Farthingale blinked. ‘You must be millionaires,’ he whispered.

  Mum shrugged. ‘Who counts? We’ve got a good ship and a good life and good friends; who cares how many chests of gold are back home in the attic?’

  ‘The queen gave Cecil’s dad a baronetry, too,’ added Filthy Frederick proudly, picking a few fleas out of his beard and crunching them absent-mindedly between his three front teeth.

  ‘Then you’re,’ Shaun worked it out, ‘…Lady Tania.’

  ‘Just call me Captain,’ said Mum, opening one of the treasure chests.

  ‘And you’re Sir Cecil!’ exclaimed Jason to Cecil.

  ‘Well, yeah,’ said Cecil, embarrassed. ‘But I’d rather be called CJ.’

  ‘Go and check on M’lady Principal, Frederick,’ Mum ordered. ‘She should sleep for another two hours or so, but we better make sure she’s all right. Now, let’s have a look at this treasure.’ Mum hauled ropes of pearls and diamonds out of the chest. ‘Must be some here suitable for youngsters,’ she muttered. ‘Ah, here we are. Choose what you want from these. And here, M’lord Teacher, this is for the school.’ She tossed him a bar of gold.

  ‘Oof.’ Mr Farthingale nearly dropped it. ‘It’s heavy!’

  ‘Gold is heavy,’ said Mum. ‘Use it to buy more feetballs or books or something. And this is for you.’ She tossed him a sword. The jewels in its hilt flashed in the sunlight. ‘And any time you want a lesson in how to use it…’ Mum winked, ‘just give me a hoy.’

  The kids crowded around. There were piles of rings, their giant diamonds glowing even in the shade of the sails, gold cat brooches with emerald eyes and daggers with sapphires on their hilts…

  (‘No daggers,’ said Mr Farthingale firmly, peering over their heads.

  ‘But, sir, they’re just fruit knives,’ said Jason innocently, ‘to peel oranges and things.’)

  …ruby buttons, gold cups with yellow diamonds around their rims, golden balls…

  (‘They’re not much use,’ said Shaun. ‘They don’t even bounce. Hey, there isn’t a golden computer game in there, is there?’)

  …small boxes made of pearls and silver that played strange songs when they were opened, jewelled birds that sang when you pressed their golden tails, and a big wide vase-like thing, that was copper outside and gold inside.

  ‘What’s that thing?’ demanded Jason.

  ‘It’s a chamber pot,’ explained Cecil, ‘for, er, you know, when you don’t have an ensuite bathroom and can’t reach the porthole. It goes under the bed.’

  He hesitated. ‘Anyone mind if I take that one?’ he asked. ‘Snap can eat his dinner out of it.’

  ‘One of each for everyone,’ said Mum briskly.

  Big Bernie looked up from the treasure. ‘The slaves get stuff like this too?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Mum gently.

  ‘So they’re rich?’

  Mum nodded. ‘They deserve to be, after all they’ve gone through,’ she said.

  ‘But why do they do it?’ cried Big Bernie. ‘The slavers, I mean. Why would you catch other people and make them slaves?’

  ‘Because they can,’ said Mum simply. ‘Some people think that if you’re strong enough to do something, why then, you can just go ahead and do it. They don’t wonder if it’s right. They just don’t think at all.’

  She blew her nose, sniffed twice, then put away her hanky. ‘To my way of thinking you should use what you’ve got to make the world better, not worse. Boats or muscles, lad, you use what you have.’

  Filthy Frederick’s wooden leg clattered across the deck. ‘Mrs Parsnip’s fast asleep, Captain,’ he reported. ‘I looked in on her and she opened her eyes and said, “When did you last have a bath?” then went back to sleep again.’

  ‘When did you last have a bath Filthy Frederick?’ asked Cecil curiously.

  Filthy Frederick scratched his head, dislodging three fleas, a kilo of dandruff and a bit of old sea monster tentacle. ‘Ten years ago, was it? No, make that twenty. It was the year we captured that Egyptian queen. She had a gold bath, all filled with goat’s milk. Ah, I was younger in those days…’

  Mum sniffed again. ‘Speaking of baths, me hearties, we stink of sea monsters’ guts! How about we find us a desert island with a good sandy beach and wash the pong off? Then maybe we can catch us another sea monster. There’s nothing better than fresh sea monster grilled on a driftwood fire with a few coconuts. Then we can…’

  ‘Ahem,’ coughed Mr Farthingale. ‘I think I really should be getting the kids back.’

  ‘Don’t worry about that!’ boomed Mum, slapping him on the back. ‘Remember the time warp thingy!’

  ‘Yes, but…’ began Mr Farthingale.

  ‘How do you think we get Cecil to school on time every day? We just think of what time we want it to be when we go through the time warp, and it is.’

  ‘So…’ Mr Farthingale worked it out. ‘We can stay here in the past as long as we like and still get back before anyone starts to worry?’

  ‘Exactly,’ said Mum.

  And so they did.

  CHAPTER 17

  Off to the Next Adventure

  Up in the prow Shark-eyed Pete was showing a mob of kids how to navigate, and in the stern Filthy Frederick was teaching the others his favourite songs.

  ‘Yo ho ho it’s the life for us,

  As grand as a pimple all full of pus.

  A pirate ship’s more fun than a bus!

  It’s a pirate’s life for us.’

  Cecil leant on the railing with the wind in his face. Someone coughed behind him.

  ‘Ahem, er, um, CJ…’ It was Mr Farthingale. ‘Ahem…CJ…I was wondering. Would you mind if I took your mum to the movies some night? If she wants to, of course.’

  ‘Fine by me,’ said Cecil. He thought for a minute. ‘Why don’t you get her to show you how to steer the ship? She’s up on the bridge now.’

  ‘I wouldn’t be disturbing her?’

  ‘Nope,’ said Cecil. He didn’t mind at all. Mum was lonely sometimes,
even with all her crew, and Mr Farthingale was okay.

  Mr Farthingale wandered off.

  ‘With a yo ho ho and we’ll sail away,

  With jewels and gold and doubloons for pay,

  Across the vast blue briny sea.

  It’s a pirate’s life for me!’

  sang Filthy Frederick, and some of the kids had joined in.

  It was good to be on board ship again, thought Cecil. School was good too and it was going to be even better now, but he did miss the wind in his face.

  Footsteps sounded across the deck—feet in joggers, not the bare feet of the pirates or Filthy Frederick’s wooden leg. Big Bernie leant on the rail beside Cecil, with Shaun and Jason on his other side. They gazed out at the sea for a minute.

  ‘Hey, look, dolphins!’ cried Jason suddenly.

  ‘They’re playing in the wake of the ship,’ said Cecil. ‘You know, the wake is the waves we make behind us. We often see dolphins.’

  ‘And whales?’ asked Shaun.

  Cecil nodded. ‘Ambrose One Arm says he saw a mermaid once, too.’

  They watched the dolphins grinning as they dived and leapt in the spray.

  ‘So your Mum really is a pirate,’ said Big Bernie wonderingly.

  ‘Yes,’ said Cecil. ‘Well, a privateer anyway.’

  ‘Um, I’m sorry…’ began Big Bernie.

  Cecil waved him silent. ‘Forget about it,’ he said.

  ‘Hey,’ said Jason. ‘How do you catch a sea monster?’

  ‘You need the right bait,’ explained Cecil. ‘First of all you get a really big net, then you…’

  The seagulls yelled overhead, the wind smelt of sun and salt and, sitting on the wrinkle between the sea and sky, a small island shimmered in its ring of surf and sand.

  The wind filled the white sails of the good ship Mermaid and carried her like a bird across the waves.

  EPILOGUE

  Wednesday is sports’ afternoon at Bandicoot Flats Central School. The kids can choose which sport they want to play. There’s netball on the netball courts. There’s feetball on the oval.

  Or on the good ship Mermaid you can fish for sea monsters or practise swordsmanship. You can study twenty ways to cook a sea monster with Putrid Percival, or the care and feeding of crocodiles with Snap, or learn how geometry can help you to navigate by the stars with Mr Farthingale.

  And if a slave ship comes sailing by, you can practise a bit of piracy too; though, as Cecil’s mum keeps pointing out, it’s not really piracy when you have permission from the queen.

  Every Wednesday afternoon the good ship Mermaid is packed with kids, and on the good ship Mermaid, Wednesday afternoon lasts as long as you like.

  Everyone agrees that Bandicoot Flats Central School has the best sports’ afternoon of any school around. Which makes sense of course, because Bandicoot Flats Central is the best school in the world! As Filthy Frederick says:

  ‘With a yo ho ho and a school at sea,

  With lots of adventures in piracy,

  We’ll capture ships and set slaves free,

  We’ll bury our treasure all tidily,

  And still be home in time for tea.

  It’s a pirate’s life for me!’

  My Dog the Dinosaur

  To Elaine Harris and her woofpersons,

  Allie and Dori the labradorable,

  with much love always,

  JF

  For T,T & L and Millie the Mutt.

  SMK

  CHAPTER 1

  A Little Lonely Dog

  He was the loneliest dog Gunk had ever seen. He was the dumbest looking too. He sat in the corner of the pound and stared at Gunk.

  ‘How about that one?’ asked Dad, pointing to a perky little Pekinese. ‘He’s so cute.’

  Dad liked cute things. Dad had a whole collection of dinky duck mugs at home and wore pyjamas with baby-blue ducklings on them to bed.

  ‘It looks like a fluffy toilet brush,’ said Gunk.

  ‘But a really sweet little toilet brush,’ said Dad. ‘Oo’s a wittle dinky darling then,’ he crooned.

  ‘It’s still a toilet brush,’ said Gunk.

  ‘I like that dog,’ said Fliss, pointing to a Rottweiler with fangs like a sabre-toothed tiger. Fliss had a shark tattooed on her arm and rode the biggest, blackest motorbike Gunk had ever seen. Gunk reckoned it was a reaction to living with Dad’s cutesiepie collection for eighteen years.

  The Rottweiler bared its fangs. The other dogs in the pound shrank back in their cages.

  ‘See?’ said Fliss. ‘It’s a great dog.’

  Gunk thought the Rottweiler looked like it would eat the whole family for breakfast and then go and chew on the postman’s bones, but he didn’t say anything. Fliss didn’t like it when people argued with her.

  Mum looked bored. She always looked bored away from her computer. ‘I don’t see why Gunk has to have a real dog,’ she said. ‘A virtual dog would be much tidier. Or maybe one of those new robot dogs.’

  ‘It’s Gunk’s birthday,’ said Dad. ‘So he can choose whatever dog he likes.’

  ‘You want the Rottweiler, don’t you baby brother?’ said Fliss confidently. ‘You wouldn’t even have to feed a cool dog like that! You could just let it hunt its own dinner! It’d live on cats and guinea pigs.’

  Gunk hated it when Fliss called him baby brother, but what could he do? Fliss was bigger than he was. Fliss was bigger than most people.

  ‘I want that one,’ said Gunk, pointing to the puppy in the corner.

  It wasn’t much of a dog. It had pale brown fur with dark brown spots and a long neck and a funny, fat tail. It didn’t even have any ears that Gunk could see. It was sitting all alone in the corner of the big cage, as though none of the other dogs wanted anything to do with it.

  Fliss snorted. ‘That dog wouldn’t scare away a burglar, though the burglar might die laughing. It doesn’t even have any ears! What sort of dog doesn’t have ears?’

  ‘Look at that long hair,’ said Mum. ‘It’ll shed all over the carpet and clog up the workings of my mouse.’

  ‘It’s not going to win any awards at a dog show,’ said Dad doubtfully.

  ‘I don’t care,’ said Gunk. ‘I want that dog. Here boy!’ he called to the dog.

  The dog wagged its big, fat tail, which meant all the rest of it wagged too.

  ‘That’s the dopiest looking dog I’ve ever seen,’ said Fliss.

  ‘Spt,’ said the dog.

  ‘It can’t even bark!’ sighed Mum. ‘Well, I suppose that’s a blessing anyway. It won’t keep us awake barking at the neighbours.’

  ‘Come here, dog,’ said Gunk.

  The dog trotted towards him. It had the longest, flattest, hairiest feet of any dog Gunk had ever seen. But somehow Gunk knew that he and the dog were made for each other.

  ‘Spt,’ said the dog, as he thrust his wet nose into Gunk’s hand and dribbled onto Gunk’s tracksuit pants.

  Dad sighed. ‘Okay,’ he said. ‘Let’s go pay for it.’

  CHAPTER 2

  Spot Comes Home

  The dog was quiet on the way home. It snuggled into Gunk’s lap in the back of the car while Dad drove and Mum dreamt of the computer program she was designing to decipher alien messages (if the aliens ever decided to send any). Fliss’s motorbike roared behind them.

  The car pulled up in the driveway. Gunk opened the door as Fliss parked her motorbike on the footpath. ‘See? We’re home,’ Gunk said to the dog.

  ‘Spt,’ said the dog, dribbling nervously as it peered out the window.

  ‘This is our yard for you to play in,’ said Gunk encouragingly. ‘And that’s the garden for you to dig in and that’s the next door neighbour’s cat for you to chase, and…’

  ‘Spttttttttt!’ yelped the dog. It snuggled back into Gunk’s arms and hid its face in his shirt.

  Fliss lifted off her helmet. ‘That dog is scared of cats,’ she said. ‘What a wimp! What sort of wimp dog is scared of cats?’

  ‘He’s no
t scared,’ said Gunk defensively. ‘It’s just a bit much for him to take in all at once, that’s all!’

  ‘Huh,’ said Fliss. Her boots clumped up the path. ‘What are you going to call it, baby brother?’

  ‘How about Byte?’ suggested Mum brightly. ‘Spelt b-y-t-e. It’s a joke,’ she added, ‘you know, a computer byte?’

  ‘Cuddles is a nice name,’ said Dad.

  ‘I think you should call it Fang,’ said Fliss. ‘It might give it a bit of guts.’

  ‘Spt,’ said the dog, looking up adoringly at Gunk.

  ‘I’m going to call it Spot,’ said Gunk.

  ‘Spot! What sort of a name’s that?’ demanded Fliss.

  ‘He looks like a Spot,’ said Gunk. ‘Don’t you, Spot?’

  ‘Spt,’ agreed the dog. He stretched his long neck up and slobbered on Gunk’s chin. He had the longest, wettest lips Gunk had ever seen.

  ‘See?’ said Gunk. ‘He knows his name already.’

  Fliss bent down to scratch Spot’s tummy. Then she grinned. ‘I know something you don’t know, baby brother,’ she taunted.

  ‘What?’ demanded Gunk.

  ‘Your dopey dog’s a girl!’

  CHAPTER 3

  Spot Has Dinner

  Gunk set the table while Dad made the gravy. Mum dashed down to the study to put in another ten minutes on her computer program, and Fliss smoothed chocolate icing on Gunk’s birthday cake.

  Spot lay under the table and dribbled on the carpet and peered out at Gunk. She looked a bit bewildered.

  Dad put the salad on the table. It was Gunk’s favourite: lettuce and cucumber and tomato and black olives and chunks of salty feta cheese, with lots of salad dressing. Gunk had chosen the rest of the birthday dinner too: roast turkey with stuffing and baked potatoes and pumpkin, and chocolate cake for dessert.