The Gargling Gorilla Read online

  The Gargling Gorilla

  and other stories

  Margaret Mahy

  illustrated by Tony Ross

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  1. The Gargling Gorilla

  2. The Dog-Magician

  3. The Runaway Reptiles

  More Roaring Good Reads

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  The Gargling Gorilla

  Rosa Sungrove, the well-known animal lover, was going out for the evening, so she needed someone brave and kind to feed all her pets. Tim, who lived next door, agreed to help her.

  “Are you brave?” she asked him.

  “Very brave,” said Tim. “I’m not afraid of spiders or sharks or alligators. But I’m very kind, too.”

  “Good,” said Rosa. “You sound just the one to look after my pets. Now, let me explain. The cat likes cat-snacks and the cat-snack pack is in the tall cupboard. The tall cupboard is beside the fridge, and the fridge is over there, on the other side of the sink. Right?”

  “Right!” said Tim.

  “However, when the vulture sees the cat being fed, he often gets a little peckish, and I don’t want a peckish vulture around the place. The vulture-chunks are inside the fridge (over there on the other side of the sink). They are in the blue bowl. Right?”

  “Right,” said Tim, cheerfully.

  The vulture looked down from its perch and clacked its beak. Tim smiled at it. He was not afraid of vultures.

  “The wolfhound is outside under the camellia,” Rosa went on. “When she smells the vulture-chunks, she gets very hungry. Her doggie-crunch is in the little cupboard this side of the sink, but her dish is on the bottom shelf of the tea-trolley beside the fridge over there on the other side of the sink. She must have her dish or she gets nasty. It’s not her fault. She just does. Right?”

  “Right!” Tim agreed.

  “When the giant chinchilla rabbit hears the rattle of the doggie-crunch being poured into the dog bowl, it often thinks it’s hearing rabbit-nibble being poured into the rabbit dish, and comes rushing inside. Chinchilla rabbits are mostly gentle, but this is a giant chinchilla rabbit,” Rosa warned Tim. “If you don’t feed her she will try to bounce on you, and she is dangerously heavy. The rabbit dish is the red one on the top shelf of the tea-trolley, there beside the fridge on the other side of the sink. And the actual rabbit-nibbles are in the large economy-sized purple packet on top of the fridge.

  “And when you have finished feeding the animals you might like a little refreshment yourself. The tea is in the yellow jar at the end of the shelf on the other side of the sink. The bread tin is next to the yellow jar. The butter and cheese are in the fridge, and the biscuits are in the green box. Good luck! And now, I must go.”

  But at the door, Rosa stopped. “Oh, by the way,” she called, “the gorilla is in the cupboard under the sink.”

  The gorilla! In the cupboard, under the sink!

  Of course, most people know that gorillas are gentle and retiring, but Tim was unaware of this. The very bravest people can be scared of at least one thing, and Tim, though brave about absolutely everything else, happened to be scared of gorillas.

  “When I took on this job,” he thought to himself, “I did not know a gorilla was involved.”

  At that moment something in the cupboard under the sink began to gurgle, or perhaps to gargle. However, a gargling gorilla is just as scary as a gurgling one.

  Tim made up his mind to keep away from the cupboard under the sink in case the gorilla put out a hairy hand and grabbed him as he was going by. But it wasn’t easy, for the sink, and the cupboard under the sink, were in the very middle of the kitchen.

  First, Tim fed the cat. He took the fire tongs and tied the tong handles to the handles of the broom and the mop. Then he reached over and, after several goes, opened the tall cupboard beside the fridge, sucking out the cat-snack pack with the vacuum cleaner.

  Then, he lightly spiked the cat-snack pack with a fork tied to the handle of the thing you use to wash high-up windows, twisting it over so cleverly that the cat’s dish was soon filled with delicious cat-snacks. The cat didn’t seem to be at all frightened of the gorilla. It ate its dinner right in front of the cupboard under the sink.

  When the vulture saw the cat was getting something, it stretched its neck greedily and flapped its wings. Tim did not want to walk past the cupboard under the sink in case the gorilla put out a hairy hand and grabbed an ankle. On the other hand, the poor vulture was certainly rather hungry. It began staring at the cat with a sinister expression. Being kind, Tim just had to feed it. First, he used the tongs to reach past the sink to open the fridge. Then he took the thing you use to wash high-up windows (which still had the fork tied to the end of it) and he reached into the blue bowl inside the fridge. He spiked the vulture-chunks one by one, passing them (on the end of the fork) up to the vulture on its perch. The vulture gobbled them down, clacking its beak with happiness in between the gobbles.

  The smell of the vulture-chunks brought the wolfhound in from the verandah. Her doggie-crunch was easy to reach, but when Tim tried to give it to her in a china soup tureen instead of her dish, she turned nasty and started snapping her teeth. She couldn’t help it. Her dish was on the bottom shelf of the tea-trolley beside the fridge on the other side of the cupboard under the sink with the gorilla gurgling (or gargling) inside it.

  The wolfhound saw Tim was hesitating. She put her giant paws on his shoulders and began slapping his face with a tongue like a wet carpet. It showed him just how sharp her teeth were: they were very sharp!

  The tongs would not reach quite as far as the wolfhound’s dish. Fortunately, a fishing line that had belonged to Rosa’s uncle was over the fireplace in the sitting room. Tim quickly cast the hook over the edge of the dish, reeled it in and filled it with doggie-crunch. Soon the whole kitchen rattled with the sound of the wolfhound crunching, the vulture clacking its beak, the cat snacking on cat-snacks and the gorilla gargling under the sink.

  Tim was about to relax a little when the giant chinchilla rabbit came bounding in. It was a very big rabbit indeed. It made nibbling noises and looked hungry. Tim was so kind-hearted that he couldn’t stand it, and he wanted to help. But it wasn’t easy. He cast with his line again, pulled the tea-trolley over, retrieved the red rabbit dish, picked up the tongs and reached over and got the rabbit-nibbles down from the top of the fridge. Gargle-gargle went the gorilla under the sink, furious because Tim had been too clever for it.

  When Rosa arrived home a moment later, she found the rabbit nibbling, the wolfhound crunching, the vulture clacking, the cat snacking and the disappointed gorilla gargling. The mop and the broom and the thing used for washing high-up windows were in their right places, the tongs were beside the fire and the fishing line was back over the mantelpiece.

  “How well you’ve done!” she cried. “You are obviously brave and kind.”

  “The only one I haven’t fed is the gorilla,” said Tim, apologetically.

  “The gorilla?” exclaimed Rosa.

  “The gorilla in the cupboard under the sink,” explained Tim.

  “Oh!” said Rosa. She began to laugh. She opened the cupboard under the sink. “This is what I keep in the cupboard under the sink,” she said. “The griller! It’s for grilling cheese on toast. I just thought you might like some cheese on toast for your supper.”

  “But I heard it gargling,” Tim said.

  “Oh, those are just pipes leading to the sink,” said Rosa. “They do gargle a bit.”

  The pipes gurgled as she spoke, and the back door opened.

  “Do you mean there isn’t a gorilla after all?” asked Tim. The back door shut.
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  “Oh, there is a gorilla,” said Rosa, “but he’s been away all evening. He is so shy and retiring, I encourage him to go to an evening class in flower arranging so he can get out and meet people.”

  As she spoke, the gorilla ambled in, bowed to Tim, and gave Rosa a beautifully arranged bowl of red and white roses.

  Of course, Tim stayed for supper. Rosa made him a cup of tea, while the gorilla grilled toasted cheese sandwiches.

  The cat snacked, the vulture clacked, the wolfhound crunched, the rabbit nibbled, the gorilla and Rosa and Tim gossiped, the pipes under the sink gargled (or gurgled) and the toasted cheese sandwiches sizzled happily in the griller.

  The Dog-Magician

  Slip Street was a short, shy street – the shyest street in the whole city. And it was not only timid but tidy, too. Up and down Slip Street the hedges were clipped, the gardens were weeded, the lawns were carefully mown and the doors and the gates were all painted a nice quiet green so that they would match the lawns. There was just one small exception. At the very end of Slip Street was a battered old cottage. Grey paint peeled from its gate, and a notice on that gate said: For Sale.

  “That cottage is just the right size for me and Merlin,” thought Davy Shuttlewing. He patted his faithful dog. But then he hastily reached backwards to grab his faithful dog’s faithful tail. “Don’t wag! Don’t wag!” he hissed in a commanding whisper, looking left, then looking right. There was no one in sight. Davy sighed with relief… relaxed… cleared his throat and spoke softly. “We’ll buy that cottage and once we’re inside you can wag all you want to,” he promised. “Unless we invite the neighbours in!” he added quickly. “No wagging if we’re out in the street, and no wagging if we have a party! Got that? People won’t want any wild parties in this street – just quiet get-togethers where they can smile at one another and talk in gentle voices about weather and income tax. No wagging!”

  Davy had been living a roistering, rumbustical life for years and years, working as the top man in a team of wandering acrobats and magicians. But he was sick of standing on the top of a human pyramid, pulling big, blue balloons out of his nose and whisking pink rabbits out of purple hats, while shouting, “Hey Presto!” at the audience. He was longing for peace and quiet at ground level, and that Slip Street cottage seemed as if it would suit him down to the ground. (“As long as Merlin doesn’t wag his tail in public,” he muttered, crossing his fingers.)

  So, after a bit of wheeling and dealing, Davy moved into the cottage and began to do it up. His new Slip Street neighbours watched him shyly from behind their curtains. “It will be nice to have that battered old cottage cleaned up,” they muttered to themselves. But unfortunately on the very first day of his up-doing Davy made a serious mistake. He painted his gate which was fine, but he painted it red.

  “A red gate! That’s a show-off colour in a street like this!” the Slip Street people muttered behind their curtains. “We’ll have to watch out for him.”

  Davy (leaning on his red gate) did his best to be friendly.

  “Lovely day,” he would say to passers-by, even if it was raining. But the Slip Street people gave uneasy smiles as they hurried on by without stopping to chat. And when Davy and Merlin walked down Slip Street together, although one or two people nodded to him across their neat hedges, no one ever asked him who he was or mentioned the weather. It is hard to invite people to a party when you don’t know their names. As for the Slip Street children – well, they had been told never to talk to strangers, which is good advice and none of them did.

  “Perhaps they’re anxious about dogs,” Davy muttered, “even gentle dogs like Merlin. (“No! No! No!” he shouted quickly. “Don’t wag your tail Merlin. Just smile and hang your tongue out. Don’t you dare wag that tail of yours in this part of town.”)

  Davy had inherited Merlin from his Great Aunt Allywinkle who certainly wouldn’t have fitted into Slip Street – not for a moment. Great Aunt Allywinkle would have painted her front gate purple, decorated it with shooting stars, and then danced on the gatepost, singing and waving her arms in the air. Until she had exploded (while trying to cast a complicated spell) she had been a wild wizard of a woman – and Merlin, her dog, had caught her magical powers as if they were measles. Not that you would notice this straight away. Merlin seemed to be one of those ordinary black and white dogs that you see around town, sniffing at telegraph poles and cocking a jaunty leg here and there. But Merlin was not an ordinary dog. He was a dog-magician.

  This was a great problem for Davy. Of course, Merlin always wanted to wag his tail (as dogs do), but Merlin’s wagging tail could be a wand as well as a tail, and sometimes when he wagged it (as dogs do) he wagged it in magic-mode. Then strange things happened. And not only that, being elderly, Merlin was just a little bit deaf. He wore a hearing aid which Great Aunt Allywinkle had invented for him. All this made life complicated. Davy and Merlin would be strolling up Slip Street and see Mrs Happenstance tottering towards them in her brushed-up black boots. Davy would begin warning Merlin. “Don’t wag! Don’t wag!” (After all, if Merlin wagged in magic-mode those black boots might turn into giant banana skins, or pink canoes, or steamed puddings covered in caramel custard. (Davy didn’t want a shy Slip Street neighbour to find herself ankle deep in custard and steamed pudding.) “Don’t wag! Don’t wag!” Davy would order Merlin.

  Mrs Happenstance would look at him strangely as she tottered towards him, and Davy would hastily try to put things right.

  “I was just telling my rascal of a dog to keep up with me,” he would explain. “‘Scalawag!’ I was saying to him. ‘Scalawag! Scalawag! Don’t lag! Don’t lag!’”

  Mrs Happenstance would shrink shyly as she tottered by.

  As for Merlin himself, though he loved getting out and about with Davy, he sometimes longed to get out and about on his own. He longed to sniff other people’s gateposts and snuff the bags of rubbish, hidden neatly in garages and gardens. And at last, one Saturday morning when Davy (a man who was longing to give a party but was almost sure that nobody would come to it if he did) was sleeping, just a little sadly, until lunchtime, Merlin made up his mind to set out on his own. There was so much for a dog to see and do in the world beyond the red gate.

  Of course, the red gate was neatly bolted, but Merlin wagged his tail at it. He wagged in magic-mode, and the bolt shot back obediently. Slowly, slowly, the red gate swung open and off went Merlin, out and away on his own, leaving Davy behind him – and not only Davy. Merlin had left his hearing aid behind him, too. It had rained during the night, and the Slip Street gutters were flowing like little rivers. Sidney Silkweed (a small boy who lived between Mr Livermore’s house and Dr Pincer’s surgery) had been tempted to try paddling. Even though he was only four he already knew that public paddling would be frowned on in Slip Street, but he had hoped to make up for this by putting his shoes neatly side by side in a true Slip Street fashion. Once his shoes were settled he began to fold his socks which were new yellow ones. But, alas, he fumbled his folding and dropped his socks into the gutter. Immediately, the quick chuckling water seized them and swept them down a drain. The thought of walking barefoot back through Slip Street really frightened Sidney.

  “I’ve lost my new socks! I’ve lost my new socks!” he was wailing softly to himself. Merlin stopped. He could see something was wrong, but, since he had left his hearing-aid at home he couldn’t quite make out what Sidney was wailing.

  “Lost a blue fox?” thought Merlin. “Poor boy! He’s lost his blue fox and needs a new one. Well, I can arrange that.”

  Merlin wagged his tail twice. He wagged it in magic-mode. The water stopped flowing into the drain and began to bubble strangely. Then a large blue fox shot up through the bubbles and out of the drain. It began grinning and gambolling around Sidney, shaking itself dry. Sidney stared in amazement, then noticed it was wearing yellow socks on its pointed ears. The fox stood on its hind legs, sang two verses of the school song and then danced out into the road, some
thing that no blue fox should ever do. Mr Livermore, who was pedalling politely past on his push-bike, zig-zagged wildly, then ran slam bang into a telegraph pole. His bike fell sideways to the right of the pole while Mr Livermore toppled to the left, where he lay, tumbling and bumbling, at the edge of the road.

  “Oh what a muddle! What a mad muddle!” he shouted in irritation.

  “A puddle?” thought Merlin. “A glad puddle? He wants a glad puddle. Very strange! But, I can arrange that.”

  Merlin wagged his tail in magic-mode, and Mr Livermore found himself floundering in a deep, warm, brown puddle that had certainly not been there a moment earlier. Indeed, no one in Slip Street had ever seen a puddle like this one. It was so deep Mr Livermore felt he simply had to swim in it.

  “A muddle! A muddle! I’m swimming in a puddle,” shouted Mr Livermore.

  “A fox! A fox! It’s carried off my socks!” wailed Sidney, while the blue fox danced in front of him.

  Old Mrs Happenstance came tapping along in her brushed-up black boots. Merlin smiled and waved his tongue at her, but she did not wave back. Her sharp gaze flitted from Sidney who suddenly seemed to be waltzing with the blue fox, to Mr Livermore bubbling in the big brown puddle. Then she looked at Mr Livermore’s bicycle lying beside the telegraph pole, and shook her head.

  “What a wham! What a bam! What a Slip Street slam!” she murmured.

  Merlin listened, but, being a bit deaf, he didn’t quite catch on to what she was murmuring.

  “Lot of jam! Lot of jam! Lot of Slip Street jam,” he thought. “Is that what she’s wanting? Well, I can arrange that.” And he wagged his clever tail in magic-mode.