Evan Ross backed into the corner of the den as he stared at his dog Trigger.
The tan cocker spaniel lowered his head and stared back at Evan with wet, brown eyes. The old dog's tail began to wag excitedly.
""Trigger " Evan cried angrily. "Did you eat Monster Blood again?”
The dog's tail began wagging faster. Trigger let out a low bark that rumbled like thunder.
Evan's back pressed against the dark-paneled den wall.
Trigger took a few heavy steps toward him, panting hard. His huge pink tongue, as big as a salami, hung out of his enormous mouth.
“Did you?” Evan demanded. "Did you eat more Monster Blood?”
The answer to Evan's question was obvious.
Trigger had been normal cocker spaniel size that morning. Now the dog stared down at Evan, as big as a pony.
It was a September morning, hazy with late summer, and now with all the years between. Mother was seeing me off at Dearborn Station in Chicago. We'd come in a taxicab because of my trunk. But Mother would ride back home on the El. There wasn't much more than a nickel in her purse, and only a sandwich for the train in mine. My ticket had pretty well cleaned us out.
The trunk, a small one, held every stitch of clothes I had and two or three things of Mother's that fit me. "Try not to grow too fast," she murmured. “But anyway, skirts are shorter this year."
MANY years ago, a girl named Cathy Dunn came with her family from Dublin, Ireland, to the Lower East Side of New York. Everything in the new country fascinated her: fireworks and el trains and stickball games, and the songs of peddlers calling out their wares in a dozen languages. She loved to watch the policeman go by on his horse and the hook and ladder come round the corner like a long red dragon. But more than anything else, she loved to watch Mr. Coletti, the monkey man.
Mr. Coletti came to Second Avenue once or twice a week with his monkey, Espresso, and his hand organ, a big box on a wooden leg, which tweedled and tootled out a super-confabulation of sounds.
Becky, and their four-year-old twins, Nicky and Alex. They lived up on the third floor.
And her dad's friend from college, Joey Gladstone, lived downstairs. Joey and Jesse both moved in a long time ago— right after Michelle's mother died.
Nine people make a lot of dirty dishes, Michelle thought. At least I don't have to wash Comet’s bowl. He licks it absolutely clean.
And she didn't have to scrub the pots and pans: That was Joey's job tonight. She | didn't have to clear the table either: It was Uncle Jesse's turn for that chore.
Michelle's dad glanced over at her. “Michelle! Why don't you want to go to school? I thought you loved Mrs. Yoshida's class.” Danny smoothed a sheet of foil around half a loaf of pumpkin bread.
Most teachers are strange and the teachers at St Barnabas School were no exception.
Yet it's almost certain that none of them – not Mr Gilbert, the head teacher, who liked to pick his nose during Assembly, not Mrs Hicks who talked to her teddies in class, not Miss Gomaz who smoked cigarettes in the lavatory – none of them was quite as odd as Class Three's new teacher.
Some of the children in Class Three thought she was a witch. Others said she was a hippy. A few of them thought she was just a bit mad. But they all agreed that there had never been anyone quite like her at St Barnabas before.
Well, old Brer Rabbit he ran beside her, jabbing with his rake. And at last he got hold of the little girl's belt and hauled her to the bank. There she sat, sobbing and crying, her arms round Brer Rabbit's neck.
“You come home to your Ma," said Brer Rabbit. “You're wet. She'll dry you and give you a good hot drink.”
So off they went together, the little girl clinging to Brer Rabbit as if she would never let him go. And my word, when the farmer heard how he had saved his little girl there wasn't anything he wouldn't have done for old Brer Rabbit.
“There's a sack of carrots over there,” he said. “Take it. And there's a sack of potatoes, too. You're welcome to it. And while you're about it, help yourself to a sack of turnips. You're a born rascal, Brer Rabbit, but you're good-hearted, so you are! Now off you go while I still think good things of you!”
Now, when Brer Rabbit was wheeling home his three sacks, whistling a merry song and feeling on top of the world, who should come along but Brer Fox, Brer Bear and Brer Wolf. How they stared when they saw Brer Rabbit with so much food!
Rosie opened the catflap and looked out into the dark street. It was still windy and cold. The wind blew across the top of the milk bottle and made it moan.
Rosie felt sorry for the milk bottle, all alone in the dark on the cold step. She fetched some crumbs from the kitchen and threw them out of the catflap, on to the top step, in case the poor milk bottle felt hungry in the night.
James and the Giant Peach was my first book for children. I wrote it during the winter of 1960-61 in New York, and I started it because I wanted to attempt something different after seventeen years of writing nothing but short stories for adults.
I can remember vividly that I was sitting at my desk and playing around with the lines of "The Centipede's Song' when my wife burst into the room and told me that our son Theo, then three months old, had been hit by a taxi-cab while out in his pram with his nurse. I dropped my pencil and we both rushed to the hospital. His head injuries were severe and almost fatal, and the next few months were desperate times, with brain operations and endless journeys through the snow to hospital, and all the awful tensions that grip a mother and father when they are fighting to save their baby's life.
When you are writing fantasy, which is a very different thing from writing fiction, you must be able, the moment you pick up the pencil, to shut out all normal surroundings and go flying away to a magic world where everything is enchanting.
I found the blue china horse for the mantelpiece, and Mum was thrilled to bits with it, even though it had a chipped nose and only three and a half legs. Her favourite armchair came off the skip too, as well as the electric radiator. All we had to get was a plug for that and it worked perfectly. But best of all was the twenty-six inch Sony Trinitron television set that I brought home in a wheelbarrow - my cousin Barry gave me a hand.
In the evenings, after he had finished his supper of watery cabbage soup, Charlie always went into the room of his four grandparents to listen to their stories, and then afterwards to say good night.
Every one of these old people was over ninety. They were as shrivelled as prunes, and as bony as skeletons, and throughout the day, until Charlie made his appearance, they lay huddled in their one bed, two at either end, with nightcaps on to keep their heads warm, dozing the time away with nothing to do. But as soon as they heard the door opening, and heard Charlie's voice saying, 'Good evening, Grandpa Joe and Grandma Josephine, and Grandpa George and Grandma Georgina,' then all four of them would suddenly sit up, and their old wrinkled faces would light up with smiles of pleasure - and the talking would begin. For they loved this little boy. He was the only bright thing in their lives, and his evening visits were something that they looked forward to all day long. Often, Charlie's mother and father would come in as well, and stand by the door, listening to the stories that the old people told;
Who needs enemies with friends like them?
My real enemy is called Robert Friend.
This makes life very difficult.
The elephant is red and rubbery, and when it comes out of its box it looks like an elephant skin that shrank in the wash.
Judy and her family climbed up the stairs and out into the fresh air, heading for the information booth on Boston Common, where Dad bought a guide to the Freedom Trail.
"Did you know there used to be cows right here in this park?" asked Stink. “It says so on that sign."
“Welcome to MOO-sa-chu-setts!" announced Judy. She cracked herself up. If Rocky or Frank Pearl were here, they'd crack up, too.
"Just think," Judy told Stink. “Right now, this very minute, while I am about to follow in the footsteps of freedom, Mr Todd is probably giving Class 3T a spelling test.
I came out of the Old Vic, my friend Hermia Redcliffe beside me. We had been to see a performance of Macbeth. It was raining hard. As we ran across the street to the spot where I had parked the car, Hermia remarked unjustly that whenever one went to the Old Vic it always rained.
"It's just one of those things."
I dissented from this view. I said that, unlike sundials, she remembered only the rainy hours.
Now at Glyndebourne," went on Hermia as I let in the clutch, "I've always been lucky. I can't imagine it other than perfection: the music-and the glorious flower borders the white flower border in particular."
Deep in their underground shelter Three people sit in the dark. Remembering how when they were children The world was lit by a spark. They were placed in underground shelters By parents who did not survive. They were packed into underground shelters Like bees packed into a hive. Tom had wanted to be a farmer But the earth was bare as a stone Bill had wanted to be a hermit But found no place to be alone
Susan had wanted to travel But the earth was covered in flame
So they sat in their underground shelter Wondering who was to blame.
Now deep in their underground shelter Three old people sit in the dark. Recalling stories of the fire-flood And of the fire-proof Ark.
Deep in their underground shelter. Safe from poison and from flames, They shape coffins out of the cradles Upon which were written their names.
THE DAY ALBERTA got air-lifted to England was the most amazing day of her life.
At first she knew nothing about it, because she was asleep. She had been asleep for the past three months, like most of the other creatures who lived in the Arctic wastes of Canada, while outside the snow fell, the wind blew and the temperature dropped to forty degrees below zero.
Fans were waved in front of the face to keep a lady cool in the steaming hot theatres. Some men complained that the large fans were more like windmills! They were decorated with pictures but also with verses of songs or paragraphs from popular books. (If you got bored at the opera you could always read your fan.) Ladies learned to use fan-fluttering as a signal to people watching. One flutter might mean anger while another flutter might mean love. Fans were also useful to hide a lady's mouth if she had rotten teeth. And they could wave away the foul smell if she had bad breath.
Dresses were worn over wide, hooped petticoats. These came into fashion in 1710 and went out of fashion in 1780- but at the royal court they were still being worn over 40 years later. A writer complained that when one young lady walked down the street she took up the full width of the pavement,
Fall came on with a softness, so that Brian didn't realize what was in store—a hard-spined north woods winteruntil it was nearly too late.
He had never thought he would be here this long. After the plane crash that marooned him in the wilderness he had lived day by day for fifty-four days, until he had found the survival pack in the plane. Then another thirty-five days through the northern summer, somehow living the same day-to-day pattern he had started just after the crash.
To be sure he was very busy. The emergency pack on the plane had given him a gun with fifty shells—a survival .22 rifle—a hunting knife with a compass in the handle, cooking pots and pans, a fork, spoon and knife, matches, two butane lighters, a sleeping bag and foam pad, a first-aid kit with scissors, a cap that said CESSNA, fishing line, lures, hooks and sinkers, and several packets of freeze-dried food. He tried to ration the food out but found it impossible, and within two weeks he had eaten it all, even the package of dried prunes-something he'd hated in his old life. They tasted like candy and were so good he ate the whole package in one sitting, The results were nearly as bad as when he'd glutted on the gut cherries when he first landed.
Little Red Riding Hood had never met a wolf before, so she wasn't scared. “Good morning,” she said politely, “but I'm afraid I can't stop and talk.”
“No matter, my dear,” said the wolf. “I shall walk along with you. Where are you off to, this fine morning?”
“I'm going to see my grandmother," replied Little Red Riding Hood.
Then he reached up to unfasten his helmet. After slipping it off, he found himself back in the everyday world. The mall, which was so real only seconds before, had been replaced by an empty room the size of a basketball court. The walls were covered with a thick plastic material painted flat black. The only light came from small ceilingmounted spots.
"of!" Joe exclaimed as his blond head emerged from under his plastic helmet. “That was something. I feel like I've been in a real fight—and lost!”
Frank was about to reply when a door opened at the far end of the room. A tall, slender young woman in faded jeans and a blue blazer came in. Even in the dim light, her long red hair seemed to glow. Though only twenty-seven, Amanda Boggs was co-owner and creative director of Xyrodian, one of the hottest video game companies in Silicon Valley, California. The Hardys had stopped by to visit on their way to VidCon, a video game exhibition in San Francisco, and Amanda had offered to give the brothers a personal tour.
"Well, guys?” Amanda said, as she drew closer. "How do you like virtual reality?"
"Fantastic!” Joe replied.
“Amazing," Frank added. "I felt as if I were really in that mall."
“Where can we buy one of these, Amanda?"
One hot summer day, a little tailor sat at his table, sewing. As he worked, he heard someone call, “Sweet jam for sale! Sweet jam for sale!"
The little tailor was quite hungry. So he bought some jam. Then he fetched some bread out of the cupboard and spread some jam on it. He decided to eat only after finishing his work. In the meantime, the smell of sweet jam brought a swarm of flies through the window. Down they flew, right into the jam.
