The Grunts In Trouble (12 page)

“You mean, the animals …?”

Larry Smalls nodded. “Many of them were as flat as pancakes.”

Sunny imagined a squashed lion in the middle of the road. How terrible! Then he couldn’t help himself. He imagined Mr and Mrs Grunt shovelling it up between them and making a casserole. He could picture the tail
sticking out of the cooking pot.

“No wonder you hate Lord Bigg!” said Sunny. “I’m so sorry, Mr Smalls.”

“Thank you, Sunny,” said Larry Smalls. “I knew you were a good kid from the moment
you – er – kind of caught me.”

Sunny felt like a fraudster and a cheat, remembering that the “payment” for Fingers wasn’t what Larry Smalls would be expecting. He tried not to think about it. “So what happened to the rest of the circus?” he asked.

“Mr Lippy, who you met, does children’s parties, and he runs the odd errand for me. The Chinn Twins – my acrobats – trim treetops and repair telephone lines. Sammy the sea lion works in a call centre—”

“A call centre?”

“Yes, when people complain to one of the telephone operators and demand to speak to their supervisor, he barks down the phone at them. Most effective, apparently.”

Mr Smalls then went on to list some of the others in their new roles, including Trunk the strongman, who had opened a specialist shirt
shop for men with no neck to speak of, and Jeremy the juggler, who now lived in a large fibreglass fruit.

“So Fingers is the only animal you have left?” said Sunny.

“Yes,” said Smalls. He probably wasn’t even aware of it, but he was gently stroking the elephant’s trunk as he spoke. Even in this dim light, Sunny could see the glint of tears in the man’s eyes.

“So why are you selling him?” Sunny wanted to know. “Why don’t you keep him?”

“Because I want him settled in a new life before I go to prison.”

“Prison?” Sunny gasped. “Why are you going to prison?”

“For blowing up Bigg Manor,” said Larry Smalls.

“You’ve blown up Bigg Manor!?!” said
Sunny. He was stunned.

“Not yet, I haven’t,” said Larry Smalls, his voice barely above a whisper. “But I’m about to.”

Chapter Twelve

Boom! Boom!

S
unny found himself with more worries than he knew what to do with: Larry Smalls was planning to blow up Bigg Manor; he, Sunny, was about to take delivery of an elephant that they hadn’t actually paid for; Larry Smalls was planning to blow up Bigg Manor; he might never see Mimi again; Larry Smalls was planning to blow up Bigg Manor; he didn’t know what would become of Clip and Clop; and Larry Smalls was planning to blow up Bigg Manor.

Sunny’s priorities were clear. He imagined sweet-smelling, bright-pink Mimi under a smouldering pile of bricks. “You can’t go around blowing up houses, Mr Smalls!” he protested.

“Oh, but I can,” said Larry Smalls. “The dynamite is in position and everything.” His voice had gone back to sounding like the Larry Smalls Sunny had first met, preparing to throw those rocks at the gate of Bigg Manor.

“But Mimi … Mimi and the others!”

“I’m not planning on hurting anyone,” said Larry Smalls. “I simply plan to reduce the house to rubble!”

“But what’s the point?” protested Sunny.
“It’s just an empty shell. Lord Bigg won’t care and you’ll go to prison for nothing.”

“An empty shell?”

“Yes. Sack – he’s the gardener – and Mimi – she’s the boot boy – were telling me there’s nothing in it. So all you’d be doing is destroying a useless building.”

“It’ll still be a Bold Statement though,” said the ex-circus man. “It’ll still Get People’s Attention. Then I can tell the world what a crook Lord Bigg is!”

“But you can’t blame today’s Lord Bigg,” said Sunny, trying to reason with him. “You said yourself that it was his
family
who started the business, hundreds of years ago, and, from what you say about his father and his father’s father having to sell off stuff, they must have stopped making those useless railings long before he was b—”

A thought suddenly struck Sunny like a Scotch egg hits a frying pan (if you’re playing tennis with them).

“What?” asked Larry Smalls. “What is it, Sunny?”

“The railings last ten years and a week before they go all floppy, right?”

“Right.” Mr Smalls nodded. “Ten years and a week.”

“But the last of the Bigg Railings must have been made long, long, ago. So surely the railings you used for your cage bars would have gone floppy and become useless long
before
you ever bought them! In fact, you wouldn’t have bought them in the first place!”

“Which is EXACTLY why I hate this Lord Bigg so much,” said Larry Smalls. “A while back, he actually managed to sell the factory but, before he did, he made
one last batch
of
railings
with the leftover metal lying around. And, even though he knew we were going to use them for cage bars, he sold them to the circus.”

“But that’s—”

“Criminal?”

“That’s—”

“Outrageous?”

“That’s WRONG!”

“Yes, Sunny. That’s wrong,” said Larry Smalls grimly. “He sold us railings for cage bars that he knew were unsafe, and animals – my animals – died because of it.”

“But blowing up a building is wrong too,” said Sunny.

“One thing at a time,” said Smalls. “First, let’s talk elephant.” He pushed the barn door wide open and sunlight flooded the place, causing all three – two humans, one elephant
– to blink. He walked outside and Fingers followed, with Sunny close behind.

‘But, Mr Smalls—”

“Elephant,” he repeated.

Sunny gave a very sad sigh. “Mr Smalls, the truth is, I don’t think my parents—”

“Those people really are your parents?” Larry Smalls interrupted.

“Sort of,” said Sunny. “I don’t know who my birth parents are.”

“Aha.” Smalls nodded.

“Anyway, I don’t think they’d necessarily be the best people to look after Fingers. They’re too …”

“Weird?” said Larry Smalls.

“Set in their ways,” said Sunny. “They do everything
their
way.”

“Then I want you to promise me something, Sunny.”

“What?”

“Whether or not I blow up Bigg Manor – whether or not I go to prison – I want YOU to look after Fingers. He’s yours now. So if you ever decide to part company with – with …”

Sunny supplied their names. “Mr and Mrs Grunt,” he said.

“If ever you and the Grunts decide to go your separate ways, you must take Fingers with you. He’s your responsibility. Is that a deal?”

Sunny was bubbling with excitement. His very own elephant! “But what if Dad has other ideas?”

“Don’t worry about that,” said Larry Smalls. He took Fingers’ trunk in one hand and Sunny’s hand in the other. Then he put them both together, Sunny curling his fingers round the end of the elephant’s trunk. It was a bit
like they were now holding hands, except that one of the hands was actually a trunk. “You two are together now, and Fingers knows it, don’t you, boy?”

Fingers pulled the tip of his trunk from Sunny’s grasp and put it round the boy’s shoulders, giving him a kind of elephant hug. He knew it, all right.

“And even that Mr Grunt of yours isn’t going to argue with an elephant, is he?”

Sunny supposed not. And now was the time to mention that the same Mr Grunt hadn’t kept his part of the bargain.

“Mr Smalls—”

“No time,” said Larry Smalls. “I’ve talked long enough and there’s somewhere I have to be.” The truth be told, he also hated long goodbyes. Now Fingers was safely in the care of the funny kid with the wonky ears and blue dress, and the funny kid with the wonky ears and blue dress was safely in the care of Fingers, it was time for Larry Smalls to move on.

Of course, if Larry Smalls hadn’t liked the look of whoever it was who was buying the elephant – he’d left those arrangements to Mr Lippy the clown – he would have kept Fingers, and simply wouldn’t have kept
his
side of the bargain. This probably would have been a comfort to Sunny had he known it.

“But—”

“No, really, Sunny. This is goodbye.” He jogged over to a pop-pop-pop motorcycle, over by a wire-mesh litter bin, and climbed on to the seat. “You’ll find some bags of feed and caring instructions over there.” He pointed. “Bye, Fingers!”

The elephant, standing by Sunny as if they
were old friends, his front leg pressed up against the boy’s body, raised his trunk and waved.

“Come on, Fingers,” said Sunny. “It’s time to meet the Grunts.”

Mr and Mrs Grunt couldn’t have been more delighted when Sunny reappeared with the elephant. In fact, the boy couldn’t remember a time when he’d seen them happier (and that included the day they managed to sink each and every remote-controlled boat at the annual Huntsworth Mayday Picnic).

“You’ve got him!” said Mr Grunt with such a smile.

“Hello, Fingers,” said Mrs Grunt. She reached out and gave the elephant a hearty pat on the nearest part of him – a knee – which would have been enough to flatten an Irish
wolfhound.

Fingers returned the compliment by feeling her hair with the tip of his trunk.

“That tickles!” said a delighted Mrs Grunt.

“Your head could do with a good hoovering!” said Mr Grunt. “Hope you don’t give him fleas.”

Sunny was forgotten in all the excitement so he slipped inside the caravan to look for his
shoes. He found them in a box on the kitchen table labelled “JUNK”, and put them back on his grass-stained feet.

When he went outside again, he found Mr Grunt leaning against Fingers as though he were a wall, chatting to the elephant. All the while, Fingers looked at him with his intelligent eyes.

“So no trouble with Mr Lippy then?” asked Mr Grunt when he saw the boy.

“No, Dad,” said Sunny. “It was Mr Smalls who gave me Fingers, and I think everything’s sort of OK, except for the fact that he plans to blow—”

“Who’s Mr Smalls when he’s at home?” demanded Mrs Grunt. “And what does he plan to blow? A raspberry? A kiss?”

“He’s the man whose hat we threw rocks at,” Sunny said. “The one who ended up
hanging from the gates of Bigg Manor, and he’s planning to blow—”

“Oh, him,” said Mr Grunt with a raised eyebrow. “Small world.”

“Smalls world, more like,” Mrs Grunt cackled. “I should be a comedian!”

“You’re certainly a joke,” said Mr Grunt.

“Dishcloth!” shouted Mrs Grunt.

“Earwax!” shouted Mr Grunt.

“Knuckle-head!” shouted Mrs Grunt.

“Herring!” shouted Mr Grunt.

That surprised Mrs Grunt. “You’ve never called me a herring before,” she said quietly.

“I meant spongebag, you old spongebag!” said Mr Grunt.

Mrs Grunt seemed satisfied with that, and they carried on name-calling.

Sunny sighed and took Fingers over to a thistle patch to meet Clip and Clop. He knew
he wouldn’t get a word in edgeways when the Grunts were behaving like that, however urgent it was. The donkeys didn’t seem at all bothered by a giant animal with a stretchy nose, and Fingers seem pleased to meet them. He sniffed their faces with his finger-like trunk. So, all in all, Sunny was happy with how that went.

It was then that he noticed a new trailer hitched to the back of the caravan. Not new as in shiny new, but new as in recently made, and new to Sunny. He’d never laid eyes on it before. It was very much in keeping with the caravan itself. It was made in the same style (or lack of style), as in loads-of-old-
stuff-badly
-put-together.