Desmond Digby - The Adventures of Bottersnikes and Gumbles

‘Useful,’ the King said, clambering on to the steering wheel. ‘That’s what they are. Grab ’em.’

‘Here, just a minute — you can’t do that,’ the Gumbles cried, all speaking at once, ‘We only stopped to lend a hand. We’re just running down to the beach. For a paddle in the cool water.’

‘Got you!’ shouted the Bottersnikes, and they grabbed those little Gumbles — this was quite easy, for though they are so lazy Bottersnikes can move faster than Gumbles when they have to because their legs are longer. And when they grabbed them they discovered a peculiar thing about Gumbles. They discovered that you can squeeze Gumbles to any shape you like without hurting them, and that if you press them very hard they flatten out like pancakes and cannot pop back to their proper shapes unless helped.

‘This,’ said the King, watching, ‘is more useful than ever.’

The Bottersnikes blinked. They couldn’t see why it was useful at all — silly, squashy things, they thought.

‘Because,’ the King growled, ‘we can pop ’em into something and squash ’em down hard so’s they can’t get away, and when I want some work done they’ll be ready and waiting to do it.’

Now the Bottersnikes began to get the idea. They would have servants for ever, to tidy up and keep them comfortable. ‘Hoo, hoo!’ they yelled. ‘What’ll we pop ’em into?’

‘Jam tins,’ roared the King. Another good idea! Naturally there were hundreds of them lying in the rubbish. ‘The proper thing is to shout “Got you!” and grab ’em, and pop ’em into jam tins.’

‘What a rotten thing to think of,’ cried the Gumbles. ‘When we only stopped to —’

‘Got you!’ shouted the Bottersnikes, and they grabbed the Gumbles and popped them into jam tins. And squashed them down hard, with horny fists. There were more than enough Gumbles for each Bottersnike to grab one. Some of the fattest, in fact, grabbed two.

How they snuffled through their noses — which meant that they were laughing — how they rorted and snorted and hooed with glee at what they had done. ‘We done ourselves a good turn,’ the King announced. ‘We done a good day’s work.’

Exhausted at the thought of this, they fell asleep at once, and the tinned Gumbles were left in the hot sun all afternoon, thinking of the cool creek where they had meant to paddle. Now, it seemed, they would never go there again.

Towards evening some of the Bottersnikes woke up, disturbed by snores from the King’s palace — most royal ones, like trombones blaring. ‘All very well for ’im,’ the Bottersnikes thought, their ears going red, ‘but we ain’t got palaces to sleep in, and we ain’t comfy, and what’s to be done?’ Then they remembered the Gumbles. ‘Stop being lazy in them tins,’ they ordered, ‘and come and put our places comfy.’

So the Gumbles were hauled out of the tins and put to work building bigger and better rubbish heaps for the Bottersnikes to crawl into; a nastier job for Gumbles would be impossible to find. ‘Harder, harder,’ the Bottersnikes bawled. ‘And don’t try and run away, ’cos we’re watching you!’

But they did not see one little Gumble under the King’s car, where he was puzzling over a tin-opener he had found. This Gumble was the one who had tinks — every tink was a good idea — and as soon as he discovered how the tin-opener worked a real beauty came to him: tink! Clear as if you had tapped the edge of a glass with a spoon.

Up jumped Tinkingumble with his bright idea and peered cautiously from behind a wheel. ‘Pssst! Bring me the jam tins one by one,’ he whispered to Happigumble and Merrigumble nearby. ‘Mind they don’t see you!’

While the Bottersnikes were trying the new heaps to see if they were comfy, and squabbling over who should have the comfiest, they rolled the jam tins under the car where Tinkingumble cut the bottoms out of every one, working fast and secretly; then Happigumble and Merrigumble rolled them back again taking care to keep the parts together so that they looked all right from the top. The job was done just in time.

‘It ain’t good,’ the Bottersnikes growled, ‘not a bit good, but it’ll have to do for tonight ’cos we’re tired, and you’ll have to work harder tomorrow.’ They shouted ‘Got you!’ and grabbed the Gumbles and popped them into the jam tins, and snuffled their noses about it because they knew they’d have servants tomorrow and forever. Then they went to sleep.

When they were snoring safely Tinkingumble called ‘Now!’ and the Gumbles tried to stand up. The cut-out bottoms of the tins fell away nicely, just as planned, but they were still stuck in the round parts — absolutely wodged in.

‘How are we going to get away?’ said Happigumble. ‘My legs are so squashed up I can hardly move!’

‘I hadn’t thought of that,’ Tinkingumble said unhappily. A tink came to the rescue as he spoke — only a small one, but quite clear. Following Tinkingumble’s, the jam tins blundered towards the road banging into each other as they went — it nearly made them giggly, and Gumbles are quite hopeless when they go giggly — and there they rocked themselves until the tins fell over on their sides, and the slope of the hill did the rest. The Gumbles ran down to the beach in their jam tins much, much faster than any Bottersnike could have chased them.

An owl, who saw all the tins rolling down the hill in the moonlight, was so surprised that he flew straight into a moult, and declared he’d never seen such a sight in all his years of hooting.

At the bottom of the hill the Gumbles shot off the road into the bush, where a friendly bandicoot poked them out of the tins with his long nose. They put the jam tins in a bin marked Please Be Tidy and spent the rest of the night paddling at their favourite beach, for Gumbles are too busy having fun to waste time sleeping and there is no one to tell them when to go to bed.

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