Gerald Durrell - The Talking Parcel

“Where’s your trumpet?” he yelled.

“Ahh,” said Oswald, pleased. “I thought it was. I’m glad you agree, dear Parrot. A goat is something quite different—with horns and a tail and things.”

“Your ear trumpet,” yelled Parrot. “ Trumpet , trumpet , trum­pet. ”

“No need to shout and yell like that,” said Oswald, hurt. “I can hear perfectly well without your screeching and roaring.”

“Your ear trumpet," shouted the children in unison.

“Oh, you’d like to see it?” said Oswald, pleased. “Just a moment, I’ve got it here—the very latest thing. Of course, I don’t really need it. I can hear perfectly well, but it’s a comfort to have it around, and I find that if you pour icing sugar through it, it makes the most delicious patterns on cakes.”

He fumbled under the waves and then one of his scaly paws appeared, holding a huge amber ear trumpet, decorated in sil­ver. He pressed it into his ear and beamed at them.

“How does it look?” he inquired. “Rather saucy, I thought.”

“Beautiful,” shouted the children.

“Eh?” said Oswald, bending down and putting the ear trum­pet closer.

“Beautiful,” shouted the children again.

Oswald straightened up, took the trumpet from his ear, and peered into it.

“Won’t be a moment,” he said to the children. “Technical trouble.”

He pushed one of his long claws into the ear trumpet and scrabbled about. Then he shook the trumpet and a large quan­tity of icing sugar fell out.

“There,” he said, pleased. “It gets a little bit choked up oc­casionally.”

He put it back in his ear, and Parrot flew up and perched on it. “Can you hear me now?” he asked Oswald.

“Perfectly,” said Oswald, surprised. “But then I could hear you before. All that nonsense about a goat.”

“Well, listen carefully,” said Parrot. “It’s essential that we get to Werewolf Island as quickly as possible.”

“Werewolf Island?” said Oswald. “What on earth do you want to go there for? Nasty place, nasty people. I went there sunbathing not long ago and the Werewolves threw stones at me. Nasty, vulgar creatures.”

“Well, the reason we want to go there is a long story which we haven’t got time to tell you now,” said Parrot. “But we must get there before moonrise; now can you give, us a tow?”

“Simplest thing in the world,” said Oswald. “You have a rope in the crumpet, I take it? Well, slip it round my neck and away we go.”

So they tied the painter round Oswald’s neck and set off. At first, in his enthusiasm to help, Oswald went far too fast and the dinghy bounced up and down so much they were all nearly thrown out. He had put his ear trumpet away, so he couldn’t hear them shouting to slow down, and in the end Parrot had to fly up to his nose and peck him before he became aware of what he was doing. At last, he got the speed right and they zoomed across the waves at a tremendous rate.

“Tell me,” asked Simon, “why does Oswald wear that chef’s hat?”

“He is a chef,” said Parrot. “Studied in Paris and China. Ex­cellent cook, Oswald, but his father wouldn’t let him continue with it, said cooking wasn’t for Sea Serpents. So he made poor Oswald give it up and go into the family business.”

“What family business?” asked Penelope.

“It’s a firm Oswald’s great-great-grandfather started, called ‘Excitement Unlimited.’ If there is a place not very popular with tourists, they just send one of their family there for a bit. He lets himself be seen and photographed a couple of times and, before you know it, the place is crammed with people wanting to see the Sea Serpent. But Oswald’s a very shy crea­ture and he doesn’t like the publicity involved, and he’s a

kindly soul, so he doesn’t like leaving footprints in people’s back gardens or breathing on picnic parties, suddenly, from behind rocks. No, what he really wanted to do was to open a restaurant, but his father said, ‘Whoever heard of a Sea Serpent running a restaurant?’ So Oswald had to join the firm, and he does his cooking as a hobby.”

“Poor Oswald,” said Penelope.

“Yes, it’s a shame,” said Peter. “It must be horrid to have to go round showing off when you’re modest.”

“Yes, particularly if he’s a good cook,” said Simon.

“One of the very best,” said Parrot, “and won’t use mooncarrots—oh, no, insists on fresh ingredients. Very particular, is Oswald.”

Now the sky was starting to go a deep golden green, and the children could see the beginnings of the four sunsets. On the horizon—a mere smudge at first, and then getting clearer and clearer—loomed Werewolf Island.

“I don’t think we’ll do it before sunset,” said Parrot, looking at his watch and then at the sun, which was sinking toward the horizon. “We’ll have to go ashore in the dark, but we must be off there by moonrise, whatever happens. It was so silly of me not to think of it, but we could have got H.H. to keep the sun shining for two days. But one always thinks of these things too late.”

As they got closer to the Island, it began to look more and more unfriendly, with craggy rocks and straggling bushes. It looked dark and evil, and Penelope shivered as she remembered what lived on it.

“We’ll land on the south end, I’ve told Oswald,” Parrot ex­plained, “because the Mandrake Forest is in the northeast and the Werewolves’ lairs in the northwest. If we can get through the Mandrakes without waking them or the Wolves smelling us, we should have the rue and be out again in next to no time.”

“What about the Will-o’-the-Wisps?” asked Peter.

“Oh, they’re all right, just mischievous. You can’t trust them,” said Parrot.

Oswald had slowed down as they neared the Island, and now headed for a little cove. They beached the dinghy on the sand, which was red and black and glowed uncannily in the light of the sunsets.

“Now, remember,” Parrot said to Penelope. “You stay here with Ethelred and Oswald, and at the first sign of any trouble put out to sea.”

“And what about you?” protested Penelope.

“Never mind about us,” said Parrot confidently. “We’ll be all right.”

“Good-bye, Penelope,” whispered Peter. “Remember, any danger and you scoot off.”

“Yes,” said Simon, “don’t take any risks.”

“Good-bye,” said Penelope. “You take care, too.”

Carrying the sacks and the sickles, Peter and Simon and Par­rot made their way down through the bushes, as quietly as they could.

Penelope sat down on the beach with Ethelred beside her and Oswald lying in the shallows.

“Don’t you worry, miss,” said Ethelred comfortingly. “Why, they’ll be through that ’orrid Mandrake Forest and into the rue field before you can say ‘fried frogs’ spawn.’ ”

Oswald had been listening to this with great attention through his ear trumpet. “Tell me,” he said, “what do they want the rue for?”

“To give it to them Weasels, of course,” said Ethelred.

“To give it to the Weasels? Yes, of course, how stupid of me not to have thought of that,” said Oswald. “Why?”

“Cor blimey, don’t you know anything?” asked Ethelred. “Don’t you know about the Cockatrices and all that?”

“No, I’m sorry, I don’t,” said Oswald apologetically. “I’ve been on a mission, you see, and I’ve only just got back.”

So, as much to while away the time as anything, Penelope and Ethelred told him about the Cockatrices and their adven­tures.

“Audacious brutes,” said Oswald when they had finished. “To think of them doing that to H.H., the kindest of men. A man who gave me my very best recipe for raspberry flan. How- lucky he had you to help him.”