Even More Pongwiffy Stories Read online

  CONTENTS

  PONGWIFFY AND THE PANTOMIME

  THE SPELLOVISION SONG CONTEST

  BACK ON TRACK

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  CHAPTER ONE

  A Brilliant Idea

  ‘No!’ shouted Grandwitch Sourmuddle, thumping the table with her clenched fist. ‘No-no-no-no-NO! We are not, positively, absolutely, definitely not holding a coffee morning, d’you hear? I hate coffee and I detest mornings. All that sitting around with your little finger stuck out, it’s not natural. Never, I say! Never, never, never!’

  She gave a final thump, folded her arms and sat back, glaring. There was a short pause.

  ‘I take it that’s a no, then, Grandwitch?’ asked Witch Greymatter, who was secretary that night.

  ‘Yes,’ said Sourmuddle emphatically. ‘No. Yes, no, that is.’

  Greymatter took up her pencil and scribbled through the last item on the list that lay before her.

  ‘Well, that’s that, then,’ she said with a little sigh. ‘We’ve been through all the suggestions. Jumblesale – barndance – quiznight – craftfair – sponsoredknit – paintyourbroomstickinafunnywayday – swimminggala – flowershow – coffeemorning.’

  There fell another silence.

  ‘It’s no good,’ said Witch Sludgegooey finally. ‘I just can’t seem to get excited about any of them.’

  It was the usual monthly Coven Meeting in Witchway Hall. Twelve Witches and their assorted Familiars sat around the long table set centre stage. Outside, the chilly winds of autumn prowled around the place, rattling at the windows and whistling through every knothole.

  So far, the Meeting hadn’t gone well. The main item on the agenda was to think of a way in which they could boost the kitty. Christmas was fast approaching and Coven funds were horribly low. Besides, there’s something about that in-between time after Hallowe’en and before the end of December that makes you want to fill it with – well, something.

  ‘Tea-break time, I think,’ announced Sourmuddle to general relief. ‘I’ve got brain-ache. How are you doing with those sandwiches, Pongwiffy? We’re all starving out here!’

  ‘On my way-hee!’ sang a cheerful voice from the backstage kitchen. ‘Wow, have I got a feast for you!’

  There followed a loud yell, a resounding crash and a lot of tinkling.

  There was a short pause, then the thirteenth Witch advanced from stage left. A piece of ham stuck to the sleeve of her disreputable cardigan. Her shoes were wet and steaming. She was holding a china handle – all that remained of the Coven teapot. Perched on her hat was a small, grim-faced hamster. He was attempting to wipe what appeared to be a large dollop of mustard from his front.

  ‘Oops!’ said Pongwiffy sheepishly.

  There were a lot of tuttings, black looks and mutterings of ‘typical’.

  ‘I dropped the tray tripping over Hugo,’ explained Pongwiffy. ‘Blame him. It’s all his fault.’

  ‘It not,’ snapped the Hamster on the hat.

  ‘Of course it is. How was I supposed to know you were right under my feet? If you weren’t such a little squirt, I’d have noticed you, wouldn’t I?’

  ‘So I take it there’s no sandwiches, then?’ interrupted Sourmuddle.

  ‘ ’Fraid not,’ confessed Pongwiffy. ‘There’s a nice piece of ham here, fresh off my cardigan, if anybody would like to . . . No? I’ll eat it myself, then.’ Which she proceeded to do, with relish.

  ‘Sit down, Pongwiffy, and don’t say another word,’ ordered Sourmuddle.

  The failed sandwich-maker pulled out a chair and sat on it, still chewing.

  ‘Now what?’ demanded Witch Macabre. ‘How are we supposed tay have a tea break if there’s noo tea?’

  ‘We think we should call it a night and go home, don’t we, Bag?’ said Witch Agglebag, stifling a yawn.

  ‘We certainly do, Ag,’ replied her twin, Witch Bagaggle. ‘We’ve got two cauldrons full of hot soup at home, just waiting for us to soak our feet in.’

  ‘Can’t go home,’ ruled Sourmuddle. ‘Not until we’ve made a decision. Besides, I’m all right. I knew it was Pongwiffy’s turn to do the catering, so I’ve brought my emergency flask. Where is it, Snoop?’

  ‘Right here, Grandwitch,’ said the small red Demon at her elbow, producing a bright yellow flask with an air of triumph. Everyone watched enviously as he unscrewed the plastic cup and proceeded to pour. Nobody else had thought to bring one.

  ‘Well, I think it’s stupid,’ grumbled Macabre. ‘Having a tea break when there’s noo tea.’

  ‘In that case,’ said Sourmuddle, taking a sip, ‘we’ll just have to make small talk.’

  ‘What’s that, then?’ enquired Macabre suspiciously.

  ‘It’s where we chat pleasantly amongst ourselves. Asking about each other’s relations and so on,’ explained Sourmuddle. ‘For example, I say –’ she put on a high-pitched, unconvincing voice, ‘I say, “Dooo tell me, Witch Sharkadder, how is your delightful cousin, the famous Dwarf chef Pierre de Gingerbeard, of whom we hear you name-drop so much?” And Sharkadder says, “Very well, thank you, Grandwitch, how kind of you to ask.”’

  ‘No, I don’t,’ said Sharkadder tragically, looking up from applying a fresh coat of bright green lipstick. ‘Poor Cousin Pierre. He fell into the pancake mix last week. Got badly battered.’

  A heavy silence fell as everybody thought sad thoughts about Sharkadder’s unfortunate cousin. Outside, the wind moaned. It was all rather depressing.

  ‘Anybody fancy a game of charades?’ suggested Pongwiffy in an attempt to brighten things up a bit.

  ‘No,’ said Sourmuddle. ‘And I thought I told you to keep quiet.’

  ‘How about a sing-song, then? That’d cheer us all up, wouldn’t it?’

  ‘We’re not here to be cheerful,’ Sourmuddle told her severely. ‘We’re here to think of a moneymaking idea.’

  ‘What have you come up with so far?’ asked Pongwiffy, who had been stuck out in the kitchen all night.

  ‘The usual stuff,’ sighed Greymatter. ‘Nothing we haven’t done a hundred times before. Nobody can face another jumble sale, and a quiz night’s no good because the Skeletons held one only last week, and the Zombies are having a barn dance, and Sourmuddle’s got this thing about coffee mornings . . .’

  ‘Quite right too,’ agreed Pongwiffy. ‘We don’t want to get bogged down in boring old stuff like that. What we need is something challenging. A new, exciting project that makes use of all our amazing talents. Some sort of Christmas show, perhaps. That’d be fun, wouldn’t it?’

  At this, Witches and Familiars alike sat up and began to look interested.

  ‘You mean, an opera or something?’ asked Greymatter, whose tastes ran towards the highbrow.

  ‘Not an opera,’ said Pongwiffy definitely. ‘Too posh.’

  ‘Us could do a musical, though!’ That was Dead Eye Dudley, Sharkadder’s battered tomcat. One of his nine lives had been spent as ship’s cat on a pirate brig and as a result he was seriously Into Shanties. ‘Us could do a musical an’ call it Cats!’

  IdentiKit and CopiCat, the twins’ Siamese Cat Familiars, nodded eagerly. Everybody else laughed like drains.

  ‘Ha!’ scoffed Pongwiffy. ‘Whoever’d want to go and see a show called Cats? Craziest idea I’ve ever heard.’

  ‘Take no notice, Duddles darling,’ said Sharkadder coldly. ‘Mummy thinks it’s a perfectly sweet idea. You can be the star and sing one of your lovely shanties.’

  ‘No, he can’t,’ argued Pongwiffy. ‘What would he sing about? Fish heads? His flea problem? Scrabbling around in cat litter?
You might as well have a musical called – called Hamsters!’

  Hugo froze in mid-guffaw.

  ‘And vot wrong viz zat?’ he enquired stiffly.

  ‘If it comes to it, what’s wrong with Snakes?’ chipped in Slithering Steve, Bendyshanks’s Snake.

  ‘Or Rats?’ piped up Vernon, Ratsnappy’s Rat.

  ‘Vultures is a catchy title, don’t you think?’ suggested Barry, Scrofula’s Vulture, not very hopefully.

  ‘Or Haggis,’ poked in Rory, Macabre’s Familiar, who was one.

  ‘Demons!’ (Sourmuddle’s Snoop)

  ‘Fiends!’ (Sludgegooey’s Filth)

  ‘Owls!’ (Greymatter’s Speks)

  Gaga’s Bats flapped about excitedly, obviously making a bid for attention. The only Familiar who didn’t have an opinion was Bonidle’s Sloth, who, like his mistress, was fast asleep.

  ‘Order!’ commanded Sourmuddle, banging her gavel. ‘Order, I say! We’re not doing a musical about any of you Familiars and that’s final. Your job is to help us Witches, not to go swanning off taking starring roles in musicals.’

  ‘Oh no it isn’t!’ mumbled the Familiars.

  ‘Oh yes it is!’ chorused the Witches.

  ‘I’ve just had a brilliant idea,’ said Pongwiffy.

  Nobody heard.

  ‘Oh no it isn’t!’ argued the Familiars, warming to their theme.

  ‘Oh yes it is!’ insisted the Witches.

  ‘I said I’ve just had a brilliant idea!’ repeated Pongwiffy, more loudly.

  Still nobody heard.

  ‘Oh no it isn’t!’

  ‘Oh yes it is!’

  ‘I SAID I’VE HAD A BRILLIANT IDEA!’

  This time everybody heard. Excitedly, she leapt on to her chair. She had one of those Looks. One of those flushed, bulgy-eyed Looks that everyone knew so well.

  ‘Oh no it isn’t!’ she squawked. ‘Oh yes it is!’ She waved dramatically at a point just left of Agglebag’s shoulder. ‘It’s behind you!’

  ‘What is?’ said Agglebag anxiously, turning to look.

  ‘No, no, not really. I’m just saying that. What does it remind you of?’

  ‘It reminds me that I must ring for the men in white coats to take you away, Pongwiffy,’ said Sourmuddle briskly. ‘Get down before I lose my temper.’

  ‘Not until you’ve heard my brilliant idea for the Christmas show,’ insisted Pongwiffy.

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘Hold on to your hats, girls,’ crowed Pongwiffy, and struck a pose. ‘We . . .’ She paused for dramatic effect. ‘We are going to put on a pantomime!’

  CHAPTER TWO

  Which One?

  A pantomime, eh?’ mused Sourmuddle. ‘I went to one of those once, when I was a slip of a girl. It was all about a poor young woman who did a lot of housework, and a posh fairy in a blue net frock turned up and gave her some grass boots and sent her off to play ball in some sort of converted vegetable. I was sick on ice cream at the interval, I recall. Ah me! Happy days.’

  ‘That was Cinderella,’ nodded Pongwiffy. ‘Although I don’t think you’ve got the plot quite right, Sourmuddle. It was glass slippers, not grass boots.’

  ‘Could be,’ agreed Sourmuddle. ‘My memory’s not what it was. I was definitely sick, though.’

  ‘I don’t think it should be Cinderella,’ said Sharkadder excitedly. ‘I vote we do Dick Whittington. And I can play the title role, because I’ve got the right sort of legs for Principal Boy. And Dudley can be my faithful cat.’

  ‘Nonsense,’ argued Ratsnappy. ‘It’s obvious we should do The Pied Piper, because I can play the recorder. You said we should make use of our amazing talents, Pongwiffy. And Vernon can be chief rat, can’t you, Vernon? And we can use some of your relations as extras.’

  Vernon looked excited.

  ‘I think you’ll find all the rats get drowned in that story,’ remarked Greymatter.

  Vernon stopped looking excited and became anxious instead.

  ‘Who’ll write it, though?’ enquired Bendyshanks. ‘I mean, we can’t just make it up as we go along. There has to be a proper script and everything.’

  ‘Oh, no problem,’ said Pongwiffy rashly. She was much too carried away with her idea to let anything stand in her path. ‘I’ll write it. It’ll probably only take me an evening. I’ve always fancied myself as a playwright. I’ll direct it too. I’ll do everything. All we need to do is decide which one. We’ll use the little-pieces-of-paper method. Everyone must write down the character she wants to play and we’ll see which pantomime crops up most often. Agreed?’

  Everyone agreed.

  ‘I’ll do the honours, then,’ said Sourmuddle, and twiddled her fingers. Instantly, twelve stubby pencils and little scraps of paper materialised on the table before the Witches. Sourmuddle herself had a quill pen and a smart silver inkpot and a large piece of parchment with her name and address prominently displayed at the top, but nobody said anything. She was Grandwitch. She could do what she liked.

  ‘Wazapnin’?’ muttered Bonidle, awaking from a deep sleep and finding herself required to do something. ‘Is it mornin’?’

  ‘We’re putting on a pantomime,’ explained Pongwiffy. ‘Everyone has to write down who they want to be. If I was you, I’d go for something undemanding, Bonidle. Like a fallen log. Right, off you go.’

  There was a bit of excited whispering and the sound of busily scratching pencils.

  When everyone had finished, Pongwiffy passed her hat along and they all solemnly dropped their papers in. Sourmuddle made a big thing about rolling up her parchment and tying it with red ribbon before placing it with the others.

  ‘Right,’ said Pongwiffy. ‘Let’s see what we’ve got.’

  Everyone waited with bated breath while she began to unfold the scraps of paper.

  ‘The twins want to be the Babes in the Wood,’ she announced. Agglebag and Bagaggle nudged each other and giggled. ‘Well, that’s all right, I suppose. Sharky’s sticking with Dick Whittington. Sludgegooey’s written . . . Snow White?’

  ‘That’s me,’ said Sludgegooey eagerly. ‘I’ve always thought of myself as a Snow White sort of person.’

  Everyone’s jaws dropped in disbelief.

  ‘I’d wash,’ she added defensively.

  ‘Hmm,’ said Pongwiffy, unpersuaded. She turned to the next piece. ‘Bonidle’s put Sleeping Beauty. No problem there, she can do it with her eyes closed. Bendyshanks wants to be . . . Cleopatra?’

  ‘Oh, I do, I do!’ cried Bendyshanks, all aglow with enthusiasm. ‘I’ve always wanted to play her. I did a course on belly dancing once. And Steve can be my poisonous asp. Oh, say I can, Pongwiffy! It’s the answer to a dream!’

  ‘Oh dear,’ groaned Pongwiffy. ‘This is going to be harder than I thought. Ratsnappy’s sticking with the Pied Piper, and Scrofula’s gone for – wait for it – Rapunzel.’

  The assembled company rocked with mirth and tapped their foreheads pityingly.

  ‘So?’ said Scrofula, who had what can only be described as Problem Hair. ‘What’s so funny? You said we can be whoever we like.’

  But Pongwiffy had moved on to the next one and was holding her head in despair.

  ‘What’s this say, Macabre? Lady Macbeth?’

  ‘Aye,’ said Macabre definitely.

  ‘That’s not a pantomime character,’ objected Bendyshanks.

  ‘Neither’s Cleopatra,’ snapped Macabre.

  ‘She can dance, though,’ shot back the would-be Queen of the Nile. ‘I bet Lady Macbeth never went on a belly-dancing course.’

  ‘She wouldnae want to,’ scoffed Macabre. ‘None o’ that sissy stuff up in Scotland.’

  Pongwiffy sighed, and turned to the three remaining suggestions. Greymatter had, for some reason, plumped for Sherlock Holmes. Sourmuddle’s childhood experience had apparently left her with a deep-seated desire to be a posh fairy in a blue frock. Last of all was Gaga’s piece of paper, on which was written, in wildly enthusiastic writing,

  PANTOMI
ME HORSE –

  BACK END PREFERRED!!!!

  ‘Well,’ said Pongwiffy despairingly. ‘This is ridiculous. There’s not even two characters from the same story. Some of you have got to change.’

  ‘Not me,’ said Sourmuddle stoutly. ‘I’m leader of this Coven. If I can’t be a fairy, I don’t want to be in it.’

  ‘But it’s impossible,’ argued Pongwiffy. ‘How do you come up with a storyline that has to include three princesses, an Egyptian dancing queen, a posh fairy, Lady Macbeth, a couple of lost babies, a rat exterminator, Dick Whittington, a fictional detective and a pantomime horse’s bum?’

  ‘Well, that’s your problem, Pongwiffy,’ said Sourmuddle tartly. ‘You said you could write the script in an evening, I seem to remember.’

  ‘Well, yes, but –’

  ‘There you are, then. It’ll be a nice challenge for you. I suggest you take it home and work on it.’

  And that is exactly what Pongwiffy did.

  CHAPTER THREE

  The Goblins’ Invitation

  West of Witchway Wood, on the foothills of the Lower Misty Mountains, lies an area of outstanding natural unsightliness, known as Goblin Territory. It is a bleak, windblown place, full of craggy rocks and drippy caves. Nothing grows there, apart from scrubby gorse bushes, the odd twisted tree and unpleasant plants of the stinging variety. You would have to be really stupid to live in Goblin Territory.

  Being stupid was something that came easily to the Gaggle of Goblins who lived there in the biggest, dampest, drippiest cave of them all: Plugugly, Stinkwart, Hog, Slopbucket, Lardo, Eyesore and Sproggit. Seven daft Goblins with six brain cells between them.

  Right now, they had just woken up and were thinking about breakfast. Not doing anything about it, you understand, because there wasn’t any. Just thinking about it.

  ‘I wish we ’ad sausages,’ sighed Stinkwart as they sat in a gloomy circle, staring at the empty frying pan. ‘Six fat bangers sizzlin’ in a pan. Lovely.’

  ‘There’s seven of us,’ Slopbucket reminded him. ‘I fink,’ he added doubtfully. (Goblins are not good at counting. They get confused after two.)

  ‘I know that,’ said Stinkwart pityingly. ‘Fink I’m stupid? I said six ’cos then I can ’ave two, see?’