Enid Blyton (2 page)

"Sorry there's so much dirt," said Pink-Whistle's booming voice, right in Mrs. Twisty's ear. " You shall have a few extra pounds of potatoes instead. Can't bear to cheat anyone, you know!"

Mrs. Twisty jumped. Where did that voice come from ? And how did the potato sack suddenly tip itself up like that and empty more potatoes into the scales? She began to tremble. All the same, she wasn't going to let so many potatoes go! She picked out about six.

A sharp slap made her drop them into the pan. "Naughty, naughty!" said the voice. "Put a few more in for that."

And to Mrs. Twisty's horror, the sack of potatoes appeared to lift itself up and empty another score or so of potatoes into the big scale-pan!

Who had slapped her? She glared round at everyone, but there did not seem to be anyone near enough. All the people were laughing. What a joke! They didn't quite know what was happening, and most of them were feeling’ very puzzled, but all the same, how they were enjoying themselves! The Twistys were cheats—and now, for the first time, they were being punished well and truly in full view of the market! What a joke!

Mrs. Twisty said no more about potatoes. She turned away and pretended to be busy. Somebody went up to buy a pound of flour from Twisty. He slapped his pound weight on one side of the scale, and emptied flour into the other.

"That's not a pound!" said the Voice, from somewhere near his ear. "Here, put this weight on—it really does weigh a pound!"

And, to Twisty's horror, a pound weight was put into his scales, and his own weighed against it. Everyone cried out in scorn.

"Huh! Look at that! Twisty's weight has gone up and the other has gone down! Twisty's doesn't weigh a pound!"

Twisty began to shake at the knees. "Good people, it's a mistake," he stammered. "There's some trickery going on here . . ."

"There certainly is," said the Voice, "and there has been trickery going on for a long time! Good people, tell Twisty to turn up his scale-pans! See what is underneath!"

Twisty tried to look fierce. He looked round for the man with the voice. Where could he be? "I'll slap your face hard!" cried Twisty, bravely.

"Go on, then!" mocked Pink-Whistle, and poked Twisty in the chest. "Slap me! Here I am!"

Twisty was terrified. He couldn't bear being punched by someone who wasn't there. The people roared at him.

"Lift up your scale-pans, Mr. and Mrs. Twisty! Lift up your scale-pans, and let us see underneath!"

Pink-Whistle lifted them up himself, and there, stuck underneath the pans into which goods were put to be weighed, were lumps of clay, flattened on to the pans to make them weigh more than they should.

Then the people went quite mad. They made for the sacks of potatoes and apples, they went for the sacks of flour and bags of pepper, they rushed at the slabs of fish—and before the two bad Twistys knew what was happening, they were being pelted with potatoes, apples, and fish, and having flour and pepper emptied all over them!

"You'll be sorry for this," sobbed Mrs. Twisty, trying to get a fish out of the neck of her dress. "I'll turn you all out of your houses!"

"WHAT'S THAT?" boomed the Voice that the Twistys now feared more than anything. "Say that again!"

"No, no!" said Twisty, scared to death. "She didn't mean it. We're both sorry for all the wrong things we've done. People can help themselves to any of our market goods they please to-day!"

"And will you behave yourselves in future?" boomed the Voice.

"Yes, yes," said Twisty. "Certainly. No doubt about that."

The Twistys left the market in a hurry, and went home. The people helped themselves to all the goods on the stalls, laughing and chattering. Pink-Whistle laughed too, then made himself visible again and went after the Twistys.

When he got to their house he saw them coming out with their bags. They were off and away! They were too scared to stay in the Village of Little-Trees any longer. They caught the first bus that came along, and Mr. Pink-Whistle got in with them. The bus would soon pass his own house, so that was very convenient for him.

The Twistys saw the little man opposite them and heard him humming a little tune. Mrs. Twisty suddenly noticed his pointed ears, and she nudged her husband.

"Look! That man's half a brownie. Look at his ears. Oh, Twisty-do you think he had anything to do with that upset at the market?"

Pink-Whistle saw them looking at him, and he grinned to himself. Aha! The Twistys wouldn't play such tricks any more! They would be very, very careful in future.

He took out his packet of fish and sniffed at it. Then he looked at Twisty. "I bought this at the market to-day," he said, "and do you know, though it only weighs a pound and a half, the fellow who sold it to me said it weighed two pounds. And . . . ."

But the Twistys had leapt out of the bus and gone. They had recognised that Voice. Oooooh! They were too scared to ride in the bus any longer. Where they went to nobody knows and certainly nobody cares.

Pink-Whistle chuckled. "Another thing put right!" he said. "Won't old Sooty laugh when he hears this tale!"

And Sooty certainly did!

THE MEAN LITTLE BOY

THERE
was once a mean little boy called Wilfred. He took other children's toys away and wouldn't give them back. He pinched the little girls when no grown-up was about. He hit the little boys, and sometimes threw their caps right up into the trees so that they couldn't get them.

Wilfred was big and rather strong for his age, so it wasn't much good trying to stop him. All that the other children could do was to run away when they saw him.

But one day little Janet didn't run away quickly enough. She was playing with her tricycle in the street and Wilfred saw her. He loved riding on tricycles because he hadn't got one himself—so up he ran and caught hold of the handlebar.

"'Get off, Janet. I want a ride," said Wilfred.

"No," said Janet. "You are much bigger than I am, and my mother - I mustn't let bigger children ride my little tricycle in case they break it."

"Well, Pm jolly well going to ride it!" said Wilfred. He dragged Janet off her tricycle and she fell on the ground. Wilfred was always so rough. Then he got on the little tricycle himself and rode off quickly n the street, ringing the bell loudly.

My word, how quickly he went! You should have seen him. All the other children skipped out of the way, and even the grown-ups did, too. Ting-a-ling-a-ling! went the bell—ting-a-ling-a-ling!

Wilfred came to where the street began to go down a little hill. On he went, just as fast—and then he came to a roadway. He tried to stop, but he couldn't. Over the kerb he went, crash! The tricycle fell and Wilfred fell too,

He didn't hurt himself—but the tricycle was quite broken! The handlebar was off, the bell was spoilt and wouldn't ring, and one of the pedals was broken!

"YOU HORRID BOY. YOU'VE BROKEN MY TRICYCLE," CRIED THE LITTLE GIRL.

A little fat man with pointed ears and green eyes saw the accident. It was Mr. Pink-Whistle, of course, trotting along as usual to see what bad things in the world he could put right.

He hurried up to the boy who had fallen, meaning to pick him up and comfort him, but before he could get there a little girl ran up and began to scold him, crying bitterly all the time.

"You horrid boy, Wilfred! Now you've broken my tricycle and I did love it so much. My mother will be very angry with me because you rode it. I shan't be able to get it mended, and it will have to be put away in the shed and never ridden any more!"

And Janet cried bucketfuls of tears all down herself till her dress was quite damp. The other children came running up to see what had happened. They glared at Wilfred, who made a face and slapped Janet because she cried so loudly.

"It's a silly tricycle anyway!" said Wilfred. "Stupid baby one. Good gracious, I might have broken my leg, falling over like that!"

He stalked off, whistling, leaving the others to pick up the tricycle and to comfort poor Janet.

"Horrid boy!" said Tom "Don't cry, Janet."

"Yes, but it isn't fair!" wept Janet. "It's my tricycle, and he took it away from me—and now it's broken and my mother will be so cross."

Mr. Pink-Whistle was sorry for the little girl. He walked up to the children and patted Janet's golden head.

"Now, now, don't cry any more," he said. "Maybe I can mend your tricycle. Tell me some more about the boy who broke it."

Well, you should have heard the things that came pouring out about Wilfred, the mean boy! Mr. Pink-Whistle didn't care whether it was telling tales or not—he just had to know about him. And soon he knew so much that a big frown came above his green eyes and he pursed up his pink mouth.

"Hmmmm," said Mr. Pink-Whistle, deep down in his throat. "I must see into this. That boy wants punishing. But first we will mend your tricycle, little girl."

Well, Mr. Pink-Whistle took the broken tricycle along to a bicycle shop, and soon it was as good as new. The handlebar was put on again very firmly. A new bell was bought and fixed on. It was much better than the other one. The pedal was nicely mended—and then Janet got on her tricycle and rode off in delight.

"Oh, thank you!" she cried. "But I do hope I don't meet Wilfred! He will want to ride my tricycle again and break it!"

"I'll look after Wilfred!" said Mr. Pink-Whistle. And then, in his very extraordinary and sudden way, he disappeared! One minute he was there—and the next he wasn't. But really and truly he was there—but quite invisible, because, as you know, he was half-magic.

He had seen Wilfred coming along again—and Mr, Pink-Whistle meant to watch that small boy and see all the things he did! Yes— Wilfred wasn't going to have a very good time now.

Wilfred strolled along, hands in pockets, making faces at children he met. When he met Kenneth, who was eating a rosy apple, Wilfred stopped.

"Give me that apple!" he said.

"No!" said Kenneth, putting the apple behind his back. Wilfred snatched at it—and it rolled into the mud so that nobody could eat it at all!

Kenneth yelled. Wilfred grinned. Mr. Pink-Whistle frowned. The little fat man bought another apple at the fruit-shop and slipped it into Kenneth's pocket without being seen. He would find it there when he got home—what a lovely surprise!

Then Mr. Pink-Whistle suddenly became visible again, and walked into a shop. He bought several rather large sheets of white paper, somepins, and some black chalk. He stood by a wall and quickly wrote something in big letters on a sheet of paper.

"GIVE ME THAT APPLE," SAID WILFRED.

Then he disappeared suddenly—but a very strange thing happened. On Wilfred's back a large sheet of white paper suddenly appeared, and was gently pinned there so that Wilfred didn't know. On the paper was written a single sentence in big black letters:

“I  KNOCKED  KENNETH'S APPLE INTO THE  MUD.”

Well, Wilfred went along the street, humming gaily, not knowing that anything was on his back at all. But very soon all the children knew it. First one saw it, then another—and soon a big crowd was following Wilfred, giggling hard.

Wilfred heard them and turned round.

"What's the joke?" he asked.

"You're the joke!" said Harry.

"You stop giggling and tell me how I'm the joke!" said Wilfred fiercely.

"Who knocked Kenneth's apple into the mud?" called Jenny.

"How do you know I did?" cried Wilfred. "I suppose that baby Kenneth has been telling tales. Wait till I see him again!"

"No, he hasn't told us—you told us yourself," giggled Doris.

"I didn't," said Wilfred.

"Look on your back!" shouted Lennie.

Wilfred screwed his head round and looked over his shoulder. He caught sight of something white on his back. He dragged at his coat and pulled off the paper. He read it and went red with rage.

"Who dared to pin this on my back!" he shouted. "I'll shake him till his teeth rattle!"

Everyone shook their heads. No—they hadn't pinned the paper on Wilfred's back, though they would have liked to, if they had dared.

Wilfred threw the paper on to the ground and stamped on it. "If anyone does that to me again, they'll be sorry for themselves!" he said. fiercely. "So just look out!"