Rude Stories Read online

  Text copyright © 2010 by Jan Andrews

  Illustrations copyright © 2010 by Francis Blake

  Published in Canada by Tundra Books,

  75 Sherbourne Street, Toronto, Ontario M5A 2P9

  Published in the United States by Tundra Books of Northern New York,

  P.O. Box 1030, Plattsburgh, New York 12901

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2009938093

  All rights reserved. The use of any part of this publication reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, or stored in a retrieval system, without the prior written consent of the publisher – or, in case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, a licence from the Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency – is an infringement of the copyright law.

  Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

  Andrews, Jan, 1942-

  Rude stories / by Jan Andrews ; illustrations by Francis Blake.

  Short stories.

  eISBN: 978-1-77049-092-5

  I. Blake, Francis II. Title.

  PS8551.N37R83 2010 jC813′.54 C2009-905856-1

  We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program (BPIDP) and that of the Government of Ontario through the Ontario Media Development Corporation’s Ontario Book Initiative. We further acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council for our publishing program.

  Design: Terri Nimmo

  v3.1

  To Kathy L. with thanks.

  J.A.

  For Alex, who knows why.

  F.B.

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter One: Mr. Mosquito

  Chapter Two: The Skeleton in the Rocking Chair

  Chapter Three: A Red One, A Green One, and A Blue One

  Chapter Four: A Tale of Rude Tails

  Chapter Five: Ella and Bella

  Chapter Six: The Magic Bottom Fan

  Chapter Seven: Angelina Speaks Out

  Chapter Eight: Beware the Spirits

  A Note on Sources

  A rude story you’re looking for, is it?

  I don’t think you’re going to want me.

  I don’t shoot my peas at my brother –

  At least not when others can see.

  I may rant and rage in the mornings.

  I may rant and rage at the night.

  In between that I’m truly quite lovely.

  It’s my granny that’s sometimes a fright.

  Once! That’s how all good stories start now, isn’t it?

  Once, in the long ago times, when donkeys walked on their hind legs and pigs went around with forks stuck into their backsides all ready to be turned into your dinner. Once, in those times, there was this creature who seemed like he was trying out for the rudest being in all the world.

  His name was Mr. Mosquito. You can guess why that was, of course.

  Oh, he was an awful thing. He never had a kind word to say to anybody. He never did anything you might call nice. Just about every day there was someone knocking on the door of his home to complain about him. The worst of it was, he thought he was the strongest, smartest, handsomest being on all the face of all the earth. He couldn’t bear it that anyone might be better than him. He just could not.

  There were all these travelers going around in those days. One of them showed up in the village where Mr. Mosquito lived. The traveler told everyone how in a deep, dark forest in a far-off land there was an ancient castle. In that castle there was a certain Ms. Candle. She’d been there forever, so he said. Men had come and men had gone, but no one had been able to put out Ms. Candle’s flame.

  When Mr. Mosquito heard this, he leaped up in excitement. He flexed the muscles on his little mosquito arms. He yelled out about how he’d be able to do what no one else had, and then he went home to his mother.

  “You get me together some food,” he ordered her. “You make sure it’s a lot, and you wrap it up tight.”

  His mother did as she was told. She seemed to think she had to. She worked all night, cooking meat and potatoes and baking bread for him. She put the food into a bag, although there was hardly anything left for her or for his father. There was almost nothing in the house.

  Mr. Mosquito didn’t thank her; he just set out. He walked and he walked and he walked. He was ready to walk forever almost, he was so certain he’d be the mighty one.

  At last he saw the castle ahead of him. The door had a big black knocker on it. Mr. Mosquito didn’t use it. He went right on in.

  “Ms. Candle,” he called out.

  He got no answer.

  “You must come to greet me!” he shouted.

  Still nothing happened.

  “I shall have to find you then,” he proclaimed.

  He walked down a long, long hallway. He came to a room with a high, high ceiling. Ms. Candle sat in the middle of the room, perched in a candleholder with a tall, tall stem.

  Mr. Mosquito let out a cough to announce his presence to her. Ms. Candle took no notice. He didn’t like that; he didn’t like it at all. He gave her a whistle, one of those nasty ones.

  “Oy!” he shouted.

  Her flame didn’t even flicker.

  “I am here to put an end to your eternal brightness,” he insisted. She was ever so calm and still.

  “I am Mr. Mosquito and you are going to get it,” he threatened.

  If anything, her lovely yellow flame rose higher. That made him mad. He went toward her. He swelled up his cheeks to blow her out. He huffed and he puffed. Her flame bent sideways.

  “Aha!” he cried in triumph.

  Her flame stood up.

  “I shall punch you,” he bellowed.

  He didn’t waste any time. He drew back his fist and slammed it into her. The only thing was, he hadn’t given any thought to how her flame might be hot. His hand got burned. It shriveled up to nothing. It was turned into this blackened kind of a stump on the end of his arm.

  He went home a whole lot more quickly than he’d come. He ran all the way, shrieking, “I’m hurt. I’m hurt. I’m hurt.”

  His mother took one look. She knew there was nothing she could do. She brought Mr. Mosquito to his father. His father knew he couldn’t do anything either. They went with Mr. Mosquito to the doctor.

  The doctor saw what had happened. He knew there was no fixing it.

  “You’ll have to have a new hand. I’ll have to graft it onto you,” he declared.

  “Will the new hand be better than the old one?” Mr. Mosquito asked him.

  “It might and it might not,” said the doctor. “I don’t have any mosquito hands in stock at the moment. I only have chicken hands, or maybe I should say chicken feet.”

  A chicken foot seemed better than nothing, so Mr. Mosquito let the doctor stitch it on. You’d think that would have put a stop to his nonsense, but it didn’t. The chicken foot was so big it filled him with new boldness. Off he went to visit Ms. Candle again.

  He walked that long distance. He went through that big door. He begged and he pleaded and he threatened. He said Ms. Candle needed a good slapping. He reached out and took a swipe at her. Another hand got burned. It was a crisp, I’m telling you.

  He knew what to do now though, didn’t he? He went back to the doctor and had a chicken foot stitched there as well. Somehow that made him even more determined. Back he went to the castle for another try.

  Did he think how Ms. Candle had never done any harm to anyone? Did he think how beautiful her light was? He didn’t.

  Before he was finished, he had six chicken feet, four chicken wings, and
a chicken rump.

  After the twelfth visit, he had to get a chicken head stitched on. That’s when he finally put an end to the whole business. Besides, he was too busy being famous, strutting down the streets with people looking at him, telling everyone he was something of a miracle. Girls were swooning over him even. He liked that. He liked it a great deal.

  Still, he wasn’t above thinking he might also like a change. He was out for a little stroll one day. He saw a man swimming in the river. The man was skinny-dipping. He had nothing on. He was in distress.

  “A thief has stolen my clothes from where I left them,” he called out. He was weeping almost. “I have nothing to put on myself. How am I going to get out of here? People will recognize me. What am I going to do?”

  Turned out, he was the local mayor, a person of importance. Mr. Mosquito saw his chance.

  “Say I lent you my head,” he suggested. “No one would recognize you then.”

  “Would you do that?” the mayor asked.

  “I would do it willingly,” said Mr. Mosquito. “I would need something to put in its place, of course. I would suggest that you might lend me yours.”

  The mayor was out of the water in an instant. He came clambering up the riverbank. Still, he did have some wits about him.

  “Our arrangement is only until I get home, isn’t it?” he asked.

  “Certainly, certainly,” said Mr. Mosquito.

  (You’ll notice Mr. Mosquito was talking a bit differently now.)

  The mayor took the chicken head. He took it gladly. He gave Mr. Mosquito the one that was his. He started to say how grateful he was.

  “Do not thank me too soon,” Mr. Mosquito told him.

  “Too soon?” asked the mayor.

  “I believe we are being hasty,” said Mr. Mosquito. “I believe you might be known by your feet.”

  “Might I exchange those also?” asked the mayor. “It will be the same as with the head. It will be until I get home. It will be no longer.”

  “But,” said Mr. Mosquito, “we cannot be too careful.”

  “Too careful?”

  “There is the matter of your hands and your arms.”

  The mayor was looking less like himself every minute.

  “There is also your rump to attend to.”

  The mayor didn’t know whether to talk or cluck.

  “We will meet up later,” Mr. Mosquito told him.

  He left the mayor standing there with his chicken mouth hanging open. Mr. Mosquito went to the mayor’s house. He took on all the mayor’s duties. He dressed himself up in the mayor’s finery. He found out the mayor was about to be married to this pretty young lady. He decided he’d marry her instead.

  The wedding was a grand affair. There was food set out on groaning tables, there was music, and there was dancing. Everyone came from miles around. Mr. Mosquito was having a high old time when the real mayor showed up. Of course, the real mayor wanted his body back. He wanted his bride as well.

  Who was going to believe someone with a chicken head, chicken wings, and chicken legs? Mr. Mosquito certainly wasn’t going to bother with him. Why would he even think of doing that?

  The mayor was desperate. He went round talking to everyone.

  “I’m not really what I look like,” he kept saying.

  People were fed up with him. It seemed as if he was going to spoil the evening.

  “Off with you or you’ll find yourself stuffed, roasted, and being served for supper,” Mr. Mosquito told him.

  Finally, the mayor left. You’d think that would be enough. You’d think Mr. Mosquito would be satisfied, but he wasn’t. He had the village boys run after the mayor and pelt him with rotten tomatoes and kick him on his chicken rump.

  I wish I could tell you Mr. Mosquito got what he deserved at some point, but I’m afraid I have no proof of that. Truth to tell, he might be the mayor of the very place you’re living in. He might now. Who can say?

  A rude story, you tell me you’re wanting?

  Well, surely I can’t be the one.

  I don’t often steal all the raisins

  When we have sticky cinnamon buns.

  I don’t drink my pop all that quickly,

  I don’t make it come down my nose –

  Unless there’s an aunt come to visit,

  The one with the frills and the bows.

  Rude. Rude. Rude.

  What I’m going to tell next is a story about a woman who was so rude she wouldn’t even stay in her grave the way she was supposed to. She wouldn’t even accept the right and proper rules for dying. For her, there was no lying quiet and unmoving in her coffin beneath the earth, with her eyes and her mouth shut still and tight.

  This was once too, of course. It was a different once though. It was the once when monkeys hadn’t even begun to grow their tails yet, when worms came wriggling up out of the dirt to greet you in the morning, and when earwigs and slugs and snails and all the world’s creepy crawlies could be counted on to say hello.

  I don’t think she was related to Mr. Mosquito, but she might have been. Folks from all over came to attend her funeral. They all knew she was so nasty the cat wouldn’t even scratch her for fear it got blood poisoning. They all wanted to be certain she was safely in her grave. They watched the coffin being lowered. They went home satisfied.

  Her poor old husband went home too. He’d hardly got himself indoors. He hadn’t even had time to make himself a cup of tea. There she came, bold as brass, walking into the kitchen in all her burial finery. She settled herself in the rocking chair. (It was the only comfortable chair in the house, I might add. Her husband had been looking forward to a turn in it for a change.)

  Rock, rock, rock she went, and with every rock there was a squeak.

  The afternoon passed by and then the evening. Didn’t matter how many times her husband told her she ought not to be there. Didn’t matter how often he reminded her she’d better be moving along.

  “I might be dead, but I’m not finished,” she kept saying. “I’ll sit here forever, if I like.”

  Night fell. He went to bed without her.

  He heard the rocking and squeaking first thing when he woke up. It was still going on. Down the stairs he came. He’d never been able to leave her when she was alive, now had he? He certainly couldn’t leave her when she was dead.

  His life now, though – it was a great deal worse than it had been. Apart from anything else, it seemed she’d forgotten his name. If she’d just gone on calling him a blathering idiot instead of Harry the way she’d done before, he wouldn’t have minded, but she couldn’t seem to stop at that any longer.

  “You old clinchpoop,” she’d say to him.

  “You cockamamy flapdoodler.”

  “You shivering, withering cesspit.”

  “You ninny-pated crow foot.”

  On and on and on.

  She was after him for the house cleaning. “Do you think because I’m dead I can’t see there’s a hair in that corner?”

  She was after him for the cooking. “Do you think because I’m dead I don’t need to eat?”

  She was after him for the dishes. “Do you think because I’m dead I didn’t notice you only rinsed that pot twice over?”

  He was at his wit’s end. It was true he could see she was shrinking. First her clothes were hanging off her, then her skin. Then she didn’t have any flesh on her. There were just her bones.

  But that was almost worse still.

  Rock, rock, rock, rock.

  “You crab-faced bandicoot.”

  Her jaw was going at him.

  “You grub-toed homunculus.”

  “You lug-loaf milksop, galoot of a lummox.”

  Rock, rock, rock, rock. Squeak, squeak, squeak, squeak. Rattle, rattle, rattle went her bones.

  No one came to visit, of course. Why would they? Who wants to be sitting down for a nice, polite conversation with the remains of a corpse?

  When Harry heard a knock he was happy. He was even m
ore happy when he saw a fiddler at the door. He thought he might like some music to lighten his load a little.

  “Come in,” he said. “Come in.”

  The fiddler got a surprise when he saw Harry’s wife in the rocking chair, but he didn’t say anything. He reckoned he’d better not. Harry offered the fiddler a bite of food and a sup. For some reason, Harry’s wife was silent – except for the rocking and the squeaking and the rattling, of course. Maybe she was sulking. I don’t know.

  “Could you give us a tune?” asked Harry.

  The fiddler gave the wife a look. It was cold and dark outside. He wasn’t ready to be going on yet. He took his fiddle out of its case.

  “A jig or a reel?” he asked Harry.

  Harry thought for a moment. “A jig,” he said at last.

  “A jig it is,” said the fiddler.

  Out came his bow. Up went the fiddle under his chin. The notes of his music went soaring through the kitchen. Something weird happened. Harry’s wife’s face (well, what was left of it) lit up.

  “Time for some fun,” she sang out.

  Harry wasn’t expecting that. Still, he wasn’t about to interfere with her enjoyment. After all, she was snapping her bony fingers. She was tapping her bony toes.

  “Fun, fun, fun, fun,” she was crying.

  Not only that, now she was up and dancing. Harry had never seen anything like it. She was moving in perfect time.

  The fiddler came to the end of his tune.

  “Should I keep on playing?” he demanded.

  “Did I tell you to stop?” roared Harry’s wife.

  Harry gave him a nod. The fiddler started in on a reel.

  “Do you have anything faster?” Harry’s wife asked.

  “Much, much faster,” answered the fiddler.

  “Fun, fun, fun, fun,” Harry’s wife yelled out.

  The fiddler played “The Olympic Reel.” He played it as fast as he could. Harry’s wife was flinging her arms and legs about by that time. She was still in perfect rhythm, but she was looking like a fir tree in a gale.