Layton Neal - Uncle Gobb and the Plot Plot

BLOOMSBURY CHILDRENS BOOKS

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This electronic edition published in 2018 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

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First published in Great Britain in 2018 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

Text copyright Michael Rosen, 2018

Illustrations copyright Neal Layton, 2018

Michael Rosen has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Author of this work

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ISBN: 978-1-4088-7394-6 (HB)
ISBN: 978-1-4088-7395-3 (PB)
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For Emma, Elsie and Emile

CHAPTER 1

The Middle of the Night

It was the middle of the night.

If you have read what this chapter is called ( The Middle of the Night ), you already know that it was the middle of the night. If you didnt read what this chapter is called, you would have missed that it was called The Middle of the Night . No worries, because now you do know that it was the middle of the night.

Malcolm was fast asleep.

He was fast asleep. Then, all of a sudden, he wasnt fast asleep. He was awake.

And it was still the middle of the night. No one likes waking up in the middle of the night. Apart from owls.

A NOTE ON OWLS:

They wake up, fly about, catch mice, eat them, and then a few hours later, do a sicky thing where bits of the mice theyve eaten come back up again.

Im not telling you this for any old reason.

Im telling you this because this is what Malcolm was lying awake thinking about. He was asking himself, WHY do owls sick up bits of mice?

He lay on his back, staring at the ceiling. And he remembered the words owl pellets from a book he read called Great Owl Pellets of the World . Imagine, he thought, if instead of that time when I was on TV and the man asked me what was the capital of Italy and I said, Ponky ... what if, instead of that, the man had asked me, What is the proper name for owl sick? I could have said, Owl pellets! and I would have been right.

Ah, if only.

Just then the dog barked.

Wow, thought Malcolm, still lying on his back in bed, that IS strange. I told him not to bark. I remember quite clearly saying to him, Dont bark tonight. And there he is barking.

Then Malcolm heard a dragging sound. Something was being dragged.

The dog barked again, and following that, someone or something said, Shh!

Then came the dragging sound again.

All that interesting stuff about owl pellets just flew out of Malcolms mind.

(You probably dont want to think about owl pellets flying out of someones mind, so if you dont want to, just stop thinking about it. If Malcolm had been thinking about weasels, they would have flown out of his mind too.)

Weasel 1: Hello again.

Weasel 2: Looks like were back again, with our weasel words.

Weasel 1: No, we dont say weasel words, remember?

Weasel 2: Dont we?

Weasel 1: No, were weasels. Its humans who say weasel words, not weasels. We dont actually talk. Except when people like Neal Layton do drawings of us talking.

Weasel 2: Oh yes, I remember: we dont talk. By the way, what are weasel words?

Weasel 1: That was explained in another Uncle Gobb book. If you really want to know, just look it up in there.

Weasel 2: All right, all right. No need to get ratty about it.

Weasel 1: Im not being ratty. Im not a rat. Im a weasel.

Weasel 2: Me too. Im a weasel.

Weasel 1: I know youre a weasel. You dont need to tell me youre a weasel.

Then came the dragging sound again.

Malcolm waited for the dog to bark.

The dog didnt bark that time.

Aha, thought Malcolm, me telling the dog not to bark has worked. The dog did after all listen carefully, has remembered what I said and is now doing what I told him to do. Which is not bark.

Then came the dragging sound again.

Malcolm decided that the dragging sound was scary.

Malcolm remembered a horror story he read once about a giant cucumber. It wasnt a living cucumber. It was a dead cucumber that had become a ghost. And in the middle of the night, this ghost-cucumber couldnt sleep.

So it walked about the house dragging something. I think it was chains, Malcolm thought but then why would a ghost-cucumber be dragging chains? If there was a ghost-cucumber dragging something, surely it would be something that cucumbers hang out with, like a bit of lettuce?