THE BOY WHO WISHED




1.


Bentley Stamp was the angriest, frowniest child in the town of
Lower Kneebottle.
He shouted at puppies.
He threw his suppers on the floor.
He always did just what his parents told him not to do.
He broke all of his toys.
He scribbled all over his schoolbooks.
He had no friends. What’s more, he didn’t want any.
Every weekend, he would simply sit on his bed and scowl at the wall all day long, being in a bad temper.
Nothing was ever good enough for Bentley. Not even the name of his town.

One Sunday morning, Bentley woke up and frowned, as usual.
At the end of his bed was standing an irritating little green man,
about the size of a loaf of bread up on end.



2.

Bentley shouted at the green man, "Who are you?" and jumped up and
down in his stupid pyjamas, which he hated.

"I’m the Wish Woogle,” said the green man calmly.

"I’ve been sent by my superiors to make you happy, since we have heard that
you are always such an angry storm cloud.
In fact, it is my task to grant you three very special wishes.
You may wish anything you like, and I will make your wishes comes true."

"Three wishes aren’t enough!!" shouted the boy. "I want more wishes!"

"Nevertheless", said the Wish Woogle, "you have three wishes.
Each will come true, just as you wish them.
So, young man, you ought to choose your wishes, and your words, wisely.
What will be your first wish, for today?"

Bentley Stamp thought, and thought some more. He frowned.
What was the thing he most wished
for, in all the nasty world…


3.

And suddenly…Bentley was invisible.

Ignoring the watchful Woogle, he stamped downstairs, after leaving a badly – spelled note for his parents: GARN TO BULLY SIMON AT HIZ HOUS > : - with a cross face next to it.
Now he knew that his mum and dad wouldn’t miss him. He wouldn’t miss them,
that was for sure. Who needs parents, thought Bentley, as he marched out of the front door, invisibly; nothing but bother, parents.
For the whole day, Bentley crept around in secret, yelling ‘Boo!’
right behind elderly people, while they were sipping their tea.
He stole sweets from Mr Corcoran’s Aulde Cake Shoppe and threw them
at the postman, who thought bees were attacking him,
and hurtled up the street at quite a lick.
Bentley barked at cats while they were sleeping in the sun.
Whatever he could do with his invisibility that was mischievous or mean,
is just what Bentley did.



4.

Later, Bentley looked around and saw that he didn’t know quite where
he was. He had been so preoccupied all day that he had wandered far from home. What rotten luck, he thought, as he stomped around on someone’s carefully tended lawn and kicked over the sign saying, "Do not walk on grass".

He was getting crosser by the minute, because he kept tripping over things with his invisible feet.
"Whippets!" he yelled. He was pretty red in the face
(although no one could see that).
Then his anger faded a little - and he began to feel afraid.
It was already 5 ‘o clock, and he had no idea where he was.

Bentley marched up to the nearest person he found, and said
"You there! Where is 39 Scarry Road? And be quick about it!"

The old flower seller he had suddenly spoken to ran off up the street -
what with hearing voices out of the air and all.
So did the next ten people Bentley shouted at. No one would help him,
Simply because no one could see him.




5.

In the end, he found himself sitting alone and invisible on a park bench, while the sun began to sink over the rooftops.
He was very relieved when, at long last, the Wish Woogle suddenly reappeared in front of him.

He tried to pretend not to be glad to see the little green man.
The Woogle mustn’t think Bentley needed him around! He tried to put on his most angry face, as he followed the Woogle out of the park, across town, and back to his house, where he arrived just in time for supper. And yes, of course the Woogle had by then undone the invisibility wish!

6.

The next morning found Bentley once again staring suspiciously at the
little green Woogle, who was sitting at the end of his bed, puffing on a long, thin pipe and paging through a book of some sort. He looked as if he had been there for a long time.
"So", said the Woogle with a slow grin. "Yesterday was just an introduction to my Wish powers. You’ve two wishes left. What might your second
wish be, young human?"

"Er…" said Bentley, not at all sure he should say anything, after the previous day’s experience. In the end, though, his greed grew bigger than his doubt.
So what did he ask for next? Can you hazard a guess?


7.

"Today”, said Bentley, “I demand…a tiger to ride to school on!"

"Very well" said the Woogle, “this you shall have. Do not fear, this tiger will do no harm to you, Bentley.” With that, he disappeared in a puff of green smoke.
At the same time, Bentley was startled by a very low growl coming from his toy cupboard; a growl that rattled the windows in their frames.
Then the door swung open, and into his room loped fifteen feet of stripy tiger.

The tiger sat down next to Bentley’s bed and waited, its eyes gleaming like emeralds in firelight. Meanwhile, Bentley’s eyes were as round as saucers. His very own tiger.
Wait until the bullies at school saw this. They’d never laugh at Bentley again. He ate his breakfast, brushed his teeth and jumped
into his school kit, all in a flash. He was going to school on a tiger!

8.

It took Bentley some time to climb up onto the patient tiger.
Then he prodded it with his foot and it set off down the stairs, out of the house and down the street.

Each of its steps was as long as four of Bentley’s normal strides.
Naturally the tiger caused quite a stir in the town of Lower Kneebottle that morning, where creatures were generally the size of hedgehogs.
The tiger growled at two chickens in the Browns’ garden, causing them to fly
right across town. That’s right, they flew. It rubbed its back
against Mr Jameson’s little red postal van, causing the car to topple over onto its side (Mr Jameson was already two miles away by that time, and still running).

It stopped at the bakery and gobbled up five fresh loaves of
bread in two mouthfuls.
By the time they arrived at the school, Bentley had lost his fear of the tiger, and was hooting with laughter at all the trouble it had caused.


9.

"Stay here!" said Bentley to the tiger, when they got to the front of
his school. "I have to go to assembly now and you can’t come, because you’re too big." The tiger lay down and yawned a yawn the size of a dinner plate.
Bentley walked proudly through the school doors, while five hundred school
Children, utterly astonished, stared out of the windows, eyes wide.

Soon, Bentley was seated in the school hall, along with his class. All the
children were fidgeting and whispering, because they knew that there was a
huge tiger loafing around somewhere outside. The teachers, unfortunately,
knew nothing of the tiger just yet, and simply told everyone to hush up.
.

Bentley felt very smug, because all the children were eyeing him with
awe, rather than throwing sticky bits of paper at him, like they usually did.
Even Petunia Winscott, the most beautiful girl at Kneebottle Comprehensive,
was looking at Bentley as if she finally realized that he existed.


10.

However, what Bentley didn’t realise was that the school’s mascot,
a beautiful blue, yellow and red Amazon macaw, very rare, had just managed to open its cage and was fluttering all about the school, enjoying its newfound freedom.

The much beloved parrot had been a part of school
life for ten years. Its name was McDuck, and all the children loved McDuck for the way he’d shout “Fire! Fire!” whenever teachers walked by his cage. McDuck wasn’t afraid of anything - even tigers.

Once boring old assembly wrapped up,
the schoolchildren bundled out of the school hall to
go and spy on Bentley’s giant tiger. The teachers, unaware, went off for their morning tea before first class.
Proud Bentley marched ahead of all the children, quite happy with all the attention.


11.

Petunia Winscott was walking at his side, which made Bentley puff up like a parrot. …Did I say parrot?
Where was the newly freed McDuck just then, anyway? Can you guess?

When Bentley got to where he had left the tiger; where it was supposed to be – it wasn’t. He and the other schoolchildren gaped at the spot and looked around fearfully. Some climbed up nearby trees or ran back to their classrooms. A tiger was one thing. A hidden, disobedient tiger was quite another.
Then the children heard a loud voice exclaim from nearby.
"Tiger, tiger, burning bright. Fire!"

With dismay, Bentley saw a blue feather drifting around the corner,
to settle on the ground near the children.

He rushed around the corner, to see exactly what he had feared.
12.

There sat the tiger, purring as it licked its paws lazily.

"What have you done!" shouted Bentley, as loud as a lion
(but not a tiger). "You’ve eaten the school mascot, haven’t you,
you naughty tiger” To the childrens’ astonishment, he walked up to the big cat and punched it on the shoulder. It looked at him.

The schoolchildren looked at the tiger.
They looked at Bentley…then back at the tiger. Then, as their eyes settled once more on Bentley…they began to get angry. Very angry.

Soon, Bentley was clutching once more to his tiger’s ears, as the big
cat hurtled pell-mell out of the school gates and away up the hill, five
hundred angry children hurling sticky buns and marbles after it, and all
the horrified teachers running after the schoolchildren.

When they had finally seen the tiger, they had all dropped their teacups on the floor in horror. After the tiger and the children and the teachers was running a little black dog, just for fun.

13.

After hurtling away across to the other side of town, Bentley leaped down from the tiger’s back and began to shoo it away into a nearby grove of trees, which took some time. The tiger was reluctant to move, and pushing a 15-foot long tiger by its rump is harder than you might think. But he did it. Then Bentley shouted after it: "And stay away!" then stomped off towards home (having to ask directions along the way). He was tired, and about as cross as a volcano on the verge of erupting. Just wait until he saw that troublesome Wish Woogle again…

The next morning found Bentley crouched behind his bedroom door with a
big potato sack in his hands. As soon as the Woogle popped into fresh air at the end of his bed, as he knew it would, he pounced on it with a yell and shouted, "Got you!" Soon, he had the Woogle neatly tied up in the brown sack and felt very pleased indeed. Now he’d show who was who, as far as being the boss went.


14.

"Right", said the boy. "No more trickery. I have a third wish, and you
had better make sure that it works out exactly as I want it to. Right?
Or it’s the stew pot for you."
“Quite so” said the Woogle, tapping Bentley on the back of his knee.
He yelped and whirled around, to find the green man munching on a small purple fruit of some kind. He most definitely seemed to not be in the sack any more. “And what, pray tell, will your third wish be?” inquired the green-hued creature.

Bentley was extremely cross, and shouted, “I just want everybody in this dratted world to go away, forever. Everybody! And that includes green trolls who appear in puffs of smoke.”

"Do you mean for today", said the Woogle, “…or forever? There is a difference. Consider carefully, Bentley.”
“Forever and ever and ever!” shouted the boy. “I don’t need anyone!”

15.

“Well. If that is truly what you wish – and I fear it’s too late to go back on your wish, since you have now spoken the words…farewell.”

Suddenly, Bentley was alone. Very alone. He walked slowly downstairs,
to find no Mrs Stamp in the kitchen, baking scones.
No Mr Stamp, grumbling at the newspaper headlines.
In fact, as Bentley saw when he ran out the front door, nobody at all.

Bentley was the only person in the whole world. For a moment he wondered where the Wish Woogle might have put one billion people, but he pushed the thought out of his mind and strolled into town.


He stole toys. He ate chocolate cake from the bakery until he felt like
bursting. He made himself mayor of the town, then president of the
world. He splashed about in the town fountain, which had a sign saying
"Please stay out of the fountain.”

16.

Bentley was so preoccupied all day that it took him a while to notice the silence all around him, or the long shadows as evening once more approached.
It seemed that the Woogle had not only made all the people vanish, but also dogs, cats, hedgehogs, pigeons…every living thing. Bentley was the entire population of the world’s living creatures. This frightened him, just a little.
He stamped around in circles for a bit, and decided what to do.
Confound that rotten sun! Why couldn’t it just stay up?
It had been a marvelous day, and Bentley was glad to be president of the
whole world, only …it wasn’t much good if there was nobody to boss about, was it?


"Woogle!" shouted Bentley. "I’ve had enough fun, now.
"You may return."

All that returned was the echo of his voice, bouncing off silent, shadowy buildings. Other than that, all Bentley could hear was the tick of the clock above the town hall.
No Wish Woogle appeared. For the first time: no Woogle.

17.

Bentley gulped. This might be a problem. He started walking back in the general direction of home. He wasn’t quite sure where he was going, but there was nobody to ask for directions. He clomped and stamped through the empty darkening streets, growing a little more worried with every step.

Then he heard a familiar sound that made his hair stand on end: a low, thundering growl, from somewhere among the quiet buildings.
Oh dear, he thought; the tiger. The one he had shouted at and been mean too, the day before.
If only he had been nicer to it, for it seemed now be the other half of the entire world’s population. It might be hungry too; since Bentley had wished away anything a tiger would like to eat (you can guess the sort of things) just that morning. Also, it was no longer under the power of Bentley’s wish. His second wish had ended. The tiger didn’t have to listen to Bentley now, at all. Oh dear, thought Bentley; why hadn’ t that dratted Woogle made the tiger disappear, along with himself!


18.

Bentley began to run, now a very frightened boy. As he ran around the corner of his street, however, he bounced off something that felt like a solid wall, yet…fluffy.
He dusted himself off., coughed and looked up…and up…and up.

Eyes glowing like emeralds in firelight. Stripes rippling in gold and charcoal.
The tiger from Bentley’s second wish looked down at him, as he cowered in its shadow. A street light above the tiger caught the edges of its fur, so that it looked almost to be aflame.
Slowly, very slowly, Bentley began to scoot slowly backwards, on his bottom. He knew the tiger could easily catch him if it wanted to.
He inched back, bit by bit, and then, in a flash, turned and ran.
The tiger was quicker.

The boy found himself dangling from one great paw, as the tiger held
him up quizzically in front of its face. Bentley could feel hot tiger breath on his cheeks.

19.

"Welll…", it growled, "Arrren’t you jussst the dinner for a hungry
tiger who wasss left abandoned in the woodsss?"

"You can talk?" said Bentley, astonished, and then –
"Ohpleasedon’teatme (gasp) IpromiseI’llbegoodfromnowon and (gasp)
IreallythinkI’dtasteawfulwouldn’tyouratherhaveacream (gasp) bun?



"Enough!", boomed the big cat, plunking Bentley onto the ground.
" You’lll be lucky if I don’t eat you in the next five minutes.
Nowww, let’s look at the situation. You have used up alll your wishes,
and you have wished away the Woogle too, the one person whooo can help you, along with everybody else in the world. You are in a real fix.
Thisss is quite a problem for you to…digesst, isn’t it?”

Bentley’s eyes began to water as he realized the position he now found himself in. “W-why are you still here, then?” he asked.
“Think of me,” said the tiger, “as one last chance for foolish boys.
I still haven’t decided whether to gobble you up, or help you, though. Hmmmmm…I wonder…”

20.

“Please”, said Bentley. “Please. I’ll do anything!” The tiger looked down at him, eyes now glimmering in the light of the moon.
“Bentley, if I do help you, there will be one condition."

“Fine!” said Bentley. “Er, what’s a condition?”

“It is a promise you are expected to honour,
if I agree to bring back my trusty servant, the Woogle.
And it isss thisss: You will try to be nicer from now on.
You will learn a simple lessson in life, which is that life returns to you what you give to life. If you arrre kind, life will treat you kindly and bring you good thingsss. If you are mean, then life will forever be just as horrid.
Do you ssseee?”
Bentley sort of did, but only just.
“AND” thundered the tiger “the minute you start to stamp and shout again, everrryone will disappear once more, and you will be left alone, invisible and surrounded by a world populated only by hungry tigersss.
And so shall you stay…unless they eat you.”



21,

Bentley thought and thought, and walked around (gently) in circles, until the stars were shining high over the town. The tiger just sat and licked its paws, watching him. Then it yawned a yawn loud enough to gobble up a small car.

So Bentley quickly said, in a very small voice, "Alright. I
agree. I promise to try and be a nicer boy from now on."
“Bravo” said the tiger.

Then the great cat opened his jaws and roared and roared, loud enough to be heard on the moon, had there been anybody at all up there.
Bentley lay down flat on the ground with his hands over his head, as the tiger’s voice boomed over silent towns and valleys. The noise seemed to last forever.


22.

Suddenly, the Woogle popped into the air in front of them, and fell
with a thud onto the ground. He picked himself up and bowed to the tiger a long, low bow.
“My liege” he said. The tiger nodded down at the Woogle. Just then, a bundle of feathers, blue and red, flew down and landed on the tiger’s shoulder.
“Hullo, McDuck” grinned the big cat. “Have a nice day?”

“Have a nice day, have a nice day!” agreed the parrot happily. Once again, Bentley was astonished. The tiger had never eaten the parrot at all!
The Woogle, meanwhile, eyed young Bentley for a time, looking him up and down, scratched its head and then said "So, you have had enough of wishes, have you? You’d like everything back the way it was, would you?"

"Yes please, sir", said tired, hungry, not--cross-at-all Bentley.

"And no more putting me in nasty sacks, eh?"

"Oh! Yes. I mean, no” stammered Bentley.

"Well then, so shall it be. Just remember your promise, boy."

“Tiger, tiger burning bright” trilled the parrot. “Fire! Fire!”

23.

The Woogle nodded at Bentley and leaped up onto the tiger’s back, as nimble as a mountain goat. Then the tiger smiled down at Bentley, and for the first time looked rather more cuddly than fearsome. “Goodbye, Bentley. You may go home, now.” With that, the tiger turned and padded away into the shadows, stopping briefly at Bentley’s school to return a somewhat overexcited McDuck to his cage outside headmaster’s office.
After that, the tiger and the Woogle went away, back to where they had come from, chatting as they walked.

Bentley, meanwhile, was overjoyed to hear the sounds of daily life once more, all around him.
Dishes clattered, motorcars hooted,
dogs barked and television sets hummed.
"Phew!" he said, very relieved to be back in the normal world. He began walking home.


24.

When he opened the door, he ran up to his mother and hugged her, somewhat to her surprise. “Hi mum!” he said.
Then he went through to the sitting room and hugged his grumbling
Father, who was buried nose deep in the evening edition. “Hullo, dad.”
Then he climbed upstairs to his room, to get ready for supper.

"I wonder what’s wrong with him?", said Mrs Stamp to Mr Stamp. "He’s seldom such a little gem. Maybe he’s coming down with something."
"Hmmpf?" said Mr Stamp, from somewhere deep in the recesses of
his paper.



Whether he succeeded in being the nicer person he had promised the tiger he’d be, is not within our power to know.
The Woogle knows, of course, and the tiger does, too.

Wherever they are, you can be sure they’re still keeping one eye on Bentley Stamp, and more recently, the other eye on a somewhat troublesome girl called Belinda Screech, in the seaside town of Badger’s Haunt.


The end of the tail.