(A novel about Slugs falling in love and killing each other but not necessarily in that order) By Mike Batt

Chapter 11: On with the Story

It was a beautiful cold, sunny morning on the edge of Don't Be So Ridiculous Valley, and the trees basked in that sort of sideways sunlight you get when the sun is low. Across the flat ground that sloped away from the valley (which was actually a hill, don't forget), there came the muted but clear sound of hammering, and of voices busily talking in the cold air. A soft, blue mist hung lazily over the river and outwards across the few houses and cottages that, provided you were looking at them, would lead the eye up towards the Farnsbarneses' tree house, situated some distance beyond, where the woodlands began again. If you weren't looking at them, this didn't happen.

There was a furtive atmosphere as squirreloid cart-pushers and slugs-on-wheels rushed between workers nailing and screwing, hammering and sawing. The trolls were the most efficient workers, the slugs the least efficient, for fairly obvious physical reasons, but in case you haven't been concentrating, the trolls had huge, muscular arms that hung down to the ground, and the slugs were just a tiny bit limbless. They did try, though.

Nigel and Ergo were conferring together over at the side of the trunk of the tree house.

"Gosh, Ergo, I'm so flipping pleased with myself I can hardly speak" said Nigel.

"Yes, well, you've done a wonderful job designing this lot", said Ergo, with genuine gratitude. "How long do you think it might be before it's all finished?"

"Well, not including painting, I'd say about another two days" said Nige.

"Great", said Ergo. "I'll tell Sodge to stand by to get the lads to start moving all the kit over from the camp site".

He stood back and looked at the partly-constructed extensions to the tree-house. Nigel had done a very good job; Ergo hadn't just been saying it to be nice. Fourteen wooden blocks of accommodation for the chaps had been built, radiating away from the back of the tree trunk, and at the front, just below the balcony where the Large Disused Owl often sat, there was a headquarters building which had everything including one of those invalid chairlifts that goes up the bannisters, so that Ergo could get from floor one to two to three when he didn't have his wheels on, without it taking half an hour. There was also a jail, which had been built first, to house Quirkhardt while they tried to think of what to do to him.

They couldn't kill him. Firstly, that would have pleased Moundrot, and they wouldn't want that. Secondly, it would have been emotionally too difficult to do. What would you do, stab him at point blank range when he wasn't looking? Of course not. Ergo reflected that it was far easier (even fun) to kill pigfrogs who were a long way off, but almost impossible when you sort of knew them a bit. In any case, Quirkhardt and he had escaped from jail together. It seemed a bit rude to just kill him. In addition to all these reasons, the fact was that Quirkhardt kept saying he was sorry. Probably lying, thought Ergo, but you never knew.

That evening, there was a huge barbecue to celebrate Ergo and Elsie's engagement. Ergo brought out his George Formby records and everybody danced around. The Time Flies were enjoying themselves (as it does when you are) and drinking quite a lot. Even Quirkhardt was let out for the evening on his promise to be sociable and help give out the salads.

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Quirkhardt was a confused pigfrog. He was in the captivity of these nasty slippery little blighters who were treating him quite well, and, because of his adventure escaping with Ergo, had gained a sneaking respect for the slug commander, quite against his normal malicious and begrudging nature. At the same time, he had, through fear and from the treatment he had received from Moundrot, developed a feeling about the pigfrog General which wasn't far away from loathing. In fact it was in the same place as loathing, because loathing was exactly what it was. Minced from the feet upwards, indeed! The balls of Quirkhardt's feet began to ache whenever he saw something nasty like blood, or thought about painful things. He didn't know why, it just happened. The thought of being minced made the balls of his feet feel really horrible, and he shivered, like you do when you feel all horrible all of a sudden. Yeauucch!

He snapped out of those thoughts, and carried on giving out the salads with as much of a polite smile as he could fake. Giving out salads to slugs and trolls and gnome-adds was not his idea of an evening out, but it was better than being minced.

Now the George Formby records had stopped and there was a band playing. Lanterns swung on the gentle breeze, and a happy atmosphere warmed the tree house barracks gardens. Squirreloids and other woodland thingeys were chattering away, enjoying themselves. At one table sat Nigel, Dotty and Little Else, enjoying the smell of the breakfast woodsmoke which Dotty had sprayed around the garden despite the fact that it was evening.

The piano elf had formed the small orchestra with himself on piano, two of Carol Singing Squad Number One (or was it Carol Singing Squad Number One?) on backing vocals, a gnome-add called Mr Clarke on a sort of woodland saxophone, constructed from a piece of rubber tubing and a soup ladle, and a large girl slug called Smorl played bass.

Ergo took a position where he could best be seen and began to address his friends. They became silent as he spoke.

"Dear friends and lovely, smashing, delightful comerades-at-arms", he began.
"Speak for yourself!" shouted Sodge, like one of those people who shout out merrily during speeches at weddings and things.

"Well, when I say arms you know what I mean" said Ergo, wiggling his knobbly bits to make the point. Everybody laughed, not because it was funny but because they were happy and wanted to laugh anyway.

"This is the happiest day of my life", he continued. "Well, actually, yesterday was quite happy. And the day I first discovered chewing gum was quite good, too. But this, is certainly in the top three happy days I've ever known, and it's not yet even finished, so it could get better, and is highly unlikely to get worse."

Elsie blushed. She knew that she was the cause of this being in the top three happy days of Ergo's life, and it made her happy, too. She was pleased that the candlelight made it impossible for the others to see her blushing.

"And the cause of my state of extreme happiness, the like of which I have rarely known, is sitting not a million miles from just over there!" announced Ergo, swishing his right knobbly bit out towards Little Else, in the manner of a show business host introducing somebody at a concert. There was a huge round of applause, thumping of tables, and cheering. Elsie began to cry, just a little bit, in a lovely sort of way, not like you do when you fall off your bike, but more like when you get a nice letter from somebody you like and haven't seen for ages.

"And furthermore", added Ergo, "I would like to say that this beautiful and brave fairy who has foolishly agreed to become my wife, is the nicest person I have ever, ever met and that if she got any nicer it just wouldn't be fair on everyone else, which it isn't anyway, because she's already nicer than you could imagine, - not, that everybody else in the garden doesn't come a very close equal second!"

Speech making wasn't Ergo's strongest point, but they all clapped and cheered again, and Elsie stood up and held out her hands to stop the applause.

"I know it's not usual for the bride - or future bride - to make a speech", she said, "but I just wanted to say..." (she sniffed back a tear) "that Ergo and I are going to try very hard and the fact that he's a slug and I'm a fairy won't make the slightest difference - except that dancing will be rather difficult!" There were more roars of happiness from everybody. From his position over on the edge of the garden, Quirkhardt watched and listened in a not-very-interested-but-not-nasty-either sort of way. Now that the band had stopped playing, and the voices were some distance from him, he heard very clearly when somebody or something gave out a sound like "Psssst" from the bushes behind him. It might have been "Hssst" but whatever it was, it was somebody trying to catch his attention. He looked around. He could see nothing.

"Quirkhardt!" whispered the voice, loudly.

It knew his name! Something in the bushes knew his name! He decided to ignore it, thinking it might be his imagination, - forgetting that he didn't have one (although imagining that he did have).

Ergo and Elsie were still making speeches, or rather, Arthur Monkberry was now proposing a toast to the engaged couple, holding up a wooden goblet full of a frothing concoction which looked like Tizer and shaving foam all mixed up together.

"Pssst, Quirkhardt!" came the voice, again. This time he knew he was not imagining it. He stepped slowly backwards towards the place from where the voice had come. He had no reason to be afraid of it - it sounded quite friendly. As he got nearer the bushes, a great big hand darted out and grabbed him by the apron (which he was wearing for giving out the salads) and pulled him violently into the bushes.

"Ssssh..." said the voice. It was a pigfrog voice! Quirkhardt made a decision that he was afraid after all. "Don't be afraid" said the voice. Quirkhardt didn't obey.

"I'll be afraid if I like!" said Quirkhardt, indignantly.

"There's no need" said Major Accuppa.

"Major Accuppa!..erm, what a nice surprise,...er Sir" stammered Quirkhardt, not now knowing his own rank since it had been so much reduced, but knowing that the Major was his superior officer whatever the case.

"Listen, Quirkhardt", whispered Accuppa. "Moundrot is very cross indeed with you, my lad".

"Well yes, I know..." said Quirkhardt, thinking that it had been rather an obvious statement on Accuppa's part.

"And he has sent me to give you a message. Knowing that I am a nice, kind, gentle, non-fighting pigfrog, and more used to dishing out the finest pigswill in the land, and expecting that you would not be too frightened of me, he chose me to bear the message to you. If he had wanted just to kill you he would have sent somebody more, er... normal".

Quirkhardt didn't believe it. He still thought it was a trick of some sort.

"OK, what have you come to tell me then?" asked Quirkhardt, his curiosity becoming stronger than his fear.

"Moundrot says that if you prove to him that your only crime is that you are a stupid, good-for-nothing, idle, smelly, ugly, weak, cowardly idiot, but still loyal to his command, he will reinstate you to your former rank and let Ursula put you back on the invitation list for her sherry parties. But you will have to become a spy, - gain the confidence of their leader and the other slug enemies, and help to bring about their extermination by our army. You must gather information and send it back to us, and then perform a deed which will regain the trust of your General, - kill their leader's pretty little fairy lady friend !"

"What, and then I won't get minced, you mean?" asked Quirkhardt, rather too quickly to retain any real negotiating dignity.

"Well, he would hardly re-promote you to Captain and then mince you, would he?".

Quirkhardt wasn't so sure. He knew Moundrot. Mincing a Captain would probably give him more pleasure than mincing a Private or a Lance Corporal. Still, he was interested in the deal. He really didn't have much to lose, as he didn't know what the slugs might do to him soon anyway.

"What does he want me to find out?" asked Quirkhardt.

"Anything of use, - of course, their strength, their numbers, - details of their weapons, - particularly those exploding hat things, - what they eat, what they don't eat, what they like, what they dislike,their favourite colours, stuff like that".

A delighted little twisty bit appeared at the edge of former Captain Quirkhardt's mouth. This would be easy, - and fun. It would reinstate him within the pigfrog army with at least his former rank, and he would be invited to Ursula Moundrot's sherry parties. The only thing he didn't really have the stomach for was squashing or otherwise bringing about the premature death of Little Else. Firstly, he had grown to like her in a disliking kind of a way, and thirdly, he wasn't very brave. There was no second reason.

"OK, I'll do it, Major" announced Quirkhardt, as if it had been a decision requiring thought.

"Good, Quirkhardt", said Accuppa. "And as a gesture, Moundrot has kindly authorised me to promote you immediately to the rank of Lance Corporal! But remember...if you fail, he will show no mercy. I'll meet you here again in exactly one week from now, for your first report".

With that, Accuppa was gone, and Lance Corporal Quirkhardt was free to choose his moment to creep nonchalantly out of the bushes so as to avoid suspicion.

The party went on until four o'clock in the morning, and Ergo danced with Little Else by standing on a tea tray converted by Nigel, with castor wheels on the bottom, so that she could twirl him around as the band played. The stars twinkled and the trees swayed in the breeze. The moon glowed. Everyone was happy.

Quirkhardt brooded with satisfaction upon the prospect that their happiness would not last for very long, and gave out the salads with an ever more polite smile.

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Now go to Slugs Chapter 12