Selby Speaks (9 page)

“Now’s the time,” Selby said, strolling along and sniffing the odd flower, “for that pleasant walk I’ve been looking forward to.”

And as he walked — possibly inspired by the wandering poet Whittlebone Jones — a few raindrops fell and he wrote a poem in his head:

“Oh little drops

And big ones, too,

How you like me

And I like you.”

But it began to pour and when Selby reached Bogusville Creek it was a roaring river instead of the usual trickle. On the other side, most of the dogs from the race had stopped and were barking.

“Oh, no you don’t,” Selby thought. “Nobody’s going to talk me into trying to cross that mess. I’m going to turn around and head straight back to Mount Gumboot and see if I can get a lift into town.”

Just as he was about to go, Selby heard a bark from the middle of the river. There, clinging to a branch, was Hamish, and the water was rising dangerously around him.

“I can’t just leave him there,” Selby thought, wondering if he could, and then thinking that it wouldn’t be the proper thing for the mayor’s dog to do. “If I can get up this rivergum and climb out on that branch … well, it’s worth a try.”

Selby took a running jump onto the low branch and made his way over the raging river to where Hamish clung just below him. He leaned down off the branch, holding on with his paws and dangling his tail towards the stranded sheepdog.

“Stay calm,” Selby said, feeling anything but calm himself. “Just grab my tail and I’ll pull you to safety.”

With this, Hamish let out a howl and then sank his teeth into Selby’s tail with all his might and didn’t let go.

“Yiiiiiiiiiiii!” Selby screamed, and he dropped from the branch into the river and was carried off with Hamish still clinging to his tail. “Let go, you maniac! Let go! Help!”

Selby and Hamish tumbled over and over in the muddy water as they tore along with the current. Selby grabbed at logs and branches, but every time he caught anything, Hamish’s weight pulled him away and they tumbled back into the water and further downstream.

Finally, just when Selby thought they would surely drown, he caught a long branch and dragged himself from the water with Hamish still holding on with his teeth.

“Okay,” he gasped, shaking his tail and trying to get rid of the sheepdog, “we’re saved. Now let go! Let go!”

Hamish was so frightened that Selby’s yelling made him panic and he bit harder.

“Stop it! Yoooooooowwwwwwww!” Selby yelled, jumping to his feet and tearing along, looking back at Hamish and not noticing that Bogusville Creek had taken them right to Bogusville and that he and Hamish were headed straight for the finish line of the Flat-Out Four-Footed Dog Race. “Yipe! Yiiii! Yooooowww!”

“And look at that!” Postie Paterson yelled, as the crowd cheered and Selby and Hamish crossed the finish line. “Selby’s won the race! He
wins this year’s grand prize — a two-year supply of Dry-Mouth Dog Biscuits!”

“Crikey!” Selby mumbled to himself as he finally prised Hamish loose from his tail. “Why is it I only seem to win when I’m trying to lose?”

“This house is haunted,” Mrs Trifle said one evening as she and Dr Trifle sat watching a TV program called
Australian Spirits, Then and Now,
which was hosted by the famous ghost hunter, Myrene Spleen. “I keep hearing footsteps running in the hall at night and there’s no one there. I’m sure it’s a ghost.”

“It’s probably just Selby getting up to nibble a dog biscuit,” Dr Trifle said.

Selby’s ears shot up like rockets.

“I’m not the one making the noises,” he thought. “At night I tiptoe around like a cat so I won’t wake the Trifles. But of course it can’t be a ghost because there aren’t any such things.”

“It can’t be Selby,” Mrs Trifle said. “He tiptoes around like a cat. No, I think it’s a ghost and I’m going to ring Myrene right now and see what she can do about it.”

Three days later Myrene Spleen raced down the Trifles’ driveway carrying a large box that said
Ghost Hunter’s Kit
on the top. “Spleen’s the name and spooks are my game,” she said, giving Mrs Trifle a bonecrushing handshake. “Take me to the spirit spot and I’ll get to the bottom of this, quick smart.”

“Whatever it is, it runs up and down the hall and makes a racket,” Mrs Trifle said.

“That’s spook-like behaviour all right,” Myrene said, snatching a bucket from the box. “And I can feel its presence.”

“You can feel a ghost?” Dr Trifle said, looking at his hands.

“I get all tingly when there’s a spook around,” Myrene said with a shiver. “By the way, I did some research before I came to Bogusville and it’s my guess you’re being haunted by none other than the ghost of Brumby Bill.”

“Brumby Bill?” Dr Trifle said. “But he built the first house in Bogusville. He’s been dead for
years,” he added, suddenly realising what he’d said.

“Precisely. He came to this area a hundred years ago with his dog to get away from the city. Gradually other people settled here and built houses,” Myrene said. “You don’t have to tell me about Brumby Bill, I know his story back to front.”

“But why would he want to haunt us?” Mrs Trifle asked, wondering why anyone would want to know a story back to front.

“My theory is that he hates what Bogusville has become.”

“But Bogusville hasn’t become anything,” Mrs Trifle said. “It’s just another country town.”

“It was peaceful bush when Brumby Bill lived here and now he thinks it’s ruined. And who better to haunt than you, the mayor,” Myrene said, pouring a tin of white paint in the bucket. “He thinks that if he can scare
you
away then the whole town will pack up and go. Would you like him exorcised?”

“Heavens no. He gets quite enough exercise dashing up and down the hall.”

“Not
exercise, exorcise.
Exorcism is just a fancy word for getting rid of a spirit. How about it?”

“Well, yes, I suppose so,” Mrs Trifle said, wondering why ghost hunters didn’t use simple words like everyone else.

“Won’t you need television cameras and electronic ghost sensors and super-sensitive, quadro-gyric, scintillating, movement-activated microphones?” asked Dr Trifle who liked fancy words as much as anyone.

“The best way to catch a spook is to splash him with a bucket of paint,” Myrene said. “It’s an old-fashioned method but it usually works.”

“Won’t the paint go right through him?” Mrs Trifle asked, wondering how she would ever clean the paint out of her carpets.

“Not if it catches him when he’s not looking. I’ll wait till I feel his presence with my psychic powers and then pull the rope that tips the bucket.
Glop, slop
— down comes the paint. Then I’ll snap the photo. Ghosts don’t like to be photographed. He won’t be back after that. And don’t worry about your carpets,” Myrene added. “This paint washes off in water.”

“I guess it’s worth a try,” Mrs Trifle said. “Anything to get a good night’s sleep.”

“That’s the spirit!” Myrene said, giggling after she said it. “Now lock that dog out so he won’t get in the way. And you and Dr Trifle can go to bed. I’ll do the rest.”

“Ghosts, schmosts,” Selby said as he lay under a bush in the front garden. “Locked out of my own house just because of a silly ghost hunt. If I don’t freeze out here, I’ll starve. I’m so hungry I could even eat a Dry-Mouth Dog Biscuit!”

Selby climbed up the jacaranda next to the side window and peered in at the ghost hunter who sat in the hall with her camera in one hand and the rope in the other.

“Psychic powers, piffle!” Selby thought. “The woman’s sound asleep and she thinks she’s going to catch a ghost. What rubbish! Whether or not she knows it,” Selby added, “the Trifles left this window unlocked and Myrene’s about to have a visitor.”

Selby eased himself onto the window ledge and then slowly raised the window. He leaned in and put a leg in front of Myrene’s face, waving his paw in front of her.

“A ghost could be doing a tapdance in front of her and she’d sleep through it,” he thought. “That does it, I’m going in for a bite to eat, ghost hunt or no ghost hunt.”

Selby crept down the hall to the kitchen and quietly crunched a couple of dog biscuits.

“If only I could just stay inside for the night,” he thought. “Only then the Trifles would figure out that I opened an unlocked window and climbed in. They’d know they weren’t dealing with an ordinary dog and it would be just a matter of time till my
(gulp)
secret would be out. Oh, well, out in the cold I go.”

Selby was heading back down the hall when the sleeping Myrene Spleen suddenly jumped to her feet and yelled, “I’ve got the feeling! I’ve got the feeling! He’s here!” And with this she pulled the rope.

“Help!” Selby screamed as the paint hit him with a glop and a slop and Myrene’s camera flashed at the same time. “Get me out of here!”

He tore down the hall, hurled himself through the air — narrowly missing the screaming woman — and dived out the open window.

“I’m finished!” he said, hosing off the paint with the garden sprinkler. “It’s over. As soon as they look at that photo they’ll know that I climbed a tree and broke in through the hall window. I’m done. I’d better go and confess right now.”

Selby slunk towards the front door just as Myrene burst out on the way to her car.

“Look at the dog!” she screamed, waving a photograph at Dr and Mrs Trifle. “I was wrong. It wasn’t the ghost of Brumby Bill. It was the ghost of Brumby Bill’s dog!”

Selby stared at the picture of himself, covered in paint, leaping through the air towards the window.

“It’s the first dog ghost that’s ever been photographed! And a talking dog ghost, too! Did you hear him say, ‘Get me out of here!?’ He won’t be back to haunt you. This is great! It’ll be my best TV show yet!”

“That was a close call,” Selby thought as he lay on the hall carpet a little later with his eyes closed, ready for sleep. “I can’t wait to see Myrene Spleen on TV talking about the dog ghost and holding up that picture of me
covered in paint. Well, at least I can sleep in the house again
(yawn)
now that this ghost nonsense is over.”

Selby listened as the footsteps walked along the hall, passing so close to his head that he felt a slight breeze from the moving legs.

“That’ll be Dr Trifle (
yawn)
heading for the kitchen to get a drink of water,” he thought. “He often does that in the middle of the night.”

Had Selby lifted his head at that moment and opened his eyes to look down the darkened hall, searching for the shape of Dr Trifle hurrying along in his dressing-gown; had he just lifted one eyelid a crack, as he did when he didn’t want anyone to know he was peeking, instead of falling into a deep sleep, he’d have seen
that there was no one there.