Page 38 - The Black Deer and Charlie Rabbit

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The Black Deer and Charlie Rabbit
were laughing so much that it took Betsy all her time to make them eat.
‘What’s so funny?’ asked their dad as he sat down at the kitchen table.
Matty was in hysterics and blubbered something about Archie finding a girlfriend and that she was standing upside down in a water butt in their garden.
‘Dinner!’ yelled Betsy. ‘That is quite enough.’
When the table had been cleared and Betsy had left to enjoy a quiet drink in the lounge, Sam brought up the subject again. ‘What girlfriend is this?’
The boys started to giggle and beckoned their dad down the kitchen stairway into the courtyard.
Poking from out of the water butt he saw a scrawny human shaped leg. Grabbing the ankle he hauled out a tatty plastic doll.
Sam shook his head and looked at the doll. ‘You had better get rid of it before your mother ...’
‘It belongs to Paris,’ Archie yelled making a dive for it. ‘I’m going to fetch her and tell her you want to get rid of her detoy,’ he said running out of their gate.
‘A what? What did he say, Matty?’ asked Sam.
‘Paris found the doll under a hedge when we were coming home from school. Jackson had told us that Wisdom was looking for a decoy.’
Sam stood stock still and his mouth dropped open.