Little Bad Wolf
By
Peter Reynolds
In memory of my father who thought me to love books.
Thanks to Jon Wigmore, Susan Starling and Kevin Lossner for their invaluable help with editing this story.
© 2013 Peter Reynolds
Table of Contents
PART 1 – THE TRUE STORY OF THE BIG BAD WOLF
CHAPTER 1 DANCING WITH ELVIS
CHAPTER 2 THE FIRST DAY OF APRIL
CHAPTER 3 TOMORROW IS A LONG TIME
CHAPTER 4 NO VISITORS FOR BIG BAD WOLF
CHAPTER 5 THE COURT
CHAPTER 6 THE PLAN
CHAPTER 7 THE NOISE-BOX
CHAPTER 8 LEARNING TO SPEAK
CHAPTER 9 TROUBLE WITH A CAPITAL T
CHAPTER 10 CAUGHT
CHAPTER 11 LITTLE BAD WOLF - TV STAR
PART 2 SCHOOL DAYS
CHAPTER 12 THE WOLF MUST GO
CHAPTER 13 CHILDREN SHOULD BE SEEN AND NOT HEARD
CHAPTER 14 WHO’S AFRAID OF THE LITTLE BAD WOLF?
CHAPTER 15 OVERHEARD
CHAPTER 16 NO NUDITY PLEASE
CHAPTER 17 ROCK FASHION
CHAPTER 18 ANOTHER NOTICE
CHAPTER 19 ELOCUTION TEST
CHAPTER 20 RADIO PROBLEMS
CHAPTER 21 I HAVE BEEN WATCHING YOU
CHAPTER 22 CORRECT EATING HABITS
CHAPTER 23 THE DEBATE
PART 3 KIDNAPPED
CHAPTER 24 NO SCHOOL TODAY
CHAPTER 25 THE SEARCH
CHAPTER 26 CAPTURED
CHAPTER 27 ESCAPE
CHAPTER 28 THE RETURN OF THE BIG BAD WOLF
Part 1 – The True Story of the Big Bad Wolf
Chapter 1 Dancing with Elvis
The other wolves were all of the same opinion. Big Bad Wolf and his pack were a complete mess. They did everything wrong. Some said they must have some human blood with the silly things they do. Whenever they heard music they would stop to listen to it. Whoever heard of a wolf who listens to music? One wolf said she had visited Madame, as everyone called Mrs Bad Wolf, and they were dancing. Dancing like human dance! Who would have thought that a wolf could do that? According to this witness, Madame and Big Bad Wolf and Little Bad Wolf were dancing to some awful noise. They told her it was very popular with humans. There were also those T-shirts she ‘collected’. Madame had a small collection of funny human clothing. She collected T-shirts with pictures of pop stars on them. Who would have thought a wolf would want a T-shirt?
Their pack was also a mess. It was a very small pack, the two of them, Little Bad Wolf and the two aunts, Martha and Matilda. All the other packs in the forest had at least ten wolves and two had sixteen. It was rumoured that one of the aunts was as sane as any other wolf in the forest but no one knew which aunt.
In addition to the fact that the Bad Wolf pack was a mess - and not just any old mess but the biggest mess which a wolf pack could ever be - the other wolves were also agreed that you were very unlikely to meet finer company or more decent wolves in this or any other forest. They were a mess - but a glorious mess. The Bad Wolves were kind decent wolves, if a bit eccentric. Every wolf in the forest knew the first place to hide if they were being hunted by humans was the Bad Wolves’ den. Many of the other wolves worried that their antics would get them into trouble.
Only last week they had seen a door of a cottage which belonged to a human called Granny Hood. It was wide open and music coming from it. “It was Elvis,” said Big Bad Wolf when he was telling the story to a lot of other wolves who had never heard of Elvis and had only a vague idea what music or dancing was. “We couldn’t just leave it,” said Big Bad Wolf. “We had to go inside and once inside … well, we danced. It turned out that the door had been open because Granny Hood was expecting her grand-daughter and she had just gone upstairs for a snooze. A very, very deep snooze as it happened. Her grand-daughter Little Red Riding Hood heard the music and the racket of two large wolves trying to do a dance which was called ‘The Twist’. Instead of going into the cottage she looked inside through the window and saw the two wolves where she expected to see her granny. She ran to find the first person she could find. It happened that this was the wood cutter.
“Come on,” shouted the wood cutter. “Let’s get these wolves before they kill your granny.” Little Red Riding Hood had not even thought of such a thing and she was in a terrible panic. She started shouting, “Quick! Quick!” at the wood cutter. He got even more excited and was shouting about how we was going to kill those horrible wolves.
The two wolves were making a lot of noise when they danced. Wolves do not go in for graceful waltzes. However, despite the noise of their dancing and the music, they still heard the wood cutter and Little Red Riding Hood shouting as they raced towards the cottage.
The two wolves fled as soon as they realised what was happening. The wood cutter tried his best to catch them. He even threw his axe at them but they were too fast and outran him. The wood cutter was very disappointed that he did not catch them. He was even sadder when he discovered that the wolves had not caused damage. He was disappointed that he had no excuse to hunt them. How he hated these protected species! He swore to himself that he would soon get those wolves.
The only effect of the two wolves was that afternoon Granny Hood had a dream Elvis Presley was trying to kiss her, and she was telling him that he should behave himself. Even that was not unusual, as Granny Hood had been having dreams about Elvis for the last fifty years. In most of these dreams he was trying to kiss her. Everyone laughed when Big Bad Wolf told them the story. His stories were always very funny. Some of the older wolves said they knew this wood cutter, and he was bad news. They said some humans were just mean and dangerous. They liked to hunt and to kill wolves. They would say that something awful had happened, such as farm animals were attacked, and they would use this as an excuse to attack wolves. They said the woodcutter was usually one of the humans that went hunting wolves. They said he will make a tale of this event too and he will be a hero saving Little Red Riding Hood and Granny Hood, and the only way he can do that is by making Big Bad Wolf and Madame look very big, very bad and very dangerous. Big Bad Wolf did not even worry about this for a full day. He just seemed to decide that nothing was going to happen. That was two weeks ago, and he had now forgotten about it completely.
Chapter 2 The First Day of April
Today was the first day of April, and Little Bad Wolf was expecting it to be one of the best days of her life. It was Big Bad Wolf’s birthday and they were planning to have a party. Usually Little Bad Wolf’s parents got up early every morning, but on this morning they were sleeping late and planning a very relaxed start to the party day. Little Bad Wolf was too excited to stay in bed. She knew that her parents rarely got to sleep late and it was not fair to wake them. She also knew that the party would not start until they got up. She tried to resist the temptation to wake them. Each time she saw them and heard their snores she wanted to pull at them so that they would wake. She wanted to shout or jump, anything which would get them out of this sleep. She also knew that whatever she did, her parents would not be very pleased to be awoken on the one day of the year when they slept late.
In order to get away from the temptation of waking them, Little Bad Wolf decided to go outside. It was a cold but beautiful day. She noticed that it was a bit noisier than usual but this did not worry her. It was just human doing things. Humans, thought Little Bad Wolf, always seem to have to do something and would benefit from being more like wolves or dogs. It was a beautiful day, and those human were parking a lot of dark blue vans along the road near the forest where their den was.
It did seem strange there were a lot of men dressed in black,
with large dogs on leads. Little Bad Wolf had never seen a gun before, but she guessed that this was what the men were carrying. She also realized that the men were policemen. At last she had a reason to wake her parents. She went back to then and almost shouted, “Mum, Dad, what are all those men dressed in black doing in our forest? There are police in big black vans. They have guns and dogs.”
“What?” said Madame, very alarmed.
“Ha ha ha,” said Big Bad Wolf. “This is brilliant.”
“What do you mean, brilliant,” said Madame.
“You fell for it,” he said. “Well done, Little. Lots of vans, lots of dogs, lots of police. Very funny.”
“This might be very serious,” said Madame.
“What date is today?” he said.
Madame and Big Bad Wolf then starting laughing. They said it was a brilliant April Fool and wasn’t Little Bad Wolf very clever to think this one up.
Little Bad Wolf looked and in a quiet but serious voice said, “This is not an April fool.”
It was at this point they heard the noise outside. Immediately everyone was wide awake very alert. Little Bad Wolf’s two aunts joined them with a look of panic.
“Stay here with Little Bad Wolf,” said Big Bad Wolf to the aunts. “Madame and I will go outside and see what they are doing. We may have to lead them away. Look after the baby.”
Little Bad Wolf usually hated it when he called her the baby (which was very often), but today she did not even notice it.
They then heard a loud voice say, “Big Bad Wolf, we know you are in there. Come out now.” The voice was louder than any human could speak, so they must have been using some sort of amplifier.
“Well,” said Madame. “We know who they want. Let’s get them away from here.”
Big Bad Wolf and Madame then raced out of the den. There were police everywhere, just as Little Bad Wolf had said. They also had dog,s and some of the dogs saw the two wolves immediately but they pretended they had not seen anything. At least two of these dogs already knew Big Bad Wolf and they were not willing to help their human masters so much on this occasion. Big Bad Wolf went to the path on the left side, while Madame went on the right.
For a moment or two the wolves listened to the main policeman shout orders at his men.
“We know this wolf, Big Bad Wolf, is a very dangerous animal. We know he is also very cunning. If possible we will capture him. However, if anyone is at risk or if he looks like getting away, you should shoot!”
Big Bad Wolf knew that the humans thought there was only one wolf. He ran a good distance from the den, Big Bad Wolf let out a huge howl.
“He’s over there,” shout one of the police. “Quick, get him!”
Then they heard another howl from exactly the opposite direction. Madame was calling now.
“What!” shouted another of the policemen. “I thought you said he was over there? He is not he is over here.”
When the policemen went in the direction of Madame, Big Bad Wolf ran yet further away from the den, and when the policemen were getting close to Madame he let out another howl.
“What!” shouted the first policeman. “He’s getting away. I told you he was on that side.”
The two wolves led the police further and further away from their den. The police got more and more confused. Big Bad Wolf and Madame did not need to see each other or talk to know what the other would do. They had done this before where they led men away from their den and each time it worked out perfectly. Even though there were more men this time and they had guns and dogs, it seemed to be working again. The police were going following them but never realizing there were two wolves.
The police were shouting and pointing in a different direction every few seconds. Big Bad Wolf knew Madame would be laughing at this as she knew he would be. They kept running and howling to attract attention away from the other wolf. They did not notice that one police man with a riffle had stopped running. He took his gun and pointed in just ahead of where he had last heard a wolf. The police man then heard a wolf howling from the other direction. All his colleagues shouted and ran in the direction of the last howl. He did not. He kept his gun pointed and waited.
He then fired a single shot and walked in the direction he had just fired.
“I’ve got one,” he shouted.
“What do you mean ‘one’?” said another police man.
“There are at least two of them out there, and they were playing with us.”
The policemen now looked at Madame whose dead body lay in front of them. Big Bad Wolf had also heard the shot and was scared. The shot had not been aimed at him, yet he was the last one to howl. He tried to listen to what the police were saying.
“It looks like you got him,” said one of the policemen.
“I think there are more. At least two of them,” said the police man who had fired the shot.
Big Bad Wolf heard this and understood what had happened. He knew that what he should do was hide or run away. He knew he had to protect Little Bad Wolf and look after her. But most of all he knew he had to walk to where Madame lay stretched out, lie at her feet and cry.
More policemen had gathered by this stage. One of them raised his gun and pointed it at Big Bad Wolf. Big Bad Wolf had a feeling that if he had ran now the man would have given him a chance to get away before trying to shot him. He did not move. He just lay there by the foot of Madame and cried. The policemen had a large net, and they threw it over him, then took him away.
Chapter 3 Tomorrow Is A Long Time
The police just left the body of Madame where they found it. After they left, wolves started to gather around it. They came in packs from all corners of the forest. There were joined by some of the dogs from the village. The presence of the dogs emphasised how significant this sad event was. Some of the wolves had never been in such close contact with a dog who was not running away from them.
Madame’s father was a very strong, noble wolf - the leader of the largest pack in the forest and chief of all the pack leaders. A number of the younger wolves form his pack carried Madame as he walked behind them. They were followed by a long line of wolves and dogs. Some other animals stood silently and looked on with heads bowed. The processions arrived at the den where Madame had lived with Big Bad Wolf, Little Bad Wolf and the two aunts. Little Bad Wolf and the aunts had heard what had happened and were waiting in silence as the procession arrived.
Near the den they heard music coming from one of the houses. Madame’s favourite singer, Elvis Presley, was singing. Not all the wolves knew how much Madame loved to listen to the voice of this man, but they understood that the music was important.
They were not just listening to Madame’s favourite singer, but he was also singing her favourite song. His soft slow silky voice was singing ‘Tomorrow is a long time’, and all who heard this were as lonely and emotional as Elvis must have been when he sang this song.
Not all wolves can understand the language of people but some can and these were the first to cry as they heard this soft sad slow song come to them over the radio. By the second time Elvis was singing about waiting for his true love they were all crying.
After the song had stopped they heard someone from the house where the sound had come from shut the door and all was quiet. Then Madam’s father spoke, “Martha, Matilda, Little Bad Wolf, today you have lost your mother and Big Bad Wolf has been taken from you. Please come and live with my pack. We are the strongest and largest in the forest and we will protect you.”
All the animals present looked at the two aunts expecting them to accept this offer but it was Little Bad Wolf who replied, “Grand-dad, thank you. We love you and your pack but I want my father back and we will stay here and look after our home until he comes back.”
“Little One, it will not be easy. We could protect you. The people will not let Big Bad Wolf out of prison too easily.”
“From this day I will work to get my father released.”
“You will need to be able to speak almost as good as a person and to write too. I know you though, Little One, if anyone can do this, you can. Please know that from this day you are also part of our pack and protected by us.”
He was followed one after another by the leaders of the other packs. Each made the same promise. They told Little Bad Wolf and the aunts that from this day they were part of their packs and would be protected by them.
Chapter 4 No Visitors for Big Bad Wolf
The day after they buried her mother, Little Bad Wolf set out walking. She did not think about where she was going or why - she just went there. The horrible things which had happened to her family had only started to sink in. She was angry. Very, very angry. The other elder wolves had always said that humans were dangerous and all wolves should be careful of them. Only her father had a different opinion.
“How can they all be bad?” he had asked. “Elvis was a human. How can humans be so bad if Elvis was one of them? They even called him The King.” Big Bad Wolf had often talked about humans and how funny they were and how most of them were very nice and how Elvis was such a good singer. Little Bad Wolf had always believed this until now. Now she felt confused and angry. They had killed her mother and had put her father in prison and she had no idea why any of this had been done. Her parents had just been dancing. Her father had told her many times that one of the great things about humans is they like to sing and dance.
Little Bad Wolf was very angry. For most of the previous night she could not sleep, but when she did she had nightmares. In one nightmare, she was a huge vicious wolf and started chasing a crowd of people. They ran in front of her, shouting and scared and fleeing in all directions. Then she got sight of one of them. It was the woodcutter and she would chase him and corner him. She was just about to attack when she woke from the nightmare. This nightmare frightened her, because she had never before thought such things.
Little Bad Wolf had all of this on her mind as she hurried on her journey. She had not decided where she was going when she set out. Only when she saw the prison in front of her did she realize that she was rushing here to try and see her father before his trail.