Soon afterwards The Great Chicken appeared on television. Beulah sat on one side of him and Harry on the other. Harry’s hair stood on end and Beulah’s feathers drooped to the floor.
‘This is The Great Chicken speaking and these are his assistants,’ The Great Chicken declared. ‘As you know, The Great Chicken has arranged for chickens to take over the world on behalf of poultry everywhere. The rest of you have had your chance and made a frightful mess of it. From now on the word of The Great Chicken is law. Everything else is flapdoodle. During the absence of The Great Chicken his two helpers will be in charge. The Great Chicken has important business to attend to.’
The Great Chicken said goodbye. There was a swooshing sound and the screen went black. Harry and Beulah looked at his empty chair. They went to the window. Chickens were partying and laying eggs in the street.
‘I guess we’d better get to work,’ Harry said.
And work they did, since neither of them knew when The Great Chicken might return. Chickens had broken loose from their enclosure and swarmed back into the city. People were fleeing by car, by plane, on bicycles and scooters and in boats. Those without any other means of transportation used their legs. In a few days it would be impossible to escape.
Harry met the Mayor secretly. The Mayor lived in the attic of his house. He had no choice; the ground floor and basement were occupied by chickens. Soon the Mayor would have to live in a tree.
Harry found the Mayor in a corner sucking his thumb. Tears streamed down his cheeks. Harry was shocked. This wasn’t at all what he had expected. Harry had come to the Mayor for help, but the Mayor needed help himself.
‘Oh, Harry,’ blubbered the Mayor, ‘I thought you had abandoned me.’ He got to his feet and embraced Harry so hard they both lost their balance and fell to the floor.
‘No,’ said Harry, ‘I haven’t.’
‘But,’ objected the Mayor, ‘I saw you and Beulah on television with The Great Chicken.’
‘Yes, that’s true. We had to pretend to obey, but now that The Great Chicken is gone we have decided to save the world from chickens before it’s too late.’
‘But surely The Great Chicken will be back,’ quavered the Mayor. ‘What will he do when he finds out?’
‘Yes, that is a problem. But I think I know the answer. I have a plan.’
‘That’s what you said last time and look what happened.’
‘You’re right. I’m sorry about that. The only way to learn is by making mistakes. Trust me.’
Harry was so keen that the Mayor stopped crying and wiped his nose.
‘Now,’ said Harry, ‘this is my plan.’
It didn’t take long for Harry to tell the Mayor exactly what he had in mind.
‘Wow,’ said the Mayor, ‘what a fantastic plan. Why didn’t we think of that before? I can’t wait to get started.’
Harry took out his smartphone and called Beulah.
‘Squawk, squawk,’ he told her.
Beulah understood perfectly and squawked in reply.
‘The next step,’ said Harry to the Mayor, ‘is for you to deliver the stuff.’
In the morning a delivery truck struggled up the road axle-deep in chickens and unloaded a pile of smartphones in the Mayor’s driveway. Masses of chickens gathered around. Beulah shooed them away, picked up one of the smartphones and started playing with it. The chickens looked over her shoulder, astonished by the pictures on the tiny screen. They snatched smartphones of their own from the pile that lay in the driveway. Pretty soon they were fighting over the few that were left.
Harry and the Mayor watched from the Mayor’s house. They shook hands. Everything was going according to plan. Meanwhile deliveries were made to other places in the city. It didn’t take long for the chickens to learn how to use the little gadgets. Of course there weren’t enough for a million and a half chickens. The chickens who already had smartphones played with them all the time and those who didn’t tried day and night to beg, borrow or steal one. They forgot about everything else. They forgot about laying eggs and became smartphone junkies. The ‘hatch attack’ was over. Disaster had been averted once again. People no longer had to fear being wiped off the face of the earth by chickens. Human beings of all nationalities, ethnic origins and religious beliefs forgot their differences and hugged and kissed each other. Beulah and Harry were heroes again.
There was just one problem. They lived in fear that The Great Chicken would return and undo their handiwork.