Read The Giants and the Joneses for Free Online Page B

the awful laugh again.
    ‘Heehuckerly iggly plops!’
    ‘It’s not funny , you scorpion!’ spluttered Stephen.
    The boy giant reached out for the tap and turned it off.
    ‘At least the current won’t be so strong now,’ said Colette.
    She kept her eye on the giant hand. It moved towards the chain between the two taps … the chain which was joined on to the plug.
    ‘Wunk, twunk, thrink … HAROOF!’ He pulled the chain.
    Good, was Colette’s first thought. The water level would go down. They wouldn’t have to keep swimming for ever.
    But then she thought about what happens when a bath empties. She thought about the whirlpool of water being sucked down the plughole at the very end. And she thought about the plughole itself, and the holes in it.
    Surely the holes in a giant’s plughole wouldn’t be big enough for a human being to slip through?
    She hardly took in the sound of the front door andthe footsteps on the staircase. But she did hear the voice.
    ‘Zab! Zab!’
    It was Jumbeelia.
    ‘Zab! ZAB! Queesh oor oy?’ She was just outside the bathroom door.
    Suddenly Jumbeelia, their kidnapper, felt like a rescuer. Please come and find us, Jumbeelia. Please! Come in now!
    Colette thought it, but Poppy shouted it.
    ‘Big girl! Come here!’
    And Jumbeelia did.
    The girl giant’s voice dropped to a whisper, but it was a furious-sounding whisper.
    ‘Zab! Uth oor mub iggly plops! Niffle uth abreg!’ she hissed.
    The boy giant’s voice dropped too. Obviously neither of them wanted their mother to hear.
    ‘Uth oor mubbin !’ he said.
    ‘Nug! Uth oor mubbin !’ replied Jumbeelia, pointing to herself before coming out with some more angry sounds.
    ‘I think they’re arguing about who owns us,’ said Colette.
    ‘ Nobody owns us!’ said Stephen angrily.
    Meanwhile the level of the bath was steadily sinking. Colette began to feel herself being pulled towards the plug end. She tried to swim against the current, but only managed to stay in the same place.
    Jumbeelia reached into the bath but Zab grabbed her wrist.
    Now the girl giant’s tone of voice changed: she seemed to be pleading with him, maybe even to be offering something.
    ’Queesh?’ whispered Zab. He sounded interested.
    Colette heard Jumbeelia go out, and her heart sank.
    The tug of the plughole was becoming stronger. Stephen, still on his back with Poppy in his grip, had been sucked towards it and was swimming in helpless circles around it.
    ‘Come back! Come back, big girl!’ Poppy cried.
    ‘Shhhh!’ said the boy giant. He leaned over and fished the soap dish out of the water. Roughly, clumsily, he grabbed Stephen and Poppy and put them into it. The next second Colette was beside them. The three of them huddled together on theslippery floor of what had been their boat.
    Poppy whimpered and Colette tried to comfort her.
    ‘We’ll be all right. At least we’re not going to drown,’ she said.
    They were no longer on the bath sea, but in the air, borne aloft by Zab.
    ‘He’s taking us back to Jumbo’s room,’ muttered Stephen, shivering in his soggy ballet dress as they lurched along.
    They peered over the edge of the soap dish and saw Jumbeelia with something in her hand.
    ‘Iggly strimpchogger,’ she said.
    ‘It’s our lawn mower!’ said Stephen indignantly.
    Zab was clearly impressed. He put the soap dish down on Jumbeelia’s floor and grabbed the lawn mower. They saw him turn the key in the ignition and beam when the engine started up.
    ‘Sweefswoof?’ asked Jumbeelia.
    ‘Ootle rootle,’ said Zab, and he picked up Poppy.
    Stephen was still incensed about the lawn mower. ‘They’re thieves, all of them!’ he said.
    ‘I think they’re doing a swap,’ said Colette, remembering how she had once swapped all the toy cars she had collected from cereal packets for the shells Stephen had brought back from a school trip.
    Sure enough, Zab handed Poppy over to Jumbeelia.
    ‘Big girl! Nice big girl’ cried Poppy. Jumbeelia kissed