The Giraffe, the Pelly and Me by Roald Dahl. Part 2.
Watch on KineScope.
We’re a fabulous crew,
We know just what to do,
And we never stop work to drink tea.
All your windows will glow
When we give them a go, The Giraffe and the Pelly and me!
We use water and soap
Plus some kindness and hope, But we never use ladders, not we.
Who needs ladders at all
When you’re thirty feet tall?
Not Giraffe, and not Pelly! Not me!’
I stood there enthralled. Then I heard the Giraffe saying to the Pelican in the next win-dow, ‘Pelly, my dear, be so good as to fly down and bring that small child up here to talk to us.’
At once the Pelican spread his huge white wings and flew down on to the road beside me.
‘Hop in,’ he said, opening his enormous beak.
I stared at the great orange beak and backed away.
‘GO ON!’ the Monkey shouted from up in his window. ‘The Pelly isn’t going to swallow you! CLIMB IN!’
I said to the Pelican, ‘I’ll only get in if you promise not to shut your beak once I’m inside.’
‘YOU HAVE NOTHING TO FEAR!’ cried the Pelican,
And let me tell you why.
I have a very special beak!
A special beak have I!
You’ll never see a beak so fine,
I don’t care where you go.
There’s magic in this beak of mine!
Hop in and don’t say no!
‘I will not hop in’ I said, ‘unless you swear on your honour you won’t shut it once I’m inside. I don’t like small dark places.’
‘When I have done what I am just about to do, said the Pelican, ‘I won’t be able to shut it. You don’t seem to understand how my beak works’
‘Show me’, I said.
‘WATCH THIS!’ cried the Pelican.
I watched in amazement as the top half of the Pelican’s beak began to slide smoothly backwards into his head until the whole thing was almost out of sight.
‘It bends and goes down inside the back of my neck! cried the Pelican. Is that not SENSIBLE? Is it not MAGICAL?’
‘It’s unbelievable, I said. ‘It’s exactly like one of those metal tape measures my parents have at home. When it’s out, it’s straight. When you slide it back in, it bends and disappears’
‘Precisely, said the Pelican. ‘You see, the top half is of no use to me unless I am chewing fish. The bottom half is what counts, my lad! The bottom half of this glorious beak of mine is the bucket in which we carry our window-cleaning water! So if I didn’t slide the top half away I’d be standing around all day long holding it open!
‘So I slide it away
For the rest of the day!
Even so, I’m still able to speak!
And wherever I’ve flown
It has always been known
As the Pelican’s Patented Beak!
If I want to eat fish
(That’s my favourite dish)
All I do is I give it a tweak!
In the blink of an eye
Out it pops! And they cry,
“It’s the Pelican’s Patented Beak!”
‘Stop showing off down there!’ shouted the Monkey from the upstairs window. ‘Hurry up and bring that small child up to us! The Giraffe is waiting!’
I climbed into the big orange beak, and with a swoosh of wings the Pelican carried me back to his perch on the windowsill.
The Giraffe looked out of her window at me and said, ‘How do you do? What is your name?’
‘Billy, I told her.
Well, Billy, she said, we need your help and we need it fast. We must have some windows to clean. We’ve spent every penny we had on buying this house and we’ve got to earn some more money quickly.
The Pelly is STARVING, the Monkey is FAMISHED and I am perishing with HUNGER. The Pelly needs FISH. The Monkey needs NUTS and I am even more difficult to feed. I am a Geraneous Giraffe and a Geraneous Giraffe cannot eat anything except the pink and purple flowers of the TINKLE-TINKLE TREE. But those, as I am sure you know, are hard to find and expensive to buy.’
The Pelican cried out, ‘Right now I am so hungry I could eat a stale sardine!
‘Has anyone seen
a stale sardine
Or a bucket of rotten cod?
I’d eat the lot
upon the spot,
I’m such a hungry bod!’
Every time the Pelican spoke, the beak I was standing in jiggled up and down and the more excited he got, the more it jiggled.
The Monkey said, ‘What Pelly’s really keen on is salmon!’
‘Yes, yes!’ cried the Pelican. ‘Salmon! Oh, glorious salmon! I dream about it all day long but I never get any!’
‘And I dream about walnuts!’ shouted the Monkey. ‘A walnut fresh from the tree is scrumptious-galumptious, so flavoury-savoury, so sweet to eat that it makes me all wobbly just thinking about it!’
At exactly that moment, a huge white Rolls-Royce pulled up right below us, and a chauffeur in a blue and gold uniform got out. He was carrying an envelope in one gloved hand.
‘Good heavens!’ I whispered. ‘That’s the Duke of Hampshire’s car!’
‘Who’s he?’ asked the Giraffe.
‘He’s the richest man in England!’ I said.
The chauffeur knocked on the door of The Grubber.
He looked up and saw us. He saw the Giraffe, the Pelly, the Monkey and me all staring down at him from above, but not a muscle moved in his face, not an eyebrow was raised.
The chauffeurs of very rich people are never surprised by anything they see. The chauffeur said, ‘His Grace the Duke of Hampshire has instructed me to deliver this envelope to The Ladderless Window-Cleaning Company.’
‘THAT’S US!’ cried the Monkey.
The Giraffe said, ‘Be so good as to open the envelope and read us the letter.’
The chauffeur unfolded the letter and began to read,
‘To whom it may concern, I saw your notice as I drove by this morning. I have been looking for a decent window cleaner for the last fifty years but I have not found one yet. My house has six hundred and seventy-seven windows in it (not counting the greenhouse) and all of them are filthy. Kindly come and see me as soon as possible. Yours truly, Hampshire.
That, added the chauffeur in a voice filled with awe and respect, ‘was written by His Grace the Duke of Hampshire in his own hand’
The Giraffe said to the chauffeur, Please tell His Grace the Duke that we will be with him as soon as possible’
The chauffeur touched his cap and got back into the Rolls-Royce.
‘WHOOPEE!’ shouted the Monkey.
‘FANTASTIC!’ cried the Pelican. “That must be the best window-cleaning job in the world!’
‘Billy, said the Giraffe, ‘what is the house called and how do we get there?’
‘It is called Hampshire House, I said. ‘It’s just over the hill. I’ll show you the way.’
‘We’re off!’ cried the Monkey. ‘We’re off to see the Duke!’
The Giraffe stooped low and went out through the tall door. The Monkey jumped off the windowsill on to the Giraffe’s back. The Pelican, with me in his beak hanging on for dear life, flew across and perched on the very top of the Giraffe’s head. And away we went.