The Giants and the Joneses by Julia Donaldson

Author:Julia Donaldson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction
Publisher: Egmont

18

The running-away collection

ONE MOMENT COLETTE was nearly suffocating inside Zab’s dank, smelly sponge bag; the next moment she was back in Jumbeelia’s room, inside the doll’s house. She was relieved, but too confused and troubled to feel really happy.

Jumbeelia had gone out of the room, closing the door behind her. There was no sign of Poppy.

‘Poppy? Poppy, where are you?’

The sitting room and the kitchen were empty. Colette climbed the stairs and found Poppy on her sardine-tin bed. She wasn’t asleep – her eyes were open – but she was lying perfectly still, staring at the ceiling.

‘Poppy, it’s me. Are you all right?’

Poppy came out of her trance then. She jumped off the bed and hugged Colette.

‘Back ’gain! Back ’gain,’ she kept saying. Then she ran to the window and said, ‘Stephen coming?’

‘No. Not yet, anyway. He’s in the garden. Zab left him there.’

Poppy started to cry.

Colette put an arm round her. ‘He’ll be all right,’ she said. ‘He’ll come and find us. Or we’ll go and find him. We’ll all be together again soon.’

She wished she believed her own words. She thought of the wasp and the spider, and tried not to think about any other giant-size creatures that Stephen might meet out in the garden. How would he keep warm at night? What would he eat and drink?

Colette was too worried to feel hungry herself, and when Jumbeelia came back with two giant spaghetti hoops she left most of hers.

‘Have nice sweety,’ suggested Poppy, pointing to a giant button strewn with huge sugar grains, but Colette couldn’t be tempted.

With a slight sigh, Jumbeelia held an enormous cornflake up to Colette’s lips. Colette tried to nibble at it but just felt sick.

Impatiently, the girl giant put the cornflake down beside the sugar grains and went out of the room, once again closing the door.

‘At least we won’t have to play farms,’ said Colette. Then, eyeing the leftovers on the table, ‘We should keep these, you know. Let’s hide them in the fridge.’

They broke up the cornflake into little pieces and put them in one of the doll’s saucepans, along with the sugar grains.

‘Leck-shun!’ said Poppy. It was her longest word, and she looked triumphant.

‘Yes, a collection. A running-away collection,’ said Colette.

‘Run away, find Stephen.’

‘We can’t yet. Jumbeelia’s being very careful about keeping her door closed. But one of these days she’ll forget. So let’s look for some other things for the running-away collection. Not just food – maybe some blankets too … and weapons.’

Jumbeelia’s bedroom was already in a mess again, with stuff strewn all over the floor. Colette began to feel a little more cheerful as they hunted for things they thought might be useful. In spite of everything, it was good to be collecting again.

‘Look, Poppy – we can wrap food up in these sweet papers. And these giant badges could be good as shields.’

‘Nice hats,’ said Poppy. She had come across the acorn cups again.

‘They might come in handy,’ said Colette, though she couldn’t quite think how.

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