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reach.
    ‘You silly goat!’ shouted Brian and ran at Nanny’s goat.
    ‘- chase the goat,’ finished Slight. He sighed as he watched Nanny’s goat heading across the field, Brian desperately following her.
    ‘She loves a good play, does Nanny’s goat,’ said Patch. ‘Nothin’ more guaranteed to make ’er happy than someone runnin’ after ’er. She’ll play fer hours.’
    ‘Maybe we should help him, Patch,’ said Slight, watching Brian and the goat.. The goat would run a short distance from Brian, wait until he was nearly touching her, then skip away again, Brian’s trousers still clenched firmly in her teeth.
    ‘No, ’taint courteous ta outstay yer welcome and I thinks he wants ta be by hisself.’
    They turned and headed for the road to Home, taking a final look at the goat leading Brian into the next field.
    ‘What do you think made him so angry, Patch?’ asked Slight.
    ‘Dunno. Queer, ain’t it?’ He pondered the question for a few seconds. ‘Maybe it was fallin’ in the stream. Maybe …’ he said, struck by inspiration, ‘…Beadles don’t like water! By the bells! That must be it! I don’t like water and I dare say I’d get in a temper if I was ta gets all wet.’
    Feeling better, they walked in the pleasant afternoon towards Home, talking of mermaids and sea horses, of the seven of diamonds and catfish.
    It took one more field before Nanny’s goat decided that Beadles were just a little too slow to be all that much fun. Whether she felt sorry for Brian, or decided that there were likely to be tastier clothes elsewhere, she finally stopped, dropped the trousers, gave a sharp little bleat, and skipped away. Brian grabbed the trousers where they lay in the grass.
    ‘Stupid goat!’ he shouted. ‘Go home!’ and he started back to where he had left his coat, shoes and socks. He was in such a bad temper that he didn’t notice that Nanny’s goat had decided not to go home, but to follow Brian instead.
    The goat waited until Brian was all dressed, except for one shoe. As he balanced on one foot and leaned forward to slip on the shoe, She took her revenge for the names Brian had called her. Head down, she gained top speed in a few paces, and aimed straight at Brian’s bottom. Goats seldom miss a target that is not moving and Nanny’s goat didn’t miss. Her horns thudded into Brian’s bottom and she had the great satisfaction of watching Brian sail through the air, still clutching one shoe, and land with a painful thud in a thick leafy bush.
    ‘I hate Muddles!’ Brian shouted.

Chapter 2

A Sad Return Home
     

    T he town of Beadleburg, as anyone who has ever been there will tell you, is very neat and clean. All the streets run straight, the shop windows sparkle, the houses are identical and the grass is always the right shade of green. The footpaths are smooth, the cracks exactly the same distance apart and perfectly free of even the smallest speck of dirt.
    Beadleburg is the main town in the land of Beadledom. Actually, there is only one other town in Beadledom, but that is not to imply that Beadles are a provincial people. Beadles are sophisticated and educated. They are hard-working, serious, honest and remember the good manners they are taught when they are young. Unfortunately, Beadles are also very boring.
    Nothing draws a crowd in Beadleburg like something not being what it should be, and the sight of Brian stepping from the bus, wearing only one shoe, missing one sock, and covered in much more mud than was considered polite, was definitely not how the good Beadles thought he should be.
    ‘Hello, Brian. Nice afternoon. You’re missing a shoe on your foot, you know,’ Hugo, the town’s grocer, said helpfully. Hugo liked nothing better than to be helpful and his face beamed with pleasure. Next to him, Isidora looked disapprovingly at Brian’s bare foot. Isidora ran the town’s bank and looked disapprovingly at everybody, and Brian decided to ignore her scowl.
    ‘You’re a