So Feral! Read Online Free PDF

curtains.
    A deep rumbly voice interrupted. ‘Huh, hmmm!’
    ‘G-G-Gav!’ spluttered Leo.
    ‘Shhh,’ said Gavin, intent on looking through the window.
    ‘But, Gav,’ persisted Leo.
    ‘Rraaaagh!’ A roar filled the air, loud and guttural, like no sound the boys had ever heard before.
    A hand clamped around Gavin’s foot and yanked hard. ‘What?!’ he screeched, then, ‘Oh-oh-ohhhh,’ as he crashed to the footpath.
    Mr Bellows loomed overhead.
    Gavin looked left-right-left-right for Leo. Leo was running down the street, keeping up with the azalea.
    ‘Gotcha!’ snapped Mr Bellows.
    A strong smell of vinegar filled Gavin’s nostrils. For one insane moment he wondered if Mr Bellows had been eating chips. Gavin pulled away, managing to loosen Mr Bellows’s grip. Though his back jarred and his grazed knee stung, Gavin tried to wrench out of the tight grasp, wimpering, ‘I … I was just look … looking for my ball!’
    Sinewy fingers clung like superglue. Tart fumes made Gavin’s eyes water. ‘Anyone who bothers me,’ said Mr Bellows, his voice booming out loud and ominous, ‘gets it!’
    In desperation, Gavin yanked back as hard as he could. The vice-like grip gave way.
    Gavin fled after the azalea bush, ‘I’ll have the police onto you for trespass!’ ringing in his ears.
    There it was, again. The trespass word.

Chapter Four
    ‘The curse takes forty-eight hours,’ said Thomas when Gavin got home. ‘Then it’s goodbye. Farewell. Adieu.’
    ‘Forty-eight hours!’ said Gavin. ‘I’m halfway there!’
    ‘You are,’ agreed Thomas. Without a hint of sympathy in his voice he tacked on, ‘Can I have your bike, too? When you’re gone, like.’
    Gavin flared, ‘No one gets my bike! Besides, I don’t believe you. That curse and the baby thing’s not real.’
    Thomas laughed. ‘They’re real all right. The baby sits on this mantelpiece above the fireplace in the kitchen.’
    ‘Kitchen?’ said Gavin, with a puzzled look. ‘I thought it was the lounge room.’
    ‘Nah,’ said Thomas. ‘Definitely the kitchen. At the very back of the house. It’s about this big,’ he went on, holding his palms thirty centimetres apart. ‘All curled up. You can see its little fingers and toes. And one ear is squashed flat.’
    ‘How do you know?’
    ‘Lockie Gozzwell told me and Lockie Gozzwell was there.’
    ‘Oh!’ Gavin thought for a moment. ‘Is it blue?’ ‘Nah! It’s sort of white.’
    ‘Can’t be a real dead baby. I saw a picture once in a magazine. A real dead baby looks blue.’
    ‘Not when it’s been properly pickled,’ taunted Thomas. ‘Then it wouldn’t be blue.’
    ‘What do you mean pickled?’ asked Gavin in a quiet voice.
    ‘You know,’ said Thomas, smirking. ‘Preserved. Like you do with vegies. They say it’s Bellows’s specialty. Only he doesn’t use vegies.’
    Gavin’s eyes widened. ‘You mean to say this baby’s sitting in pickling water?’ he asked.
    Thomas burst out laughing. ‘Pickling water!’ He clipped Gavin on the shoulder. ‘No such thing as pickling water. What they use,’ he finished triumphantly, ‘is vinegar!’
    Vinegar? Gavin’s nostrils flared and his eyes watered at the memory. Without warning, he slid to the ground. ‘I’m the one who’s just been pickled,’ he moaned, then he went on to describe the morning’s events.
    The whirring sound of a fax put an end to his tale. Gavin watched as the machine spat out a sheet of paper. Knowing his mother was expecting it, he walked over to pick it up.
    ‘Tomorrow’s list,’ said Gavin, spying the hospital crest on the top.
    Gavin’s mother worked at Bridgewater Hospital as a Gastrointestinal Surgeon. She operated on Fridays. Every Thursday they faxed through the next morning’s list of cases.
    ‘Bor ing,’ said Thomas.
    ‘I’ll give it to Mum,’ said Gavin, his eyes automatically going down the list. 8.00 Andreatti. 9.00 Mellay. 10.00 Bellows. Bingo!
    ‘Mr William Bellows,’ he read