The Giants and the Joneses by Julia Donaldson Read Free Book Online Page A

then chortling, ‘Heehuckerly iggly plop!’ when Stephen gasped, his mouth on fire.
    Zab didn’t always give them such burningly hot food. Usually he threw down some breadcrumbs on to the floor beside a bowl of water. The rim of the bowl came up to their chins and he would laugh as they stood and scooped the water in their cupped hands.
    Colette and Stephen were both now permanently dressed in army uniforms from Zab’s action figures. The clothes were too big and baggy, but Stephen was hugely relieved that he no longer had to wear the hated pink ballet dress.
    It wasn’t too bad when Zab played soldiers with them. Usually they were both allowed to be on the winning side, which involved beating up a lot of plastic figures, but once or twice he gave them both swords and tried to make them fight each other.
    Back home the pair of them had fought all the time, but now Colette realised that she didn’t want to. In fact, they were getting on much better than they ever had done before. Stephen hadn’t called her any insect names for days.
    Sometimes Jumbeelia tried to get them back. ‘Beesh, Zab, beesh! Niffle uth abreg!’ they would hear her clamour. But Zab just held them above his head and laughed.
    At night they slept in Zab’s sock drawer. It was very dark, and the socks didn’t smell too clean. Colette found herself missing the doll’s-house bedroom.
    Even more, she missed her bed at home. She could hardly bear to think of Mum tucking her up or Dad waking her with one of his funny voices, pretending to be the family butler or a Roman slave-driver. But most of all, she missed Poppy. She hated to think how lonelyand scared her little sister must be feeling, all on her own in the doll’s house.
    ‘We’ve got to get back to Poppy,’ she said to Stephen now, sitting in the passenger seat of the crashed car and feeling her forehead for the new bruise.
    Just then, Zab grabbed them, one in each hot sweaty hand. He kicked the car, and strode out of the room.
    ‘Maybe he’s going to give us back to Jumbeelia?’ said Colette hopefully.
    ‘I bet he’s going to put us in the bath again,’ said Stephen.
    They were both wrong. Zab took them somewhere they had never been before – into the garden.
    He put them down on the path and then reached into his pocket and placed something beside them. It was their lawn mower.
    ‘I bet Dad’s missing that,’ said Stephen.
    ‘Don’t be stupid! Do you seriously think he’s bothering about a lawn mower when all of us are missing?’
    ‘Oh shut up – don’t rub it in.’
    ‘Sorry,’ said Colette. She blinked back the tearswhich were pricking her eyes and looked about her. On one side of the path was a forest of giant grass. Some upside-down plastic flowerpots the size of huts sat on the path beside a desert of a sandpit.
    Zab was digging two holes in the sand. He popped Colette and Stephen into the holes and scooped some sand back in around them. They were buried up to their necks.
    ‘It’s another of his experiments,’ said Stephen gloomily. ‘He wants to see if we can get ourselves out.’
    The sand was the heavy kind, and they couldn’t. Zab laughed and strode away.
    ‘Do you think he’s just going to leave us here?’ Colette asked in panic. It was terrifying to be abandoned, trapped in the sand, her arms pinioned to her body, unable even to scratch a tickle on her nose.
    ‘No, look – he’s coming back.’
    Zab squatted on the path beside them. There was something draped over one of his fingers. It was wriggling about like a great pink python.
    ‘Squerple!’ he said, dangling it in front of Colette’s face.
    Colette closed her eyes and turned her head to one side, which was all she could do. She quite liked ordinary worms – in fact, she had once collected them – but this giant one was as thick as her buried arm. It didn’t have a proper face, but she could see its mouth quite clearly, opening and closing slightly as if searching for some earth to