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  Foreword

  The behavior and adventures of the characters in this book are modeled after those of certain actual meerkats still living in the Kalahari. These creatures wish to remain anonymous to protect their privacy. For this reason, their names and their language have been changed. Any similarity between these characters and any meerkat stars of stage or screen is purely coincidental. Furthermore, any resemblance between Oolooks or Whevubins on safari, actual Click-clicks, or Sir David Attenborough is purely in the eye of the beholder.

  Ian Whybrow

  First edition for the United States published in

  2013 by Barron’s Educational Series, Inc.

  Text copyright © Ian Whybrow 2011

  Illustrations copyright © Sam Hearn 2011

  First published in 2011 by HarperCollins Children’s Books

  77-85 Fulham Palace Road

  Hammersmith, London W6 8JB

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication

  may be reproduced in any form or by any

  means without the written permission

  of the copyright owner.

  All inquiries should be addressed to:

  Barron’s Educational Series, Inc.

  250 Wireless Boulevard

  Hauppauge, New York 11788

  www.barronseduc.com

  Print edition ISBN: 978-1-4380-0305-4

  eISBN: 978-1-4380-9237-9

  First eBook Publication: August 2013

  Library of Congress Catalog No.: 2013936275

  Also available by Ian Whybrow

  Meerkat Madness

  Little Wolf’s Book of Badness

  With thanks to Professor Tim Clutton-Brock who is responsible for much of the madness about meerkats and who has taught me—in fact, he has taught the nation as a whole—more about meerkats than Uncle Fearless has had barking geckos for breakfast.

  Table of Contents

  Foreword

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 1

  Skeema, Mimi, and Little Dream were thrilled with their new home. Far Burrow was dark and safe and wonderfully smelly. It was roomy, with comfortable chambers and plenty of secret entrances and exits. Above all, it was theirs—a home of their own that they shared with their dear old, lovely old, one-eyed, Uncle Fearless.

  At the first hint of daylight, they made their way along the dark tunnels to the Upworld and stood together at the main entrance for Warm-up. Meerkats can’t really get going until they have warmed up their minds and muscles properly. To do this, they have to point the little pads on their tummies toward the rising sun for a while. So there they were, tummy-pads in the air, feeling a bit cold, a bit tired, but happy.

  Uncle stood beside the kits, mumbling to himself. He had been doing this a lot lately. In fact, recently he had become even more eccentric than usual. For example, he had taken to dashing off by himself for long periods of time. And he was always popping down into the burrow, even in the daytime, declaring that he was “just checking that all the escape tunnels were in good order, don’t ya know?” If he had checked them once, he had checked them more times than he had teeth and claws.

  And now here he was, mumbling to himself: “Hmmm… get a grip, Fearless. Whup-whup, now! Not so much shilly-shallying, you fool! Get in there before it’s too late. Just pop the question before she dashes off again, what-what!”

  “What is he muttering about?” whispered Mimi to Little Dream. “…before she dashes off again…?” Mimi usually thought of herself first and imagined that others did the same. “She? But I haven’t dashed off anywhere lately, not me, not Mimi!”

  Little Dream said nothing. He still hadn’t woken up properly.

  Uncle began to lick his paw and slick back his whiskers, mmyim-mmyam. “Quite honestly, Fearless, old boy, you’re not looking too bad for an old battler,” he said aloud. “You may be a bit bent and bashed-up in places, but you’ve got your health and strength. So get on with it, boy! Pounce before the beetle buries itself, as they say!”

  Mimi’s big brother, Skeema, pricked up his ears and looked sideways at Uncle. Being rather eager about plans and schemes himself, he too was curious to know what Fearless was up to. “Pounce, eh?” thought Skeema. “Old battler…? Hmmm. I wonder if he’s planning to have a fight with another meerkat mob. Prrrrr! Perhaps he’s found out that the Ruddertails are planning another attack on Far Burrow!”

  For several days now, Uncle had been exercising furiously. He had taken to doing push-ups and making energetic sprints to and from a nearby tree. He would come back all breathless and fluttery, running his paws over his face and arms to smooth them and looking down to see if his tummy had gotten any smaller. Now and then he would throw himself on his back and kick his legs in the air, making strange yip-yip-wheeee! noises and shouting, “I’m all yours! Come and get me!” He was often wiggling his eyebrows and clacking his teeth. Skeema felt pretty sure that he was getting himself fit for a fight!

  On this particular day, Uncle was taking unusual care with his grooming. He suddenly seemed to notice a wayward tuft in his fur and nibbled at it furiously. “Lie down neatly, now!” he growled. “Disgrace! This’ll never do! Hmmm, nip nip! Must keep myself neat and handsome, what-what!”

  “Aha! I get it!” said Skeema. He had suddenly thought of another possibility. “Are you making yourself look nice for the Chief of the Click-clicks, Uncle?” he asked.

  The Click-clicks were a small tribe of Blah-blahs who lived fairly close to Far Burrow. They were strange, giant creatures who had accepted Uncle as their king. They were not unlike monkeys, but smoother, and they usually stayed out of trees and walked on the ground. They often came up quietly and left gifts of food for the Really Mad Mob. They bowed down to the meerkats and let them climb up onto their heads. Being as tall as young thorn trees, they made excellent look-out posts.

  To show how much he admired Uncle, the Chief of the Click-clicks had given him the special collar that he always wore with pride. Like all Blah-blahs, the Click-clicks talked in blah-blah-blah noises instead of squeaking and chattering to one another in the normal way. The only time they didn’t go blah-blah-blah was when they got excited. Then they sounded like hyenas… hee-hee-ha-ha-haaah!

  The Click-clicks had plenty of strange and silly habits. For example, instead of building proper, safe burrows deep down under the sands, they made pointy white mounds above the ground! These were so flimsy that you could see them flapping whenever the wind blew. They were called the Click-click tribe because they were very shy and often hid their eyes behind special eye-protectors whenever they came to admire the meerkats up close—which was often. Sometimes they used their tongues to make click-click noises as a greeting.

  “No, no. The Click-clicks have gone, I’m afraid,” said Uncle, staring outward. “The rains will be here soon; I can smell ’em. And Blah-blahs get very nervous about storms, don’t you know. Those feeble pointy mounds of theirs won’t keep them safe from sky-crash and fizz-fire. That’s why they’ve all jumped into their Vroom-vrooms, d’you see? I expect they’ve gone to find a safer place to live.”

  The Click-clicks were not clever enough to think of building lots of different escape tunnels. Instead, they relied on enormous traveling burrows that moved on spinners. At the first sign of danger, they would jump into them and vroom-vroom
!—off they would roar in a cloud of dust.

  “Oh, dear! That means no more nuts and eggs for me-me, then,” sighed Mimi. “No more standing on their heads and having my tummy tickled.”

  At the mention of the word tummy, Uncle slid his paws under his and hoisted it up with a “One-two-three… HUP!” It was a habit of his. Skeema and Mimi giggled and did a “One-two-three… HUP!” imitation of him. He took no notice, and just kept on gazing into the distance, sighing. After a while he sang a little song to himself:

  “Fleabites are red, my love.

  Blue skinks are blue.

  Lizards are yummy, love

  And so, my fluff, are you.”

  The kits stood and stared as Uncle fiddled with his helmet, tilting it across his good eye and saying quietly to himself in a strange, low voice, “Not too bad for an old soldier, eh? How do I look, my dainty itchy-kitchy?”

  “You don’t think he’s going crazy, do you, Skeema?” said Mimi.

  “I hope not,” said Skeema. “Although, come to think of it, he has been doing some very peculiar things lately. He kept me awake for hours last night, talking in his sleep, giving me hard squeezes, and saying strange things to me in a sappy sort of voice.”

  “What sort of things?” asked Mimi.

  “Well, like: You’ll be quite safe with me, you fabulous creature.”

  “What do you think he’s talking about?” said Mimi.

  At that moment, Mimi heard something behind her and, turning around quickly, saw something moving in the shadows. She let out such a dreadful shriek that Little Dream leaped up and gave a shriek himself.

  “WUP! WUP! WUP! ACTION STATIONS!” cried Mimi.

  “Wh-what?” growled Uncle. “Enemies, is it? TAKE COVER! DIVE-DIVE-DIVE!”

  In one sweeping movement, Skeema grabbed his trusty lime-green Snap-snap—a powerful weapon he had acquired from the Click-click tribe—and held close, ready to take action.

  Tails up, claws out, the kits braced themselves, ready to run to safety or fight for their lives.

  For a moment they stood rooted to the spot, for there, behind them, something was making its way steadily toward them from the darkness of their very own burrow!

  Chapter 2

  What was it, struggling up out of the gloom? A honey badger? A cobra? Either could be deadly!

  Suddenly Uncle let out his breath and relaxed. “Stand easy, Really Mads!” he ordered. “No danger.”

  He bustled past the kits, bowed deeply into the tunnel, and offered a helping paw to the intruder. “Up we come,” he said.

  The stranger was a fabulously fluffy female meerkat. She was tall and youthful, and when she turned, she showed very pretty, regularly spaced dark patches down the sandy fur of her back. Her eyes were very deep and dark and her gaze was steady. When she saw how anxiously the kits looked at her, she almost turned and went back the way she had come. But then she seemed to assure herself and she stepped forward and spoke up boldly.

  “What ho, Fearless, old thing,” she said. She sounded very grand and hearty. “I hope this isn’t an awkward moment. But I really don’t think I can keep myself a secret for much longer. There! I’ve done it now, haven’t I?”

  With that, she threw herself down onto her tummy in the still-cold sand in the way respectful meerkats do when they wish to be introduced.

  “Now, now, m’dear! Get to your paws, please!” said Uncle, puffing his chest out, pulling in his tummy, and straightening his safari scarf. “No need for ceremony! The kits are not going to bite you. You’re quite safe here with us. Come out and join our Warm-up.”

  “What is she doing near me, Mimi, in my home?” exclaimed Mimi indignantly.

  “Our home,” corrected Little Dream quietly, looking a little confused.

  Skeema dashed over and peered down into the entrance tunnel, wagging his bottom from side to side as fiercely as he could, to show that he was ready for any sort of attack. “If there are any more of you down there—come out and fight!” he cried.

  Mimi joined him, and began to yell out challenges to show how fierce she was. “Yes! Come out and fight me, me!” she challenged. “I’m special, you know! I’m the craziest kit of all the Really Mads!”

  Little Dream was still looking dazed by the speed at which things were happening, but he was quick to stand shoulder to shoulder with his brother and sister. “Exactly,” he cried. It wasn’t very scary, but it was the best he could manage on the spur of the moment.

  “Steady! As you were, everyone!” growled Uncle Fearless. “Stand easy! There’s no one else down there, you can take my word for it.”

  “There could be, Uncle!” said Skeema. “After all, this female must have snuck in through one of the escape tunnels.” Skeema knew a trick or two himself, so he was always quick to sniff out the cunning plans of others.

  “I can assure you, Skeema,” said Uncle, licking his paw and briskly polishing the fur on his chest with it, “that I invited only one guest to use the spare chamber last night. And that was Miss—or to use her proper title, hem-hem—Princess—Radiant.”

  At the word princess, Mimi bristled. She had always wanted to be a princess like her poor mother, Princess Fragrant who, tragically, had disappeared when Mimi and her brothers were no bigger than baby mole rats. So when the Really Mad Mob had moved to Far Burrow, Uncle had promised Mimi she could be a princess. Thanks to Uncle Fearless, they had escaped from their old home where they had been bullied by cold Queen Heartless and her horrid, mean royal kits.

  They had made their way, facing a number of dangers together, across the kingdom of the Sharpeyes, almost as far as the land of their archrivals, the fearsome Ruddertails. Mimi no longer had to bow and scrape to the cruel Princess Dangerous, who had reminded her constantly that she and her brothers were of no importance at all, being mere orphans.

  Now the Really Mads had their own burrow and their own tribe, and she certainly didn’t want to have to go through that sort of thing again!

  Skeema was still alarmed too, and he blurted out, “Is she a Ruddertail? She smells like one to me.”

  “Enemies!” piped Little Dream, remembering the tremendous fight they had all had to keep the Ruddertails out of Far Burrow when they first arrived.

  “Manners, everyone!” roared Uncle. “Silence, PLEASE!” Sulkily, the kits obeyed. He went on, “Princess Radiant is most certainly not a Ruddertail, Skeema. And she is not an enemy. She is—or rather she was—a member of the Truepatch tribe, who treated her as cruelly as the Sharpeyes treated us. And they threw her out. Sadly for her, she had no fellow meerkats with her, so had no choice for many days and nights but to be a tribeless wanderer. When I came across her, worn-out and defenseless under a shrub on the border of Shepherd Tree Clump, I… well, I didn’t hesitate, did I, Princess?”

  “Radiant, please, my dear! Let the kitties just call me Radiant!”

  “Kitties!” sputtered Mimi. “Me? Me? A kitty?”

  Uncle ignored Mimi and pressed on with his story. “I had no hesitation in offering the, hurrumph, very lovely Radiant, my protection. Our protection, I should say. Only…”

  “Only we thought I might be a bit of a shock to you if I just wandered into the burrow,” added Radiant with a twitch of her (very lovely) nose. “So we thought I’d better lie low until we could think of a way of, er, breaking the news about me as gently as possible. Your uncle—the dear, kind fellow—hid me away and brought me all sorts of delicious grub to fatten me up a bit. Didn’t you, my splendid, old fearless hero?”

  The kits looked at each other and rolled their eyes. “Yuck!” muttered Mimi.

  “That explains why Uncle kept running off and disappearing!” whispered Skeema with a touch of admiration. “And why he kept pretending to check on the escape-tunnels. Crafty!”

  “But she can’t stay here,” replied Mimi, horrified.

  “Well, I don’t want to intrude if I’m not wanted,” said the newcomer, sensing that she was far from welcome. “Perhaps I should
leave now. I’m sorry.”

  “Nonsense! You’re not intruding at all!” cried Uncle. “Allow me to introduce you properly. Radiant, this is my niece, Mimi. Say how-do-you-do, Mimi.”

  Mimi was so furious that she could only just manage to say hello.

  Skeema was equally stiff and he couldn’t quite bring himself to say that he was pleased to meet her.

  Little Dream was much more welcoming. “How do you do?” he said politely, and touched his nose against the stranger’s face.

  “Our mama is a wanderer too,” he said sadly. “I have dreams about her sometimes. Her name’s Fragrant. You didn’t bump into her on your wanderings, did you, by any chance?”

  “Now, now, Dreamie,” said Uncle gently. “Let’s not go over that again, eh, dear boy?” His sister, Fragrant, was dead and gone, he was sure of it. He hated to see the little guy get excited by a false hope. “Harrumph! I tell you what. We can’t bring your mama back. But I’ve been thinking. What the Really Mad Mob needs more than anything is—um—a kind and caring adult female to join us. Someone strong, with spirit, d’you see? Someone who can bring… well, the things that the right sort of adult females can bring.”

  “But you look after us,” said Skeema.

  “And we manage very well on our own,” grumbled Mimi.

  Uncle wasn’t listening. He gazed adoringly at Radiant. “So if you’ll permit me, my dear…” he said, “as King of the Really Mads, and Lord of the Click-clicks—I should like to welcome you officially into our tribe.”

  In a flash, he twirled like a dancer and sprayed her with the mark of the Really Mad Mob. “Please consider yourself one of us,” he said merrily, rapidly blinking his one good eye. “Kits, give her a nice welcome, what-what!” He puffed out his chest proudly.

  “I say, you’re all frightfully decent!” cried Radiant, hugging them firmly and giving everyone a good nose-rub. “I can’t tell you how grateful I am to be among friends and out of danger. I had a pretty grim time all on my own in the Upworld, I don’t mind telling you. We meerkats are not much good without other meerkats looking out for us, are we?” She tried to make light of it, but were those tears of relief shining in her eyes? She wiped them away impatiently. “I’m not sure how I can ever thank you.” She looked hard at Uncle when she said this. Then she was bustling among the kits, squeezing and nipping them affectionately. “But I give you my word that I sure am going to try.”