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  All this time, Frederick had quietly been watching Morgan. Here at last was something he was really interested in. He lifted the plastic spade above his head and stepped forward.

  ‘Here! Don’t you go clonking Morgan with that, young man!’ warned Mr Oakley.

  But for once, Frederick wasn’t being violent. ‘I throw it for him,’ he said. But as he raised it behind his head to do just that, Morgan moved forward and gently took the handle in his mouth and laid the spade across the toes of the boy’s rubber boots. Frederick was thrilled.

  ‘Good boy,’ said Mr Oakley, though it wasn’t clear whether he meant Frederick or Morgan. He gave all the children a nod of goodbye and walked away with Morgan towards the lane.

  ‘You all go careful now,’ he shouted behind him.

  Chapter 6

  Nutting was no fun at all. Frederick made a fuss because he couldn’t understand where to look for nuts. He made a fuss because he couldn’t reach them when they were pointed out. Then he made a fuss about them being put into his bucket. He moaned because the shells were too hard and they tasted horrible when he tried to crack them open. And when they were cracked for him, he moaned because the nuts made him cough.

  ‘Never go nutting with a nutter,’ murmured Siri with a sigh.

  ‘I bags we take him home,’ said Charlie.

  ‘But we haven’t really worn him out yet,’ said Harry, remembering what Nan had said.

  ‘Well, he’s bound to enjoy making a dam,’ suggested Jack.

  ‘The only problem is … how are we going to keep him clean and dry?’ Charlie wondered.

  ‘Don’t worry. I will speak to him,’ said Siri. ‘I shall tell him to use common sense.’ He tucked his trousers into his wellies and waded into the stream. ‘Look here, Frederick. You see how the water flows this way?’ He dropped in a leaf and gave it time to bob downstream. ‘Well, we are going to make a small wall of mud and turn the water so that it makes a nice lake over there. You can do the spade-work. But it is very important to enter the water slowly and carefully. That way you won’t …’

  It took Frederick three seconds to rush forward, trip over a stone, do a belly-flop into the shallow water and stand up screaming his head off. ‘I HATE YOU ALL! I WANT MY MUMMY!’

  ‘Now what do we do?’ asked Harry.

  The answer appeared out of the bushes behind them with a crash. Everyone whirled round and ducked down, waiting to see what had caused the noise.

  It was a wild-eyed scraggy dog, with tangled and torn fur. Its long skinny body and legs were shaking, and a greyish tongue swung out of its mouth. As if it didn’t look scary enough, then it barked.

  ‘BWOOOOF! BWOOOOF!’

  In a flash, everyone had the same thoughts. This is the wild dog, the worrier, the sheep-killer!

  Then a voice said, ‘Here, boy!’ It was Frederick, muddy and dripping in the stream. ‘Here, Shaky!’

  ‘Um, no, Frederick,’ Harry warned quietly out of the corner of his mouth. ‘Best not to call the doggie. We’ll all just stand nice and quiet until he goes away, shall we?’

  ‘Come on, boy!’ Frederick called again.

  With a yelp – or a snarl – the beast hurled itself towards the child.

  ‘Look out!’ yelled the GOGOs.

  Too late. The dog had covered the ground in a flash. It threw itself into the water. Frederick leaned forward and patted its shivering back.

  The dog barked, then grabbed the boy’s sleeve in its teeth. It whined and began to tug. Frederick giggled and allowed himself to be pulled out of the stream and on to dry land.

  As soon as the boy was out of the water, the dog dashed along the path, woofing like thunder and bouncing up and down on its front legs. ‘Coming!’ called Frederick – and dashed after him.

  The GOGOs looked at each other. ‘Come on,’ said Harry, and they all took off behind.

  The dog kept ahead most of the way, inviting the children to follow with barks that made their ears ring. Sometimes he dashed sideways through the woods and came up behind them, grumbling and snapping at their heels as if they were a flock of sheep. Shaky was the sheep-worrier, all right. Harry and his friends were certain of that.

  Soon they were on the lane and then outside the gate of Harry’s house. The dog ran a little further up the lane, stopped and waited, trembling and whining and yawning in a nervous sort of way that showed its long yellow fangs. Frederick, looking equally wild and messy, ran after the dog and threw his arms around its neck.

  ‘Um, I wouldn’t do that, Frederick,’ suggested Harry. ‘I think the doggie needs to go home now.’

  Frederick wasn’t having any of that. ‘No! He loves me!’ he said.

  ‘BWUFF! BWUFF! BWUFF!’ answered the dog with its loud bark.

  Charlie had an idea. ‘He’s saying he wants you to come upstairs and get changed out of your wet things,’ she whispered. ‘Quick!’

  For the first time since he had arrived at Harry’s, Frederick did what he was told and went quietly with the GOGOs as they smuggled him into Harry’s room and sorted out dry clothes for him to wear.

  Shaky sat just as quietly at the front door until the GOGOs returned with Frederick, all of them creeping down the stairs. They’d just opened the front door without being spotted when Sam stepped into the hallway.

  Harry’s older sister was all dressed up to go shopping with her friend Melody. Her lips were shiny with red lip-gloss and she had her new denim jacket on. Suddenly she spotted Shaky on the doorstep, and Frederick with his arms wrapped around the dirty creature. ‘Argh! Keep them away from me!’ she squealed.

  ‘Look at the state of that kid, Harry! What will his parents say if they see him like that?’

  ‘Oh, blame me, why don’t you?’ said Harry.

  Her shouting sent the dog backing away from the door. Freddie let go as Shaky scampered off, jumped over the front gate and ran into the lane, barking like mad.

  Frederick ran after him. ‘Shaky! Come back!’

  ‘Freddie, stop!’ shouted Jack, racing after the small boy.

  As Frederick dashed blindly out of the gate, a tractor came rumbling round the bend in the lane.

  At exactly that moment Mum and Nan came rushing into the garden, alerted by Sam yelling, ‘Look out!’

  Chapter 7

  Jack hurled himself after Frederick and grabbed him, pushing him to safety on to the grass verge. The tractor driver shouted at them as he rumbled by.

  ‘Come back, Shaky!’ wailed Frederick. But the dog was so scared by the fuss and noise that he dived under the hedge on Mr Oakley’s side of the lane and ran off across the field.

  There was no calming Frederick after that. He bawled, he sobbed, he wanted his mummy, his daddy and his Shaky. Nothing else in the world would do.

  Harry thought he would never hear the end of it. It was all his fault, according to Sam.

  Mum and Nan weren’t too pleased either. ‘All we asked you to do was amuse him for a couple of hours!’ they complained.

  Harry escaped into the garden where Charlie, Siri and Jack were sitting glumly on the grass with their chins in their hands.

  ‘There’s only one thing for it,’ said Harry. ‘We’ve got to find that dog.’

  ‘How?’ asked Siri. ‘It obviously doesn’t come from around here. And you heard what Mr Oakley said. All the farmers around here know about the sheep-worrying. If they see a stray dog they’re going to shoot it, not catch it.’

  ‘All the more reason to find Shaky before they do, then!’ said Harry.

  ‘And what if he’s innocent …?’ asked Jack.

  ‘He didn’t act innocent,’ said Charlie. ‘He looked pretty savage to me.’

  ‘But he didn’t do us any harm,’ said Jack. ‘OK, he looks fierce and he’s got a scary bark, that’s all. You shouldn’t judge animals by the way they look and sound, any more than people.’

  ‘Exactly!’ said Harry. ‘It would be terrible if Shaky got shot and it turned out to be another dog that was afte
r the sheep. And the other thing is – Frederick’s crazy about that animal. He thinks it loves him. You all saw how much nicer he was with Shaky around.’

  ‘You’re right!’ said Siri. ‘We’ve got to find him.’

  The GOGOs all nodded their heads and quickly agreed on a plan. They would split up and do a proper search of the area by bike … and skateboard, of course. First they would check out all the dogs in the village just in case Shaky went creeping round to invite them to join his pack.

  ‘Meet down by the bakery in an hour,’ said Charlie, strapping on her kneepads. ‘GOGOs to the dog-rescue!’

  Harry made sure his water bottle was firmly locked into its cage, turned left at the junction and puffed off towards Hanter Hill. His friends shot off down towards the village, Siri on his bike, Jack standing on the pedals of his BMX and Charlie rumbling along on Dragon.

  Shaky looks as if he’s a stray, Harry thought to himself. He had no collar and no one had seen him before. Harry had an idea: maybe he was a farm dog from one of the hill farms around the valley.

  Tucked into his back pocket, wrung out but still damp, was Frederick’s wet T-shirt. He thought Shaky might like the smell of it.

  It was five miles to the track at the bottom of Hanter Hill but the really hard part came after that where the path got very steep. Once he reached the top Harry stopped to drink some water and looked out over the farms.

  In one or two fields there were tractors ploughing wonderfully straight lines and neat curves. In others, trailers and big boxes stood ready for the potato harvest. And over there … were they sheep? Something was drifting like a cloud towards the corner of a field next to where tiny cows stood almost still, grazing quietly. It was a flock of sheep, and something had stampeded them!

  Harry jumped to his feet. He thought he could just make out two dots zigzagging behind them but they were too far away to see properly. You’d need to be a hawk to see exactly what’s going on over there, he thought. And suddenly his hand was slapping at his pocket, feeling for his key-ring.

  The little white plastic cards clicked together as he pulled it out. This really is an emergency, Harry thought. I need help from something with better eyesight than mine. He fanned out the dinosaur cards in the palm of his hand. One of them already glowed and was hot to touch. The creature was greyish but marked with spots of yellowy orange. It had a very sharp beak and something rising from the top of its head like a sail.

  Perfect! thought Harry. His heart was pounding fast. ‘I know you!’ he called, and he swept his thumb across the length of the creature – nose-to-tail.

  Chapter 8

  The pteranodon appeared without a sound, resting on its belly on top of Hanter Hill. Its size made Harry gasp. Its great skinny wings hung down over the steep slopes, gripping them as if the hill were an egg waiting to hatch. Harry had expected to see something raw and bald, like a bat. Instead he saw soft red feathers, bright as a parrot’s, along the front edges of the amazingly long wings.

  The creature’s head made his heart race, too. It was like the woodpeckers he had seen drilling for bugs on the branches of a dead apple tree in the orchard. Harry looked nervously at the sharp beak that was longer than his outstretched arms. Right now he was hoping not to get mistaken for a tasty bug himself.

  Pteranodon cocked his great head on one side and the tall triangle of his crest flashed like red silk with splashes of yellow in it. Two sets of eyelids, one up, one down, closed over an eye the size of a cannon-ball. Was that a wink?

  ‘We meet at last,’ said Pteranodon in a wheezy voice. ‘It’s always a pleasure to meet a believer. Do you need me to save someone?’

  ‘N-no,’ said Harry. It still shocked him every time to see a B.U.D. up close like this.

  ‘Please don’t be scared,’ said the winged giant. ‘I have quite a large brain and I am at your service. You need to fly, I expect. Fine. I came prepared for that. I am exactly the right size and weight to carry you. We can adjust, you know. Did Spinosaurus tell you?’

  ‘Y-y-y-yes,’ said Harry. When Spinosaurus had awarded him the key-ring, he had explained that he could make the dinosaurs as big or as small as he needed them. But right now he was trying to work out how he was going to ride this scary beast. The dinosaur had a cluster of ‘fingers’ at the middle edge of each wing. Harry couldn’t see how they could hold him.

  ‘Do you mind if I take a look at your back feet?’ asked Harry.

  ‘Not at all. Shall I show you how I place them for take-off?’

  Harry nodded and Pteranodon made a little jump, pulled his back legs under him and squatted down. There were four claws on each foot – but they weren’t quite what Harry expected to see. He had thought they might be sharp talons, weapons used for gripping or tearing, like the ones on a buzzard or an eagle. In actual fact, Pteranodon’s enormous feet were flat and spread, rather like the webbed feet of a huge duck.

  ‘Ah, I see you are wondering how I am going to carry you,’ wheezed the dinosaur. ‘I am not going to grab you by the pants, if that’s what you were thinking! There’s a more comfortable way.’ He stretched his neck and lowered it. ‘Hop aboard!’

  It was just low enough for Harry to be able to jump up and grab it like the branch of a tree. But no sooner were his feet off the ground than the creature raised its head. Harry was left dangling from one arm.

  ‘Hoy!’ he shouted and dropped back on to the grass.

  ‘Sorry,’ said the dinosaur. He lowered himself to the ground until he rested on his belly like a glider. ‘I suggest you lie along my body and hold on tight around my throat,’ he told Harry. ‘That way you’ll be able to see past my crest. I use it as a rudder, you understand. Ready?’

  Harry got himself into position, squeezing his knees against the creature’s ribs like he was riding a horse. ‘I’m ready!’ he shouted.

  He heard the beast sniff as it tested the direction of the wind and then it turned until it was facing the distant forest. For a moment Pteranodon bunched up and scuttled forward on his two flat feet, rocking Harry about in a way that made him squeal. But a sudden push from the back legs and over the edge of the hill they went!

  Chapter 9

  There was hardly any noise at all up in the air, except for a slight rattling from the creature’s red crest as it vibrated in the wind. Harry had never been up in a glider plane, but he guessed it might feel like this. The thrill of it!

  And then there was the dizzying view, as the fields spun and blurred together below. ‘We seem to be going up. Can we go down?’ asked Harry to a spot on the back of the reptile’s head where he guessed the ears might be. ‘But … um … slowly.’

  ‘Your wish is my command,’ said Pteranodon. ‘Hold tight.’ He folded back his wings, tipped forward … and down they plunged.

  Wow! was all Harry could think. He heard someone screaming and realized it was him. The force of the air rushing at him blew out his cheeks and made him squeeze his eyelids together. The fields were coming towards them at an alarming rate! There was a whistling in his ears now and Harry knew for certain that they were about to crash.

  Except they didn’t. Calmly, Pteranodon stretched out his wings and they slowed right down. Harry’s tummy took a little while to catch up with the rest of him, but he was too excited to worry about that.

  ‘Sheep,’ he said aloud suddenly. It was important to remember that he was on a serious mission and not on a ride at the funfair.

  ‘Is this what you wanted to see?’ asked Pteranodon politely, skimming over a hedge and sailing over the backs of a flock of panicking woolly ewes. ‘Hereford Ryelands, I believe. Yum!’

  ‘They’re not for you to eat!’ Harry told Pteranodon quickly. He could hear the terrified thunder of the sheeps’ hooves and their hopeless maaaaa! cries. And there, crazily running in circles around them, were two dogs: one a black-and-white Border collie and the other a small brown terrier.

  ‘Oh no!’ shouted Harry, recognizing them both straight away. The collie wit
h the white ear and eye-patch was Jeff, who belonged to Mr and Mrs Temple at Flag Station Farm, down at the bottom of Harry’s village. He was a friendly dog, always wandering about the village wagging his tail, chasing bikes and wanting you to throw sticks for him.

  As for the little terrier, he was none other than Lady Spansford’s pet, Spike!

  The dogs didn’t seem to be trying to harm the sheep, only round them up. Unfortunately the farmer pointing his shotgun didn’t see it that way! He was leaning over the gate from the field where the cows were grazing, concentrating on trying to get a clear shot at one of them.

  ‘Get away, Jeff!’ yelled the man. So he knew it was Jeff, too! He’d probably seen him with Mr Temple at the market. ‘And you, too, you little beggar!’ He aimed the gun at Spike but couldn’t shoot because he was too close to the sheep.

  Harry thought quickly. Thankfully the farmer couldn’t see the flying dinosaur, but Harry wasn’t invisible. He had to be careful. ‘Fly round behind him,’ he instructed. ‘You’ve got to grab that gun before he shoots,’ he gasped. ‘Leave the rest to me.’

  Pteranodon tilted his wings and circled the field, then swooped low over the farmer’s head. As he snatched away the gun with his beak, Harry reached down in front of the wing, pushed the man’s hat over his eyes and gave him a shove. He staggered and dropped on to his backside among the cowpats.

  ‘Quick! Get the dogs away before he comes to his senses!’ Harry ordered.